 We're here at 534 this evening. And before we go any further, for those of you who don't know and maybe are just for the first time seeing this group, we have an additional member. Who just come on. Darius cage and we want to officially welcome him to the group. Thank him in advance for his service to the town in this in this regard. And Darius, if you wouldn't mind saying hello to folks and tell us a little bit about yourself. And then we'll move forward. Hello everyone, I'm Darius cage. I'm in ninth grade at Amherst regional high school. I'm very excited to work with you guys and I'm very excited for what the future holds. We're very, very happy to have you join us. And, you know, we're looking forward to, to your, your comments and your contributions. Especially as a young man in our town, who is active. We know in school and in other parts of the community. So welcome again. Thank you. I want to thank the, you know, Mr. Bachman and Ms. Moisten for helping us move forward with that interview and that in that appointment. So, so thank you very much. So, at this point, what I'd like to do is review the agenda. Thank you all of us. Miss moisten. I don't know if you have that available to put on the screen but if you do that would be great. Thank you. And so here we are. And we're at the opening remarks, and we're going to start with the approval of the minutes in a moment. But just so that people in the, in the community particularly know we follow this format where we will open up with after the agenda review and approval of the minutes we're going to open up to the community for public comment, which we reserve about 15 minutes for that. And reminding people that this is a time for making comments to us as a group. And, you know, our role is to listen, as always. And we don't engage in conversation at that point, but we welcome your comments and thoughts at that time. And following that, I will open the floor up to our, our working group members to give us a little update on anything that they've been doing relative to this work in their professional and personal lives that might inform the work of the group. And then after that we get into the meat of what we're doing this evening. And our agenda includes setting our calendar for the completion of outreach tasks and reports. I will go over it again for, for the public in particular, our charge so that we're reminded of what we're, what we're doing in this work, especially for those of you who are new to the meeting. And so we'll be discussing those tasks and reports and trying to set forth a calendar for when we might consider getting those things done in a timely manner. We are also going to engage in discussion about hearings and other outreach strategies. Part of our, our goal here is to make solid connections and meaningful connections with our community and organizations and agencies. And in order to do that, we need to establish some framework for how we're going to do that. So we'll be discussing that at that point. And then we're going to talk a bit about best practices about around collecting racial data, especially with regard to the Amherst police department. This is a piece with the group field is important. It's a matter of importance to many other states and districts around the United States. And it's important for us to explore that. So we're taking a look at that and having a discussion about that. Finally, we do have some needs as a group. And we've talked a bit about those in previous meetings, but at that, at that point in the agenda, we'd like to think about what we actually need before we start making requests for assistance, either from the town or other places within our community. And follow that as if there any upcoming events. We'll establish a next meeting date at that time and make that public. And then we'll entertain any items that have not come before the chair within the 48 hours prior to the meeting. And then we'll move to adjourn. So, that said, let me go back and go to minutes. Thank you, Jennifer. So are there, you know, for the group, are there any comments, corrections, edits around the minutes of our last meeting on the, on the 17th? Well, yes. I think the minutes are excellent. There was one minor correction when we get to the business of giving the three extra days to committee members to submit things. That was specifically about the questions for the Amherst police department. And where the talking earlier about questions, we were going to ask the community. I thought it'd be helpful if that's specified. Where it says, just above that motion to open the question that I would rather than questionnaire, I would say questions for the APD. I think that'll take care of it. Okay. And then I also have one correction to forever. Yeah. Thanks again for the notes. They were very comprehensive. I like the fact that there was a lot of information. The only thing in my area where it said the last bullet under my section E to E is said once budget was cut by 10% 11 police officers left six went to other towns and five just resigned. It's just a correction that it was 11 submitted applications to go elsewhere and five left. That's what I had read in the article. Right. Okay. Other comments. I'm not sure if you're a walker. Anything. And I'm all set. I. One of the ones you brought up. Ross, I was going to mention the world with something we're all set. I'd like to accept the motion to approve those minutes. With the, with the stated corrections. Can I get a motion to approve the minutes with those data corrections. Okay. Miss Ferrera has made a motion to approve the minutes. As amended. Yes. All those in favor. Russ Vernon Jones. Hi. Alicia Walker. Hi. Deborah Ferrara. Hi. Rihanna Owen. Thank you. And I'm an eye. So the minutes have been approved. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Everybody there. Thank you. I'd like to open now. The floor to our community for, for public comment. If you would. If you have something to say, Miss moisten, we'll, we'll recognize you. And. We'll open you up for commentary. So we have. It just says Jeffrey would like to. Okay. Jeffrey. Welcome. Nope. Yep. He was there. No, I don't think that that he won't promote him back in as. Okay. Yeah. You're muted, Paul. I think we anticipate that was someone trying to bomb. Mm-hmm. Very quick, Jen. Yeah, that was right. I don't know. The picture didn't look right. So. Let's hope that's all. And that's over. Okay. We're still in public comment. Any other comments from the community? Okay. Not, not seeing any. Thank you all for your participation. Wanted. Welcome. Thank you. Thank you. This evening and Miss. This evening. And. Just so. You know, Darius cage has now joined us and he introduced himself earlier. So we have a full compliment of folks here tonight. It's a great group. Also. I want to thank everyone for their, their work and input in between these meetings. And I want to thank the commissioners. And I also want to thank the commissioners. And I also want to thank Mr. Backelman and Miss. Moisten for their support. Throughout that process. So let's move right into the agenda. And I wanted to just go over very quickly. And I don't know if you have it readily available. Miss. Moisten, but I wanted to review the. The purpose and the, the charge of this group. And I just wanted to make sure that we have it on occasion so that people who are new to listening to us. And. Certainly it's a good reminder for us to remember where our charge lies. And how it informs a group. So if you have that great, if not, I can just briefly review it. Sorry, I'm going to see if I can pull it up. I had so many screens up that I couldn't get back to the actual meeting to. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Back on that. If you have it, it'd be great for people to see it. Visually. Visually. And. Just one moment. There you go. Can you see that? Yeah. Thank you very much. And. So. This is just important. I think especially for the public to. To see. And to, to understand, you know, the purpose of the community safety working group is to make recommendations on alternative ways of providing public safety services to the community. And. Make recommendations to reforms to the current organizational and oversight structures. Of the Amherst police department. So, you know, within this charge, you see a number of. Of things we're. Aiming to do. Within this work. And. In particular, the, the working group where it says the working can achieve this by. And I think if you just breeze down looking at the bullets, you can see that the, the intent of the group is to. To learn a lot more. About our town and our police department and certainly how our department. We're also. Examining a lot of existing structures. We're doing research. We're reviewing policies, et cetera. And we're exploring models. So that's the work that's going on between meetings. And you're going to hear more about that as we're going to be talking about how to interface more with the community. But I just wanted to mention that. This work is, is very intense. It's, we're on a very tight timeline to get this done. We realize the importance of the work. And everyone. On the working group has been working intently to. To fulfill this charge. We are. Now in our fourth public meeting, I believe, and. You know, we're trying to move. Move forward aggressively with reaching out to the community. And making that connection. So. This is just important to, to see. And as you probably saw the way it came up on the screen, it is really is connected to the. To the town website under the community safety working group. And you can go in there and see reminding people, you can see our minutes. You can see. Our, our meeting, our recorded meetings. And this is a place also you can interact with the, with the committee with the working group. So feel free. And I encourage you to do. Do so to connect with that, that website. So that said, I'd like to. Thank you, Miss. And I'd like to go to our action and discussion items. And the first one is setting our calendar for completion of outreach tasks and reports. And we're going to be doing that. There's a lot before us. And this is probably going to connect to some other activities within this agenda. But one of the things that we have on our plate right now is a deadline for January 15th. For a report. And there seemed to be some sentiment. And it's going to be. A very, very, very long timeline. Certainly given what is, um, you know, what we're confronted with now, uh, with holidays, back-to-back. And, um, certainly, you know, wanting to communicate fully and comprehensively with people may take a little more time. So, uh, I'd like to hear from the, some meaning for the town but I think it would be important to hear what the group has to say with respect to getting that moving forward and you know when we can legitimately and reasonably put it together in the form that's useful to you in the town. So I'd like to just open the floor up to our group. Yes Ms. Owen. I think we need more time. I think we're moving in the right direction by connecting with the community first but I also think January 15th is maybe a realistic timeline to hear from the community rather than have the report from the police I guess because also to hear all the voices in the community they're also celebrating the holidays and offer work and enjoying so I think we need more time but that's just my opinion. Thank you other comments Ms. Ferreran. Yeah I also agree with Ms. Owen that we need more time you know I actually want to know you know one whether we have that link for the community in terms of the questions that we had put together and then also whether the questions for the police went out with that 10 business day and the deadline for that because also that will inform us because I think we need a little bit more information back before we can be doing a report out to to the council and also I do want to hear from Mr. Backelman in terms of okay what was the kind of reason as to why the 15th was important to the town council right for them to get a report I want to get more of that idea so that then we can have more of a better idea how to you know what that extension what would be the date that we need to ask for so