 Alright, here we go. You're all set. Great. Okay, so I am calling to order the November 8th meeting of the governance organization and legislation committee pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 extended by chapter 22 and 107 of the acts of 2022 and extended by chapter 2 of the acts of 2023. This meeting will be conducted via remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so via zoom or by telephone. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means and I'm calling to order at 933am. The meeting is being recorded, and I'm going to do a sound check to make sure folks can be heard and can hear, and I will start with you, Lynn. Present. And Pat. Present but absent. Understandable. Mandy. And Jennifer. Present. Excellent. Alright, wonderful. So I thought for today's agenda, we would begin. Let me just do a quick review of the agenda. Town Manager Backelman is joining us at 10 to review the town manager goals. So we have three proclamations on the agenda. I figured we could begin by reviewing those until the town manager arrives. And then we will move to that portion of the agenda until we are finished with that. And then from there, I'll check in with you, Pat. I thought we would move to the black reparations committee and then whatever time, if there is any, we would then move to the rules of procedure. Does that. I'm, I'm wondering, since we don't have anything back from KP law that we get right to rules and procedure and hold the other one to a long next meeting, but that's up to you today. Well, did we, I was going to on similar line suggests actually around that something, something similar, but also maybe a bit expanded so I could offer that now quickly to see if how folks feel about it. Are we meeting on the 15th, I guess that was my question. Okay. So yeah, that makes a lot of sense, I think. And I, Lynn will touch base with you though I had a thought about something for Monday's meeting, which I didn't realize we had. So that was my what my email was about. So, all right, let's then let's, let's get to it then and we can start with the South Asian fall festival proclamation. And Athena, are you, have you been the person bringing this up. Okay, great. Thank you. So I'm not sure did anyone come with changes to this. Okay, so then we can just go through is Shalini. I don't see, she's not joining us. I don't think okay. Are there any changes that were made that does anybody know from last year, the last time we did this. I'm sure there'd be date changes but I can. We did one last year. I think it was the year before it was. Okay, it was the year before. Let's see if I can find that one. Yeah, I mean, because if nothing's been changed but the dates, we can process this one very quickly. It looks like the DEI department. Yeah, has been added. Yeah. I don't think it was it wasn't didn't exist two years ago. Right. When we did this. I don't know if there are not there are changes. If we don't have any clarity or consistency changes. Yeah, I haven't any questions then we should just vote. Agreed. Can you just scroll down Athena just want to make sure the ending is. We got those dates right. Yep. Okay. We got the date changes. And we got the date changes. I think it's the 17th, not 13. And of course it needs to go and letter ahead, but that's. And there needs to be a place for me to actually sign it. Want to make a motion on this. Sure. I move that we recommend. I don't know. Mandy, Joe, please make the motion so I don't stumble. Proclamation clear, consistent and actionable. Thank you. I knew she had a recording of that somewhere in her brain. Is that a second, Lynn? Yes, it's a second. Thank good. All right, so Jen, we'll start with you. Yes. All right, Mandy? I. Pat? I. Lynn? I. And I am an I. So that's great. All right. So we can move on then to the 2023 human rights day proclamation. See, we have a large audience with us as usual. Yes, and I see Mandy, your hand is raised. Yeah, the one in the packet is not last year's because last year we fixed all the lacking ands after the wear as is. And boy, yeah. So, you know, beyond that, I can talk about some of the changes that were in last year's. It was all of those ands. And then to the last whereas and the now there for us. But it was the and at every every phrase and every whereas except the last one last year's did not have the last two sentences of the last whereas. So it deleted that as a town council. We have always embraced every opportunity to reflect and embody these values in our work for the community. We do so again today. I think that is because the now therefore was rewritten last year or maybe the year before. But in last year's there was a different now therefore that talked about those values and embodying them. So I think it was sort of moving that sentence down into the now there for us. And that one, the now therefore phrase last year read the Amherst town council hereby proclaims December 10, 2023 human rights day encourages our community to embrace every opportunity to reflect and embody the values of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and their work for the community and urges Amherst residents to celebrate and then this day with the communal reading, blah, blah, blah. And the in witness where we don't use anymore at all. And Athena, do you would pulling up last year's or you're just going to make it the changes? I'll read it slower for Athena. OK. Yeah, I was trying to find. That's what I