 All right, pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021. This meeting will be conducted via remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so via zoom or by telephone. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. And with that, I'm calling this meeting to order at 632. And we will just do a roll call though as I see you on my screen so Rodney Parker. Tyler. That's in. Laverne. Present. Ben. Present. Juliana. Present. Awesome. All right, so I'm not sure that a package actually got emailed out to everybody, but I did find it on the website. Did you all get an agenda thing? Yeah. Oh, maybe it was just me then. So be before we go on, I just want to welcome our new members and I'm sure Philip, you're probably going to do that as well. But Tyler, you have not officially been sworn in yet. You're welcome to participate in the proceedings tonight and give your opinion you cannot officially vote until you're sworn in. And so we'll need to connect offline and connect you with the town clerk's office to do that. Yes, so thank you for that. And with that, we will introduce ourselves if we could just go around really quick maybe just say how long you've been on the commission so that way for newest member than Ronnie you can go last and you can give us any thing you want to say for that so my name is Philip Avila. I have been on this commission since 2021 I believe in August, and I am one of the co chairs. And well let's just do a popcorn type of things I'll pass it to Ben. So I'm Ben Harrington. I'm the other co chair I've been on since 2019. I guess this is my second term. So, and then I will tag. I don't know who I'm going to tag. Juliana. My name is Juliana. I've been on a commission for since spring ish like June of 2022. And I'll pass it to Pamela. Hello, I'm Pamela I'm the staff liaison for the commission, and I will pass it to Tyler. Tyler, I've been on the commission since November, I think, but I still need to be officially sworn in. And I'll pass it to Laverne. I'm Laverne Kelly, and I've been sworn into the commission since earlier this month. But it's a number. All right, Ronnie, if you want to introduce yourself and say, I'm Ronnie. I lived in Amherst for just over a year. I am newly appointed, but I have been sworn in. I got in before Tyler could. And I'm very excited to be part of this group. Thank you. Awesome. Thank you for joining and everybody else. Let's see, so I don't have any announcements. Other than that, we do have a Lunar New Year event coming up on the 29th, but that is on our agenda so we can discuss more about that later. Agenda review so we have public comment that's happening next after this and then HRC member reports, if anybody has any. Then we'll HRC bylaws complain to review process Lunar New Year and then Black History Month and then anything that we did not anticipate 48 hours for someone would like to bring anything up. You have an opportunity to do so under item six approval of 1117 minutes did we get those. I'm not sure that that that the minutes were sent out so I, there may have been, well there are some probably glitches with today's packet because it was my first opportunity to post the both the, the announcement to the town clerk's office about the meeting and the packet so the packet does appear in on the website for the HRC but I'm not sure that those materials got attached to the email I think it was just the agenda but I, Jen was trying to train me so I apologize for that glitch. That's all right. So we'll approve those minutes next time our next meeting. So then with that, then we are going to move on to item number two which is going to be public comment. We're going to move on to the public. If you would wish to speak, you can do so by just raising your hand and see two attendees. No one would like to speak then we're going to go once, twice. All right, we're going to move on. Any member reports does anybody have anything that they would like to report out on. We just have one report that with the CSS JC, which is another committee that I am a part of the. Excuse me I'm forgetting the whole acronym right now the community safety social justice committee yes. So with them and with as well as our committee the last that we had discussed about post. And the post complaint process and all that we filed with injunction with them just to inform the post commission about the July 5 incident so that way, it can just be on record so that's all I have with both updates from this committee and that committee as well. Anybody else have anything to see anything. All right. Then we will move on to the HRC bylaws. So, at our retreat, which I'm realizing that most of you were not actually except for I think me and Ben. We discussed about kind of this upcoming year and what we would like to see what we'd like to do as a commission and as a committee and we kind of did this last year. I do want to take a moment and just like kind of reflect on that piece of it we last year really had on our agenda to have more visibility in the town, as well as participate in awareness of cultural events. I think that with our newest members I think we're doing something maybe to have some type of visibility. And also I know that myself and Ben just did an interview with the Amherst Indy to get out in the newspaper so we are trying to make that visibility piece just to get people want to wear of the HRC and just to have our names out there in town and I will say personally I think the HRC does have a present in town because now whenever I go to an event. I'm always hey you're the co-chair of the HRC huh so I think I think we're doing something with that. So with the bylaws, there's a lot of like legal language to it and a lot of, I think, update that needs to happen I don't know when's the last time that it had been updated. But we are looking to Pamela jump in if I am saying anything incorrectly but the town is doing kind of an overview of majority of their language type of access in things. So with that our bylaws came up in that discussion. And so thoughts, my thoughts are is that it might make sense rather than