 Hello, everyone. Hi, Deb. Miss Pat, and Phillip, we already said hello. Hello, everyone. Hello. I am waiting for the agenda. Okay. So I am calling the meeting to order it is 602 pursuant to chapter 20. 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 see instructions below. 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. So the meeting is called to order. Everybody's present. Do I have to do the thing where I go around and say everybody's name and then they say things and just to make sure we're all heard. Yeah, everybody can hear. Okay. I'm going to just go by the order on my screen. Phillip, can you hear us and can we hear you? Yeah. Perfect. Thank you. D. Here. Perfect. Pamela. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Wonderful. Freck. Yeah. Thank you. Miss Pat. Miss. I think you're muted. Yeah. I'm sorry. Perfect. And Deborah. Here. And I can hear you. Perfect. I always feel like a school teacher when I'm doing that. It's very doesn't feel. It feels funny to me. So let's see. Okay. I'm going to go through the agenda. I'm going to review the agenda really quickly. First we'll have public comment, then a presentation on the resident oversight board. Then a presentation on the Massachusetts peace officer standards and training commission. Then statements from the families and youths of Amherst nine. And then a presentation on the public comment. And then a presentation on the DEI, which is diversity, equity and inclusion and crest, which is community responders for equity, safety and service updates. Any topics not anticipated by the chair, 48 hours in advance of the meeting. And then that would be it. So first is public comment. During the public comment period, I'm going to go through the agenda. I'm going to go through the agenda. I'm going to go through the agenda. I'm going to go through the agenda. I'm just stating your full name, preferred pronouns and residential address. Residents are welcome to express their views for up to three minutes. At the discretion of the chairs based on the number of people who wish to speak. No speaker can see their time to another. The CSSJC will not engage in a dialogue or comment on a matter raised during public comment. And I just wanted to check in with the group because I know that it's not something we want to do. I personally kind of like it because people might have something to react, respond to from the meeting. So I don't know if people are open to having to public comment periods. I like it. You know, sometimes it's a. People join later or they are there for particular. Spot on the agenda that they want to hear. So. I think it's important, but it's up to the committee. Miss Pat. I agree. I've attended couple committee meetings. And this is very flexible. In terms of public comments. Does anybody have any opposition to having a second public comment period. Sorry. Could we vote on it? So we have to make a motion. Okay. So did you want to make a motion? Freckle. To make a motion for. Public comments. Both at the beginning and at the end of. V.C. J.C. meetings. Does someone second it? I second. Can I second? Am I allowed to second? Yes. I second. Okay. So I think it's in favor. Of. Freckle's motion. Okay. No abstentions and no nays. So it passes overwhelmingly. Okay. So that being said, we will go to our first public comment. Period. There are two members of the public. If either of you would like to speak, please raise your hand. So. We can move on then to the next agenda item. Which is the resident oversight Ford timeline. So that would be Pamela. I think you're muted Pamela. Ms. Ms. Pat, is your hand up or was that up from earlier? No, it's up. Okay. Just very quickly. Ms. Young, do you know if the two liaisons were sent? This meeting notice. The time counselors. Oh, I do not know that the, uh, um, the notice was sent out by Angela as you know, Jen is out and I'm not, I don't, I'm not, I'm not sure whether it was sent to them. Okay. I'm just, I'm missing them right now. I know Pat. DeAngelis had emailed me right after our last meeting and said she was unable to attend tonight, but I have not heard from Dorothy. Okay. I'm going to, I'm going to message you. Yeah. I know that, um, Pat DeAngelis is, is away. Okay. All right. I'm going to attempt to share screen at this point. So included in your packet was, um, a draft of a proposed timeline for the creation of a resident oversight board. And I'm not going to go through the five page document in detail, but just basically want to talk about what the proposed, the proposed timeline would look like. So it's a five step process. Um, that looks includes community engagement, selection of the board model, developing board policies and procedures, selection and training of board members and implementation of the board. Um, based on the work that the CS. CSW group did. The acronyms sometimes are difficult for me to remember. Um, I think that the aggressive timeline of trying to get this accomplished within a 10 month period. Uh, that would mean that the board would be in place by the beginning of the new fiscal year. Um, In July. Uh, I think that, uh, that's still doable, but it is a pretty aggressive timeline considering that. Um, I think that the board would be able to talk about this and have not started the community engagement process. Um, so some of the challenges would be the fact that there is a slight delay in the start. Um, I think engaging the community in various aspects of having discussions about the creation of the board, whatever look like. And I know that a lot of work has been done previously. But I think that there wasn't wide engagement of the entire community. And so that as part of the, um, Working groups, I think it's report B is one of the things that is desirable in order for the creation of the board. And then the other, I think challenge is the. Collective bargaining agreement. Of the, um, Of the police department as it currently stands. I believe the supervisors. Uh, Uh, Uh, Collective bargaining agreement is being negotiated now and very shortly. The patrolman's agreement will be negotiated. Um, One of the opportunities and you'll hear more from Dr. Shabazz about that is, uh, that's, Um, Is post because while there has not been, I think discussion about the creation of a resident oversight board during the current, um, Collective bargaining agreement negotiations. The state legislation from post would mandate some of the things. Uh, that you would desire. And so there's, I think there's a way in which, um, you might. Not maybe you, you may be able to create a board that it doesn't exactly mirror the board that was designed and included in the CSWG working report, But I think that that would allow you to achieve some of the, um, Desired outcomes by relying on the post. Uh, legislation. So. Yep. Go ahead. Yeah, that's what I was going to ask. Pamela, you done. Do you want questions at this point? Sure. Sure. I mean, I, I, this, I know was on the, uh, I, I don't, I don't see that there was a lot of point in going into that. Um, I think that the document was shared with you in, um, in August. So I'm hoping that people have had an opportunity to take a look at it and, and ask more specific questions. And, um, as you know, it's still very much in the draft form. So I guess I have a couple of questions. Um, The first one would be. Uh, I know you talked about, you know, engagement and stuff like that. And then who would be the people to really kind of decide who's going to be selected on the board? Um, you know, do you have a process for that? Or is that something that you're going to like, you know, work out? Um, you know, as, as the timeline goes, or. Do you have any idea right now? So I think that the plan would be to follow the suggestions of the working group as far as board selection is concerned, but I think it would also be a decision that the town council would have to make. Um, because it would be a part of their decision and the, I guess bylaws or audience that they would create, create in order to establish the board. Yeah. Yeah, because I guess, yeah, because I guess my thing would be like, you know, like you said, CSWG, we definitely, you know, kind of did a very kind of detailed outline in terms of some of the things that we wanted to see. And I know you said you're going to be getting a lot of kind of stakeholder feedback, but, you know, hopefully again, to just remind it to make sure that you are getting the feedback from our group, CSSJC throughout the process, because, um, you know, we're going to be really looking at this Hawkeye, uh, in terms of, you know, what, how, you know, people are going to be selected, you know, making sure that there's stipend connected to this. This was a big part of our discussion. So resources funding so that they could be, um, people of color and people who are marginalized people from all backgrounds on this, um, board, because we know that a lot of times, you know, folks that are marginalized aren't able to be part of it because, you know, they don't have to, they have to work, they have this, they have that. So if there's a stipend or something connected to it, something that's a little bit more tangible, then that will make it more feasible. So obviously that's going to be something else to open and look at. Um, and then, and then third, the other one is what's going to happen in the meantime. I understand that obviously it takes time for a board of this type to be put in place. Um, but what's going to happen in the meantime, right? So we've got 10 months. So who is the community going to rely on to deal with, you know, like, especially like, you know, what happened with Amherstine and, you know, hopefully it won't happen again, but we can't just rely on hope, right? So what are we going to do in the meantime? Who's going to be the kind of, you know, group or panel or whatever that folks can rely on that complaints against the police because they're not going to go to the police. Right. So I think that's a complex question because we are bound by the current structures that are in place. And, um, currently there is not anything in, in place that would even come close to being what was desired of this resident oversight board. Um, and so I'm not really certain that there is a, a concrete answer to that question. I mean, what we have, what Phillip has tried to use are the human rights commission is to use their position as a way to, um, ask questions of the police department. Certainly the DEI director's position can ask questions of the police department, but neither the human rights commission, nor the, my role as the DEI director would have the authority to have, you know, full oversight, investigation, um, discipline, you know, those, those things are not in place at this point. Yeah. And I guess that's what I'm saying. I guess what I'm saying is that it needs to be in place to stop. That needs to be in place in the meantime, because if not, we're, we're, we're going to be, you know, in the same situation for the next 10 months until July 2023, which again is not going to be feasible for, for community members for us to just say, well, you know, just keep using what's in place for the next, you know, 10 months until July. Um, so I don't, I don't have a good, um, solution for a stopgap manager. I think if you wanted to fast-tracked a resident, um, advisory board, you would have to decide that the, some of the things that are, that the board would be able to do some of the power of the board, um, would have to change. So I, and of course I'm saying all of this is just thinking about the process, but let's, let's say for instance, that you wanted to fast-track a resident oversight board and, um, and one thing that the might occur would be to change the position of the board so that it was advisory as opposed to investigative or didn't have the, uh, you know, we were willing to not include the power to discipline police officers. So some of those things that would be required, um, to be a part of the collective bargaining agreement, which might cause a delay in the process if they were, if there were, if they were foregone, then that might speed up the process. I am not certain of, um, of what sort of an intermediary type or agency or board might look like. Um, in the research that I, that I did and in the research that you all did that's referred to in the reports, um, from the CSWG group, I don't recall any type of board that was sort of like a placeholder or something that was in between the two processes that currently existed in the city. Of course, like, you know, this is not my area of expertise, so I might have overlooked something and obviously would be willing to do more research or listen to other ideas, but I, I don't, I'm not aware of a, of a placeholder for lack of a better term agency. Well, yeah. And so, so let me, let me say it this way. Um, you know, one, um, we don't want to, to, you know, if it's going to, it's going to take time to put the board in place and we don't want to take away, you know, the strength and the power of the board that needs to be in place. And obviously I know you need to work with the unions and, and obviously that's, that's something that's going to take some time and everything. So that needs to happen. Like in terms of CSWG, remember, we were getting pushed too, right? We were getting pushed to do things very quickly, very fast. So we can think of everything. However, you know, we can think of the realities, right? Is that to put this board in place is going to take time. So then what has become apparent is that there needs to be a stopgap. You know what I'm saying? So that's what I'm saying. I'm saying that it does need to be a stopgap. It's not that we thought of everything because we couldn't think of everything at that time because we were under the gun to get these things done, right? Um, but the stopgap is going to be important. It's going to be necessary. So I guess I'm, I'm asking you and, you know, and others within the town, you know, I don't know what other folks in leadership there, you know, maybe with Phil from the Human Rights Commission, I don't know. To kind of put y'all, y'all's head together and maybe come and talk to us. Maybe we can put our head together too. First to come up with a stopgap. That's what I'm saying. And I'll stop here. Thank you, Deb. You bring up so many good points and some of the ones that, um, you know, I was thinking of, and while you were speaking, just trying to think through that, what would, uh, potentially, um, you know, uh, be a stopgap. So first off, the engagement with the community, it's important that the CSS JC know, um, with whom and how, because, uh, part of the, uh, issue, you know, in terms of equity and diversity is that again, we're at the table and we're helping to advise. Um, I do like that you have input from Poku and, and the BSU, but you know, just in thinking through that as far as higher ed, um, the Latino students, you know, they have their own kind of student body organization. Um, also the academic one, uh, clock us and then, um, BSU, but Afro-American studies and there's several different student, black, um, African descendant people's groups on campus, including Caribbean student organization. Um, you know, so I'm just saying it's much more complex in terms of, uh, looking to, uh, students of color, I think we do have to, to cast the net wide with that and utilize real quickly and utilize the resources that we have and we could help with that. So that's that. And then you can respond one moment. And then in terms of advisory as a stopgap, maybe a some type of configuration of the HRC, the CSSJC, uh, and DEI, at least on an advisory basis as a stopgap, the same configuration that we are basically, uh, committing to right now. Because as it stands and once I get to post how the complaints are being lodged, there is, um, a lack of, there's a lack of safety for, uh, people to lodge complaints. They're asking for birth dates. Well, you know, those types of things, names, you know, the whole thing to lodge a complaint with the police. This has been the problem that we've had previously. And I'll stop there. Yes. Yeah. So I just want to, um, to say that I, I really think that the entire committee would have to be involved in community engagement. And I, I, um, would hold up the model that the African heritage reparation assembly is doing, which includes, um, really an expectation that everyone on in the assembly, so everyone in this group would participate. One of the things that I, um, that I have had some discussions with Brianna, the communications director about is that, um, I think that we, there needs to be a script developed so that we are all, you know, um, really speaking and, and with one voice about the issue. So not people aren't going to one event and hearing one thing. And then another event and hearing in, um, something else differently. But, you know, the DEI department is, is only a department of two. And in order to do the widespread, uh, engagement that is necessary, um, we're going to need help. And it would