was. Me too. So so the last whereas deleted the last two sentences, the sentences that start as a town council and then the now therefore began with the Amherst town council hereby proclaims December 10, 2023 human rights day comma encourages our community to embrace every opportunity to reflect and embody the values of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in their work for the community comma and urges Amherst residents to celebrate and then you can just get rid of the second celebrates. Once you get celebrated in there, the next two words Amherst celebrates and then that's what it read. It did not have the please. I know it did have the please join us maybe. But that one's fine. And who are the sponsors on this one? I know I was last year. I was last year too. And would like to be again this year. And we're not going to be outside freezing, Mandy, Joe. I noticed that. I mean, it won't feel normal. How are we going to do the candlelight reading? We can make the room dark at Bangs. I don't know. They also have those candles now that don't that you don't have to actually light. And those those work really nicely. Yeah. But we've been Jennifer, you Jennifer. Yes, Jennifer. Yeah. No, I'd like to be a sponsor also if I could. I don't like people. So I don't want to be a sponsor. Lynn, did you want to sponsor this year? Yes, I did. I did. And so would I, Athena. And so would I. And is the DEI department? Should we add? I asked John Moisten and she said the Human Rights Commission. OK, so I just added that. Perfect. And I had one other question that I didn't notice, I guess, last year in the second to last, whereas the one that talks about the council's issued proclamations, the very last phrases and has deliberated upon and endorsed all of the previously stated town meeting actions, which are presumably referring to the ones that were in the paragraph before. But I don't think we've deliberated on or specifically endorsed many of them, mainly the last two. That doesn't mean we don't. But the Human Rights Culture Resolution, the safe resettlement of cleared Guantanamo detainees and not conducting business with the state of Arizona. So I don't know how those two phrases relate to each other. Do we need to have all of that? Which part of your feeling on that? About the going back to the history. I'd like to I'd like to, whereas in 2009. Mandy, what you're saying is that these things that happened in the town meeting or authorized by the select board did not get deliberated upon by the council body. Right, yeah, it's just that sort of phrase that references deliberated and endorsed by because that was the phrase that kind of struck me as in five years, we haven't talked at all about conducting business with the state of Arizona, for example. Right. So would you recommend that we just end it at an Human Rights Day period? I would say that's probably the easiest thing to do. Yeah, because we're I think GOL is continuously looking at these things. So as the years go, maybe some of these things will be brought back up for looking at. But yeah, that is everyone good with that? So it's the paragraph above that. For instance, the reason I'm concerned about it is because we actually have also recently filed in the last year, two years, the special legislation for legal permanent resident voting. We could add that language to the council paragraph, too. Yes. I think that's a great idea. Yeah. And Human Rights Day and has filed special legislation seeking the ability to provide just adding that back to the council one. Yes. Yeah. That makes me feel better. Have we done anything else along that lines? I think it needs to say, is it for noncit... It's to provide. Illegal permanent residents is better than noncitizen, I think. Right. Because they are legal residents. No, they're legal. They're not illegal. Right. Eagle, right. And I think that confuses some people. Legal permanent residents. Right. That's what bring it forward. I'm thinking about your question, Michelle. I can't think of anything else. Unless we want to add in the Jewish Heritage Month. I just did the South Asian one. We just did that, exactly. I think we need to be careful about listing every resolution and proclamation that we make, because this list could go on endlessly. Maybe we should say, end others or, you know, to be... Jennifer, go ahead. I was just going to say, if we try to list all of them and then leave one out. Right. That's what's better. Right. It's a better way of saying it. Thank you, Jennifer. So do you think we should include the word end others or just leave it as is? And we're not... We didn't say that this is the full list. What we could say is, has issued among many or... Yeah, I think the adding end others somewhere in there or among others. Yeah, among others feels better. And I would say... It's issued among others, annual proclamations in support of something like that, maybe. Great. I would also not say annual, because, for instance, we didn't do... Well, we did Puerto Rico this year, but there was no ceremony. We've done every one of these annually. You're right. OK. That's better. Anything else on this? Would... Maybe if we scroll up, we can get somebody other than Mandy to make the motion. I move. Here we go. OK, I move. Go ahead, Lynn. Human Rights Day Proclamation 2023, clear, consistent, and actionable. As amended. Is there a second, Bob? OK, great. All right, so I will start with you, Mandy. I. Lynn. I. Pat. I, I'm