us try and rewrite the bylaws to have someone like believe the town attorney or town clerk go through for a language accessibility across all platforms type of access to it so that way we're not using language that is that isn't in conjunction with other documents that would be relevant when we do use our bylaws or access our bylaws so it might make sense to have them go through it first just to kind of use the language that they would use anyways and then us go through it to change kind of like the content of it not the language so much of it. Pamela did I capture that right. Yeah, so the, the, the prior HR director, shortly after I arrived had asked me to take a look at the town's. I believe it was their affirmative action plan but there are several different different documents among the governing documents on town. So there's an affirmative action plan there's an EEO policy which is equal employment policy. The town created a diversity statement and then there are the bylaws concerning the HRC. So, my thinking was in discussion with Philip is that it makes probably the best use of the time of the Commission to have the general counsel for the town review all of those documents for consistency first, and then we can then reach sort of respond or you guys can respond to their to their drafts so the other asked that we would have a general counsel would be to review some suggested procedures for the Human Rights Commission. They've had long standing bylaws about receiving complaints but hadn't not previously had standards about how complaints would be processed so we, one of the things that we did at the retreat was review the by review the procedures from other towns around the Commonwealth, and I made some suggestions about the length of time of responding how we would respond to those types of things. So the goal would be to have all of that work done by the town account that by town council and then bring it back to the Commission for review. I could just jump in there because we've kind of, we kind of started this conversation. Three years ago, maybe about the HRC bylaw and getting some language and changed. So, so sans like the legal lease part there are some so that the last update was like 2009 right. And there's some, I say this delicately actually I won't say delicately there's some borderline and probably crossing the line like almost not even almost transphobic language in there, or language that could be construed as that. And like my recommendation would be that we kind of kind of let general counsel understand that that's something that we would like to be taken out and maybe even provide some suggestions I would think that like in 2023. So I'd hope that people would know which, which excerpts to take out and kind of reword but but yeah that's my two cents from the last couple years there. Council would do that one of the things. I mean, so if you contrast the diversity statement which is the most recent statement that the town has made, and you look at I'm going to just for the, at the protected classes that are included in that document. They do look different so I think having general counsel review all the documents and being consistent across all the documents that they would make that sort of correction and of course, you know will note that as well. Yeah, I think that you bring up a good point but I would then read in some of it I was like oh yeah this definitely has not been looked at. Like I thought we kind of knew better than. I'm trying to very quickly I don't know that I can successfully do this because I'm doing it on a high status share kind of what I'm looking at. That way new members can hopefully look at our access to bylaws or Pamela if you have an easier way to share that. I'm sure that our newer members would like to take a look at the bylaws that we're discussing and talking about. The packet. Is that what we're talking about. Yes. Yeah, so in that I can try to bring up the because we copy the two pages of the existing bylaws and they were in the packet. So I can try to bring that on my upon my screen. So I'm going to go off camera for a minute while I do, while I look for that. Did anybody have time to look at the packet with the bylaws or anything. Yeah, I came through them just to see what was in there. As a new member what are your general thoughts on them. My first thought was already flush the full definition of gender identity. But yeah, I mean I think it's a good stage I think there are good questions being asked as far as making ourselves more visible. The questions at the end for discussion which I have some thoughts on as well. Um, yeah. I like some of the ideas. I don't have anybody else read it and have something to say about it. I had questions actually about a bunch of it. But I guess all that's not done yet. Right now it's an interesting point in our committee here because I think we can, we can change these bylaws in a way that hopefully makes it a little bit more. I think it's possible to people understanding of certain definitions and certain language, but to also for this committee to kind of have that charge and that focus as to what we're looking at in the next year and upcoming years and so on and so forth. Can everybody see my screen. Yep. See if I can enlarge this just a little bit. So this first document what was just the bylaws that currently exist and then links to the affirmative action plan the EEO policy and the DEI statement so those documents that I discussed where there was some inconsistency between the protected categories. And then as I'm able to, let's see if I can scroll down to the bylaws. And I don't see the current, I think the bylaws are in this document it's not the, the, the copied page pages but there's a link to the bylaws and the definitions that currently exist. So there was a revision I think in June of 2022. I think that revision was just to get our commission from a seven commissioner to a nine commissioner. I've been do you remember that correctly. Yep. That's accurate. But I think that's all that revision was. I know that it's going to be sort of very difficult