be my expectation that it would be the members of this group who would be, um, participating in that community engagement. And I think that was part, part of your charge. So it's not, I don't envision that, that we're going, we, meaning the DEI department are going to do this work alone. Thank you. Um, Miss Pat. Nope. Nope. You're, you're muted. Unmute. Sorry about that. So Miss Young, um, thank you for putting this together and for the presentation. So, um, but, um, Deb and Allegra have said some of the points I wanted to make, um, but to have community feedback, engagement, I have to push back on that because when CSWG, when we were meeting, um, we through consultant, they did engage some folks. We also had like consultant out of town that also did some, that gave us some feedback. It's very, you know, with issue of police, police. It's triggering for some people. So I'm wondering, is it really a good use of anybody's time to spend the month of October doing community feedback? It's just in the question that I'm posing. I would rather have it focused on. So the projected date is June 2023. What I would like to see is, you know, will there be bylaw ready for the new resident oversight board? So we leave it up and running, meaning forming the board and everything by the June deadline. I think we need to think really deeper prioritizing, you know, what needs to be done. And regarding the gap, right now we don't have ROB. And I happen to attend the Human Rights Commission. Last week, Wednesday, I urge everyone and people who are listening and people who are listening in the future to check out that particular meeting. It saddens me that the town created this commission with highly talented, smart members, and yet the bylaw for HRC makes it impossible for this commission to do their job. It's something we need to think about if we're talking about having a Human Rights Commission to be the gap body. We need to have the bylaw that is current amended so that they will have the power to make decisions. I was really frustrated as I was listening to the meeting. And I think we need to make change. If we're talking about dismantling racism, we need to roll up our sleeves and do the work. Thank you. So I will invite Philip to comment about the bylaw and just focus on the first issue that you raise, which is around the work engagement. All of the research that I've done, the research that was cited in the working group document, all point to the fact that in order for a board to be very successful, there has to be community buy-in. And obviously I wasn't here during the work that the group did previously, but it is my understanding and you can correct me if I am wrong that there was not a widespread discussion about the resident oversight board. And as I said, the research seems to indicate that that is a necessary component. So, you know, I don't think that has occurred. I think it is important. I don't think it's a waste of time. I think it is possible to engage in community engagement and work on the bylaw at the same time. Philip, do you have anything to share? Yeah, I was just going to share that. I think that the resident oversight board is a very necessary part that I believe previous CSWG members saw coming then. Thank you for that foresight because it, as Miss Pat has kind of entered that right now with the Human Rights Commission, we're kind of at a standstill because of a bylaw that won't allow us to push the envelope further than we would like it to go right now. We have put in, and we'll hear later today, the voices of the families and the voices of the children involved in this incident. And other than putting it on record, it does not seem that it's going to be pushed in any direction. And so we're looking at different avenues as to where we can go, whether that be with post and looking to see if town council might be open to changing bylaws. We're having a retreat this next week, I believe, on the second. So if I know that's a discussion point for us. We've got a lot of work cut out there for the Human Rights Commission is while I'm trying to say, and right now, this purview of not having an over, or the resident oversight board is very evident and very needed in our community. And I kind of like the idea of having CSSJC, HRC, and the DEI department, maybe be that gap that Deb was talking about for the time being, until we create the oversight board. Thank you. Allegra, you have your hand up. Thank you and your hand up first. Well, they've already heard from me. I'll come back. Why don't you go ahead? I, I, at first when I saw this, I was kind of thinking, oh my gosh, this is such a long timeframe, but I do appreciate that it seems that the steps involved are with deliberation. So it's, it does leave us in this place where we don't have something in place for longer than we would like to not have something in place for, but I do think that the idea of getting community feedback, especially if CSSJC is involved in those engagement efforts so, so that we're involved in hearing from the community is important. And I think, I think the one on the one hand, it could show whether there's buy-in and on the other hand, there might be something that we didn't think of that a community member does have to bring to the table. I do think that it should be a both and so we're not just not working on the bylaw until we've checked the engagement process, we're thinking about two things at once. And I guess my question would be if there is any more kind of specific idea about who might sit on a, on an interview committee for this, would it be, you know, would there be representation from our committee from HRC, from DEI, from town, because I know, for example, when this committee was formed, there were various stakeholders that were brought in that weren't necessarily related to any of the town committees in town, but had a lot of knowledge and care for the work that was being done. So, so I guess I'm just wondering how the selection of the selectors would work. Okay, so I, so let me just repeat your question to make sure I understand it. So you're asking who would participate in the selection of individuals who would be on the resident oversight board. Yes. Okay. All right. So it is my understanding that the town would be following the recommendation of the previous working group. So I am not familiar enough with all of the procedures in the town to stay to understand whether that is discussions with the personnel board and the town manager about the composition. I, I, I quite frankly, I just don't know the details of the, of that answer, but it is my understanding that the recommendations of the working group are what would be guiding that process. And those recommendations, as you, as you know, called for a majority BIPOC board with representation from other marginalized groups in town. Thank you. Thank you. I'm, I'm assuming, and I could be totally off base, but that the, the town manager. As kind of the head CEO head CFO, so to speak, of the town of Amherst appoints that committee to, as a hiring committee, so to speak. And then they select folks and again, hopefully it's going to be across the board in terms of BIPOC representation. I just wanted to say in terms of the timeline, I want to agree with Deb that a lot of, you know, once again, a lot of this research has been done. But one of the critical components that CSWG had in terms of getting this work completed was not only, of course, their commitment to it, but hiring qualified consultants. And I'm not even talking about me. I'm talking about the one from out of town, you know, that did the final report with, with CSWG. Hired consultants to help with this work. Review boards in other towns from my research. They are really important and significant steps in restoring trust, not only within, you know, public safety, but within town managerial class of people, because some of that due to what has happened recently. And in the past, of course, has been undermined by the actions of folks in the town. So what I'm putting to you, Pam, is that I think it's important and we could support you on this, is that a consultant be hired to look at not only the research of the CSWG, the, all the other consultants, but also what, what is put out by post and what is in terms of the contract potentially so that that can all come together. And we have a solid review board that works for this community. So the, an external consultant is listed as one of the questions on page one and throughout the document. So I, I mean, anticipating that there, that that is definitely will be a possibility. Obviously, you know, there needs to have discussions with the town manager and about funding of, but this is a very specialized area and there are organizations and individuals with this expertise. So, you know, that's, you know, something I certainly agree that there should probably be an external consultant to hire to sort of guide the town through this process. Absolutely. I mean, that's, you know, my, my opinion, the committee may differ, but I just feel very strongly that we need a consultant or consultants to come in to assure that this is the best type of configuration. We know we need it. We want it. But the best type of configuration, particularly considering as a police, you know, negotiate their contract right now. This is a critical moment. Ms. Pat, you had. Yeah, I was just going to respond to some of Allegra's question as to the makeup of the committee. I think the WG deliberately recommended that two members of CSWG should be appointed. So I just want to put that out, just like we recommended to have two CSWG members to be appointed to, to this group as well. So appointed to the interview committee or. No, I wanted to the ROB. So two members of my CSWG group will have to be appointed to join it. Yeah. And I can't remember all the other ones, but we are very kind of specific in terms of the other roles so that it, that it was diverse so that it had like income diversity. I had a whole bunch of different, you know, diversity and inclusivity across the board. So that would be another thing to really pay attention to for the next two years. And I think that's going to be a very important part of the process. And I think that whoever is going to be kind of, you know, following that process. And I just want to, before I ask my question, I just want to be supportive of what. D said in terms of, you know, the stop gap being maybe these three groups, us, HRC and the I think, you know, we need to kind of, you know, work on how that could, could happen. But I think, you know, that might be the way to go because you stated about the unions, right? And that their supervisor union meeting right now. And then the police officer union is going to be meeting. So I guess, and you know, negotiating and I, you know, I know that a lot of times when they put these contracts in place, it's like for three years. At least it's multiple years in terms of contracts being in place. So I guess my thing is, you know, are we priming them with the fact that this is coming? So even if they can't be included in negotiations now, because it's not up, but are we priming them with that? Because then what you have to do is renegotiate contract when the Rob is, is, you know, ready to go. It has to be brought to them to kind of go through, you know, the parts, but I hope you guys are doing like some of the laying of the land right now with the unions. Is that happening? So I'm not a part of the negotiation team, but I know that I've had conversations with Paul about the need for this to be included in the negotiation and the negotiations. I do believe that the negotiations do include conversations about post so that in some way will sort of prime the pump because that's part of the negotiation. But I don't believe that there've been specific conversations about the resident oversight board, but I know that there are specific conversations about post that are coming. But yeah, so that might be something to talk to Paul about and figure some of that stuff out because the unions, you know, obviously, you know, I love the unions obviously that they're for a good reason, but they could also be a big hall, right? There's going to be places where you all are going to have to really kind of negotiate. So the more time you have with them, you know, really, you know, letting them know what's coming down the pike and things like that, the better it will be because what they don't want is to be, you know, sideswiped, right? And just come, you know, all of a sudden now we have this or whatever, you know. And what I mean is that obviously we've been talking about it, but we need to address it to them directly. It's not just to hear it on the news or in the newspaper or one of them joins our meeting, not like that. It has to be officially like you all are talking to them about this so that they all notice that this is coming, you know, so that they won't come with, oh, well, you all never let us know about anything. You all were just already putting these things together and never talk to any of us. I mean, you all know how to do this. I mean, it's just about making sure that these conversations are being had, even if it can't be included in the negotiations right now per se, because there's no specifics. Yeah, so, I mean, as you said, you know, I'm sure that Paul is aware that he needs to have some conversations about this with the unions. And I'm not part of those of the negotiation team. I know that they're having conversations around post and some of the things that that would need to occur would also be happening as a part of that post legislation. So I think that there is some preliminary, well, I know that there are conversations specifically about post, I don't know what specific conversations have been had about the resident oversight board, but I do know that people in the town hall are aware that they need to have those conversations. Okay, yeah, and even if they aren't, if you could just bring that to Paul, since obviously we're close to Paul, I mean, you know, that's another reason for you being in these meetings is just to kind of, you know, share with him our feedback and what we think needs to happen because, you know, the earlier you start these conversations, the better with the unions. Thank you. I don't like or miss Pat, I don't know. Thanks. I'm sorry. I can't find the button. I was just going to say, and I don't know what Miss Pat's going to say, but I was wondering if maybe I think there's been a lot of talk about posts and maybe if it would be helpful to go to the post presentation to give some context, if nobody else has any pressing comments that they want to make about the presentation on the resident oversight board. But Miss Pat, I'll be very brief, extremely brief. So, oh my goodness. So CSWG was very, very clear that whoever end up being the DEI director should be involved, come wide on issues that will impact a specially marginalized group. It pains me that there is contract negotiation with APD and our DEI director is not involved. In fact, I was the one who pushed for two departments. The reason being that we need people of color to be, to sit on the same table where our senior management in this town who are mostly white people. And then we're talking about contracts with the union and we don't have DEI director on it. I would like to propose that CSSJC send a letter to the town manager because this is the vision that CSWG had that we have somebody from marginalized group to be part of decision making, okay? In issues like this. And the DEI director is the perfect person to do it. I don't mean to put you, like put you on what you call it, but I just wanted to put that out. Like it's really distressing me that the DEI director is not part of the union negotiation contract. Thank you. So I'll just say that I believe that the negotiation team had been predetermined before I started in my position and they had already started their work, which maybe why I wasn't brought in because the work was ongoing. And I don't know when the team will be determined for the patrolman's union, which I actually would argue would be the more critical union to be a part of those conversations. And even though, and I will just add that, even though I'm not a part of the negotiation team, I know that Donna Ray, the previous HR director and I had conversations because she was a part of the negotiation team about this issue. So, you know, there is a way for there to be a communication regardless of whether I'm actually on the team or not. And I will just point out that this is a department of two. So there's already a lot on my plate. Not to say that it's not important. I don't want to take it on, but, you know, there is a lot to do. So I appreciate that, Miss Pat. And I know I definitely appreciate that. Pam, that it's just two. And there's a lot happening in this town. And that is why the CSWG really pushed for a DEI director. But I think Miss Pat mentioned last meeting that we really need like another person, you know, to handle