sorry, I'm eating. No worries. I, myself and Jennifer. Yes. Pat, were you the second? Yes. Thank you. I think Jennifer was... I don't care. It doesn't matter. Yeah. You can have the next one, Ben. All right. So we can move on to Small Business Saturday, which is the last proclamation that we have to review. Do we... Is this one we've done before? Yeah. Oh, yeah. And this one's been submitted by the chamber and bid. I think the chamber and bid. I think the chamber actually submits this one. And the bid, right. And please. I just have two small things. In the very last whereas. And you scroll. Yeah. So the very last whereas doesn't end with an and, so that should just be to a period. And the, it's underlined in blue here, but it's second annual, just the line above is the wrong. It's needs to delete. Those are my two small ones. And Lynn, are you the only sponsor on this one? I'm, I'm, I would like others to be. Jennifer would like to be added. Looks like. You can add me. No, I would. Yeah. So we should get this now to our constituents. Pardon me. No. So we. No, I will get this out to my constituents to go shop that day. In addition, there's also going to be the sip and stroll. And that's. Drunk adults who are not students. Marauding. Buying things, hopefully. On the ground. Is it still a maple though? They have found a new tree. That is. Is it a maple? I guess it is. The Mary locust doesn't work. The Mary oak doesn't work. I'm going to check on that right now. The Mary tree. You know, it. There may be. That's a tree where they've carved. Hold on. The face of the Virgin Mary. That's a Mary tree, right? Well, in Southern California, it would be a palm tree. Oh. Does it really work? I have notes that will allow me to tell you what the name is. But you want us to be quiet and behave? No, no, no, no. That just don't pass it yet. That's all. Did anyone attend the sip and stroll last year? I did. Oh, was it, is it, was this one in the Drake or was it a, wasn't there a something, a holiday, something or other in the Drake. As well. I remembered, but this was separate. You walk around. Yeah, it was, it was nice. It was not enough alcohol to get drunk though, but, which is fine. But we went out and rotting. Too bad. I find this is somebody can play besides students. They did call it the Mary maple. So they must have found another maple. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was nice. It was not enough alcohol to get drunk though, but I mean, which is fine, but we went out and rotting. Too bad. They must have found another maple. Or they're fibbing. I know they found another tree. Sometimes you just got to keep it the way it was, you know. Yeah. Yeah, we don't have a character of our town. What would the color of our, if there was an aura to describe the mood of our meeting today? What would the color be? Cause I came in all like. Deuce. Deuce. All right. So is this looking good, ready to go for a vote? All right. So I'm like to make a motion on this. Okay. I believe that we declare the proclamation in support of small business Saturday and card days and more clear, consistent and actionable. As amended. Cause we amended it. Okay. As I'm. The proclamation in support of small business Saturday and card days and more as amended clear, consistent and actionable. Second. Second from Tom. All right. I'm a yes, Pat. All right. Lynn. Yes. Mandy. Hi. Excellent. All right. Good work. All right. You know what I'm before, we have four minutes before Paul gets here. So I would like to just run something by this body as it relates to the reparations since it is on our agenda. I think what's in the purvy to do that, that's floating in the water. So we're going to run that. The next slide, please. I'm I'm sorry. First, Leana, please stop me if, if you feel like I'm. I'm crossing a line. One of the things that we're going to explore when we talk about this next week is whether it makes sense for. The work of reparations to be included into the work of another committee. We started that conversation last week and we. What struck me that I was thinking perhaps depending on what Monday's meeting agenda looks like is there's been sort of an ongoing conversation about looking at the CSSJC charge and determining if when we created that charge, you know, we created it in one moment and it's evolved and now we're in a new moment. And so, wondering if at the council level, sort of as a precursor to the discussion that we might have, does it make sense to consider the work of the Community Safety and Social Justice Committee as well as the other DEI and the reparations work together to have that conversation about that committee, its current charge, how it may have evolved, and then that may lead us into a discussion here in our next meeting about whether it would be appropriate to have such a charge that would be inclusive of those multiple pieces. And so that's what I wanted to put out there and I see Mandy has her hand raised. Yeah, I would just, this is not a statement for against any of that, but more of a process which is the council did not adopt the CSSJC charge. So I don't know, and I'm not sure it's within the council's purview or authority to amend that charge. Paul adopted it himself. We reviewed it, but he adopted it himself so it might be something worth talking to Paul as to whether he would like that conversation and maybe even suggestions from us. But I just don't know the process when the manager has formed a committee, I'm