to review this document online. My suggestion might be that I that we send out the packet as a separate document that it is available on the HRC website, but then would give individuals an opportunity to really review it. So, shortly after the beginning at the very start of this month in January, our general council made a trip to the town to meet with all of the department head managers and met specifically with the new managers which was myself are all from the department and the new HR director. So the three of us met privately with general council to review and talk about issues in our various areas. So there is a, so the, I think that the the counts, the general council is aware that this might be coming to, you know, to their law firm so I think that probably the best course of action just for sake of time would be for people to take the time to review it a little bit and maybe I'll call Jennifer and I with specific concerns, and then we can put it back on the agenda and have an opportunity to discuss it further. Okay, yeah, let's let's do that. Okay. So one of our bylaws and looking up that we do have on and this came up in our retreat was the state of what is it the annual HRC state of the town report. And through that, I would like for us to either talk about getting that going possibly getting that going, however, we want to go about it but I think that that's something that has not happened since I've been on the commission I don't know that that's happened since you've been on the commission then. As far as I know it was like the last time it was actually done it was a presentation to what do you call it to town meeting so I mean that that kind of tells you how long it was you haven't had time meeting for a few years now. New years like five years six years something like that. Yeah. So it's at least that been that long. Yeah, we're overdue. I think that's a great idea. This is running jumping in. I really think it would serve all sorts of purposes apart in addition to helping us be better focusing targeting serving would really alert people to their right. It doesn't have to be a big complicated report but it can serve so many purposes. I'm excited to see that. That kind of thing is what I looked for us to know at the time that I was applying to join I looked for some kind of saying like that. But articulate what we're trying to do what we've done. We hope to do. I think it's a great idea. Yeah, I definitely agree with that. And so, with that. I had very passing thought in the past hour of how to do the work ahead of us and how to kind of get this commission to focus in and do work. And so I'm on this other committee that has kind of subgroups or subcommittees if you will, whatever we choose to call them is whatever we would choose to call them if this idea gets kind of a majority vote or majority thought of it is that the way that I see the interesting in our bylaws there's a way that it says for educational purposes for different purposes that are clearly in our charge that this commission should look at and needs to look at what is in our charge. And so the way that I thought about it is that we do every month we kind of look at and Jen is actually a lot better at this than I am as to what kind of is happening in the month for educational purposes so like the National Women's Day coming up different things like that to where we post on Facebook, but I think that that has been difficult to do so as a commission because we all kind of meet once a month and then we're kind of like oh yeah well now we're running a lot to try and scramble and get something together and send it into Jen and then I think we miss opportunities to post and to kind of get that educational piece out there. And as well as kind of all this talk about bylaws the complaint and review process, looking at our town website, looking at different things so that's kind of another piece that I see. The last piece would be the community event piece to it I think that our community events are wonderful and great. I do think that as far as sitting as commissioner and I'll speak just for myself as co-chair. I think there's very often times where I'm like, oh yeah Jen like what are we doing or what's happening. And I would like for that to be more of an effort on our end as commissioners to kind of be like, Oh we know what's happening this is what we're doing like this is what's going on on that piece. So, with that when whole London speech. I would like to propose or make a motion that we create subgroups that involves each commissioner to whatever subgroup that they would like to be a part of that then that subgroup can then report back to this whole community. So that way it's not that me and Ben as co-chairs are trying to do the educational pieces to the administrative work and do the community activities so that's actually how we use the function that that's exactly how it kind of how it works like like for instance, we have like there are certain like annual events or you know holidays or whatever, not even a holiday just know days of acknowledgement that that we would look at what we would do is we would start looking at the calendar and kind of assigning groups of people to each of those different, you know, like say like, what we'll say like you know black history wants is coming out so there will be different folks that would be involved in my town events. There'd be people that would be responsible for like, you know coming up with statements and these sorts of things. And for some reason we sort of shy away from that I think it's like the flux that we've had here with the membership, but that's basically how we use the function. And the other thing that I would add to that is that we probably should have and I'm not sure what the disconnect is why we can't have like a subcommittee that that posts to Facebook where we're like, you know folks kind of like for them, you know, the little blurbs that we would write up for each different type of event or whatever but I got, I think it makes sense to get back to doing it that way. It seemed like we were better functioning