some of the day to day kind of office type of things so you can be free to do the larger work, such as, you know, surveying from top to bottom, you know, the racial, ethnic, language diversity, et cetera, of people that we employ in town, you know, and at what levels and salaries, you know, salary parity, those are the types of things that a DEI director in other municipalities look at. An annual or biannual survey of these types of characteristics for the towns, right? So those are larger things that we definitely want you to attend to at some point. And, you know, I really do ask, sincerely, how can we help push this along? Because, you know, we see that, you know, there's already, we understand there's on ramping, but there's, there's struggling to make sure that these areas are covered. And that is not a slight to you at all. It is simply, you know, trying to push and maybe even challenge in terms of resources, resource allocation in this community. Of course, the town managers being evaluated currently, I really encourage us all to submit a good, bad or indifferent, you know, the, you know, comments in terms of the town managers' performance. He is under our employee as residents. So I hope that we all participate in that. But I think this is a critical, critical thing that you need the support in order to do what a DEI director does. So I don't know if, if you all are aware, but there is a mass DEI coalition of diversity, equity, and inclusion managers in the state. And they actually had a launch party today for a document that they have prepared for municipalities around the Commonwealth. So I've been actually a member of that group before I even started in this position. So once the position, my appointment, potential appointment was announced, I was one of the members of the group, Jillian Harvey, who is the DEI director for the town of Arlington reached out. So I've been in communication and participating with that group. And one of the things that, that Jillian would say is that she would advise that the DEI directors don't do the type of full assessment that you're describing that they use a consultant. I actually have developed an assessment tool that I will be sharing with all the department heads, which asks them a series of questions. It's probably not as complete as a private or external consultant would do, but it does begin to have us take a look at the demographics of the various departments, both in terms of employees and in terms of individuals that they serve in the community, as well as a series of other questions so that we can start to really unpeel, you know, this onion of about where the town is, what people see as their role, how they might enter into the work. So it is my intention to do that high level work and I have gotten started on it. I'm just cautious that, you know, that as a department of two, I don't want the list of responsibilities to become so large that I'm ineffective in the things that I'm asked to do, you know, so in addition to this commission, you know, Jen and I are staffing two other boards and they all have, you know, different agendas that are equally as important that we're trying to work on. So it's not that I am minimizing the importance of the task. I'm just trying to make sure that I can adequately do the task that I have already on my plate and they're important and they will require a lot of energy. You know, I would say that this one commission could be my full-time job without anything added because of the number of things that you have on your plate and because of the depth that is required in order to do them. So, you know, I'm just trying to moderate what is asked of the department and of me and be realistic about what I can achieve and can achieve. Absolutely. And yes, definitely. However, it's to be achieved in terms of those types of surveys and assessments, but it's a long time coming in terms of doing that in the town of Amherst. So I look forward to once that happens, but I know it's just another something added to your plate. Okay. So are there any other comments? Oh, Deb, sorry. Yeah. Yeah, just quickly, just to kind of again, you know, reaffirm what Dee said Pamela, I mean, I think what you want to do though is kind of you already, like you said, you know, you're new, you're trying to get to the land, but you already see there's a lot of work, but also there's a lot of need, right? Amherst, we've been dealing with these types of, you know, inequities and issues for a long time. And this is the time to really push. So the other part too that you want to be thinking about is really kind of doing an assessment for yourself in your office, right? There's you and Jennifer, like, like Dee said, right? You need an administrative assistant or someone to kind of manage more of the day-to-day office, but maybe you all need some more staff people too, right? So that then, because it's going to be important, like what Ms. Pat was saying about having, you know, you and others at the table representing the voices of the marginalized, right? The voices of those that are not heard, their issues are not being brought to the table. So I think that this is also for you to kind of think about, right? How else to, because again, CSWG, we were under a tight timeline. So what we did was like, hey, we needed to create this, we needed to, but it's not like we had all the details, right? So as we're going through the process and we're seeing everything that's actually happened to be done, now you and others and with our help, right? Whatever you need, you're going to get our support to really put the pressure to get it. So think bigger, think outside the box and really, you know, stop making that assessment because I think what you might need is more people for your department. Thank you. And I see Earl Miller has joined us. Hello. Hello. Sorry. Sorry. I wasn't earlier. I got this meeting mixed up with another one. I apologize. Okay. So where are we Allegra on our agenda? My next. Let's, let's head to post. Oh, okay. Alrighty. Well. Let's see. Okay. Good. You have the, the new one. Thank you, Pam. So in your packet, I submitted a PDF of this presentation. Since then I've added about four slides. And try to just make things clear. So there, there are slight revisions, but it's mainly the same information. So want to just briefly, we're going to talk about what's posed. It's already been hinted at. Where's the application of post as a system statewide. And then getting to the point, how might we utilize this? And these are just some suggestions. And I hope we could think of others. How might we utilize this in Amherst? So if you want to go to the next one. Let's see. Can I actually let, can I, I'm going to share my screen because I have it. Real quick. Let's see. There we go. And. Okay. Can everyone see it? Great. All right. So what post is maybe some of you are familiar with it beyond, you know, the packet and what we've been discussing. It comes out of a survey. Coming out of 2019 where, you know, there's a lot of, you know, there's a lot of, you know, again, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor in the wake of their, their deaths and their murders. There was kind of this top to bottom look. At policing in Massachusetts. And it's not that it's not, you know, people contest it, particularly the, some of the police organizations, there is a very important aspect of the survey. That there are some needs and some troubling aspects about how localized our training in the state of Massachusetts is. And what that means is that each municipality, each town has the ability to kind of set their own standards. And it's not something that on the state level that is fully mandated. So that means it differs, right? From community to community. And so those are some of the things that they really wanted to look at. They also wanted to look at, and this comes out of CSWG, how are we able to track, you know, troubling police officers that have had complaints, right? So background checks for every officer in the state, mandatory certification processes for police officers and training, and then charge with creating more accountability so that there's guidelines in the cases of where police officers have been found to, you know, behave improperly that there's a de-certification process, suspension of certification, and reprimand, et cetera, from misconduct. Those things were not made, you know, they were different from each community. So they wanted to have it more statewide be the same. And so that's why they develop posts. And so here are some of the other findings. One of the things that I found really interesting, and of course, this has been corrected since post has been instituted, is that the state of Massachusetts was one of four in the United States that did not have one of these comprehensive types of systems where things were more uniformed in terms of policing. So we were, you know, again, handling things on these kind of local jurisdictions independently. And there was very little oversight on the state level. The other thing I thought was really interesting that, again, this parallel, some of the critique of CSWG is that within the training, that it lacked a kind of curriculum diversity. And that had to do with, you know, kind of cultural, you know, knowing different people's cultures and that type of thing in different communities, they didn't have that. And so again, that was not very uniformed. And that indeed, and this is still happening that there's a shortage of training instructors. So even if those municipalities wanted some type of specialized training for cultural competency, there's very few people to handle that. And so these are their recommendations that came out of post. Again, it started in 2019 with that survey, was that you'd ensure officers are meeting training requirements. And by having these training requirements and establishing standards, that becomes part of their certification as officers. Like they would actually have to go through this, including cultural competency and the like to be certified, okay? And that they would continue to evaluate the training curricula and instructor certification. So not just, of course, the police, but the instructors. And that would be something that they would continually do. Again, on the state level, making it more uniformed instead of very individualized locally. So here you have the set minimum training standards, certification and police licensure, required departments to track. And this comes out of CSWG again, departments to track fired and problematic officers to make sure that they are not unknowingly hired when leaving one department for another in the same or different state. That is something you would assume that we do. As a state, but it's not happening. Some bad officers are fired, they leave one locality and they get hired in another. And so that's a pretty serious problem. And of course, the ultimate goal is to restore public trust. And so their idea was to develop these four databases, two type of internal databases and then two public databases. And what's important about these databases in tracking police officers is that one of those databases would actually have complaints attached to them, any types of, on the good end, it would have the certifications attached to it, but you would be able to track any officer where a complaint has been filed or that was problematic in terms of domestic violence, let's say. And these are things that again, are being contested by police unions because they feel that that's an invasion of privacy, but this is what the Post Committee is pushing for. So these are some guidelines that they are still working on, but this is the proposal, these four databases and the two public are important for our uses. So the public database, as the quote from Anika Zuniga, who's the director of Post, I imagine initially the ability for someone to type up a name and see fundamentally some disciplinary history and certification status. I think that is ultimately really important when we think of negotiating with our police for the new contract. This is pretty strong to have such a database in place because we can find out, are they fit to serve? Are they fit to serve? And then do they have some cultural competency? If so, what types of certifications? So this is just kind of repeating some of that. The important part of this, the database would include information about investigations against law enforcement officers, including suspensions, terminations, resignations, right, to avoid discipline. So it's not like, oh, they just left. It's like, well, why did they leave? Those things would be attached to it. So thus far, as in my research, it's 4,500 records, but we're talking about 15 to 20,000 full-time police officers at the very least. So the commission is kind of behind in doing this and compiling the information. Some of it has to do with their local and unions that are contesting having this database be released to the public. I did want to share, however, just to see how this coincides with some of the things that the CSWG and 7Gen worked on. Here is right out of the report. We show evidence of the need for these types of databases. Former police chief that came and consulted here with UMass and the local police, he said that we did not have a very good system to lodge complaints and to the previous conversation about the review board that they recommended a civilian advisory group, right? That would not only help in terms of community police relations, but again, it would add transparency, right? So these are things that since 2014, this community has, of course it was needed before, but they knew they were made aware of the need, okay? So then here's part of how POST handles complaints and incident reports. And the language here to me is very strong when we were talking about the Amherst 9 and what occurred and had someone complained, who's gonna complain or do they feel safe to complain? Those types of debates actually aren't even important if there is an issue having to do with police behavior that is suspect, there should be a complaint here, it says complaints and this comes straight out of the document itself. So you can have this as a PDF and go to the document. Complaints can originate from a member of the public as an external complaint, from personnel at the agency, an internal complaint or incident or any other source and that they are required two business days of receipt of a complaint alleging the misconduct of an officer. So that officer may be cleared in the end, but these are things that should be reported just as a point of process. And here are the types of complaints alleging bias on the basis of race ethnicity, et cetera. And then two, complaints regarding use of force, excessive prohibited or deadly force. And then three, actions that result in serious bodily injury or death, right? So those are much more serious, but one, complaints alleging bias, those are things that are again, that they're specifying, those are things that are legitimate complaints. And then there's another area of complaints that are regarded related to being unprofessional and this is their language, unprofessional. If the complaint is related to minor matters, including discourtesy and basic work rule violations, tardiness, et cetera, please refer to post regulations to maintain a log of these complaints which need not be submitted to post, but made available upon request. So again, the database would track these types of complaints, lacking in professional kind of decor and professional behavior, but it's not necessarily, you know, something in infraction that they could be fired for. However, complaints and incidents that are not related to minor matters as described above and fall in the category of officer misconduct or unprofessionalism should also be submitted to post and subcategorize as follow. Now understand what I'm reading is a part of the guidelines of post. There's a whole section on advisory that I'm gonna get into at the very end, but these are guidelines which are the stronger legal language. And maybe that's something, Pam, you can qualify as to what's guideline and what's advisory, but the guidelines are the stronger legal language. And so here, unprofessionalism, policy or procedure violations, conformance to laws, conduct, unbecoming and untruthfulness. All of those are areas that are, you know, that can be cited as areas to report. So we're not gonna watch the video, but it is connected to the PDF. Here, you have evidence of how post is working already in the state of Massachusetts, 19 police officers no longer certified to serve. And it has to do with these guidelines that have been put in place with post. And you can watch the little news segment on that. Now, the whole point of this is to suggest that with these stronger guidelines, there is a way in which we could have better police accountability. And on the police end, it would restore trust in terms of community and police relations. So important, of course, for us to look at the collective