not sure the council can change it, but he may very well welcome thoughts from the council on whether we want to put reparations in it or not or whether we have any requested, you know, thoughts on modifications and also it might very well be a good conversation to have, but I think Paul would need approached first too. Thank you so much for that reminder I did not realize that I don't think I was on the council actually when that was created but that's that's good yeah that makes sense. Jennifer. And I am so after the conversation with Paul, I mean I would think this would be a conversation I mean could the CSSJC, I mean could everybody that's involved or representative of everyone's involved to have a conversation. You know, so because it may be that this is what everyone, you know, the wants but I don't, I feel uncomfortable if GOL made that. Exactly. Recommendation without input from CSSJC and DE, you know, maybe DEI. And even the reparations assembly, but I guess you're that representative. Because we're possibly putting it there as well. Right, right. Like, just seems too much. Well, I think that, you know, whether or not another committee, I mean, if we are going to fold the reparations into another committee, there will need to be some amendment to that charge that will need to occur to be able to include the reparations work. I just had the feeling that maybe the council hasn't really had the opportunity to revisit all of this body of work that is similar for a while like the CSSJC's work, the reparations work, the DEI like so much has happened since that body was originally created. And so that was kind of my, my thought process on, on having a council conversation that could bring in other folks for, for input as well. Yeah, Lynn. I think having look taking a hard look at this. First of all, thank you for bringing the suggestion forward. I think taking a hard look at what you're suggesting is if that's what the town manager would like us to do is really appropriate. I just question whether we're going to get it done in this council. So I think there needs to be a carry over recommendation based on us having a conversation with the town manager that asks, you know, this asks that early in the next council that this kind of conversation be had with, you know, appropriate representation, I guess would be the way to talk about it. I have to think about, and maybe you've thought about how you would word something like that as a carry over item, but I don't see, I mean I just quickly looked at the agenda for Monday, where we started six o'clock and heaven only knows when we'll finish. I don't see it happening. And I don't see it happening with a thoughtfulness that needs to go into it. That's really my most important issue is that this is a very thoughtful issue and it needs to be done with time for people to reflect and think. Yeah, I agree. I agree and I, you know, I selfishly wanted to be still on the council. These decisions would be made but I really do have a lot of trust in the process and I think it deserves the time and the attention and thoughtfulness that you're talking about Lynn. So, I think that I will have a conversation with the town manager and just see what his thoughts are and then if nothing else, I'll get that back to Pat so that we can be on the same page for the next meeting. You know, Michelle, even though you're not won't be on the council, you are at that point the former, the chair of the former committee and there's no reason why you shouldn't be part of that conversation. Thank you very much. We'd be losing something if you weren't. So, Don't make me cry now. Okay. I know, I know we're not there yet. Don't worry. We still have two months or a month and a half. All right. All right, so let's see 1003 do we have the town manager. No. So did I hear right that that this is going to be incorporated into the carryover. Yes. I just wanted to make sure I had that correct in minutes. Thanks. And just looking at, let me see something here. Okay, so if Paul, we're still waiting on Paul. We could do public comment. Yes. Although I don't think we have anyone but we'll call it. So I will call a period of public comment. And do we read the public comment statement even when nobody's here. Anyone. I'll read it. Let's see. Slowly. Okay. Right. During the public comment period, the chair will recognize members of the public when called on. Please identify yourself by stating your full name, preferred pronouns and district or address. Oh, that one's a little different. I don't see anyone. So Pat, I'm going to ask you, do you want to talk about something future agenda items or any other like house keeping stuff. Before Paul gets here or should we go to the rules? I see Mandy's hand. Oh, I have a future agenda item. Which is in August. The council referred to GOL the rental registration bylaw and regulations for review. And so if we even want a chance of voting on them this term, they need to be reviewed by GOL probably next week. Which may also require when Paul gets here and a nudge on legal review too. I'm here. What am I nudging? I'm here for the rental registration bylaw and regulations. To L still needs to make a clarity consistency and action ability. Vote. Okay. And just to add to the nudge, the goal is to have the first reading of that on the 20th of November. We also want to have KP law looking at it. If they haven't started. They had the reparations things that they were in the middle