anyway that those are my thoughts. We'll just put that on the on the board for a second Ms. Ferreran I'll come back to those questions and see if we can get answers to them I just want to see if there are other folks who want to chime in and add to that or want to support any of those comments previously made. Ms. Pat. So I agree with what both Ms. Owen and Ms. Ferreran just said but in addition I guess my biggest concern is that we only meet once a week for a couple hours and I feel that we need more resources to help us accomplish our tasks so even if we're giving extension without additional resources I don't think we'll be able to pull it off in several months. Thank you and if I may just in response to that in our agenda on the that item D is resources and assessment of need if we see that agenda item that would be a place where we can come back to that Ms. Pat because I think you know we all agree and that the town is certainly willing to be supportive but I think we have to have a conversation about what it is we actually need so that we can be clear and accurate about what kind of support it is to get our work done. Let me go back to Ms. Ferreras questions you asked about the uh basically about the what's on the website right the the portal and I don't know if there's any update on that Ms. Moyston you can uh share with us and then you know Mr. Bachlemann also there was the question about the January 15th date and the significance of that for the town so either one of you maybe comment on those two things. If you wouldn't mind restating the question again Ms. Ferrer about the well yeah my my my two questions was just follow up from last week right because we had to come up with that kind of list of questions for the community so I just wanted to know whether that's whether the link is is somewhere because obviously then I'd also like to share it with some contacts and you know do my outreach through my social media so that's one two whether the questions went out to the police because I know we're supposed to be doing that simultaneous and if so what's that 10 day 10 business day period that we gave to them so that we can you know have that in the back of our minds as we think about an extension and then three uh what is the significance of the January 15th to the town council. Okay got it so um Mr. Bachlemann Ms. Moyston either one of you want to begin the response Mr. Bachlemann. So the letter to the police went out um Monday I think it was um there was some editing of it back and forth but we got I think we got the final version out there um they're they're facing the same challenges we all are in the holiday season with the key people mostly being on vacation but you know if they if they have 10 days um so that would be the first week of January January 4th so I have not talked with the chief in particular about whether that's he's going to be able to meet that deadline but they've got all of next week to work on it so what I advise him is to answer the things that are easily answerable if it's existing data note that and then if there's more if he has to spend more time on certain pieces of it identify those things but let's get an answer to the to the working group uh in first week of January um so um and why in the other question was why that date why January 15th the reason for the January 15th is the town council vote was to have a report back by the end of January they wanted to uh establish that um the work of the working group would be incorporated into the budget making process for the FY22 budget um now you know I'm I'm privy to all your meetings and so I know that where you're headed so that's you know I think I'm I'll be responsible before reporting to the town council at their meeting on January 25th um and at that moment I'll you know just give I'll give them a status report as to how far you've gone you've done a tremendous amount of I mean you're starting at zero and you're really ramped up week meeting weekly very aggressively so appreciate that work um clearly you're gonna need more time I think everybody recognizes that you can't do the level of work and cover the work that you need to do I think the work was designed to talk just about policing first because that's the thing that's probably going to impact the budget the most and then all the other things at the in the second half of your charge so I so the the answer question um I would say if you say here's where we are as of January 15th you know in January say here's where we are we think we're gonna need maybe by January 15th you'll have a sense of how much more time you'll need for that piece of it maybe you need another four weeks or six weeks or something like that we can work with that so just one one quick follow-up question with that so so it makes you know it clearer in my mind in terms of why it was that they were asking for it because of the kind of having some of that information for the FY 22 budget so does that mean though that if we take an extension then um it won't that won't we won't have if our recommendation kind of make you know has something to do with the budget for the police and things like that will that be taken into consideration or what have we missed our mark because we didn't get in the information by the 15 you will not have missed the mark you know the budget is a we've begun our budget process we've met with the department heads but this one I know is in work as a work in progress so yeah the the goal of the council was to not lose a whole fiscal year budget process and that's and you know if you were in danger of that I would definitely let you know in advance well in advance that here's a deadline I don't have a firm deadline the sooner you can do it the better obviously but um yeah I think you've you've got time I don't I deliver a budget to the council on May 1st but decisions are made probably two months prior to that so but so there is a deadline hi mr. Vernon Jones at the time we make our first report if you're advocating for some functions currently with the police department to be taken away from the police department and provided by another town agency or by contract do we need to have a detailed proposal and a budget to go with that by our first report or can we are you know as a more conceptual report available from us sufficient at that point yes mr. Bachman so I think the idea is we think you should be doing this and you could throw that onto the staff to come back with a plan and say here's how would you do that if you said we want more services provided by social service agencies or a different division of the town or something like that you could say that we think this should happen the more thought you put into it clearly you'll be studying other cities and towns and how they've done it the better off will be but we can we'll apply it to how it fits with Amherst in particular so just in following up on on the comments but mr. Herrera and mr. Vernon Jones even as early as January 15th you know we we could have some kind of summary statement as to where our status is at that point and at that time you would also recommend we could also recommend some kind of a narrative statement around the budget in terms of what we think we'd like to see not being fully committed you know at that point because we probably won't know we haven't had a lot of time to spend with not only the police department but with the organizations you know agencies and nonprofits it said I don't want to lose sight of them as well but um you know so it's more of a summary report I guess I'm hearing and also I'm wondering if there are some elements of that that you could share with us to say here's kind of here's what you here's what I would be useful to me at that particular time so it gives us some framework we can come up with something I'm sure well I just don't want to be guessing as to what might be useful at that point in time before the year January 25th meeting uh so mr. Vernon Jones well I would suggest that in terms of a January item since the town manager has been in our meetings that he could simply report to the town council you know what what he's experienced and what we've done just from his own experience and as I recall I mean mr. Backelman just said maybe another six weeks should we now set a tentative date of the end of February as our report on section one of our work and would that be appropriate in the view of the town manager is that directed to mr. Backelman uh if I may yes yeah okay I was just wondering yes uh huh yes mr. Backelman so yeah I think it would be useful if you are going to continue on this weekly schedule I'm not sure if you're willing to continue that but if you you might have two meetings in January say on the January 13th meeting you might say where are the reconnoiter where you are I would then feedback to you how what I will report to the council at their under 25th meeting I think it's you know if you say we're we're headed in this direction or that direction any kind of direction you can give me that would be helpful to know where you're going as a as a working group you may not be there quite then by then I think the end of February we can we can work with that that's helpful to me I think miss miss pat you had your hand up yeah I think what would be helpful for me is the assurance that we will get some resources to help us I'm okay with the six weeks extension as long as I know that we might be getting some help with with the work we're doing otherwise six works we're not this sufficient so how about our report writing yeah I think I think what in you know please correct me you know Mr. Bachman this is going down the wrong track but I believe the town is willing to provide support to us for what we need to do and I think we can best serve our needs by articulating them as clearly as possible so I'm supporting what you're saying you know miss pat in that you know we we may certainly need some additional legs under this to to help us get this done I think it's our responsibility to be clear about what it is actually we're going to need so that you know the town can respond in kind so hopefully when we get to that we can have a fuller conversation about that specifically you know what are we going to need to get this work done and then we can dig down a little deeper if that's okay miss forever but I guess I guess that's where I'm kind of you know in agreement with this pat with miss pat because I'm kind of like it's almost kind of like how can we come up with a date certain in terms of kind of like okay this is how much of an extension we need if we don't really know kind of like you know like like you said Paul Wiley miss Wiley that we need to kind of figure out what our need is we definitely need more help because as miss pat said it's meeting on a weekly basis without any other work kind of happening that moves us along it's going to be difficult for us right even though we're all doing I know in between meetings we're all doing research and reading up we're doing all of those things but that's still not going to be enough in terms of putting together a report so so that's where I'm kind of in a little bit of a quandary yet because we haven't talked about what what our needs are and what the resources are so I'm a little bit wary about committing to a six-week extension without kind of having that that that conversation first sure yeah and I don't I don't think at least I didn't I didn't hear necessarily a commitment to that just yet yeah but I see what you're saying yeah and I think it makes sense so maybe this is in some ways putting the the cart before the horse a bit but you know at the same time I think it's important for us to have in this background what we're thinking about we are talking about an extension for sure we we certainly are going to be talking about what is going to be done within that extended period and you know we need to you know move rapidly toward what what it is we need to to have in place in order to support that work so that we get it done in a time of minute we're going to move move to that you know pretty quickly and I think we should be able to resolve that and then we can come back circle back to the um you know the timeline again to see if it makes sense because we don't