bargaining that is now going to take place within a few months and that we fully understand how the non-disclosure clause, and this is why I was saying Pam, maybe it's worth, you know, again getting somebody hiring a consultant soon because the non-disclosure clause that is already part of the contract, that's something now we can reopen in relationship to the post guidelines. So my question, does the non-disclosure clause contradict the legal mandate of post and is it used to report or track complaints of officers, right? How can we utilize that? Because again, that accountability is really important. Are we currently using any of the guidelines of post? I would like to know that as not only a resident, but as the CSSJC, especially regarding police complaints. Now I've gone on the police website. There is an area where you can put, you know, any type of compliments or, you know, the good deeds that the police are doing. I'm certainly, you know, we know that there's certainly a lot of that. But then you go to the complaint section and you have to put your personal information. So I'll show you that after I finish this because I'm tying up. And I think that, well, I know that in the research that we did, people are, you know, fear having their personal information shared like that because they're afraid of retaliation. So, and here, if post is not used, then we should stress the importance of usage in the next bargaining agreement with APD. So I think what you were suggesting, Pam, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, is that they aren't necessarily using post currently, that this might be the start of putting this into the new contracts. So, go ahead. So the police department is in compliance with post the way in which the legislation works. Each department is asked to submit basically a third of their police department records to the post commission. So over a three year period, the commission will review all of the officers in the Commonwealth. So the Amherst Police Department has submitted all of the records for the officers that they needed to submit for this timeframe, for this first review. And they're fully in compliance with the post requirements or submission of certification of officers. And I do believe that they're, that they've followed all of the policy requirements of post. They are currently, I think it's a supervisors union that is currently in negotiation about the collective bargaining, over their collective bargaining agreement. And they are having discussions about post as part of that discussion. So it's post to state law. So the collective bargaining agreement cannot be an opposition of state law. So those requirements will be a part of the new agreement. Great, thank you for that clarification. I also want to, I see your hand is up real quick. Wanted to offer here is also within post. And understand there, I just read some of the guidelines. This is part of the advisory section which is, again, maybe Pam could distinguish what's the difference, but the advisory section has a whole section on de-escalation and disengagement in terms of interactions with minor children. So children under the age of 18. And so you could see here in my little rough outline here to highlight it to issue guidance as to developmentally appropriate de-escalation and disengagement tactics, techniques and procedures and other alternatives to the use of force of minor children that may take into account contextual factors including, but not limited to the person's age, disability status, developmental status, mental health, linguistic limitations or other mental or physical condition. So those are advisories that are issued as a part of post. And I just think of, you know, how that interaction that we saw might have been different had this had been attended to perhaps in a different way. So I did want to offer that and Allegra, go ahead because I'm gonna go on to this next slide that gets a bit more detailed, yes. I was just gonna say, I think in reading the LEAP report that had been put out when CSWG was putting together their Part B report, there were some things that the LEAP report flagged as possibly being out of compliance with post in terms of some of the disciplinary things, for example, like something going off of somebody's record within one year. So I think I can go back through the LEAP report and kind of look at where the suggestions to bring into compliance with the post regulations would be, but that is something that LEAP had definitely flagged as there were some areas that needed to change. I think you're right. I think we need to find that spot and that page, but I think you're right about that. And I remember that that being a point of discussion when the LEAP portion of the report came out for the CSWG. So that is going to contradict that. So that's something that has to be negotiated, right? And they can't be out of compliance, period. So here, the training certification for interactions with children. There's a whole certification area for that. And they should be, this is something Earl maybe even to attend to here. Law enforcement officers should be trained in developmentally appropriate trauma-informed and racially equitable tactics to de-escalate minor children. So including communication strategies. So I think this is really important, which avoid threats and intimidation and promote calm age-appropriate language, provide choices and allow ample time for compliance. This is something, again, that we witnessed. The police did not do any of that. At least within the clip that we saw. Now, thank goodness it all ended calmly, but I actually, going back to the children, it ended calmly because the children stayed calm. And then lastly here, this is coming out of the same advisory that education and training specifically, training and communication stabilization and crisis intervention strategies, right? Strategies and techniques should encompass and they offer the following, active, reflective, empathetic listening, rapport building, affect management and crisis negotiation and response. If we recall the officers, and I don't know the female officer, and unfortunately she will live in my memory, but what she was saying to the young people in having no rights, there are others there saying the same thing, but again, affect management, crisis negotiation and response, rapport building. I didn't see any of that taking place. So again, this is how some of this could be utilized, right? In training and certification of the APD. Yes, that was you Pam. Yeah, I just wanna correct. So it was not the female officer who made this statement. So I think we need to correct that. Okay, thank you, thank you. I guess I remembered it incorrectly. So, but the officer's there and I think it's again really important that we look to these new strategies and these new guidelines as a means of training our APD in appropriate ways to interact with our young people and with the residents of this community. So that is what I have to offer in terms of posts, there's a lot more, of course that you could find on the massachusetts.gov website. In terms of posts, very specific areas within the guidelines. And like I said, they have the section on advisory that includes interaction with youth. So if I may, as a follow-up, I would like to say that I am aware that two members of the Amherst police department recently attended a de-escalation training that these are the two officers or officer and a patrolman who are responsible for providing training to the other officers in the department on de-escalation techniques. So I know that there have been some efforts for them to gain additional knowledge and training on this topic. And that was actually a regional event that was hosted at UMassie Amherst. And I think I know the invitation went out to probably more than 50 departments. So it was a pretty large regional event. Okay, thank you. Earl? So just quickly, currently we do not have any role in the training of APD on any level. We do have some trainings coming up. We will invite all of our public safety partners to participate, but I just wanna, I don't have any ability to influence their attendance or frankly do anything other than invite. So no, the reason why, thank you for that clarification. I wasn't suggesting that you all were doing the training. It's just that when we think of trauma informed, you know, and I think of our colleague Allegra that, you know, as a social worker and reminds us that, you know, the interactions with police for many people, it's very traumatic and it's very triggering. And so to have some type of training that keeps that at the center, particularly in dealing with our youth, I think is terribly important. And so I am thankful for the guidelines, but you know, it's like, what about the training? Training is something that also within our research we found with CSWG and Seven Gen and Elite Probably Report, that training only goes so far, right? It's the people and it's how we hold them accountable in terms of the use of that training, right? So, no, I appreciate that, Earl. Any questions or comments? I mean, overall I'm hopeful, but I really, you know, it's how will it be included, right? Not only within the contract, but how will it be included within our own APD? Yeah, I think it was Allegra and then Deb. I'll defer to Deb, because I already said something. No, I mean, I think that that's really what I wanted. Thank you for doing the presentation, Dee. But I really just wanted to kind of get a sense of, I guess, you know, how are we going to have like, or who do we get the information from to kind of see how is APD, you know, actually doing in regards to post, right? Are they following everything that is there that's the, you know, that's the requirement? I know that panel that you said that it seems like they are, quote unquote, whatever that means, but I really want to get more into the details into the weeds, so, but I'm not sure, you know, how do you go about that? I guess it was a question. So I don't have a specific answer for that, other than to say that I have spoken with the Chief and he told me that the Amherst Police Department was in compliance with the post regulations and that they had gone through the first one-third of the officers as they're required to do. I don't know, from my review of the post, I don't know if there's a requirement that there's a public disclosure of the activities that they're doing in order to comply. So those training recommendations or any of those things. So I'm willing to ask, but I don't know of a mechanism for how that would be publicly disclosed other than to state that they're in compliance and the last news report that I saw about post was that the commission had not completed all of the reviews that they were required to within this timeframe because the Boston Police Department had not complied but every other police department had complied with their regulations. I know that there was at one point a list of those communities that were not in compliance published but every indication is that Amherst has complied with everything that they're required to do at this point. And at this point, what you're saying is that I think it's A through F maybe that they've submitted. So that's how far behind they are in the sense that they're doing it alphabetically. They've gotten A through F and so there's the whole other set of the alphabet that they got to go through to submit records. Right. So the expectation was that it would be a three year process in order for them to do like the 15,000 or 16,000. So A through F was just I guess by names, the third of the group and then they'll go through the remainder of the alphabet. But I, we have relatively speaking a very small police force. So it would probably be quite easy for the chief although I can't speak for him, right? To find out whether the remainder of the police force like a third of our, two thirds of our police force is still a relatively small number. So I'm sure they know whether all of their officers would meet the requirements or not. Right. And when you talk also about requirements that's the certifications that they have to participate in. Right. So in Amherst and this was as part of the report that the CSWG did. So Amherst is one of like 91 towns and cities and towns in the Commonwealth that has an accredited police department. So there's over 351 police departments in the Commonwealth and only about a third of them are accredited and Amherst is fully accredited. So it would be my speculation, good probability that all of our officers are gonna meet the requirements for post for certification because the department is already accredited. So it as it operates at a higher standard than some other police departments in the Commonwealth. And so that brings up and then we'll go to Allegra, a diversification of the types of trainings. And so it's to look at what type of training not only statewide, but locally that our police department is participating in. So we just heard one, a new de-escalation training, which is great. But there, again, there's others out there that may be applicable or are appropriate for us. Allegra. I guess I'm just having a little bit of a hard time thinking about like trauma informed and people carrying a gun in like the same sentence. I mean, I work in the courthouse and I see police every day and it's still scary for me to see a police officer with a gun holstered walking down the hallway to the water cooler, you know, it's triggering. And that's in, you know, I'm doing my job, I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. I'm not in fear of anything or, you know. So I can't really imagine being a young person interacting with a person who has a gun and thinking that, you know, oh, that was really a trauma informed interaction. And I feel better because this person has had this specific training. And I see kind of what you say, Dee, that, you know, training is important and having uniform training kind of know better what we're dealing with, but it is about how a person uses that training. And if they're not using that training, then what good is the training? And I guess my concern is that by increasing the types of trainings that a police officer needs to have, that will be inadvertently funneling more money into the system of policing rather than funneling money into alternative programs such as press or even just community services that address a lot of the things that people who might be coming into contact with the police are struggling with, whether that's substance use or housing issues or job instability, immigration issues. You know, I think I get a little prickly when I think about spending more money on police training when I think that perhaps if we were spending money in the community instead, we wouldn't need police as much. So I mean, that is just, I don't know if it's a critique at post or just like a, I don't know what we do with my jumbled thoughts, but I just kind of wanted to say that because it made me a little concerned. So personally, I agree with you, but realizing after reading the guidelines and the advisory's and post that each community is not to say, they're not making it up, but they're deciding on what type of training, they're deciding on their different approaches and that it's not uniformed statewide. That made me a bit anxious because we're talking about people, right? So we're talking about fallible humans that we are and making those types of decisions and not to say that policy and procedure and bylaws and all that because they're made by people, but at least there's a point of reference to say, oh, this police officer or this department stepped out of line based on the state guidelines and we know what we're dealing with. If it's, oh, by the Amherst guidelines and not by the Arlington or Pittsfield guidelines, that makes me kind of anxious. I mean, I do think like, what happened in Pittsfield this past year where the person with mental illness was shot. What happened? Was it a lack of training? Was it a lack of de-escalation? I don't know, but at least we have a reference point that we can look at and say, oh, well they weren't following these particular guidelines. So now let's look at that. So I agree. It's like, do we need more money put into training? I think we need some type of overall, and that is just my opinion, some type of overall model of what an expectation and accountability for the police in the state of Massachusetts. I mean, if we're gonna have them, then yeah, I want something that goes across the board, that it doesn't differ from town to town. I don't know, like to hear anyone else's ideas around the use of post. I just want to say one quick thing, because I think I'm losing my internet. I'm in Agawam, I think I'm gonna lose my internet connection. I think the Pittsfield situation is one you may actually want to look more into because it was de-escalated. There were actually two police engagements in that event. It was an incident of self-harming. The first officer was able to de-escalate