of looking at. If I did not ask them about rental regs, so I'll shoot an email to them and say you can update on that. They have the current version, so. Yeah. Paul, real quick, before we start on the town manager goals, I just wanted to follow up with you. We just had a little discussion about reparations and we have a plan, so I'm going to follow up with you this week at some point, and so we can have a chat on that. Okay, sounds good. All right, so we are here to review. Just congratulations to everybody who ran and got elected and whatever, or chose not to run. Congratulations on that, too. Thanks. No, we, yeah. You must have had that conversation. We did. All right. So I'm thinking back to last year and when Paul joined us for this, Pat, did you have an idea about how you wanted? No, go ahead. Okay. So we, Paul, we've been reviewing the town manager goals, and you are here so that we can review them with you and see if you have any feedback for us, or if there are any questions from the committee for you. So we can open it up for that. Have you had a chance to look at this, Paul? I have not looked at it in detail. I'm sorry. Okay. Mandy, do you feel like you could go through the highlights of what we've changed and things like that, or is that putting you on the spot? You're really good at doing that. Pat probably can, too. I'm not going to do anything today. I was promised I wouldn't have to. That's right. Paul, that's why I'm chairing the meeting, by the way. And she offered. The one thing that I... The changes are in red, too. Yeah, and I have another suggestion. So that's what I wanted to know one week, that I wanted to add into housing affordability. Okay. Yeah. And also we should remember we had a couple comments that came to GOL only, that came about the senior center, I believe. And so, Paul, I don't know if you've also get those emails when we get them, or if you were included on those, but those were two public comments we received. Good. Okay, Pat, where would you like to... Well, I really would like some feedback on this. One of the, for housing affordability, the trust has been trying to get a list of the actual number of affordable units in town. Because the state, and I'm, Jennifer, if you can remember the term for the state listing, which includes units that are not actually affordable, but if they're in a comp... If they're affordable units, for affordable units in a 60-unit apartment, they all get counted. And the trust is really trying to understand, and I'm trying to really understand, how many affordable units do we actually have and where are they? And I think a list that was maintained, so I would like to make the suggestion of creating that kind of list. So, if I do want me to respond, like that one, the SHI is a state housing inventory, and that's, they count things in a certain way, and we comply with how they count things. So if you look at our numbers compared to any other community, you'll get the right, everybody's counting the same way. I think, if you're saying, we'd like to count it differently, which doesn't include the non... Well, I think the community could count it both ways. Yeah, understood, yeah. It'll be a lower number, obviously, because if you do all of rolling green, there's only a certain number. I assume that that's possible. I don't know what Nate has, the conversations, I know he goes to all the trust meetings if he's had that conversation with them or not, but I can check into how hard is that work, right? Okay, yeah, because right now, and Jennifer chime in, please, Nate basically tells them, oh, well, we use the SHI, and I understand that, but there's... What do we actually... I'm not trying to say Amherst doesn't, I think we're doing an incredible job. Yeah, because what's the goal? I'd like, and I know the trust, and so it really wants to have a listing of what is real, no matter how it's counted by the state or other communities. What do we have, and what are we creating, how do we move with that? But you're still looking at subsidized housing, not like you have, you've, at Rental Reg, you've heard people say, I keep my rents artificially low, but we don't count that for whatever reason or housing units that are... So it's not a true picture, you're getting just only things that are being subsidized by the state or something. Right, and it may be valuable. Well, I don't know how you know whether a landlord is keeping their rents artificially low, unless they announce it in a public meeting and then, you know. So it does seem to me that the trust has been asking for this information for so long that it's time for us to actually know what we have, what we can... Yeah, I don't know how much work it's involved in putting it together. So I can ask Nate that question. Jen, does that sound true to you, what I'm saying? Yes, that they, exactly. I mean, and again, it's probably not something we're required to keep track of, but they're interested to know. It's like there's always questions about how many students are enrolled. It's a bit of a moving target, but... Yeah, I guess I'm curious what the goal is. Like if you're saying how affordable is Amherst and you don't wanna just look at state subsidized housing units, you'd also wanna look at Mill Hollow or some places where it is really, truly is affordable rent. Or you may... But if the goal is just to say how many are actually... We don't like the way the state's counting, which is what I think the trust is