you know depending on what resources we're asking for we want to know when they're going to be in place to do the work so that'll have something to do with with how we we perform forward so okay let me put that on hold for just a moment we'll we'll come back to this again um everyone as we talk about the resources I wanted to go back to miss moisten just um to comment on the other questions for error raised about the link correct the link yes yeah so I'm just working with it to get that link out and as soon as it's ready on the web which should be if not tomorrow early next week I'll send it to you all so that you have it individually in an email as well um and then it'll be on the web page as well and if you can think of any other places for it to be sent you can send me that and I can send the link there too like I could send it to the Amherst survival well I don't know how they would distribute it or right because they're outdoors but if you have ideas of other places where it could be placed then let me know well I I think I would I would um encourage members of the group to to to all respond to miss moisten around that charge especially um I know we've had some conversations you know Miss Owen and Miss Walker about the the community um and I know the Amherst police department is is a focal point right now for us but there's a large extended community of you know the nonprofits for example we were talking about so you know your feedback and and you know Miss Pat um Miss Walker you know it's gonna be very important around that as well I think that that that link has to be uh you know a solid place where people can go and feel if they have a connection to this group so any any input you can think about and give to you know forward to miss moisten would be helpful. Mr. John. I think once the link is ready it would make sense also to have a press release uh in which we let people know and see if the newspaper will print it um I don't think we should be negotiating the wording of press releases in committee meetings and I'm wondering whether we can authorize our chair uh in consultation with whatever support the town can offer um to put out press releases about such things. Miss Owen. I also want to throw out there I think it would be a good idea obviously I think social media is a really great way to spread the link but maybe we could make a flyer um at my job I do like these branded flyers through an app called Canva so I'd be more than happy to put something together if we want to do something like that once the link is available and just post put it everywhere like laundry mats restaurants that are doing takeout um community places that are open I guess it's a little more difficult because of COVID but I think that would still be important. And I'm so I just want to ask because I've been through this with other committees before as well that when we go to distributing that I will have a few of you will volunteer to help distribute it in local places like laundry mats and different restaurants correct. We'll make we'll make sure that happens Miss Moisten for sure. So in terms of press releases I'm just you know working with Mr. Vernon Jones off of your comment I can certainly put together I'd be happy to to work with someone on you know co-authoring a press release and you know run it by you know Mr. Backelman, Miss Moisten and see if we can get it moving if someone would like to join in with me. Miss Pat? I think it's fine for the chair and co-chair if you don't mind Miss Owen. Yeah I can. Yeah if that's all right with both of you I'm okay with that. So you're you're volunteering Miss Owen huh? Is that okay? Yeah. You're good to ask her. We're good on that so so Miss Owen you and I will we'll communicate on that and we'll get something. So Miss Moisten you're talking about the the timing of this it should be ready up and ready by when? I'm hoping by early next week I don't know I have to you know it is again we have some holidays and sure folks are getting out so I just I have to connect with reconnect. So I want to just be you know that's what I'm asking just so we can get the timing of a release out. But I will have more tomorrow and then I also and this but we have like a weekly check-in with press through the town and I don't know if that's at some point that you guys would want to send your press release to the town manager or communications manager and then that can be announced there as well. Sure when when is that is that a regular weekly time and moment Mr. Bachmann? Yeah so we if once you develop what you have we meet with the press on Tuesdays we can put it through the town's social networks you know Facebook Twitter and on the town's website and however other ways people can you know and then if people can pick it up through their social networks that's the way to really it people I connect because you post it not because the town posted probably but we can sort of get the format out and make it easy for you to do that. Sounds good okay so Miss Owen you and I will work on that and get it to the town in a timely manner. Miss Pat? So I have a lingering concern maybe I'm jumping the I'm jumping the gun right now I'm thinking and I don't have problem with the distribution mode that we've just discussed I'm thinking have we thought about some folks some residents who would like to respond to the questionnaire but wouldn't want to submit it publicly due to fear of retaliation because that's real in this town so how you know so that's why I kept going yeah I kept mentioning we need resources we need resources. Miss Moisten yes thank you Miss Penn. I'm going back to the um the ambassadors or community leaders and I um the Human Rights Commission already has an active list of people who've already said that they would like to be involved in some way as an ambassador so I at our next meeting I can bring that list to you um or I could just email it to you I'm on just to say um sometime next week either or so whichever works best for you guys but and then if you guys have folks because the more people that we have in the community helping with this the the the more people responses will get. Miss Pat? I think that's great when you first mentioned it uh was it the previous meeting I'd like to hear a concept of ambassadors and committee leaders and you just answered my question like could we submit suggested names to you and I just have to be um cautious that we should think about stepping for these people to do the work for us. Think about what I'm sorry? Stippend. Yes okay Miss Moisten. So just because I've been working on this for a little bit um so yes I would like to have a little mini ambassador program where they have just like a little bit of a training local government 101 and yes to be stipend in some way whether that be per I don't want to call it a job but per like if this time it's to do this questionnaire and then the next time it's something else it you know each time or if it's just a general stipend I don't know but I'm hoping to carry out like a whole full program for them. Okay and also this you know when I think you're you're raising a point Miss Pat I think that you know we all wonder about certainly when people um sort of that they begin interacting with this particular tool and they're they're making comments and putting input in um we we sometimes are concerned about whether or not we want signatures or whether we want you know we will accept anonymity those kinds of things and so I don't know if that's something that the the group is thinking about too you know there are some pluses and minuses on both sides maybe some folks want to say certain things um in some feedback and would rather remain anonymous there are others who may be happy to to understand anything that that they write but I'd like to hear if there are any any questions or concerns from the group about this as we go on forward Miss Walker. So I wonder when we're collecting the answers to the questions does that become public data like can other people besides us see the answers to everybody else's questions? May I recognize you Mr. Bachmann? Yes thank you. Yeah so anything that comes into the town is a public record so anybody if they ask for it we must produce it as a as a document unless it's you know HIPAA protected or uh involved in unless it's privileged in some way uh but anybody can come in and ask for anything um under the public records law so that's why you might want to have something to do with some way to anonymize the responses. Miss Pat? I mean the idea of people not identifying themselves and submitting their responses I think it's a good idea but I don't know about you guys um nothing is private anymore I mean your email can trace trace who submitted responses so I'm not trying to be difficult tonight but it is harsh reality for some people um if it's coming through you know if they have to submit the responses to the town whether they identify themselves or not email can trace you but I am believe that we're also thinking about other options of how people can you know submit their responses like the ambassador program so I feel a little bit relieved about that. Miss Morrison? Um so with the forms the way that it comes in so when we receive like the people who submitted applications to be on this committee the only way that we know what your email is is from you submitting it so that part we can't see perhaps it can get in there and and dig deeper but we can't see that as the viewer looking at it um and the other thing that I want to suggest is just from past experience of trying to um engage the community the the backbone of this work is going to come from you guys speaking to residents and saying hey we have this because the only people who typically would know that this is on our website are the people who already linked and tapped into Amherst resources um so it's so but it doesn't matter if it's submitted by paper right it's still submitted to the same public record so I don't know if you can take that information yourself and I don't know that necessarily that you need people's names either. Miss Owen? And then Mr. Aaron? How do people feel about having um the form or the survey the name part be optional would that be a possibility because I think retaliation I think that's a really good point. I mean what oh sorry. Well let me Miss Farah was next and then then Miss Mr. Backelman and then Miss Miss Pat. Yeah I mean I think that you know I agree with Miss Owen that I think the important thing is for us to get the information and you know the whole um fear of retaliation is very real um I know we're all going to be outreaching to you know folks in the town and young people in the town for them to respond and things like that and a lot of them are going to be afraid possibly of getting impacted one way or another right if their name's out there and things like that so I think we need to facilitate it to um allow folks to be able to either put their name or not put their name you know if they don't want um the only thing that I know that a lot of times especially in the work that you know that I do and I've done in the past is that if there's an anonymous um claim that comes in and obviously if it has anything that you know could end up being something that needs to be investigated or something like that you know what I'm saying I mean then that's that's something that we have to be aware of we would have to turn it over because everything is public record anyway we'd have to turn it over um for some follow-up let's say if someone's putting something there that you know maybe they're being arresting themselves or maybe arrest the others or something like that you know um that's the only kind of thing that I know in the past that's been a little bit weird in terms of having anonymous information but just wanted to kind of share that and I think I lost a cue there I don't know I think it was Mr. Barkerman was it back to you Miss Pat or was it Mr. Barkerman I can Mr. Barkerman Mr. Barkerman then Ms. Banyan yeah just uh to Miss Owen yes you can not require an email address if you don't want to um you can say optional uh on anything you want so you can craft it however you want other comments so I you know I think I heard the point I believe