like that. No, I would agree. I see, Jen your hand is up. Hi everyone. So a couple of things. Let me just start with what Ben left off on is like there's not a lot of working committees that have separate Facebook pages for a specific reason. And so, the IT department when Deb Radway left because that's really when it the responsibility for posting on it changed. They just were like, the staff liaison needs to do that we can go back and ask them but that they just weren't. I don't know. I don't know about it I guess. And so my thing with the subcommittees is I like, for some reason when you call them subcommittees. They, it has to be a posted meeting so if people just want to like match up and do stuff, like one on like two people, then that's okay but anything is that that exceeds that is going to have to be, you know, posted, which I think is part of like the problem with people getting together to do stuff is because it's like you gotta tell me 48 hours in advance. I agree. Would it be three or less since our quorum is four. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Oh, because one has to be because we have nine. Right. I think it's like working groups like I know, I know, right, yeah. Yeah, yeah, whatever we call them that that would be perfect but I think that I just I see all this work and I'll be quite frank I know bylaws are not people's jams and people thing I know the administrative end of things is not fun and gets people excited for certain things so it's not something that you're interested in but you're interested in like the educational or getting it to Jen to post or helping out more in the community event type of situation. Like, I know Liz is she loves doing that I know that she's always kind of the first one for you Jen to be like yep, send me up or let me know what to do and I'm there. I think that dividing up the work in that way but having like a more official type of language to it just makes sense to to do. Yeah, I think that's great. And I think that works. I just want to run it by Paul and Athena tomorrow, because sometimes title changes it to anytime we've had a working group they've had to post to. So, like I just want to check with Paul, and I can just email everybody. Okay, and then right so you guys can actually create what teams you might want let me just find out this one logistical piece first. And then, once we figure that out, then you guys can move can still can move forward right doesn't have to stop the work behind it. Yeah, I think I think definitely I think that. Yeah, because I was just like writing out like okay like I know we talked about bylaws I know we talked about our complaint review process and then I know we talked about like the website and I was like oh my gosh it's already seemed like a lot of work for two individuals to do. I think that we would totally appreciate that right like really really appreciate that. So, I think that's great and sorry, I'm home I'm cooking and you just don't want to look at my kitchen mic so I just turned the camera. But I am here and I am listening I'm going to go ahead and mute now. The hero awards, I remember like we broke that down by task, but I'm not sure that we necessarily define what each of those groups responsible for tasks were. No, it was just like that was a good approach. Yeah, it was just more like you're going to do decorations you're going to do the grocery shopping like we just did it in the meeting. And then that was just that. So you know, you could. You know, you could do that in the meeting with Paul and Athena and Laura. Yeah, yeah, because I mean if we have to just break it down in a non official capacity just to be like oh you're going to work on getting post to Jen and you'll work on whatever it is. Yeah, but yeah so you can check in with Paul and Athena that'd be great. All right. So then with that, then I don't have anything else to add to bylaws I know we kind of got sidetracked with this. And then I just brought up. But, so where we are at is we are sending it to while asking the town attorneys to look at it for writing out things will email Jen or Pamela with any concerns that we have, like the one that Ben have brought up with gender identity language. So if you see anything in there that you're kind of like whoa I really that needs to change and I'm sure they would do it but just to get an echo on it is always great to add in. Get it over to Jen and Pamela. Anybody have anything else to add to that Tyler. Yeah, do we have a timeline for when we should email or contact Jen and Pamela about any changes to the bylaws like is this something we should try to have done within the next couple of days, or is it more over the course of the next month. So, Jen and I are going to be attending a conference in Boston. Through the end of this week so you certainly don't have to do it over the next couple of days. I would say, if you were able to to respond in the next couple of weeks in advance of your meeting then we can share information out to the entire group about the comments that we received. And, Jen, you still have your hand up I don't know if you want to weigh in. I don't sorry, I'm going to lower it now. So our next meeting will be February 15. That's the third Wednesday of the month so would you like it by like the eighth. First, what do you what do you think of Pamela. So, I would say it earlier than the eighth that all possible that because we need to gather the information and send it out to you and post the meeting and the packet so. Okay, so how about we say two weeks from now then the first. All right, and with that if no one has anything else. We will move on to the next agenda item which is complaint process review. We're able to find that. In our previous retreat. So I believe again it was part of that summary of the retreat packet that I sent out. And I don't. Let's see. I'm doing this from memory because I, I did not do a good job of reviewing everything in advance. But basically what I suggested was a window for which the director would respond to complaints. And a process for insert, I think, I believe informing the co