saying, because you're counting things that are not subsidized. But then I think the newspaper headline out of that is town has fewer affordable housing units than reported, and then it just... Where are we going with this? What's the goal? I will check with the chairs, Erica. Yeah. But I can easily find out, is it a hard thing to do or not, basically? Yes, that'd be great, Paul. Thank you. Lynn, I saw that your hand went up and then down, so unless you are... I don't need to comment. Okay, Jennifer? Yeah, so I don't know if I should say... I had a couple of... I didn't send them in a couple of other, perhaps, town manager goals, because I actually didn't know if they were at the level of being a town manager goal. So one was under the capital improvement, so should I just wait till we get there? Why don't you go ahead and suggest the amendments that you have, and then we'll... I think it would be good for us to go through the whole thing together with Paul. Okay, so I was really intrigued when Paul mentioned this about roads during a council meeting that because it's... We don't have the $40 million, whatever, we need to really repair all the roads that need to be repaired, and that we tend to... We're at a competitive disadvantage in trying to retain the road paving services of the few companies in this part of the state that do road paving as we're competing with these larger state contracts, and that perhaps we could form a consortium with some surrounding towns to go out to bid together. So is that something we could include to ask the town manager to come out with an assessment of whether that's something we could really do? I mean, to really try and tangibly do something to have more roads paved. So I didn't know if that rose to the level of a town manager goal, but I wanted to throw that out there. Paul. Yeah, I think what you're saying is we want more roads paved more efficiently, right? Maybe at a better cost. Have you got the best costs? Yeah, better costs, yeah. And one way to do that is to align ourselves with other communities, and maybe we have more power that way to get a better price. I think that's what the goal is on this, right? Yeah, that's a certain... I mean, I think you really want to have roads in the goals. I mean, it should be a priority for the council. The response from staff is we are limited by the funds we have and what we can pave. You know, we'll keep asking for more money and deciding if the council can decide if we're going to put more money into roads. And then it's like, well, are we getting the best bang for our buck for the money we are putting into it? That's really where I think that question comes from. Am I accurate on that? Yeah, and then I... So is that... But I would imagine it's fairly time-consuming to put that consortium together. Is that something a committee might be formed to help do? I mean, I'm thinking of like the committee choice aggregation. I don't know if it's a long list. We don't probably need state approval, but would it be helpful to have a committee helping the staff? No, I think so Franklin County does it already. And so what we would do is look into would it make sense for us to join their consortium? That's really what the question would be proactively say. There's already one in existence. Let's join it because we don't have to reinvent the wheel. And would we save money if we did? Okay. I think if the goal is to save money as opposed to being just join a consortium because there's some pluses and minuses to a consortium, you lose flexibility, but once you join a consortium, whoever they choose as the contractor you use because they're promising a certain number of road pavements and that's how they're getting the competitive bids. And I know DPW has in the past not liked to do that, but I think it's just been an opinion, not we haven't really done a full investigation. And if you were to say more efficient ways to pave more roads, such as joining a consortium and talk to us about that, that would be a good goal. Okay. Well, I would like to. Yeah. Yes, we add that. Okay, Lynn, do you have something in response to that? Okay, go ahead. So I want to make sure that in the word efficiency, we're also opening up the possibility that it's a multi-year plan because we're never going to fix this in one year. And so the word, the themes I keep hearing from other counselors and from finance committee members is multi-year and in collaboration with other communities. We can get the attention of the industry, if you will, maybe even a new entrance into the industry or something, okay? Yeah, that's a good one. Jennifer? Yeah, so this is actually very specific. Following up on, I think Laura Draker sent an email to the council about town manager goals and she had asked about, she said, Hadley's looking to build a new DPW facility. Might we, would there be an opportunity to have a joint one? I don't, so I actually thought that was intriguing. But I would put that out there. Yeah, I mean, I think, so if you want to add that to the goals, that's good. We've had that exploration of conversation with leaders of Hadley a couple of different times at different locations, seeing if there's some economies of scale to be had. And it seems like, it seems to me like that would make a lot of sense, but Hadley has to be willing to say yes to that. And my last conversation, they were gonna talk to their finance committee chair and get back to me. Whether they, if there was a