is from this but I said other people that I didn't I thought you said I thought you shook your head Miss Pat so you said no no Mr. Barkerman was ahead of me I know what I said okay so do we have this in Spanish language are we going to have that translated for us okay that's a question I think Miss Moisten raised your hand I'm sorry Miss Pat I didn't I that's okay I really do love you I love you I love you I love you I love you too Miss Moisten go ahead so we can have it translated in Spanish um I was going to ask to Ms. Ferreira about it being um translated into I don't know what the correct term for Cape Verdean Creole Creole Cape Verdean Creole Cape Verdean Creole and you know any languages that you guys can think of that it could be translated into would be great and I can see or if you have resources to have them translated that would be great too and I'll look into that so that's where that's where the stimpend you know to ask you know native speakers to help us with something also yeah so I think this gets back to the point you were raising earlier in you know to the larger uh the larger question about the resources we need so for example that's a category you know we may need some translation services going forward to to broadly connect with the community in in the best way possible in the deepest way possible so that that's that's kind of like a topic I mean like a category for example translation services something we can share with the town and I think if we have those needs that's what we articulate to the the town so they can put them in place Miss Owen I think you had your hand up next oh no I I want to I was interested in that also because I was thinking about just the how we would go about translating people's responses and flyers too to make sure that everybody is aware of the survey okay I know we have the Kibbe community Cambodia community for example in our midst so well you know with you know having experience in the schools you know we you know we used used to when I was working certainly and I'm sure they still do it now we're translating a lot of different things into languages so that you know there was an equitable way of communicating with folks across the board as much as possible so I think that's something we certainly should strive for in in this effort you know whether whatever language it is we try to do our our best to to cover all the bases there or as many of those as we certainly can um in that effort it sounds like what I'm what I'm hearing from the group in terms of the the um this link is that we we need to give people some options that'll allow them to freely share information and you know whether that's email name whatever there are some optional categories there and you know it sounds like that's something we we should consider as a group and and how best to do that I'm not sure exactly you know whether we we we craft you know we we just put parenthetically you know in some of these things optional optional optional but at the same time I want to be sure that we're getting what we need you know miss Walker um I understand that our goal would probably be to have everyone fill it out in its entirety uh but I think that we should just make the entire thing optional because there may be some questions that people feel uncomfortable answering but they may want to share with us other questions share other questions let's share their answers to other I see I got you yeah uh-huh mr. Vernon Jones um when I looked at the survey in Newton they had a single response box and my proposal here is that we give everybody all the questions and say respond to any any of them or all of them and then give them a single box and then they can tell their story they can go one and here's my answer two and here's my answer or they can just answer one question but I think the simpler we make it for people to communicate in their own style and way the better input we'll get and I certainly support making name and email address optional miss moisten yep and I just wonder too how does the group feel about so if we have an ambassador and then she that he or she is with you know six or seven community members and they just do like a more of a general answer that works as well correct because you know that that would be very hard for someone you know if they have a group of seven or eight to have them individually do the actual form but if you take all of their the responses and compile them into one would be good I could I could see that working for us especially in terms of you know the time frame that we're working on also and I think these these questions too as as I'm remembering them are relatively open-ended so that in in some ways they could certainly fit into what Mr. Verna Jones is saying it gives people an open-ended option to just answer what's on their mind and heart and not that they have to go on a grocery list and answer you know one two three four five six you know it may not have may not appeal to them in that way either it may seem like an overload but maybe some folks have a certain thing they want to share with us is very important and that answer expressed in their own narrative might cross a number of different elements of what we're looking at so I think we should maybe you know move to try to have this this link be more user-friendly in the ways we're talking about certainly leaving things optional and so Ms. Moyson I'm thinking about having us you know look again at that in some way look at that form to you know maybe in the it's it's in good shape right now I think the way it looks but if we need something else to you know to be done on it that we should we should do it as quickly as possible Mr. Vernon Jones I think the last set of list of our questions sent to Ms. Moyson did have optional preferred but optional for name and email address and a single box then said that says enter answer any or all combined or separately I think the current draft is really is very much in line with the conversation we've just had okay well you know it states we invite you to respond to any or all of the questions below and that that's about as open-ended as it gets you know and again let me just say and this is related to another the topic we need to talk about but if if we can go with that the format that's there with the understanding that it's open-ended enough and it allows for some anonymity for folks who really need that in order to express themselves fully then you know we should we should probably move that forward as quickly as possible considering the the fact that we do need to do some translation work etc and we need to explore that as a resource but I would like to you know get that get that moving especially since we you know we want to put out a press release etc in a timely manner to the community any any comments from the the group on that so I guess no I guess just to kind of like just to be clear in my mind and so you're saying that obviously with what you with kind of like respond to any and all will also kind of say that obviously they can't they don't have to state a name if they don't want to and that they can respond in their native language they can respond in whatever language they feel comfortable I mean I guess we need to kind of make sure that that stated so that they feel comfortable to do so absolutely just in response that yes and yes and yes and I think in terms of announcing this that then we have to be able to say that whether it's an oppressed release or on the actual site itself before someone begins diving into that that link you say you know once they get in there is that the first thing they see is exactly what you said Ms. Ferrer you know you know you can you can respond in your your native language you can respond to any or or all questions you you feel you want to respond to and I think that leaves it open ended so it's an open palette for people and I think that's what we want to want to broaden the the opportunity there so what you're asking I think is exactly where the way we should go we're all good on that okay Mr. Vernon Jones um we had also talked about inviting people to come speak to us in person and maybe I don't know that's this agenda item or another one but I think what what we talked about was making this you know give us your answer here or sign up for a time to come speak at a public hearing do can we schedule a public hearing that's a great segue to be on our agenda that's exactly what that was you know the whole idea of you know what what's the you know how wide and that can we put out there to give people multiple opportunities you know to to respond to us and I think maybe Mr. Bachman you can answer Mr. Vernon Jones's question about a hearing I don't I don't know you could call it a public hearing you could just say it open forum you could open it up and say you know we're here we're going to allocate an excellent amount of time to listen to the public and typically you know you have that every meeting right at the beginning when people can make a public comment so I think that you certainly have that you could choose a date in January and I think that might be something you might if you choose a date tonight and that you want to do it in January you could start to publicize that along with all the other material you're putting out if that's something that you want to do is this something Mr. Bachman that people have to sign up for well there's different way you know we're looking at different options for zoom you know you could do it like you do like you do now which people just show up and then if they have a comment they would be brought into the room you could do it where there's more like you have to sign up in advance although that actually you can't do that because you have to have a public meeting anybody can come at any time that your public body we'd have to look through what other options are available to you but you'd want the public to be able to watch it live and record it obviously and then have the as many people as they available to come and talk to you. Ms. Ferrer. Yeah I think it would be good that you know with the press release if we were able to come up with a date when we'd have this open forum with the press release we could all you know we could already kind of state the date you know and say hey here's the link to that way you can respond to these questions you know in your native language you can respond anonymously or you can and or and or right you can also come and talk to us at this public hearing or open forum that's state that's scheduled on you know January whatever at this time you know I'm saying I think it would be good to kind of give both information all at the same time. Other comments I have a comment but I don't want to take up too much airtime here. Ms. Walker. I actually just have a question about if we did do a public forum the format would it be that they came to one of these meetings or would it be a separate meeting aside from our meeting where we meet as a group to have people come to speak. Mr. Vernon Jones. I think we could do it either way but I'd like to see a set a night aside you know or a time aside where there's a big block of time you know an hour or two where the public can come and and we don't respond but we we listen and you know people could sign up ahead of time for a turn but they could come without having signed up and if we get through everybody signed up then other people could speak as well. Other comments Ms. Oman. I didn't have my hand up I'm sorry. Yeah Ms. Walker and then Ms. Pat. Ms. Walker. No sorry that this was my question. Okay Ms. Pat. Ms. Pat. Okay so actually I mean Tashina is on I was wondering if you could ask hi if she has any questions or comments since you know she you know we can't see her. Okay. Did you hear what I said Mr. Chairman? I did she just turned up her microphone I was waiting for her to. Oh she did. Yeah now she turned it back off again. Okay. I'm listening. He's listening. Yeah. Hi Tashina. Now I don't have any comments right now and I'm cooking that's why my light is my my camera's off. Okay. Hi Tashina. And welcome by the way. Hi. Well I think- Ms. Oman while you're while you're you're you're speaking there we do have a new group member you know Mr. Darius Cage. Hi. I