chairs I think you want decided that you guys wanted to be informed of the complaints that we that we received. We, as Jen has pointed out, we have to be somewhat careful about how that process looks because all of our emails are public documents and if people are concerned about privacy. Then, not all of the information would want, we'd want, we wouldn't want to send all of that the complaint itself by email so for example, I think recently Jen received a complaint. And in an effort to sort of follow the policy that we haven't quite adopted yet. She sent the two co chairs a summary of the complaint and discuss the possible actions with them. One thing that I think might be suggested by general counsel I think that general counsel might make some changes to the process of the general counsel was a bit concerned about preventing the ability to, to actually adjudicate or decide cases when we don't have the legal authority to do so. And one suggestion would be to have more of a public face that looked like a referral process or, you know, I don't, we can't provide legal advice, but you know a listing of agencies that would help specifically that do have adjudicatory authority but I, I, you know, I think once the attorney reviews all of the documents will probably just get a comprehensive package to review and you know the commission will get a comprehensive package back to review and discuss. So my concern and I was just going to say I think I think that was the idea for the process of I remember that conversation was kind of like, we don't want to just be like, oh yeah we don't know anything about it or we can't help you. If we could refer someone to an agency that does know further information about it or that can help in a certain way then yes and I think I believe that's where that conversation was going with that, adding that in there. So that's, that's where I think we're a little bit in a holding pattern until we hear back, you know, hear comments back from you guys specifically about areas of concern and then present that to the attorney and then have them come back with specific suggestions for changes. Okay, let's see. We're then looking at the retreat. Also another thing that came up was the sponsorship of know your rights sessions. And then some other further long term goals that we have and just I think on a personal level for me, at least when I get in conversation with people it's always about affordable housing in this area, I think that's the biggest topic that I hear, and just one on one conversations with people. I think that if we could potentially do something with the affordable housing trust that might look something like what we did, or what you all did last night. Pamela and Jen, that's not necessarily a session where it's a conversation more of a listening session I think that that might be a disconnect that some of town, the townhouse town council or whoever it is that's on the decision process is that that disconnect of not being able to hear people as to pay like I cannot afford to live in this town for X, Y and Z reasons, but it doesn't need to go into an argument to where it comes into an unproductive conversation but I think that in a long term type of goal that might be something that we may consider as well as I know I want to go that we also had was food insecurity that we have something along the lines of that and just well my I guess bias of working at the Denver Survival Center. I think that that always is a push for me that I would like to get more out there I think our center is really great and I think that we do a lot but I know that there's community members that don't know that the center exists or that the center has free lunch Monday Tuesday Thursday Friday and other accessible household items for pantry and different things like that so with that I don't know if that could become a listening session I don't know if that's more of an information session I just think that overall in the next coming year that's something that we should look at to possibly do. I see Ronnie you have your hand up. Yeah. I'm a community gardener so I'm very committed to security and growing food and all that. The housing issue is so pressing here. It seems like there are lots of organizations that are addressing the food security issue or food insecurity issue. But they're really the housing thing today and we're in this meeting the planning board is considering some revisions to bylaws where they think that particular changes and bylaws will make housing more affordable. I don't know how it's all going to come out. But I think that the need for housing that is affordable and housing for people who live and work around here is so so important and I think that doesn't seem to be any real coordination or thought there's a lot of good will so if we could look on an issue for say the next couple of years. To me the housing thing would be would really make a difference and there are lots of lessons to be learned because this is a problem throughout the country and there are all sorts of different approaches that have been tried. And you know we have all these brains and ever you know we could we could really push this forward and there's no right lens on this at all. We have all an economic lens which is an important lens and I'm not counting it but there is a question of our human rights to shelter. So, I think also educating on the education side about what are these right and letting people know you have a right to shelter you have a right to a safe and secure home. And those are things that would be a nice practical sort of other side of our work, where they can actually be good results. So I will really support the housing thing. Yeah, thank you for that. Anybody else have anything that they want to add to that. I have a question I guess this would be for like Pamela and Jennifer because we, we normally have like a liaison or have had a liaison to the housing trust. I was just wondering if there if anyone knew of any progress with I know Liz was pursuing that. I mean, Liz was pursuing that previously I'm just wondering like where we