door they wanted to open or not. But I think if you were to say shared municipal facilities, it opens a lot of different things, and like, you know, Sunderland is looking to build its own senior center. Every town wants to have its own senior center. Every town wants to have its own, the whole thing of municipal facilities is always tough, especially with smaller towns. Good suggestions, Jennifer. Thank you, no, okay. You had a second one or was that, did that complete the two that you had? Yeah, I had another one when we get to pilots, but I'll wait. Okay, Lynn? Yeah, in this one, I particularly am gonna be interested because we've been getting signals from Senator Comerford and Representative Dom that the creation of a authority or a commission, if you will, that's like MBLC, Mass Board of Library Commission or the Mass School Building Authority, that the one for municipal and public safety buildings is actually getting some traction. So what would be interesting is, if we came in with a proposal that included two municipalities on, you know, say some place that's at near one of our borders, whether our proposal might be viewed more favorably and more money. So there's some options there. And when we get to pilots, I wanna mention something, but after Jennifer talks. Yeah, so just to respond to that, they do usually give incentives and that's how we were able to get our, when we did fiber up to Mount Lincoln through Pelham, we were able to like double the amount of grant because we were servicing some of the town of Pelham's buildings as well as our Centennial Water Treatment Plan. Okay, so let's maybe, let's go back up to the beginning and just go. Yes, Athena, sorry. I just wanted to note, Pam Rooney had sent some suggestions for rules. I have those in an email. So I don't know if you wanna take those up now or go through what we have first, but I can pull those up when you're ready. Okay, that was for goals, not rules, right? For the town manager goals to just- Yes, goals, I'm sorry. Well, we have rules too, to deal with so. Yeah, sure, let's pull those up and take a look. So I think it looks like maybe these were sent to you Pat and Paul and Athena, so let's see. Starting with housing. I think Pam has brought this up previously about forming a task force and I remember there being a conversation about that. Paul, what are your thoughts on that? This is to explore strategies, increasing housing options for year-round residents and to accommodate 50% of all US students now living, having to live off campus. So the goal is to form the task force and I don't know if that's really how you would phrase a goal and typically a goal would be to create a plan to or explore, however you wanna do it to bring options for increasing housing options for year-round residents. I mean, like if I form a task force and it doesn't meet, then I've met the goal. I don't think that's what you want. I think you want a plan and the tool to use it would be a collaborative group to look at this. Yeah, so how do committee members feel about the level of specificity that Pam is recommending here in terms of the goal? Because I hear Paul's point. But I think, and then I think from Pam's perspective she's trying to get something tangible. So let's go to Jennifer, then Lynn, and then Mandy. Well, I like that and I don't know if this has been done before that it's including representatives that this would be staff, residents and representatives from the higher institutions of higher learning. Now, maybe this happens. So I think that is a good approach that I don't know that we've had before. And I think that all, excuse me, all those entities probably need to be in on the conversation. So that's just my comment. Thank you, Lynn. I want us to think more broadly about this issue and not with the level of specificity that's here. And also reflect on the fact that there is something about this in the strategic agreement with UMass. There is no completed strategic agreement with Amherst College, but I do know from conversations with them that they're thinking about their own workforce housing as well. And this then also got brought up in front of the governor or with the governor for UMass as well. So I don't know that this is the way to do it. And I would like to make sure that we not be too prescriptive in goals. Thank you, Lynn. Mandy. Yeah, the current number four that we've potentially changed to propose strategies to stabilize the year round population could be easily modified to something like proposed bylaws or regulatory strategies to stabilize the year round population or to increase housing options for year round residents or modify that one that says propose something. Don't just investigate, don't just create a task force, don't just explore, but we wanna see actual things we could adopt. And that was sort of the start of number four's propose instead of explore, but I think we could modify that the whole language of that to encompass what Pam was getting at with her task force issue. And all similar in number three proposed measures to increase the diversity of the housing stock, right? Instead of just increase, we wanna see things that will do that. And I'll add that along the lines of what Lynn was saying, there have been several conversations that have occurred around housing just this year with various of these groups that we're talking about and state officials and things like that. So how might we include language here in the