see him on the screen there so just wanted you to know who he was. Yeah comments. Paul Jennifer had her hand up in response. Yes Jennifer said earlier. Sorry I just again what's going to suggest that perhaps you offer like a daytime in an afternoon time or a weekday time in a weekend time because so that you have the ability or making it more inclusive by having the ability for people to come at different opportunities or different times. Yeah I I like that idea I saw some head knives there in response to what you were saying Ms. Moyston. Also it probably it would be great to have that happen. Those events if they are two separate events happen before a scheduled meeting of ours so that we can hear this information come back and have some conversation about it. So setting some date or dates for this right now in January would be important and that's probably something we should do you know at this meeting. Ms. Walker. Did we decide which day of the week we were going to put our regular weekly meetings? We have not. Okay. So I'm also thinking about you know what Mr. Bachman said about the you know the 25th being the budget you know there are a lot of things in the in the mix here but I think the earlier in January we can maybe do this kind of an outreach or in terms of a public forum or hearing in January the better. Ms. Moyston. Sorry so Darius I don't mean to put you on the spot but I'm just but I'm going to I guess so I'm just curious to have any input or any thoughts on anything that we've discussed so far. All of the ideas are pretty good. The part about like the questions being optional I feel like that's like very important because I don't think like someone's problem should be like in a criteria or like fit something for it to make like like a make something like make it happen um and yeah maybe like if people aren't comfortable typing their responses maybe you can like have like a place where you can like record yourself or something and someone can listen to it and that's pretty much it. That's good thank you. Thank you Darius. Very good suggestion. Thank you. So um in terms of I'm talking again back to the calendar the piece I think this isn't there's a there are a couple of things here if if and I'm working backwards a little bit but if we could schedule a couple of times and I like to suggest in Ms. Moyston about having you know probably one day one evening let's just call it that time for people to do that and we'd have to be you know available as well that's something we could probably schedule tonight in advance of you know sending out a a press release which couldn't be you know pretty comprehensive with a lot of different things about the link about the hearings etc I don't know what people are you know we'd like to comment on that but I'm thinking in terms of like the calendar like maybe that that first was it the first full week I've got to look at the calendar again the first full week in January if that gives us enough time thoughts on when we could we could have that as forum Mr. Vernon Jones I think it's going to take some time to get the word out and get people lined up but I'm not committed to this but let me just throw something out to get us started I would propose Saturday afternoon the ninth and Wednesday night the 13th Alicia has her hand up yes I'm sorry I was looking at the calendar here and took up nice and Alicia sorry Ms. Walker that's okay um so I think Wednesday the 13th would be good I was going to suggest that um second full week in January just because we want to have enough time to give people notice um so that we have a great turnout like we would like but I think we should move the weekend one out if we can to that weekend because I think that's a little bit soon with the holiday for the night okay agree Mr. Bachman so yeah that's I think that's I agree with Ms. Walker that if you did it the weekend of the 16th that's Martin Luther King Day weekend so if there's something that's going people will be more focused on thinking about things I think it might be a good time to for this committee to be out there this out there saying and we're here to listen as well I'm trying to look at our calendar here so um Mr. Bruno Jones and Ms. Walker you're talking about the 16th as a possible date for an evening the 13th and the 16th yeah the 13th and the oh the 13th and the 16th okay how does that stand with with other members of the group what are the times I like is it evening afternoon I don't know which one for which date I I think we were talking about um I'm not sure which was which but one was an evening one one was a and after afternoon or daytime that I put I use the term Alicia what what would you recommend um I think it might make more sense to do during the week at this regular meeting time like the 5 30 time and then if we do like a daytime event on a weekend or more of an afternoon time so we're talking about um this time maybe 5 30 um the other consideration is to to do it later on that evening to allow people to get through their dinner hour maybe and um um you know go to you know start maybe at seven there are different different ways people that you know use their evenings um some folks don't like to cut through dinner hours to do things like that other people like to do it before or right after I know we schedule this meeting because most people are available after 5 30 so um Ms. Miss Owen um will the meetings be recorded like the people that are coming to tell us okay yeah so why don't want like why don't I propose this then how would we go with let's you know stick to the let's stick to 5 30 on Wednesday the 13th and that would be our evening forum and then Saturday at one o'clock just to throw out of time Ms. Moisten um Brianna can you make some fantastic flyers so that we can post that on the website and you guys can send those out in other places please yeah of course um do you guys have any specific um colors that you wanted to brand our group with or whatever the town color is okay I don't know what other people think I have a question about Saturdays though um I I think one o'clock might be a hard time I know I know for me it's generally a hard time because on Saturdays once I get going with my day I'm usually unavailable um so I don't know I don't I you know I'm thinking of like I don't know things like food shopping and farmers market like if people are doing stuff during the week like midday Saturday I don't know I don't there any other time on like when we do it earlier like 10 I just suggested that one o'clock to to open open up a comments like yours to see how this might work for people um all of us have different you know plans and styles on the weekend but uh uh something that makes sense it might make sense for a lot of people other folks Mr. Byrne Jones well as Paul Bacham had pointed out that's Martin Luther King Day weekend I'd like to know what else is scheduled for that Saturday before we pick a time maybe well that that that Saturday morning probably is going to be probably filled with some events the breakfast we have today obviously not breakfast probably a virtual virtual no they're not gonna have that well I checked in and so the last so I knew that they were were thinking about doing something virtual the time will do something virtual on the 15th but I'm sure like in Springfield and Holyoke and other surrounding areas that there's a probability of them as the other cities and towns celebrating in some way so Saturday we seem to like Saturday but so what what time would would would would you suggest I'd like to get this settled in and move on we have a couple of other items we have to discuss too question that question yes miss miss miss Pat so hi miss Tashina um well like three p.m. work for you on Saturday I mean I mean for me personally like I'll I'll make it work um I mean I'll make it work I just I'm just trying to like you know throw something else out there but you know but I mean I guess it's COVID so not many people are leaving anyway type thing you know but I was just trying to think a little bit like kind of once I once I leave my house I usually leave my house so so um yeah I mean three p.m. if that's what the group agrees on I mean whatever time the group agrees on I'll I'll make you know an effort to be participating I just I just was like thinking like oh it'd be better to try to do it before people are leaving their house for one reason or another well if we establish yeah and if we do it now if we get this information out now it is there's several weeks here we're talking about where people can think about this going forward so we've we've got the we have the 13th um we put that out there and we have the the 16th let's say a three o'clock there's plenty of time for people to to plan around that too and um you know they can sit in this as long or as short as they want to and they also have ways of accessing us beyond the hearing I just want to this is not the only time they'll get to say anything so I'm you know suggesting to the the group that we we put those dates and times out now and um you know make those plans Mr. Vernon Jones I would suggest we also set an ending time certainly we'll get better attendance if people feel it's not going to go on forever and partly I think we we may be limited how long we can really listen well well this is Amherst after all so you you you could get a very active audience oh yeah you will it will come so I mean this just taking this in response to that um you know on the one hand we that that makes sense too because it gives people a frame we also if we we get a large larger turnout and there's a lot going on then we don't want to short change anyone either so we probably should leave ourselves the option to extend the time a little bit but we can we can certainly say we're planning on whatever time we decide as a group it does it does help people to know I think two hours is good so let's go with 5 30 to 7 30 on Wednesday the 13th and three o'clock to five o'clock on Saturday the 16th and you know we'll agree to to get a press release to include that Breanna's going to make some outrageous flyers and we're going to you know in the in the right colors whatever those are I don't know what they're going to be but surprises and we'll also be talking about in that press release the link to our to our website that cover everything in the press release yes so can we move to a related topic um and um and I guess let me just go to this may skip down before because I want to get to this best practices around collecting racial data which is an important question for us because it's it's come up a number of times not only here in in in our discussions but certainly in other towns and other communities but before I do that I want to get back to miss miss pats um initiating conversation around resources so if we have we now know that we're going to have um a scheduled hearing uh public forum if you will on the on the 13th and the 16th we um I'm looking at I'm looking at you on the screen miss moisten you know our is what kind of resources are we going to need to have in place that we can do within the group um without any additional help can we just do that ourselves as in you know miss moisten do it set it up I'm here to help in any way that I can possibly help you guys and support you um so I was taking a note of something so can you just repeat it again because I think I got what I said was I was talking about going back to what miss pat was talking about in terms of resources if we're going to have um public forums on wednesday and on saturday are we going to need any resources other than the technical pieces to put this together with the invitations etc so I mean I don't know if you would want to have a professional facilitator come in to monitor and to keep the conversation going or if you guys feel like it's okay well I just to have people come in and speak so that piece would be up to you but outside of that we would I just we would have a zoom link which I will get to Brianna so that she can put it on the the flyer well our our you know our mode of operation has been in public comment is to listen to folks and um so it would probably be left up to me or miss owen for example or any member of our community to facilitate that