and disarm the person. The second officer, which was a second call, was actually the officer to shoot the shots. I just think there's a lot for everyone to learn about kind of long-term de-escalation from that situation. Okay, I'll look into it, but it does having a loved one with severe mental illness that it just, it always makes me anxious and to know that that happened so close to home, but I will look into it. I was agreeing with you, actually. I think part of it is what, there's some level of risk in folks with mental health challenges being in the community just because their behavior differs from ours, but statistically they're just far more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators. All right, so I think I'm gonna be out for today. Sorry, I missed the rest of the meeting. I'll see you all soon. All right, Deb or Ms. Pat, I don't know who was next. So I'll go. So with this over here, what you were saying, Allegra, in terms of, I'm in agreement with what you were saying too, in regards to the trainings. And I think that's something that we kind of struggled a lot with with CSWG, right? Because we were like, we're trying to recommend as an alternative to the police and really stop limiting the numbers of police. And that's why we're saying no new hires when they retire or they leave or things like that, right? To do a transition, and especially as Cress kind of ramps up and things like that. But I think as what we saw with the Amherst nine, right? While we do have police, we do need training. You know what I'm saying? Because if we don't have the training, if they're not getting these types of trainings for de-escalation, because they still are out there, they still are armed, and they still are dealing with responding to complaints. And it's too bad that Earl left, because of course I wanted to ask him about press and so on and so forth and how they're doing. And especially in terms of response to noise complaints and things like that, because really they should only, we just wanted the police to be dealing with criminal violations and all non-criminal would be pressed that would be responding to it. So that's the thing. I mean, until there is a total phase out, let's say, or something like that, money needs to be funneled to training, but obviously training that works, not the check the box type of training, right? It has to be who's doing the training? Is it long-term? Is it something that's really being effective as opposed to just the one-time kind of training just to say, yeah, we did it. And really you don't utilize anything that the training imparted. Thank you, Ms. Pat. So I'll be very quick. Thank you, Dee, for the presentation. So I'm looking at the time and we have quite busy agenda. And I was wondering if people have more points to make on post, if not, maybe we should move on. I have a lot to talk about about our APD. For myself, I don't believe in training. I'm sorry, nothing is going to change. I was very clear with CSWG, it is what it is. Until there is accountability, no amount of training would change these people. And it has nothing to do with race. It has to do with blue code protecting each other. Until there is accountability, training means nothing. People who watch CSWG knew where I stand when it comes to diverting resources, money, to police training. It's not going to work. I'm sorry, thank you. Thank you, Ms. Pat. And I just want to end on it's a way to, you know, on one end to hold them accountable when they are employed, but it is limited. So I agree with you there. If we want to go ahead and move on to the next item on the agenda. Well, can I interject just real quick in terms of what Ms. Pat did say? So what are we going to focus on in terms of the agenda because the hour is getting late, you know? So can we just prioritize, you know, the kind of the, what we're going to, because I'm assuming like, we're going to talk about the statements from the families and youths and possibly victim compensation. But I don't know if there's time to do much more. If I may, I think the MS-9 families approached me and I promised them that it would get into our agenda, you know, to respect them because I know we haven't had any action from the town council that we prioritize that. And they specifically requested that their voices be read tonight in addition to having their documents as part of public packet. So we should prioritize that. So I agree. And also for the compensation fund as well. Yes. No, I just wanted to say, unless Allegra, you got some word from Lynn, we have not gotten any official response from Lynn or the town council. Lynn or the town council to our letter. So can I say, yeah, can I say very, I'll be very quick. I wanted to say it at the beginning when we started our meeting, but during the member report or something like that, I have to say, okay, MS is a tale of two town. We have majority BIPOC youth, their rights being taken away from them. And the town council doesn't have any time to come to decision or get back to us. We're not even on the agenda. However, we have Jones building. What do I care about that? They spent so much time and then they were able to make quick decision. We have amassed media, not sure about support funding from our town government. And yet it's okay for us to borrow more money for Jones library. I don't get this town. I do not get this town. I just want to put that out. Town council is so important for them to decide on Jones library. That we're talking about human lives, about our youth, our future generation. We have not heard anything from the police, nothing from the town council. And then people want CSWG, people want anti-racism work, people want diversity, inclusion. What is this in our town? What are we doing? Are we just wasting our time with this group? What are we doing? Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Pat. Do you want to go ahead? You and Allegra present about the letter because I think that's next. Isn't that next on the agenda? It is. Ms. Pat, do you want me to read it? Yes, please. Yeah. If you can start with the youth first. So the first document that we have is the voices of the BIPOC youth from the Amherst 9. And it's a series of quotes. Would you be able to just put it on, though? Share your screen. I think it would be more powerful to kind of show the words and kind of keep scrolling them as you're reading them. Absolutely. Thank you. It's on my screen and I'm like, oh, well, everyone can see it. All right, sorry. Can y'all see it? I'm going to make it larger. I think they wanted to start with the youth one first. Yes. Oh, sorry. Yes. Nope. There we go. Okay. Our rights were taken away on 7522. I never thought I would hear those words in this area from our police. I listened to the police when they said we couldn't talk, had no rights, could not use our phones, could not call our guardians and our parents. And so I just didn't move, didn't speak and complied to not make anything worse. I've been taught that if I speak respectfully with police, it's okay to ask questions. Well, I thought I could, but I did not dare to. And I was confused on why I could not call my home and I did not dare speak up to ask anything. Will I always be punished because I have a tint to my skin and now even more with me speaking up, will we need to now be fearful of retaliation from the police? I'm not looking for any trouble. I just wanna live peacefully. Am I safe to walk alone or with anyone really? Now anxiety plays a major part of my life because of police making me feel unsafe. I worry if I'm okay to go anywhere, especially alone. I worry for my friends. I worry about how much the experiences with the Amherst police has taken from my concentration on school and my studies because my safety and being of color was something I thought I would not have to worry about in this area. To what degree am I to be of concern for my safety? I was at my friend's house and came outside. I saw sirens. I saw my friend get questioned by the police. My friends who were in a parked vehicle at a parking spot had a flashlight shown at them. They were told to exit the truck and sit on the curb with the rest of us. I started to record the altercation. I did this in case the police said we did something wrong. If I had to run in with the police, I would hope someone would record it too. If anything happened, it would be on video. Anything could have happened. The police were yelling, power tripping. They were yelling, we were detained. They were yelling, we had no rights. Being detained technically means you're not allowed to leave. No one had the courage to leave. The fear of the police is instilled in us. My heart was racing. I was scared. I had no rights. I didn't know what to think. I felt lost. I didn't know who I could look to for safety and security in the time of distress. Our emotions were at all time high. Nothing good comes from the police. My view of the Amherst police is that they are up to no good. I'm looking to cause problems. I know this from experience. Toward the end of the encounter, I thought we would be free to go, but they have us call our parents. We couldn't just go on about our business. We had to continue to do as they said. We were not free to leave on our own accord. My friend's mom had to take me home. If I complain, they may come after my family. I didn't want that negative attention. I feel I am stuck. I want something to happen, but I want to protect my family at the same time. I keep busy to not think about what happened to us, but it doesn't work. We talk or think about this incident almost every day because we see the police every day. I am a student who has lived in Amherst my whole life basically. Outside of school and studies, next comes sports and family, then friends. I've never been one who wants or causes trouble. I've been taught that if I could trust, I have been taught that I could trust the Amherst police to call on in an emergency or need of help. That's been taken away from me by the Amherst police. There's been more than a few times police had made me feel less than. I have over time wondered what I did, what did I do wrong to be treated as if I'm some hoodlum. I stay respectful and know I'm not doing anything wrong. So why, even though I have tried to see otherwise, I can't help but see a common denominator every time, color and race. I do as I'm told, and even though respect is not reciprocated, I still am humble. Give and show respect and follow directions when encountered by the Amherst police, as well as in general. That's how I was raised, it's instilled in me. And this incident doesn't surprise me. I've been questioned by the police before for things I am not involved in. When I was in middle school, my friends and I were in front of the firehouse next to CVS waiting for other friends to join us after getting their food. The police had us go inside the CVS. They were responding to a call about a theft of the CVS. They said they wanted to see if any one of us matched the description of the suspect. They had us go inside of CVS to compare each one of us to surveillance camera footage inside the store. When a girl in our group identified the person who was white, the police just said nothing was going to happen to him and he should just return the item. The police didn't call our parents then. Nothing came out of the incident. My friends and I continued to have bad experiences with the police. Thank you, Allegra. You wanna read the, does anybody wanna read the parents voices? Does anybody wanna volunteer? Or is there a way to sum it up? I'm just worried about time as well, I guess. Well, basically it's the same, what the document they shared the last time we met, but they made some adjustment. If people have read it, then we just move on, but they wanted us to read it. Yeah, I mean, we can read it. I can read it. Okay, go ahead. But do you have it in front? Yeah, yes, it's right there. All right, so September 7th, 2022. It has been a little over two months since two armed and uniformed Amherst police officers responded to a noise complaint at a working class apartment complex as many were settling in from Independence Day festivities. Police with their cruises and flashlights pulled into the apartment complex parking lot, found a group of young teens to assert their power and authority and deprive them wrongfully of their constitutional rights. The teens were instructed to sit on the pavement and interval-like suspects in a police lineup. Of the nine youth involved, six are black and Latino. They are our sons. Try to put yourself in our son's shoes. They were simply visiting and congregating in a friend's parking lot to provide accompaniment and comfort in a distressing or unfortunate time when they heard a friend was stuck with a flat tire. This is what grown-ups call mutual aid. They weren't going anywhere until that friend's problems were resolved. Our sons were the wrong color at the wrong time. Our some who have lived here longer than the ages of our boys will tell it like it is that our color has always been the wrong color for Amherst and based on color have always and will forever be a target, a target of unfair punishment, interrogation, detention and harassment. Our children have been traumatized not by brutal physical force, but by the blunt force of racism and the suffocation of racial profiling that they have witnessed and now have experienced themselves over and over again. We look forward to continuing solidarity, work with the Community Safety and Social Justice Committee to achieve our goals while protecting our children, their identities and their future. Quote from parents, it is just so unfortunate I chose to live here and raise children because I thought it would be different here because of diversity. Our children feel unsafe regarding what they have seen in the U.S. with police and young people of Colorado as well as adults and they thought they were protected here. They took away the trust and belief of safety day and we are supposed to have while our kids are out there. Why didn't they make them feel safe as they waited for AAA? Parents teach kids to trust the police and call on them for help. They took that away. The chief of police chopping it up to having a slice of pizza without children to smooth out the harm is offensive and disrespectful. Nothing closer that is going to melt away feelings of unease and unrest in our hearts and minds from the damage done. Thank, oh, that's it. Thank you Deborah. So these documents were also sent to Human Rights Commission. So the question becomes how is the town going to come up with their final investigation because the families and the youth want their voices being included? As I referenced earlier in our meeting, HRC, Human Rights Commission don't actually have any power but they by now make it impossible for them to even act in terms of coming up with their recommendation or whatever. Philip, you can help me out. And again, I encourage people to listen to the HRC meeting last week. The emotion was raw. All the members who attended that night were very powerful in what they spoke. And I don't want to give it away, just go watch it. Go watch it. We need to support these MSNITE people. And if people have comments, otherwise we'll go to the next item of Justice Compensation Fund. I just want to say that it's really powerful hearing our youth who have grown up here and are growing up here talk so negatively about our community. And I have on the opposite end, I have heard from majority community people speak so fondly about Amherst. Like this is an idealic place. And I mean, not all of them, but I'm saying that in contrast to what these youth have shared and my own children have shared. So, I sympathize and empathize and really feel the trauma that these young people have endured, and will continue to remember this community as impacting them in such a negative way. It really, really saddens me, including how the parents come away from this. And like you say, Ms. Pat and others have said, where's the accountability so that they can feel whole? So, I know you're gonna talk a little bit about that. Deborah. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I mean, some of the same things, right? I mean, obviously, you know, so heartened and thanked the youth and the parents for coming forward and talking about this very traumatic and difficult issue. But as you were saying, D, us as people of color and black people in specific, that's parents as parents and us with black males, with kids and everything, that's the type of stuff that we are afraid of every day when they go outside the house, right? That they're going to encounter the police, that they're going to have those types of negative encounters. And now we have the Amherst 9 that had that, right? And we have video, we have all of those things. So for me, I guess my thing is, you know, and you kind of ask that question, but I really wanna, what are we going to do? Because the town council has not responded. We have not gotten any definitive investigatory report from the police. Things are just lagging. They haven't even responded to our email, not even have the decency to respond to us to say, hey, we're considering it, we're deliberating. I mean, something, you know what I'm saying? It's just like no response whatsoever to even like, you know, engage us. And here we are two weeks later and this thing keeps up, it's happening in July. And you've heard from parents at our last meeting and then you heard from young people now and everything, so, and we zero silence, nothing. So what are we going to do? What's our next step? That's what I'm interested in knowing because obviously they're not doing anything. So what's our next step? So if I may, and I'm not claiming that, you know, some of the ideas come from me, I have been actively involved with some of the Amherst 9. Amherst 9, I think that there has to be personal healing. Okay, whether or not APD admits or not, they're guilty. They denied, you know, the kids' right period. That was misconduct, okay? And kids are hurting. And this is lifelong for these kids. It's just not, it's not going to go away that quickly. So they need to heal personally. And let's face it, if some of these kids, their parents are like middle class or upper middle class, they'll be lawyering up because I know that's what I would do. Okay, they'll be lawyering up. I think we need to listen to the youth and the families what they think will help them heal, start the process of healing. And I don't want to hear that the town, here we don't have money, we don't have resources. No, but we have money to put into John's library. I'm sorry, we have money, okay? Secondly, we need to remind our coaches, need to remind the town council chair, Ms. Lin, they need to put us in our agenda for their next town council meeting. We need to go back there, okay? We need to push. We want anti-racism in this town. It's going to require some work. We need to do that. We need to get in touch with the police chief and the town manager. What is the final investigation report? Like, we need to be proactive. And if our coaches don't mind, we need to send emails demanding that they put us on the agenda next time. This is the most important issue in our town. The event of July 5th would define Amest in 2022, history will, it will go down in history how we responded to mostly BIPOC youth, okay? I know we're doing all other good stuff that this is going to define us, you know, for 2022. So everything else don't matter. This is the highest priority because we're dealing with human beings. So we need to keep pushing. This is what CSWG did. There were some town councilors who wanted to shut us down while we're making recommendation, but we stopped together. And I'm saying that with our group here. We have to be united. We can disagree and that's okay. But we cannot let noises distract us. We need to stay focused and push and push. And that's why we have this committee. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Pat. Did you wanna talk about the compensation fund as a part of the action? Sure. I think I wanna go. I can go. We can do it together. Yeah. So I know Ms. Pat had said last time she was hoping somebody would work with her and I was interested in doing that. I don't know where it just went. It was just right here. Did you still have it? I'm sorry. I have it. It's up right there. Yeah. And Ms. Pat, do you wanna speak to the importance of using the word justice rather than- Absolutely. So several weeks ago, I think the first time we met, we were talking about July 5th, the idea of victim compensation fund was what I was using. And then the families got back to me and the youth and in order not to confuse people because there is already victim compensation fund that is administered statewide or something. That's not what I meant. So the idea of justice compensation fund, the word justice seems to empower. It's an empowering word. And so we switched from victim compensation fund to justice compensation fund. And when we talk about fund, we're talking about money from our town, not somewhere else. So basically, why do we want this fund? So the reason basically is that police, APD officers has been harassing folks, especially people from marginalized communities and nothing happens, no consequences. With the compensation fund, it will hurt our town financially. It will force our town to bring reform. So APD, hopefully, is the hope because when something involves money, people will start raising questions. This officer has been doing this for years and getting away with it. And people keep hurting. It needs to stop. It put a stop to it. You wanna go next? Alecra? So we talked about who, what the purpose would be. And so it would be available to people impacted by police miscontact, such as brutality, harassment or over surveillance. And I think it's important to kind of conceptualize what healing means on an individual basis. So I think we talked about not having the funds be only for specified categories, but for things that could support somebody's healing, whether that's accessing mental health or social services, compensating for lost wages, or anything else that somebody who is impacted would need to move forward. Also, some of the recommendation is that the money should come from the police department, but we all know that the union will not allow that to happen. But we also have potential sources of funding. Like we still have some money left over from APA funds. We can access funds from cash reserve or even cannabis sales tax revenue. And more than anything else, the families and youth want to ensure absolute confidentiality. And I agree with that, that neither our town department should handle the payments. Whatever is agreed upon between the town and the vector and the MS-9, there should be an agency, preferable BIPOC-led organization to pay out the money without any strings attached away. We don't want the town going to pay a therapist so that folks can get therapy services. No, this is like settlement, okay? Give them the money to use it to do whatever healing work individuals and individual families need to do. So it should not, the disbursement of the funds should not come from any of the town departments. The town, we need to find a BIPOC-led organization to handle that aspect. And I just want to thank Allegra because you actually drafted most of it. So thank you. You're welcome. Yeah. Thank you, Ms. Pat and Allegra. I could see perhaps not wanting to put more on the Human Rights Commission but a Human Rights Commission type of group that having to convene when people apply, is that something that you imagined, both you and Allegra imagined that when people apply to that fund, that would trigger a meeting of that group, a convening of that group to decide how the money is to be dispersed or is it an ongoing group or you haven't gone into those details yet? So in my conversation with some of the families, the thinking is that it will not be like an open meeting type of thing where families and you or whoever, resident and the town trying to negotiate settlement, okay? Once two parties agree on it, there has to be independent BIPOC-led organization to dispose the money. So since resident oversight board, we don't have it. So that's what we're talking about gap, that snow. So with thinking maybe Human Rights Commission go handle the complaints and then if the resident affected decide to access the fund, they should be able to do that. And it needs to be negotiated. I will imagine with the town manager, whoever have the power to make decisions with money. But it's something that has to be done privately, not discuss openly about how much people are getting. So the families want to make and the youth, it has to be a confidential amount. That's what you do for compensation for settlement. That's what you do. Any questions or comments? Yeah, so I was hoping, I'm sorry, I was hoping that I make a motion tonight, but I don't know if we have enough time for discussion, but I just don't want us to only present tonight and no action. And I know we met twice this month. I'm almost feeling, do we even want to meet twice next month? Because this month we met twice and some of the stuff we hope to accomplish didn't happen. We didn't hear back from the town council. We don't know what the final investigation report is from the town. We don't know who's going to handle the voices of the families. Like I'd like us to have like a concrete thing that we can either send to the town manager or to the town council, either in the form of making a motion or just agreeing for our coaches to write later that this is what we discussed today and whatever. Like I'm kind of like action oriented type of person. I don't like too much talking. Yeah, no, I agree, Ms. Pat. I just wanted to make sure that no one had any questions about what you and Allegra presented before we move on. Sure. So Ms. Pat has put it into full view there. What do we want to do next? Well, I have the... Yes, Dee, I just have like one question around the victim compensation fund or justice compensation fund. I know the name has been changed. So justice compensation fund is just in terms of I think... And I agree, Ms. Pat, obviously we need to be action oriented. We need to kind of follow up with something. But obviously we're seeing that things are falling on their fear. So I don't know if we need to take it to media really at this point. You know what I'm saying? Which would be more so what I would go towards is, yeah, we can send them an email or whatever because we've already done that. And when we send the email to them, we send it also to all the media outlets so that they know what's going on. Because obviously without the media being involved, it seems like nothing's happening. But in terms of the justice compensation fund, I guess it's how... Because there's still a lot that needs to be kind of figured out about that, you know what I'm saying? There's still a lot of details. I agree with it. And I think we need to establish it, but I think we need to put it in a way that gives to... Like we were discussing when it was first initially kind of brought out, like, okay, who's the one that's going to kind of like make some of these decisions to kind of create it so that the families of Amherst 9 and then future families and people that are impacted by the police can obviously benefit from it, right? So that's my only thought, is that there's still a lot to kind of be decided about that. So when we do include it, let's put it in a way that kind of gives us or gives whomever the way with all to fill in the details so that it's not on the town or the police or whatever to fill in those details. I mean, what we presented tonight is just a draft. And I know there are some more details we could add, but meanwhile, I worried that this youth and families are hurting. And there is no movement in our town to do anything. We need to raise hell as a committee because that's what we're selected to do, to do our job. And that's what we're doing. It may feel uncomfortable for some people, but history will judge. We need to do the right thing so that this youth will feel supported, basically. Yes, there should be ongoing Justice Compensation Fund into a future, but at this time, I think there is urgency to really help this youth and their families, okay? It's impacting their academics, it's impacting their emotional wellbeing, it's impacting all aspects of their lives, work, everything. So the sooner they get financial relief, the better. The next step would then be for the whole community to start the healing process. So we need to keep up the pressure. Deb, I like your idea about the media because that does get our town attention. We need to keep the pressure. That's what CSWG did. We need to make changes in our town because the town council already committed of making our mess inclusive, right? This is what it takes to do it. So I'm going to agree with all of that and offer to help write a press release. Again, it comes down to do we as the co-chairs or whoever wants to help with that, take a stab at it and then we approve it next meeting, the process for the whole open meeting law issue is at hand. But I'm totally in agreement with that because this is the time going back to our first conversations within the agenda to not only challenge what is going on in terms of equity, right? And justice in this community, but our police are renegotiating, you know? So it calls into question. Do we support this institution that has harmed and wronged our young people? I mean, it's like an abusive relationship. And I think of testimonials of young people who have been abused and who talk about the adults in their life who have failed them. I don't want us to be that committee that, you know, we could have acted or made a stronger statement and we didn't do it. You know, I want these young people to feel love, to feel healed, to feel that, yeah, I wasn't, I was vulnerable that time, but the community really wants to protect me and maybe I'll come back here and raise my children. Those statements that they presented, I can't see those young people coming back here and feeling safe enough to do that. And that really saddens me. So I'm with you Deb, Ms. Pat. I don't know how the rest of the group thinks about that, but we write again to the town council. I have here in my notes asking to be on the agenda for the next town council meeting. Also write to the chief of police. Where's the police report? And then will the compensation fund letter, and I'm asking this as a committee, will that be the justice fund letter? Will that go out separately? Or do we include that in a total press release in terms of this particular incident? We should include it, I would say include it. Yeah, we should include it. And if I may, in terms of press release, I don't know how other people feel. Do we feel comfortable giving up to co-chairs to do the press release? And on behalf of, do people want to read it? Yeah, I think they should kind of draft it and then we can kind of, you know, you can give it to Jennifer, however we've done it and then we can provide feedback and get it back. Just give us deadlines like we used to do with CSWG, just say, okay, we would need feedback by this day and whoever provides feedback does or whoever doesn't, then it moves forward. And so that just for clarification, they'll go to you Freke. So the press release would be in the form or a similar letter that we're going to also send to the town council and to the police chief. Is that correct? And we should send it to the town manager too. The town manager, town council. Well, yeah, we would CC all of them, but I just want to make sure that we have all that, okay. Yeah, and then we would just need to figure out so it would be a draft and then, you know, to give folks opportunity to give any feedback once the draft is made. But we don't have to wait for the two weeks. We can just do it in the meantime. Okay. Do we know when the next town council meeting is? No, we need to look at that. Yeah. Is it next Monday or are they skipping a week? I have no idea. How is one week, is one week too soon for people to send, you know, to give feedback and everything? Well, we have to write it. Right. So they have to write it first and then, yeah. Yeah, so I said at the top of this, I'm dealing with a child who's finally come down, unfortunately, with COVID. But after Monday, probably Monday, I'll have time in which to commit some bandwidth to work on a draft. Yeah. Then, yeah, then give us a couple of days, whatever you think. But yeah, when is the next town council meeting? Do we know? We get deadline when we can send feedback to the coaches. And if people need to edit the justice compensation fund, that's fine too. Okay. It's just that we might not know the deadline, Ms. Pat, until they put together the draft. So it would be more so if we want to say, okay, after they put out the draft, we have, I don't know, three, four days to give feedback. We can do that, I guess. The next town council meeting is October 3rd at 6.30. Oh, no. Okay. That's Monday. Yep. Oh boy. But that's really soon. That is soon. And what's the one after that? Do you know what that feel? October 13th. Yeah, October 13th. So maybe we should shoot October 13th, yeah. Can we shoot for that? Oh. Ms. Pat, what do you want me to do? You wanted October 3rd. Can we shoot October 13th? That would have to be the date. That's a Thursday. They meeting on a Thursday? Are they meeting on Thursday? I'm confused. Yeah, that's a Thursday. They are meeting. It's a Thursday and on their agenda, it looks like a town service and outreach committee of town council, which is public hearing on parking, public hearing on purpose. Okay. I mean, I guess I could get something together, but I don't know if y'all want to. I think it's fine. It's fine. Yeah. I think that's 13th. We don't want to rush it that much. Yeah. Okay. Craig? Craig? Thanks everyone for this wonderful conversation. And I really appreciate the work that has been put in starting with Ms. Young and with