stood on that because it would be great to partner with them like it's kind of a very important issue in it. Definitely an even rate centric issue. So Liz is still the liaison from this group to the housing group and there are a couple in town. So it one first step might be for Jen and I just to put together. A list of the different entities in towns that are involved in affordable housing so planning the affordable housing trust and then there are a couple of others that are private. And then you might, you know just have a sense of what their charges and think about having a listening session sort of like the event last night where each of those groups might have an opportunity to talk a little bit or share what their charges and then enter into conversations so I will say that I don't fully understand the difference between the different groups I hear some information from planning. But I'm not quite certain that I, that I understand the coordination between between the groups as well so I think we could offer that Jen and I could offer that as a first step. And then who's involved in those decisions and then bringing that to the group for you to think about putting today, putting together or offering a listening session. Yeah, I think that that'd be great if you both could put that together. Jen. I'm a little bit logistical because you know. So I just want to make sure that everybody's aware like Liz does not sit on the affordable housing trust she's just up like at some at one point. Every HRC member sat on another related board or committee they didn't sit on it but they attended the meetings to collect the information. So we went through a period where we really just didn't have any, we didn't have enough members to do all of that. And so the housing trust was the only one that we kept and Sid was actually a member of the affordable housing trust, which is how Liz kind of slid in so that is something to think about too. Thank you Jen that that's kind of what I was getting at. Thank you. That actually is a good point and that does bring up a logistical question as to now that our membership is growing in our. We have new members, maybe we do want to look at possible liaisons to other committees. Meetings, whoever it is so that way when we have member report outs and we can kind of know what's happening in town through through the through that. So the piece that I do want to add in with a possible listening session or possible, however we do it is that speaking to the earlier point of visibility in the town and people get into new HRC and knowing just the D.I. Department, the Crest Department, whoever it is, I think that that that piece will become crucial in those moments that our community members will know that either we're sponsoring it. The D.I. Department is sponsoring whoever we get involved into it, that affordable housing it's touch each subject right I mean I can think about in my life where there were times where I was like, Oh, I don't know how I'm going to go this month and how that's going to happen for me. So it's a touchy subject it's a vulnerable subject and we do want to give our community members the space to kind of really speak about it to speak their, their truths of what they're feeling what they're going through in town, how they're living and, and that can get that can get hard and that's why the idea of a listening session. That was the first one I thought about it made the most sense to me because I don't want it to turn into oh well we can do it because of this law or we can do it because of that law or whatever it is it's just more of hey listen, listen to the community first, let you know, kind of where what they're going through what what's what's the real issue here and then maybe we can then start looking at how do we, how do we address it how do we make it more accessible how do we make it to where families and people of color can live in this town. So that's kind of where my idea was with that. Then the last thing that I have in that I just want us to have in our purview of the year is the legacy project that we had discussed at our retreat so that looked what was that the week after the Amherst block party is that what we were saying the week the week before so right so for the new new members I at the HRC retreat I had suggested the idea of taking on what I called a legacy project so the idea of taking on an initiative that would require long term planning and would hopefully be grow to be something that would be sustainable for for the town of Amherst and so there are a couple of different national models one is a welcoming America it's sort of focus on immigrants and refugees but it's really expanded beyond that but that was the initial focus and so in the week leading up to the annual town block party, the commission would host a series of events that are really designed to build community so there would be events that would be cultural events that would be educational know your rights events on about support services for immigrants and refugees just it could be a host of events and then the culminating event would be the block party which is already a standard event so it would really provide a nice vessel for having a more robust activities around issues related to human rights so I can reshare with the group again those initiatives and also provide like another example as well so that's sort of what we were thinking about with the legacy project. Thank you for that Pamela. So that is kind of our number two items are number three sorry. So number four then is upcoming events so we just had our MLK day event on the 15th and I got to say that was a very well attended event that was a really was a really good one to see in person that was my first time doing that one in the last one that we did was over zoom so the speech was very well. Well, definitely well written but I would say well chosen by our commissioner, let's take it in as well as Jen. And I don't know Pamela if you had any choice and are putting that together but that was that was a really moving speech and I really enjoyed getting to read it and