because you know we'd have to depending on you know yeah we don't want anyone you know taking up too much time certainly you know and but we don't want to shortchange them in terms of what they wanted to share so um I'm not sure how best to approach that because I'm thinking of myself and I can't speak for miss owen but I'd like to be a close listener in this regard and not have to feel like I had to you know manually facilitate that I agree for error yeah I mean I think that that's I was kind of thinking about that too before miss moison brought that up I mean I think that's where we need to kind of have that conversation around like resources and what we need because you know again yeah for us if we're going to be listening we want to be focused on on listening right and really kind of taking our own notes things like that as opposed to facilitating as opposed to kind of writing down copious notes or whatever the case may be even though I know it's going to be recorded but even to kind of have the help of someone to go over those recordings and things like that and kind of match it up with possible data that we're going to have to kind of you know review and things like that and getting the written responses also and kind of putting those in some type of category I mean we're going to need some type of consultants I mean you know so I don't know if we would have we'd be able to have consultants in place by the 13th because that's you know fast and coming but even if we can't do that I mean obviously we need to do it we need to kind of be set up if we're going to announce it so those are some of the things that we really need to figure out I mean I think the resources question we need to kind of have that discussion. Ms. Moisten and then Ms. Pat. No Pat had her hand up first so are you sure? Yeah it's fine I'm just gonna I'm glad we're I'm glad we're having this discussion now and actually on our first meeting I assume that we will have an official circuitry that will take the notes for us. I know Ms. Marston have been doing a fantastic job but attending our meetings is not the only responsibility she has and I'm just concerned that she's sticking on a lot I mean I can speak for her and when I alluded to resources and consulting whatever I mean we want to call it it's I don't want anybody to fear overboding. I know the chair Mr. Wale you've done a great job and the and the vice and Mr. Rosbenin just had everybody but since the time manager told us that it's resources I mean I agree with what Ms. Ferrera said this will be a good time to to have somebody just put everything together for us at the at the hearing and also go back to the recordings and see any you know themes and similarities in our previous meetings we just need you know somebody to help us out and I think you know the town employees helping us out but I think we need more so I'm glad we're having this conversation I'm repeating myself that that's some of my thinking in terms of resources so that we don't all feel burnt out. Yeah and so what I most likely be able to offer so typically I will offer whatever you would like but with it seems automatic that I would be more of in a host position where I introduce you guys and I'm keeping up with who's in the audience and who has questions and if we have a Q&A so that makes it a little bit hard for me to take notes at the same time however if I miss something I always go back to refer to the notes now so the notes can be handled and even even if we have someone who facilitates that they most likely will go back to the notes that's I mean to the video recording as well so I can and we will all have that recording I can send it out to us all so we can all pick out what we you know what really resonated with us or with you at the meeting or because I don't know that we can get someone in by the 13th that is yeah for facilitation that's pretty quick mr. Bachmann yes I think it's important for you to identify what your needs are so you could you could whether you need facilitation I know miss moison is very good facilitating she and she's a good way of handling that we can provide technical support out you know the other staff can provide technical support or whatever we need for that piece and or if you need someone who's going to do deeper research for you or if you need someone who's going to help you move from meeting to meeting so there's someone doing stuff in between so you're it's not all left on you like a project coordinator project manager those are all different skill sets that you'd want to identify for who can help get this project moving because this isn't going to end you know this is an ongoing effort for us I think so I think drilling down a little bit more into what it is that you need to help you move forward it will be important you know what are the skills that you feel like you're not that we need to bring to the table that we don't have access to the town that we would have to put an RFP out type of thing for it thank you well it seems like even if are we talking about having this in a zoom format so if we're talking about a zoom format then what you're offering miss moison could be have a lot of utility for us in terms of recognizing people you know putting him in the queue having them speak etc I would like to have available to us that and but also I'm not sure if we need a person in addition to that in addition to you for example to you know sort of you know be a facilitator if you will to move the conversations forward in addition to what you're doing Mr. Vernon Jones I think it depends a little bit on what we're expecting to do I would like to see us have somebody whose only job is to take notes and I also think it might be good to have an additional tech person you know backing up and protecting the meeting but if we're simply going to have people you know put people in a queue and give them a certain amount of time and unmute them and mute them again we don't we don't need a lot of facilitation I I I feel like we're going to need a lot of help when it comes to really thinking about alternative ways to organize services I want to make sure that you know there's a pot of money that we save enough of it to really help us with that piece I think listening to the community you know we one I think we already have a sense of a lot of what we're going to hear but I'd be inclined to hire a note taker make sure we've got extra tech back up and then let's see after we've had the hearing what we think we need the most help with do you think we'll need help but it's I think it's a little hard to say right now exactly what we most are going to need yeah I I kind of agree with that um and I'd certainly like to hear from from others on this um one of the questions I and maybe we can do this with a recording but uh you know might we need somebody to to you know literally transcribe this stuff into a document that that we can look at to to study mr. Bachman so zoom does provide that automatically so it does provide transcription oh wow I didn't know that nice so yeah and so I'm going back to the the resourcing around this um let's say assuming you know miss moisten is able to you know manage for us that those those forums in terms of the the technical work of moving people in and out of of the cube and we have a note taker as mr. Vernon Jones is is putting forward um then you know when it's all said and done I think we might need uh some help I'm not sure exactly how to how to articulate this help right now but how to take this information and collate it into something that's going to you know move us forward in our work we're just going to have a lot of information and how we're going to break this information down this goes back to what are the you know kinds of questions we might be asking uh people to comment on at the at these forums is it going to be open-ended similar to the uh you know to the link for example or are we going to have some particular questions that are guiding questions for people to say when you come on here here's what we're looking for and the notes could follow underneath those questions you know we're looking what's your response to this what's your experience with this and we can even begin to collate it in that way so that when we're all said and done we don't have this broad array of commentary all over the place but we can actually put them in some categories that we can recognize and use going forward so I think a lot of how we stage that the forum is going to be pretty important. Comments Ms. Ferreira? Yeah so I mean I guess for me what I'm hearing is like two different things that I mean obviously we're hearing you know preparation for the the open forum right and what we need for the open forums but I'm also talking about so that's one but then the another one is talking about just moving us um you know from meeting to meeting and the work that we need to do in between meetings so I think though we can't we shouldn't like take too much time to really look for someone you know we need to kind of figure that out you know and and I know we might not know everything that we need but I think we could stop putting together some type of you know RFP of things that we need like I know we're going to need you know someone that's going to be you know kind of collating organizing gathering information that we're going to get from the open forums from the written responses from the police data we're going to need someone that's going to be doing deeper research you know from week to week we need more data we need to collect more information you know locally regionally nationally around this work more than what we we're going to be able to do given that we have everything else going on we're going to need a lot of data organization we're going to need someone that has very good writing skills is going to help us write these reports you see what I'm saying I mean there's going to be general things that we're going to need and someone with facilitation skills which later on if we do want to have more open forums more like which most likely we're going to need what we're going to do so I think we need to kind of already stop figuring that out as opposed to waiting and putting it out for another couple of weeks because then we're going to get ourselves we're going to find ourselves in a bind that's what I think that so I agree with what everything that Miss Ferrara just said I want to go back to what Miss Marston alluded to in terms of Miss Marston you had mentioned that there's not enough time to get somebody on board quickly so I'm curious like what does it take do we well I guess the question can go to the town manager like do you need to like advertise formally to help people apply or how does this work I mean you know can we reach out to people to see if anybody's interested or is it something we can put it as part of our public announcement or I mean I'm sure there are people who are out of work that might need to do something for us another thing I want to mention in in terms of resources is I keep going back to grassroots organizing like that's another area that I think we will need assistance through the ambassador program you know for us to also not lose sight of that so Mr. Backelman then Miss Marston so if you I think that what Miss Ferrara was starting to do is to document what are the things that we need you're talking about data collection data organization research into regional and national things these are things that you will do individually but you want someone who's going to like you can filter it through them someone who's going to be able to pull that together deliver reports to you and then when as you make decisions be able to reduce that into writing so someone's got to take on all those tasks and that's what I'm hearing you say Miss Ferrara what you're looking for and possibly facilitation down the road but not necessarily right up front but you're you're saying what's what's our end product and our end product is a document probably who's going to how are we going to get there we've to do data collection do all these things and Miss Pat what you're saying is maybe we need more outreach into the like more of our organizational model and maybe that's something at the same time or in addition