everyone else for what we've been able to have with this meeting. I wanted to speak about the compensation fund. I don't think it's appropriate to have the name Justice. The Justice Fund, the question of Justice has been one that for 2,000 years you've been trying to figure out the answer. I think we could be much clearer if we have the name as something like Policeman's Conduct Fund. It's very clear, precise. And it shows what we are aiming to push against that if we do believe we need this fund. So I'm not sure about having it as Justice Fund, but I also agree that something like a victim compensation fund that speaks, that's kind of weak name because it speaks to something that has been done to someone rather than what we're looking forward to doing. That's I think the first one I have. Something about Justice is it implies due process. And one of the things I've been consistent about has been that we need to get a clearer sense of what's happened. That's what due process is. We might not know what happened entirely on that event, but I think there's more that we could know. And we're getting it from the statements that have been made by the families and by the youth. I want you to imagine a different scenario. And this is a scenario where you have a police officer or a pair of police officers confronting some youth and the police officer claims that the youth might have maybe thrown a punch or abused this officer. Would it be okay if this police officer had a body can and released just a minute? One of the things we would want to see is when did the recording start? How long was it? What I'm saying is there's more that we can know. There's more we should be pushing to know. And I'm absolutely in favor of the push and the pressure that we want to bear on the counsel, the manager, the police. But I think for the sake of due process, we do need to know more and we need to suspend judgment until then. It might turn out that everything that we feared and everything that was believed, it might turn out that that's the case. But we won't know until we've reached that point. I do have a question, which would be my third point. Is this fund primarily for those who are BIPOC or is this a fund for anyone else? Now, if that's the case, then one of the recommendations that we see where it's written, how to administer the fund, it says a third party, preferably a BIPOC-led organization should get this done. That's, I think, something that we can think about. Again, we're looking to have the community that comes together when we're dealing with something like misconduct. It might fall predominantly on one segment of the population than another, but the entire community gets affected and that's something that I'd like us to think about. Thank you. Thank you, Burke. Deb? Yeah, I mean, obviously we understand that we have to kind of, how can I say it? Make sure that we're looking at all angles and look at all sides. And of course, thank you for sharing your viewpoint. However, at this point where we're at is that we have, we have been engaging, we went and met with the town council at their meeting. Well, we started out by just sending a letter, asking questions about that. Then we went to the town council, then we've sent several emails to the town council and to others being like, okay, and we haven't gotten even a response. We're busy, you know what I'm saying? Like we're busy, we can't get to you. Nothing, I mean, zero silence. So I'm all for due process, obviously I'm an attorney, you know what I'm saying? So due process is my game, you know what I'm saying? That's what I believe in. However, we've given a lot of opportunity for the town council and others to respond and nothing has happened. If we don't respond, this incident happened in July and what we're asking for, we're not, I don't feel like I'm judging. What we're doing is saying, hey, you need to, this is about healing, people are hurting as we've just heard, so there needs to be something since you're not taking the steps, then we wanna take the steps to heal the community. I think this is what's gonna help to heal the community, right? It's to heal. Where's your investigative rapport and put us on the town council meeting? So I don't think we've judged. We're actually just asking for action, right? We're asking for a rapport. We haven't even seen a rapport, a final rapport. We haven't even gotten the decency of a response from the town council for our emails. So for me, it's about moving forward and giving voice to the voiceless, right? Which is our young people who are impacted by this and their families and parents and so on and so forth that are saying they want some type of accountability. Because no accountability has been given to them whatsoever. Up to this point. We are in post-October, this happened in July. So I'll just end there, but that's my opinion. Thank you, Deb, Pat. So, so Frankie, we don't always agree and that's okay. We're from the same country. You're my brother, nephew, whatever. So I do agree with you about your suggestion with police misconduct. I don't know about other members. I love it. I like police misconduct compensation fund. It's very direct. I like that. Thank you for suggesting that. I'm also a fan believer of due process. But what you have in our town is lack of transparency. If those kids, if one of the kids that didn't videotape, we wouldn't even know anything. People will just believe what police said because they have the power, they have the clouds. People are afraid of them, retaliation. For some of us who are speaking up, we're risking everything for what we're doing. It's not easy for some of us who are speaking up. So they've had their chance. Yesterday was actually 12 weeks that the incident happened. Please, it's 12 weeks, not enough time for our town to take action and I'll just leave it there. Thank you. Phillip? Yeah, so I have the unique like perspective of the human rights commission and everything else. And I will say that this issue is very much, I think as Ms. Pat said, fighting for it is very hard on our soul, hard on our self. The transparency really needs to happen. And like I'm about that close to breaking on that of transparency. So the human rights commission filed the complaint. Human rights commission is waiting for a response. Human rights commission didn't even hear anything back for a while about that complaint. Like was it received? Was it not? What's happening? I kept on pushing, kept on doing it. Now we have an incident to where we're waiting on a report and this report may be done. It may not be done. It's very unclear to me. If it is done, I do know that at the very least the detective involved, has submitted something to the chief of police. Now there's an incident to where this may not even come out to the public for transparency because of the collective bargaining agreement that the police commission has are the police have right now that we all just spoke to earlier. And that transparency piece is what's really igniting, I think my flames, igniting some people that I talked to's flames. And it really is just kind of like, look an incident happened and saying nothing speaks volumes to what you actually think of the incident. Not doing anything speaks volumes to what you actually think of the incident. And so the presentation on posts very much appreciated. I think that that covers a lot of why posts needs to happen like yesterday to have all this just not be a thing because then we would have a police department that wouldn't be tied up in a collective bargaining agreement that if any disciplinary actions are done to these officers that it doesn't become public record for that reason. That's ridiculous. That's crazy to me. Like what the community is hurting the community is asking for questions that we may not hear about anything. So that piece of it is very hardening on me. And I think that the letter that the family sent and the quotes that the victims of this incident sent spoke volumes to it. And I will just echo Ms. Pat's announcement earlier that if you have time to look at the Human Rights Commission video, I think that that was just kind of raw emotion reacting to the video. And I'll leave with what I left there. This becomes a defining moment in these young individuals life. People of color and all of us on color on this call and in every community can think of that defining moment in your life of kind of what sets you off to be like, oh, I don't know if I trust that person or that incident happening that I don't really care for. So for many young individuals that are involved in this incident, this is that defining moment. And to speak to everybody else on this call, what are we doing? What is this community doing to make that defining moment in these individuals life, make them feel like we got their back, like we're gonna do something. We're going to, as Ms. Pat said, we're gonna raise out. Like I said, I'm that close to doing it. Thank you. Thank you Phillip. Pam? I just wanted to point out that Councillor Dorothy-Pam has her hand up. And so I'm gonna move her into the panellists, allow her to talk. Yes, Dorothy. Hello. Hi, I just wanted to respond about the date of the town council meetings. It's Mondays, October 3rd and Monday, October 17th. The October 13th meeting is a TSO meeting. But sometimes if a certain number of councillors are gonna go to a meeting, Lynn declares it a town council meeting even though it really isn't. Because we're not allowed to get together and talk unless it's a formal town council meeting. So it's the 3rd and the 17th are what you want. Okay. Thank you. And enlightening discussion. Okay, thank you very much. Okay, thanks for that clarification. So we have two proposals for names of the compensation fund, one justice fund and the other, what did you say, Frickie? Police. Conduct. Police misconduct fund. So I think, just to respond to it, I like the justice fund because certainly it is empowering, but also if the fund doesn't have full specificity of being awarded just for police misconduct, let's say there's some act of bias that harms someone. And they are, it could be also traumatic in some way, but not involving the police. It could be some staff person or some other incident within the community. I don't know, but let's say it's not directly related to a police officer and that young person or individual needs some counseling in some way. So what happens? Can they apply to the fund? So I agree, I think Deb had mentioned, well, it needs to be fleshed out a bit more, but if this is, if we are saying it's specifically just for police related incidences, then I'm surprised, Ricky, it's so specific, but if that's the case, I think the specificity works. However, if it's something that could be used for other incidences of harm within this town and the person applies for that money to help with counseling or what have you, then having that specific name might hinder, you know, it being awarded or utilized in that way. Deb, I think. Yeah, and I mean, and I think like if we're that specific, we can run afoul with some of the stuff, even if we're just limiting it to the police, which like I said, I mean, some of the details need to be ironed out, right? Are we saying it's a compensation fund for anything that the town does or before what we were talking about was the police, specific motion to the police and what actions that they took, which I think you probably want to stay in that realm. I don't know if we want to broaden it, but maybe we do. I don't know, so we'd have to have a discussion, right? So, but even if it was within the realm of the police, if we say set, you know, police misconduct, then we're going to run into as we know, right? Words matter. And so then they're going to say, well, this incident was no misconduct. You know, it was just, you know, there was no violation. It was just this and this and this. And so, and then what we're going to get into is that impact will not matter anymore. It'll matter whether it was a violation under whatever law so on and so forth, right? So I think for me, I wouldn't be for the, you know, saying police misconduct, I would say justice. Or if you don't like justice, we can come up with another word, something more broad, more general, then that's specific because I know the player words and then what we will go down, the path that we will go down. Yeah, my concern as well. Allegra? So I guess I was just going to say I've been doing a little bit of research and what I have found is that victim, like the actual like victim compensation funds across the country, people who have had interactions with the police, like people who have had a relative die at the hands of a police shooting are not eligible for those funds. And part of it is because they have to have a police report stating something, you know, stating what had happened. They have to be cooperative with the police in the investigation and they have to have not been, you know, found to have been doing anything wrong. So I think, I know California has been trying to get on the ballot to make victims of police brutality eligible for the already established victim compensation fund. But I think that kind of in conceptualizing what this would look like, I don't think there needs to be all that red tape in terms of having a police report, having this, having that. And I could see where maybe there is concern about the word misconduct, but I, you know, if the police are not the ones who are deciding who is eligible for this or not, then I would hope that at least a layer of that is taken away and that if it's funnelled through the ROB at some point in the game that that would, that body would be making decisions in a manner consistent with some of the, you know, the spirit of CSWG and the envisionment of that body. So. Okay. So just so I'm understanding, because probably everybody else understand, but I might not be. So you're saying that it shouldn't the name police compensation fund should not be a part of it and it should have justice or what are you saying specifically? I wasn't necessarily speaking to the name of the fund at all, just kind of speaking to the idea of, I guess I, you know, I think misconduct is kind of, to me, I think it's like a broad enough term because I think it could encompass over surveillance. It could encompass brutality. It could encompass use of force. It could encompass unprofessional behavior as we saw in the post guidelines. So I don't necessarily think misconduct would be a word that wouldn't encompass the different areas that were perhaps envisioning could make somebody eligible for this fund. So you're in favor of police misconduct potentially? Potentially. Okay. All right. That's all I wanted to make sure I was understanding. So I made because I also did some research. I've been talking to the families impacted as well. I think it's very straightforward and simple, okay? The focus here is the police. This initial funds should focus on police misconduct. And it's not up to the police to say they were wrong or not. No, we're taking away that power from APD. We don't care whether they said misconduct happened. They already said it with this MS-9 that they didn't do anything wrong. It doesn't matter. What matters is the impacted resident, regardless of your race. This is for any resident, okay? That has suffered harm in the hands of police. It's not police to admit. We don't care whether police admits or not. Is the person who experienced it? It's what we're talking about here. So I will vote for police misconduct because it's very specific. And if in the future, CSSJC want to, you know, recommend additional compensation fund, I'm offered it. My worry is if we make it too broad, this might drag on knowing that our town government doesn't really care that much about the lives of marginalized people. So the more narrow we do this, only for APD, put that attention to APD. This is what you'll be doing to our people for a long, long time. Now it's time for you to pay up. It doesn't matter whether you admit or not. Arrow or B, or in the meanwhile, the Human Rights Commission get to decide along with the person who experienced it, whether you need compensation or not, not the police. They don't have anything on that. No, this is not what this is for. I don't know if I'm making this clear enough. No, I think it's clear as a strategy as well. So I appreciate that explanation. Yes, Freke? Yeah, thanks for some of the clarifications that I've had and to respond to Deborah. I think I like justice. I think there's almost no one who dislikes justice, even those who are unjust. And so what we're looking for is a very terrifying way to speak to something specific. And that's why I went for the misconduct fund. I think one of the pickups that we seem to be having rests on adjudication, who gets to decide? That's really one of the fundamental questions. And I don't know what the answer is and that's something that I'd like us to think about going forward, who gets to decide what misconduct is. Apparently we don't trust the police enough. And