reading through it. So, Lunar New Year, we are looking at the 29th for that day and Jen please jump in whenever. I'm super super super excited about Lunar New Year, it is the first in person Lunar New Year for the town of Amherst, and it's actually our third event of it and so what I'm trying to go as big as I can go with or we're trying to go as big as we can go, because so we have Dr. Lily So, who is also a pastor over at First Baptist Church, she's the Chinese minister minister there. And so she's going to come and really explain the the history of Lunar New Year how it became so and kind of how family celebrate how she celebrates, she did a fantastic job doing that she's done it with us for the last two years. She's pretty fantastic and then, you know the restaurants are being really kind we're going to have some lunch. And then after that we have the East Culture Arts Inc. coming and they will do, they're from Hartford, Connecticut and they will do a little bit of everything in celebration of Lunar New Year, year of the rabbit. She's definitely very excited. It's definitely really excited and I will say that the pastor, she definitely does a really well job of explaining and kind of going through the historical pieces to Lunar New Year than my very first event that I attended without one night. I learned so much and that was over zoom I was just so much I really wish that it wasn't first time glad that it is happening in person. Very well, Jen. Advertising wise, do you want any help with poster anything or you got that. Oh, I've, there's, there's a flyer created and so if I will send it to you guys I just. Dr. So is actually translating it into Chinese for us so she's doing that now and once I get that back then I'll send it out and I'll send it out to everybody. And then I, I, I'm thinking like our communications director she will send it out to her. Press release, and then I have a list of like community members that I typically send to and then if I can, if you guys can send it out to your friends and family in the area that would be great to just to help spread the word. That's perfect. What, what time is the event starting. That is going to start at 1130 I'm going to say I will take, I will be there from 9am so help anytime would be greatly appreciated setting up we have the high school cafeteria and the auditorium and so I, in my mind I'm envisioning us using the divider and Ben maybe you can help me out with that if I can do that if I can close one half off because we can have doctors so give her presentation and then we can eat on the other side and then go to the auditorium, instead of going back and forth to the auditorium. We can we can absolutely accommodate that. I'll get up with you offline for the details and we'll make sure. Yes, thank you very much. It's great do you need, do you need us to pick up food from restaurants need help in that department or anything. That would be fantastic. Yes, yes. Let's. Here are the things that I need help with I will need help with decorations and then people picking up food so that's going to be so fresh side is going to deliver but ginger garden for most in crazy noodle will need us to pick up. Thank you. HRC members, as far as attending if you could that be great and as you just heard, any help with decorations or food pickup will be greatly appreciated and Jen, you know and I can connect you know I will be there and then do whatever needs to get Yes, and I just I also just want to give Claudia over at the chamber, a little because she has really spearheaded the donations for the food, right. So I just, I really just want to give her a little bit of a we'll give her to at the event so awesome. Yes, much appreciated. Sounds like a fun event. So then we are looking at black history month. What are we thinking of doing for black history month. I know that there's usually a theme to the month and I am blinking on what this thing is Jen you told me. So I believe it's resistance this year. As a theme and Jen and I've talked briefly about it. I did, she and I did a presentation at the Applewood retirement center. Our, our community were Applewood retirement community. This past Saturday, and that presentation was based on Dr King's final book. And we're from here chaos our community so one thought would be to repurpose the presentation that we did for Applewood as an offering for black history month I know that there will be a believer proclamation. And I think that the overall thinking and I see Jen is unmuted now so she can weigh in is to do one event on zoom and one, and one maybe in person event but she's. As far as the zoomer in person I'm going to leave that up to the group I'm happy to help with either one but on February 1 will have our annual flag raising where the proclamation is read so a lot of folks typically from the community come out to that. And all really that happens is usually the Amherst gospel choir comes out and sings, we're at minimum Jackie Wallace comes out and sings, and then that counselors read the proclamation, and then there's a flag raising ceremony and that's really will do like light refreshments and that's really it. I do like to do something later in the month that's a little bit more, you know, theme based and moving along with the theme like one year it was family so we, you know I found a lot, I asked a lot of people in the community for photos of their families and I like I created a movie in and of all the family black families that we're here in Amherst or some of them not all. And so that you know we try to connect it with, and we try to localize it to right so we have our own black heroes and we've had black heroes who've come to Amherst to visit Amherst and resiliency is something that can that that title theme can we can do so much with that because as any BIPOC community knows that resiliency is the is is just how we survive right it's there's nothing else you know it's just how we how we move forward and and survive so I'm really excited to do you know something in the middle of the month and we will definitely include the some of the stuff from the MLK