to or instead of so I guess the first thing you would want to do as committee is to say what is it that we want if we could do a quick sort of just a maybe maybe we do it in between between now and the next meeting come up with the list of all the things that you need and come up with a sort of sample saying then send it out to people to get some quotes on and put it out there you know we are a public we are an entity you know we we have to follow procurement laws etc etc but I think you're right or time is of the essence and so maybe we can someone wants to help or you could submit ideas or or Miss Ferrara wants to suggest some things and we can pull a sample RFP together to bring back to the committee at your next meeting you could probably move that forward pretty quickly Miss Ferrara would you be willing to to sort of spearhead that in terms of us coming up with this this this list or the elements of the of the resources we might need going forward we could follow in protocol how would we get that to Miss Moisten for us to review you because that would be the next thing to get it to to to Mr. Bachman sure yeah people want to send you know their list to me at least I can put it in some type of fashion in terms of you know not being redundant and all of that and then submit it to who back to you Paul or okay to Mr. Bachman but everything should go both Jen and me yeah yeah yeah so and I think we should all weigh in on that certainly um and this is all right so what I'll do is I'll people send it to me and then I'll kind of put it together and then send it back to you all and then you can share it with everyone Mr. Brennan-Jones um I think we yes if if Debra would get things to Jennifer and Mr. Bachman it'd be great if we could see it you know a couple days before the meeting so we have a chance to to read it and maybe prepare some possible edits that we could do at the next meeting so are we yes miss miss miss Pat just to be clear are we talking about next week meeting you want this done before next week meeting yeah that might be that might be too quick I just want to clarify I want to be sure well I wasn't making the comments so I don't know Mr. Brennan-Jones is that what you were speaking to I I I didn't have a particular timeline in mind okay would that time work for you miss fedara by next meeting yeah I mean I think it's this is what the folks are able to do because remember Christmas you know Christmas is coming up and Hanukkah and Kwanzaa and all of those things and New Year so well yeah I missed Debra Bachman yeah so I don't I won't be available next week just for the word just won't be around so yeah so we should so why don't we say by by the sixth then by the which would give us the two weeks but I guess I get it to me you know you need to get me some information I don't know what the fourth or something by the fourth in the morning so I can turn it around that would work for for me I don't know that's fine yeah okay and I think we you know we make it a point to get there and I think I was trying to get back to miss miss pat what you're talking about these are resources not only I think just for the what's coming up in terms of our hearing but this is you know we're starting to take a longer term view at least starting the longer term view around resourcing and supporting the work of the group so we have some immediate things certainly in terms of facilitation and that kind of thing but then we have some longer term things we've got to report writing and support and research and those kinds of things which take time and have to go through some some procedures to to make it happen so we can get that information to to miss ferrera as soon as possible I would say certainly we would not leave it to the last minute to give her plenty of time and uh I wouldn't you know encourage us all to support her in that way so she can get that to miss moisten and mr. boncombe yeah and just a second what um Mr. Wally said yeah just make sure you put everything in terms of resources that you think that we would need in general not just for the open forum I think it's for us to be able to to do our work successfully and really meet those two kind of reports that we need to submit to the town council agreed sounds good to me okay um so um i think do a little summary at the end i'm gonna come i'm gonna come back to the the hearing i also want to talk about you know setting up our next meeting at some point but i do want to take a moment if i can shift to the uh this whole notion of collecting racial data and i think this is this is an important topic in the research some of us have done certainly and you know we've all done some reading there are there are some states and and some local municipal uh some municipalities across the country who dc for example i think has required that their police department collect racial data on on stops etc that was that was a court ordered um uh a court issued order and so we're talking about that it comes up in the questions as we're talking about you know talking with the Amherst police department about collecting data around race and um there are some you know ethical questions there are some uh other questions certainly that we can ask about that but it sounds like it's something that we want to know as a working group what kind of uh racial data is being collected and what kind we do we hope to see if we're in fact going to um ask the the police department to collect data that they may not already be collecting so um there are questions about how to do this there are probably some best practices along along the way that we can look at if i want to just get get the committee's sense uh within a couple of minutes at least we can keep we can move this on to a different to another agenda too because we're getting close to time to stop but i didn't want to lose the moment to hear if anybody had any comments or questions about the police collecting racial data and mr verning jones i wanted to ask the town manager paul do you know what they're collecting now in the way of racial data uh and if they're not why not i don't know the answer to that question i mean i was very impressed with the recommendations of the legal women voters report uh and then i went to some of these national reports and they all advocate collecting racial data as best practice collecting and sharing publicly um data as best practice for police police reform um miss bowman and then mr bachleman um so personally i'm still really skeptical about it um being a mom of children who are mixed to get confused for being latino all the time hey i'm on my meeting please stop i don't know why i don't have that photo um if it's not i really just don't think that it's something that i don't think we're gonna get accurate data uh um whether be direct like i don't think if we're if we're requesting the police to do it i don't think we're gonna get accurate data um but aren't on a side no aren't arrest records and things like that aren't those public records yes so i don't know i just i just don't i'm just not sure we're gonna get very accurate data about what the information that we're getting from the police um and i was gonna say well maybe we can contact people who got arrested but i don't think that's gonna work either so that's why i didn't say that but um i i'm just really skeptical skeptical about like how accurate the data is without without requiring them to ask their whoever they're arresting and then you know and then require to know that the person refused you know if the person refuses to answer that that needs to be noted as well because i think that's the best way we're going to get a baseline as to whether or not people like whether or not people are willing to share that information about themselves um and then like we were saying last week about whether or not how are we going to make sure we cover the large you know genre of people like we have you know are we going to allow them to like mark off multiple things multiple ethnicities are we going to allow are we going to just put other and just like if you have that be acceptable are we going to allow them to write in what what the you know what the answer it you know what i'm saying so like there's a lot more complex and it is it is very it is very complex and and i think the reason for bringing it up is because of the complexity of it and i think if we're seeing it as possibly something we need it's certainly something we have to to talk about as a group of Mr. Vernon Jones asked the question is are are the collecting this data now we don't know apparently and Mr. Bachman i think you had your hand up after Ms. Pullman yeah i think you know there's a lot of i think that's a perfect question for the police chief to answer what collect how do you collect the what what information are you collecting how do you collect it do you do project it yourselves or do you ask the question if there's no answer um you know and there are certain things that were uh under our sanctuary by law they're not supposed to ask about certain things like immigrant status and things like that so so there are there is a i think you would want to know how they conduct it in practice i think it's a really important questions for you to ask well i think you know that that's that's our next step i i think is to contact the embers police department certainly and find out and then i think in the body of questions that we we've asked already um uh we're putting forward to the police department you know we see the necessity for understanding and you know the data around race so how best to do that there's a huge um uh document that came out from uh the United States Department of Justice uh i think the acronym was cops um and it was um community oriented policing services and they had a huge document that they put out which talked about that specifically collecting data how it's collected some of the pitfalls etc documents like that is probably something you know we should look at to to keep ourselves better informed but certainly um we we should go back and and talk to our local police too and i think was it somebody had their hand up in this i did miss pat yeah so as this topic we're discussing right now from me uh is triggering triggering me because in 2004 we were having similar conversation so to here today for the town manager to state that he doesn't know if we're collecting and none of us in that in in this zoom meeting we don't know if the apd is collecting or not i mean it's just um who feels my suspicion and what's nightmare why wouldn't they be collecting identifying information mr shena i hear you i understand what you're saying sometimes mixed race individuals can be misleadable i have misraced grandchildren sometimes they refer them as latino as well i get that i get that but it shouldn't be the only excuse for apd not to be collecting racial data it matters to me a lot i would like to know you know what you know what apd is doing in terms of um who they're stopping who they're arresting in terms of race it does matter to me i and i and i i think you know that that makes perfect sense i mean it it seems to matter to a lot of us certainly um and i i think the question being posed to the police department is a very direct question and it has an answer i think we also have again this body of questions that we're putting forward to the police department which we will find out more about what they're doing or in places where they they're not doing what we're asking how those gaps might be filled and um you know we're we're the we're the pitfalls that you know in terms of data collection and and the use of that data um miss rara yeah i mean i think you just kind of hit the nail on the head uh mr wiley that's what i was going to say it's just like we've just submitted a you know a bunch of questions to them which is going to by them by their response we're going to really get a sense of okay have they been collecting this data because remember most of our questions we're asking for breakdowns in terms of identity you know race ethnicity and and other background information so they're going to have to let us know okay if they don't have it why don't they have it and how they've been doing that right um the other thing too that