if that's the case, then we can't allow them adjudicates their own case. That's fine, but who gets to decide? I'd like to return to the Justice Compensation Fund's draft. I think somewhere here it mentions that anyone who has been negatively impacted by interaction with the police will be able to apply. What does negatively impacted mean? I think in the statement that was made by the families, one of the lines spoke about the fact that it wasn't brute violence that was unleashed on the kids, but what was unleashed was racism, I think. If that's the case again, what does negatively impacted? And that's why we do have to return to the question of adjudication because we can't allow it, or I believe that we shouldn't allow such a broad, loose term weaken whatever goals we're looking for with regard to healing within the community. Thank you. Just quickly a point of process here, because it's 847, I hear what you're saying, Freke, and I think those are elements, and it was mentioned earlier, to be decided later. Like those are, and you're bringing up really good questions such as who gets to decide? What does negatively impact mean? Maybe that takes us to refining the document at some point and further defining that. And then talking about adjudication, but I think those are things we could take up at a later date. What I think this meeting can accomplish is we need a name for the fund because if we're going to include it as a part of a letter to the town council and as a press release, then those things have to be decided in order to write that up. We can have a later discussion on how that compensation fund should be administered and what's the process and go through that. That's my suggestion, because I don't think we have the bandwidth or the time to fully discuss that, but you bring up some really good questions. Deb? Yeah, I agree with that too. I mean, it's 848. I need to get to my family. So I think we need to wrap this up and just get to a vote. Again, let's put it to the vote in terms of the name. Like you said, the details, we'll figure it out afterwards and stuff like that. I still don't agree with, I'm not gonna just put it out there. I'm not gonna vote for police misconduct because I already said what I had said about it because I think it'll get twisted down the road, but let's put it to a vote because majority is what takes it. So let's do that because of time, we need to keep this moving along. Keep the train moving. Yes, absolutely. If I may very quickly, I didn't respond to Frick's question about why BIPOC led organization. This came directly from some of the youth and families. If it's done by white led organization, some BIPOC folks will not feel comfortable accessing the fund. So that's the reason why it was stated there by BIPOC led organization to administer the funds. I just wanted to mention. I appreciate that Ms. Pat and I'm all for centering folks who are often at the margin. I mean, not always, but who are often at the margin, particularly in terms of the administration of such a fund that impacts more often certain communities. Why shouldn't they be at the center? So I hear you. Frick? I hope it's not that hard to find an organization that across the board, a lot of us could agree will be impartial. Well, I don't think you're being partial if you're a BIPOC person. So that's also, we don't have to get into it now, but I hear you. It's something that we have to further refine. But just because you're BIPOC, it's like just because you're Obama, doesn't mean Obama was just the black people president. So I hear what you're saying. All right, so let's try to get something completed here tonight. And it sounds like Allegra and I will be drafting a letter to the town council following up on the incident that occurred. And asking to have CSSJC be placed on the agenda for October 17. And we will send it to the town manager, chief Livingstone, because that letter will also include a demand for the police report, right? And then we are going to mention the compensation fund that we have yet to decide on what's the name. So maybe we have to put that to a vote, but I just want to make sure those are the three things to include. Is that correct, team? Yes. OK, all right. Good. So we will draft that. And I think, Pam, we send it to you and to Jennifer. And then Jennifer and you send it out to the committee. Is that how that process works? I just want to ask. Yes, that's correct. Jennifer's out of the office. So, well, hopefully she'll be back in before that you've completed your draft, but you send it to both of us and I'll make sure that it's out if she's not back in. We'll do. OK. And then we need to decide, if we're all clear on that, then we need to decide on a name. Even if it's a working name, I always say, we might decide a different name. But if the name for now is the Justice Compensation Fund or the Police Misconduct Fund, then we go with it and we can always decide, maybe even once that committee convenes that we're envisioning, decide on a different name. So we have to make a motion. I could do that. So what about a name? And I'm going to just complicate things even further. What about a name that includes healing, healing and restoration fund? It's so long. I know Phillip is like. It is so long. All right, then exit. See, that's what I'm saying. It's like we can have all kind of names. So all right, so either Justice or Police Misconduct Fund. So who, Freke, you said you're going to make the motion? Yes. We have to do it in two parts because it's two different names, I believe, just to make it clear. Unless someone can come in the way. You can just do the Police Misconduct one. And then if everyone likes that, if the majority just will go with that. I think in the essence of time, let's keep it moving. I think Freke is going to make that, right? If there's a majority of us that wants to go with that, then we'll just go with it. All right, let's do it. Make motion. So I move that the Justice Compensation Fund drafts be renamed the Police Misconduct Fund. No compensation. I'm going to feel. Oh, compensation. Sorry. Yeah. Yes. So we say, we say. So I move that the Justice Compensation Fund be renamed the Police Misconduct Compensation Fund. OK, is there a second? I second. OK, all in favor of Freke's motion. We need to have a show of hands. OK, so that's three. Oh, God. Y'all just keep things exciting. OK, I don't know. We'd have to include Pam to break the time. She can't. Yeah, she can't. Oh, I know I'm just. What do we want to do, people? It failed because we didn't have majority. I know. We stayed forward. So you can put you can put justice forward and then it'll be the same thing, though. It'll be. That's right. And so we've got to come up with a different name then. So you want to do the healing one? I kind of like something healing. But I still want the focus to be on. What about healing compensation funds? I mean, you all thought the other one was too long. Or restoration fund. Oh, that's too long. Healing. Well, I think it's so aspirational to heal. I'm going to take that one back. But I'm getting a test of suggestions. OK. What are some of the suggestions? What are the suggestions? Yeah, Miss Pat, what were the other suggestions? We need help. Beloved community funds. That's also kind of aspirational. Because are you left whole? Settlement fund. I'm struggling with settlement. It's not illegal. I tell you what, it's not illegal. Yeah. And after all those suggestions, I'm now leaning towards the police misconduct. You know, I just can start something new that other communities might, you know, pick up on. Unlike the focus police misconduct, we're taking away their power. It's not up to them to say that that is misconduct. But the problem that I have with that, Miss Pat, is that you're you're looking at it right now. We when we have a group of people that are going to be looking at that, what about 10 years down the road, five years down the road, a new group comes in and then they define what these misconduct is. I try to look at, you know, down the road, like it's not just me, right? I'm not here anymore. People that I put in, it's not there anymore. What if they decide that police misconduct is a high bar and then these folks are not going to get any money? Because it's police misconduct. They set the definition, they set the standard. That's my concern. So I'm getting texts that says police will go against the police misconduct. The union might push back. We know that already. Oh, that too, that too. That's for sure. That's my concern. I'm changing my vote because I want these families to get, I changed my vote. I'm sorry. OK. They're not going to push back. Well, the first motion failed so quickly. Someone make a new motion so we can vote and move on. OK. So I'll make a motion. Go ahead. Name the compensation fund, the Justice Compensation Fund. I'll second it. Thank you. All in favor of the Justice Compensation Fund. OK. One, two, three, four. Allegra. No. That's it. It's full. It doesn't matter. I already voted. It doesn't matter. The majority rule. So it is the Justice Compensation Fund. I'm having fun with this group because we're so informal. That's how HRC is. That's how CDBG, when I attended their meeting, I like it. There we go. Robert LaRose. OK. All right. Justice Compensation Fund it is. So we have anything that people had just going through to in the meeting, anyone didn't anticipate? Yes. So I want to announce that our wonderful MS Sunrise Youth Group, they are planning know your rights training. And we also promise that there will be a second public comment tonight before we close up. And there are still some audience in this meeting. So yes, I just wanted to make sure there weren't any other things or announcements like you just shared. AMR Sunrise is a youth group. And this is a training. Know your rights training. So excited that the young people are bringing this to the community. October 9th. October 9th at 3 o'clock, 3 to 5. And I've been part of the plan. I've been receiving their email. So I'm kind of like CSSJC rep. If people don't mind, because we'll be talking about the Know Your Rights. So we are co-sponsoring the event as well. Great. And so the human rights commission is also sponsoring. I'm sorry. I cut you off, Phillip. So you said the Human Rights Commission is also sponsoring. So it's not working yet. Great. So if folks want to know more about it, they can contact you all. Great. Yeah. Anyone else? I just wanted to say that the budget hearing, the first budget hearing is scheduled for November 7th. So I imagine that at our next meeting, I'd like to propose pending some sort of formal letter to the town manager and town council about what we would like to see in the budget, specifically for Crescent DEI, drawing most likely from CSWG and the recommended budget that they had put forward to use it. I also have one announcement. The CDBG request for proposal is on. It's something in our next meeting. We may want to discuss how we can try to see if the DEI department, we can support the department to apply for grants. And I'm not remembering the deadline, but it's something that we should think about, put it in our next agenda. Great. The deadline is November 4th. And I just want to point out that you do have one person in the attendees with a hand raise for this last public comment. Yes. Yes. Thank you. OK, I think we are ready to move on to public comments. Yeah. Thank you. Vera? Hi, this is Vera Duongmini Cage, a 12-long meadow drive in Amherst. I want to thank each member of the committee and DEI officer Pamela Young for staying so long at this extended meeting once again. I appreciate the need for a more robust DEI department. And I want to raise that when I was serving on the Amherst School Committee, we wanted to establish the participatory action research project involving youth and families. Unfortunately, that never got funded from the school level. And I hope the town will take this seriously to consider that methodology to engage community. And I think we've heard a lot from white people in this town. And we need to be intentional about reaching BIPOC communities. I am aware that the Crest Program has launched, but it is missing the voice of Asian-Americans in that body. And I want to see the town be able to acknowledge that and seek ways to rectify that. Additionally, I applaud this committee for spearheading something that is an alternative to the criminal justice system, to the legal system. We know that that process can be re-traumatizing for individuals and very threatening for families. And that's why some people do not resort to seeking that type of resolution. And so this type of justice fund or whatever name you decide is insignificant. But what is important is what it means to the children and families involved to be able to put this behind them in a way that this is not a topic of conversation that involves them directly. But they can be part of saying that this may have happened to me and my friends. But I did everything I could to stop it from happening to my younger siblings and to the other generations that follow me. Thank you very much. Thank you, Vera. Thank you, Vera. I just want to, since we mentioned the budget real quick, I'd like to know where we are in terms of translations of town council meetings and Zoom translation ability for folks that speak languages other than English. So I think that's part of the work that we're committed to and inclusion. So I just want to be mindful and remind ourselves that there's still a need for that. And funding should go towards that. Thank you all. We have to, did we set the next meeting? You did not. OK, this is still a good time for everyone, these Wednesday nights. OK. So we need this for me as long as we don't go on the third Wednesday because that is on the human rights commission. Oh, right, right. That's our member that. So the next meeting, are we going to try to meet twice in October? There isn't been if the town council invites us, that I think it would be way too many meetings for us in October. Good point. Yeah. So the 17th, right, is that meeting? So we should meet after the 17th or before. That's, I guess, the critical question. So the Wednesday before is the 12th. And then the Wednesday afterwards is the 19th or the 26th. I'm sorry, say that. The 26th. Yes. So the one immediately following the 17th is the 19th. And then the 26th is at the end of the month. So do we want to put it to the 26th? Can I make a motion that we meet on the 12th? And then on that meeting, then we decide kind of what's the next step? Because if we could meet on the 17th, we will know that by hopefully the 12th. And then if not, then we can just move the meeting to the 26th, because the 19th is the third Wednesday. OK. Yeah, because 12th can't meet on the third Wednesday. So that's why I was saying the 26th. Yeah, I think we should try to meet on the 12th just because too, so we can prep for the 17th. Let's see if they do give us the 17th. Yeah. And we can prepare for it too. OK, let's do that then. So we're doing the 12th. What are we doing? That's the 12th. And it's the Wednesday in October. OK. So put that on calendar still at 6 o'clock. And I think that's a good suggestion so we can prepare. Hopefully if they put us in. Yes, well, we'll find out. OK. We'll find out. And that's where media comes in. So we'll find out before then when we have a meeting, we should be inviting the media. Right. Yeah. So the other thing is, Allegra and I will write the press release. We'll have our names as the contact for that press release. So just in case, I don't know, Scott Smersbach or whoever will contact us potentially. Do you have your hand up, Allegra? Are you over? No, I just might. All of a sudden the volume got really loud. OK. But I mean, but I think even though you all will have your contact, shouldn't it come from all of us though? Oh, absolutely. But usually on a I'm just thinking. They got you. No, no, no, that's perfect. I just wanted to make sure that all our names will be on it. It will be everybody's name will be on it as the committee most certainly. OK. Anything else? And if we forget something in the draft, please feel free to send comments. So they would send comments, Pam, to Jen and to you. And then it would circle back to us. Is that correct? Yeah. OK. All right. Great. Yeah, that's how you do it. All right. Thank you all for serving. So when we plan the next agenda items, if we can have the DEI and press update first, like we did it the last time. We didn't do it today. If we can put that as the first thing that, you know, because I want to hear more about the Cress program. I think I read somewhere about the Cress responders, you know, in the school, CSWG never, never, never, never recommended that. It's a no, no, no, no, no. But anyway, it's for next meeting. OK. So if we could have that, Pam, already on the agenda, I'm sure we'll be we'll remind you. But yeah, the updates of that and that's helpful. OK. Thank you, everyone. See you next time. Take care. Yeah. Good night, everyone. Night.