but I think we can like just and there's just so much so it's really up to whoever's going to be working on it with me and to like chime in and get an idea from the group as well. So I'm not like costly taking it over, it is up to you guys at the end of the day. So, it is coming up. I think that leaves a good point. Does anybody want to volunteer to help out with a black history month event mid mid month. I'll volunteer. All right. I'm pretty sure I'm done. Travel, so I'm hesitant to volunteer. Sorry. Yeah. And these these volunteers will just be like kind of this, the spearheaders of it so with Jen and Pamela the, of course, any help that you can give. I'm sure it'd be greatly appreciated if you could. So Jen or whoever is taking notes Pamela that was a lover and Ben volunteering for that and I'm okay with an in person or zoom one whichever way we go. I'm fine with that but I will leave that up to you all to to decide anybody else have anything else you want to add in about black history month. I think a decision if it's going to be zoomer in person because at least, okay, that can be done now and we don't have to wait till the next meeting. Right. So, yeah, that's fair. I prefer in person. I'm gonna, I'm gonna say that I think in person events make the most sense now that we can move in, move to that. But is anybody opposed to in person. Tyler I know you're out of the country so obviously you're opposed to it. Okay, so that it's in person. Jen. You have your hand up. I was thinking it would be great if we had a commissioner who could kind of keep in touch with Amherst media so that way we can record this and they can air it later for us. Yeah, I don't know that they can live stream from them. Like I'm not aware if they can live stream everything or where they can live stream from, but it would be great if we could have somebody just reach out to Amherst media when we have an event so that they can participate I know they're really busy and they're a little bit short staff but I just, you know, I think it would be a good idea to include them on some stuff a little bit more. Can it really fall on me. I'm a board member. Are you. Yeah, so I'm the school committee liaison to Amherst media. So I can reach out to Jim let's go. And I was going to say the easiest place. I'm sure there's other places we could stream from but I know we're set up at the high school to do it. I don't know like high school library is set up for it. But I can talk to Jim about minimally, like, you know, recording it and broadcast. Yeah, it would be fantastic if Lunar New Year, and then if we can't get Lunar New Year is the black history month celebration was recorded and then aired. I mean it's also, you know, helps them out with viewings to so yeah, and we can announce it to right like so that people can look for it. Yeah, definitely I think if we could get Lunar New Year benefit that can happen I know that's a tight turnaround but they can make it happen. I think that'd be great but yeah, let's definitely try and make it happen for the black history month event that will happen in mid March or mid February. Not March. All right, and so then with that, then, let's see. That is it unless anybody else has any other topic that the chair did not reasonably, or co chairs did not recently anticipate 48 hours in advance for. Liz is in the attendees. I think he anticipated that. Not anticipate that. Maybe Liz can give us a quick rundown to if she went to the affordable housing trust meeting where she would still like to be be able to use on for that. Is it possible to let her. Yeah, I'm trying to promote her to to panelists. Cheers. Oh there she is. Okay. Hey Liz can you hear us. Hello. I'm actually just finishing a track meet in Boston. How are you. I'm doing good. How about you. We were wondering, we were wondering if you had a. Yep. Can you hear us. I can hear you. Okay, we're wondering if you had a chance last month to go to the affordable housing trust meeting. I did not go to the meeting. I got a report from Sid. And now I got to remember what he said to me. But they are working on some housing units somewhere. And I can't remember exactly where now. But I will come into the meeting because I didn't think this meet was going to get over this fast. Yeah. No problem. You can always just send it in an email to an, nobody who reply all to an email that gets sent. Jen, your hand. I think we're back up. I'm not sure. Yep. So there's some affordable housing. We've been, the town has approved some affordable housing off of. East street at the old East street school. And then there's also. That was it. That's it. That's it. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. So on Belzer town road, I believe that are going to, that are in the making. I believe way finders, which really. Like the, the mission of way finders. So Pam, when Pamela and I make that list of resources. We'll include some information about them because they, they do great programming for the residents. And then I think there's that still that one on North Hampton road that they're still working on. And the parking lot. So if you go down nine, which I know no one wants to, but if you go down nine, you'll see us. The other thing is that the VFW, they're the railroad tracks on main street has been acquired by the town and they're looking to make that a shelter. Right. I did hear that. Yeah. Well, yeah, awesome. Thank you for sharing that. And what you just missed were like really quick recap as I'm not going to go over the whole meeting. Is that we have an event for Lunar New Year on the 29th. And then a flag raising for black history month on the first. And then Laverne and Ben along with Jen and Pamela. We're going to come up with an in person event mid month for next month for black history month. So it's kind of a lay down recap of it. And everything else will be in the minutes. But then with that, we were, we're just about to end. Unless anybody else has anything else that they want to bring up. No. All right. Then I will call this meeting to an end at seven 41. Have a good night, everyone. Thank you. Thank you.