i was hearing especially for miss bone miss bowman bowman is whether you know and i think we're going to know that too from their response is you know you know if they're not collecting it why or how are they doing it what's the breakdown in terms of the categories that they've been trying to collect and also i guess can we even trust that they're collecting the information correctly right they're doing it in a way that is voluntary that that the person feels like they can respond and the person feels that they can trust that or or do we need to really look at in terms of us right in terms of recommendations for the future that is independent you know an agency or person that collects that information um you know so those are some of the things that i i'm thinking about as we're talking through this and having this conversation and i think it's going to be informed a lot by those questions that we already posted them thank you yes mr um is on i completely agree i just wanted to throw out there i think community trust starts with community transparency so we need that data and it is triggering to hear that these same questions were raised in 04 um mr wiley i know you had brought up this reform in dc i read pretty recently that part of what's going on dc and them getting this data is also when things seem off um georgetown university law students going back and watching body camps to make sure that the information isn't skewed and there's complete transparency there so i think all of this is really important it is and i think it's a deeper dive than what we're going to get to it in this meeting certainly and you know and i think that's the reason why we're here as a working group you know we don't want to repeat any you know mistakes or you know leave gaps unfilled uh you know going forward we're trying to fill in all these areas that where we don't have information and get the information we need and it's going to be useful and also we want to have you know be transparent and we want to be accurate with what we're reporting and we want to be clear and i think someone mentioned trust a minute ago all of this is about building trust in this community and um so this is this is not something that's going to happen in a meeting or two certainly but it has to be a persistent and an intense piece of work going forward that that you know you know exemplifies and demonstrates the seriousness and the importance of this whole thing for a lot of people and that's that's our job so that's what we're charged with this is the examination of the word this is the learning that's in that's in our charge so this is what we do so um you know that said um you know and we can think about this for a future agenda too how will we need to look deeply at these different this these different uh towns and and cities and what they're doing we have to look at their research because we know we hear statistics all the time about statistic black versus white arrests you know use of force non use of force that data is coming from somewhere and somebody's collecting it so you know how they collect it you know if it's accurate those are the kinds of things we want to you know take a deep dive into to figure out what's best we work best for here yes here in the community and um so we can be fully transparent with everybody you know police department on down so um anyway so we're getting we're we're already there at seven thirty I want to spend a minute if if I can and you can help me with this certainly as a group to summarize a little bit where we are one thing in terms of calendar we have the 13th and the um and the 16th as our dates for forums and uh we're going to uh we're going to put out a our press release which talks about the forums we're going to talk about the link that's going to be on the website and there was a third thing the the link the forums um I guess the other side the media the press release press release yeah yeah so I think we're gonna we got to get that going and that's got to be done by soon right by next Tuesday wasn't mr. Bachmann yeah okay so we have that in place we are um so the hearings the calendar we're sending Debra our i'm Debbie about the resources that we need yes thank you the the resources we have to get that to Debra by January 4th or earlier please I believe that's the date you gave us uh mr. Eric yeah by uh January 4th in the morning um earlier in the morning yeah by 10 let me just say by 10 am January 4th or before that or by January 3rd at 10 o'clock at night so that's that's our next piece of work and that's going to inform our short term and long term needs for resources which we brought up today um and let's see I'd like to have a way of having us talk more about the collection of data after we find out from the police department what they are doing around that just that particular question maybe we've got a whole body of questions that maybe we can bring that into conversation at our next meeting which leads me to this question about our next meeting do we want to have a meeting next next Wednesday on the 30th we've been having them every week on Wednesday miss pat I think we should give the employees our break next week and mr. Bachman doesn't need a break um miss moist yeah right I'm on vacation next week so I would really appreciate a break yeah I'm more than willing to come in and and and do a meeting for you guys it's not a problem it's virtual right like you can't really get out of a meeting anymore well yeah I think we should respect their time off please it's not healthy would we so are we the following Wednesday on the sixth yes yeah that's a good recommendation it'll also give us a chance to do some more you know continue our research on our own it gives uh some room for us to interact with um you know the Amherst police department uh because day two everybody's running in this uh holiday circle um so our next meeting would be on January um sixth well can you do Wednesdays mr. Wiley I'm doing them it's it's hard but I'm doing them because that seems to work for everybody else I mean I can do thank you for asking yeah so you don't okay mr. Bachman so you've settled on the six is that have you concluded that I'm just asking you either by head nod or wave to me or something the sixth if that works for everybody okay so the sixth at five thirty yes mr. Bachman so I have two things I'd like to mention uh under other things whatever um so one is that uh councillor ball millen was part of the meeting and she has uh emailed uh miss moisten and I and so we'd like to share those with you she had ideas for some things that she'd like to share with you I just ask if we share those out that you not respond all because that's considered deliberation you know you can respond back to miss moisten or me or something but you can't email each other the second thing is just thank miss moisten for having a quick trigger finger on eliminate we had two people here who we perceived to be zoom bombers uh with IP addresses in Texas so um you know these types of means sometimes become targets so we will continue to monitor that and be alert to people who are asking to be recognized from from outside the room uh mr. Vernon Jones I don't want to discuss this now but it would be helpful to me if someone could say something about the long document that was in the packet uh and whether that relates to a particular agenda item oh yes yes mr. Wiley me and Jennifer met with um masters of public policy student over at UMass and she's interested on doing her capstone studies on something similar to what we're doing basically on how community involvement increases um public value I think is how she phrased it and Paul and I were interested in more learning about how to measure um public value and what that means um in the academic context that she brought it up in thank you yeah and miss moisten yeah I just want to let everyone know there's quanta celebrations so that are happening this week so um on the 26th at one o'clock there's a quanta celebration um the link will be sent out to you and like as a group I'll send it out to you and then some other resources for other events that are going on as the shabazz will be having something um at the mill district at four p.m. I believe on the the 26th of December as well yeah thank you for letting us know about that um also just uh if I may just the reminder before we um move to adjournment uh as we're creating the agenda I just want to remind folks to if you have agenda items you want us to deliberate on uh at our next meeting um please send them uh to me miss moisten so that we can you know get them in the agenda I don't want to be uh the one creating the agenda in isolation although I do you know I've created based on what I think what I'm hearing from people and what I see in the minutes but if you have something that you'd like to have a discussion about at the meeting please send that to to me so that we make sure everyone is is having the input that's needed for this work um also again I want to welcome uh welcome you and Darius uh to our meeting I want to thank you miss moistening for inviting mr. cage into the conversation earlier you I know he was listening very carefully because I was I was looking at him so much yeah but uh we want to welcome you and also I'm going to reach out to you to see if you you know have any questions for us and how any of us might be able to support you going forward it's been a quick turnaround and we're just happy you're here so um welcome again and thank you for your participation comments um miss forever than miss pat so just quickly like in terms of agenda items but when do you want us to submit those so that we can make sure like on a weekly basis so that then it becomes a habit but when do you want those well I have to get them well miss moisten has to post it 48 hours ahead of time so if they're like am I accurate in this I guess at this point so like the if it's a Wednesday meeting then I'm gonna say Monday Monday morning Monday morning is a good time by 10 to just say Monday by 10 I knew that works it has to go to the clerk so I have to submit it and then the clerk has to to actually um post it to the website so there's a little bit of a process there um and also weekends and holidays are not included so for instance when we have Monday holidays um our meetings will need to be posted the previous Friday if we're still having a Wednesday meeting so it and it's literally down to the hour so if we changed our meeting to 10 o'clock a.m that means it would have to be posted no later than 10 a.m on Monday morning it just happens that our meetings fall in the evening so I don't really usually have to worry about it I I will communicate with miss moisten to remind folks too if necessary to say hey this you know just a reminder if you haven't thought about an agenda item please submit it by next time that's date whatever we're working on just to make sure that we're all getting our chips in the bowl so to speak any other comments or questions yeah I raised my hand yeah I just want to say um thank you to Mr. Wally for wanting to reach out to Darius um I think that that's a good thing I've already also reached out to him that if he ever have questions um about the group he can not like discussing anything but if he needs any type of support around you know the work we're doing so just um let me know so thank you for wanting to do that oh you're welcome and I think I may be if I may I think I'm speaking to everybody in this case I think we'll all reach out to Darius as a part of the welcome and also don't wait for us Darius you know if something on your mind let it fly you know we'll we'll we'll get back to you very quickly again we're glad you're here um don't worry it will when you get adjusted yeah I'm not worried about him okay um so thank you um let's see where I think we're at the end like to have a motion to adjourn so move Mr. Vernon Jones has moved that we adjourn the meeting in a second okay all those in favor I can see you or do I really have to take a roll call this morning okay I'm writing everybody's on board thank you all very much and um have a great rest of the week stay safe stay healthy enjoy the holidays happy holidays everyone very christmas everyone's uh thank you