goal that invites that continued collaboration and those collaborative discussions so that it's clear that we are looking, we're messaging that that's how we like to look at this. Jennifer and then Lynn. Yeah, and I think also I kind of read this as we tend to talk to the colleges and universities about student housing on campus off campus, but this was also could the institutions of higher learning be involved in also how to have more housing for their employees, which is a win-win for the institutions, for the employees, for our town, they send kids to their, so that was to also broaden that conversation to include workforce housing. Yes, okay, Lynn. Athena, I guess I'm took from our discussion that or at least I said, I felt that PAMS was too specific and then Mandy Joe made the suggestion of things like proposed strategies, including bylaws and whatever else to stabilize the year round population. I just, when you put in to encompass Rooney's suggestions, it means that specificity to me. Okay, fine. So Athena, when you're making the, are you making notes that then we're gonna go back and deliberate language around or you weren't suggesting that that be the language? I didn't think. No, I have this in brackets. Unless someone wants to tell me the specific words, then I'm just leaving notes where we're making notes we're missing the specific words and the committee wanted to go back and, here's some other notes need spaces that we had discussed or the committee had discussed at the last meeting. So yeah, those need a little bit more fine tuning and we just didn't have the exact words. But if somebody wants to suggest specific words, I'm happy to insert those. I just didn't wanna take too much liberty in crafting. Makes a lot of sense. Yeah, I'm just, I'm gonna go to you, Paul. I just have a quick question. When are we hoping to have this body having voted these? So the council is planning on having, Lynn, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but on our agenda planning, we have an initial discussion at the council on November 20, just for feedback to GOL. And then the first meeting at December, the council would see a first draft and then a final vote, if not that first meeting in December, then the second meeting in December. So just depending on how the council feels after seeing that final draft from GOL. So I think we have a GOL meeting on the 15th. And then that is the last GOL meeting before December. Oh no, there's one on the 29th. So there's a GOL meeting on the 29th. So I think that we're hoping that GOL will vote a final recommendation on the 29th. But that the council wants to see the draft on November 20. Okay, so we'll have next week to sort of try to get some language put into place for these suggestions. Okay, all right, Paul, sorry. So on this one, are you looking, it says increased housing options. Does that mean increase in supply or variety? Do you think? So the number three? Yeah, number three directly relates to the comprehensive housing policy goal of increasing housing diversity. So that means not just single family homes, not just departments, but increasing the types of housing stock available. So the number four is that's related to Pam Rooney's comments. It seems like they're- It was actually there before. Yeah, okay. It was there about stabilizing the, it was explore strategies to stabilize the year round population before and now it's proposed measures sort of to do so with potentially using some language like, you know, what was hers? It would be proposed measures to stabilize. Housing for year round population. Yeah, housing for, you know, or to increase options. She says options, but increase year round resident housing or I don't know the wording, right? But she had faculty and staff, you know? So specifically identifying faculty and staff sort of. Okay. So was the only thing that Pam, Pam's recommendations are on the right side in red. Right. And that's all of her recommendations then. We can- No, there's nothing in black. And then these are all adds and edits down here. Okay. Okay. So Lynn? I'm going to speak to seven relationship with higher ed. And I mean, it's an impossible, it cannot be done. Okay. And so I think we want to do something where we absolutely are looking through pilot payments and other funds from the university, but we will never, you cannot make higher ed do this unless we pass the laws. Okay. I mean, it's just they don't, they're not beholding to us bluntly. So I want to make sure that we don't word it in a way that is not even doable. I want to make sure we continue to work on it. And that's really through pilot programs. Which I think Jennifer also wanted to speak to Mandy. Oh, I was going to, we're jumping around so much, but CRC members also had other suggestions for GOL to talk about for housing additions. Okay. So I'm suggesting because we have the privilege of having Paul here today and our time is limited that we would ask Paul if there are any specific items that he sees in the current draft that he would like to address or if there are any specific questions that we would like to address with Paul, whether it be about any of these goals. And then I think we can go into more detail as a body once Paul, you know, not to take too much of Paul's time. So Paul, I'm handing it over to you. So you just want to walk down the document on the left? Is that how you want to do it? Yeah, that would be great. I think Mandy, your hand's still up. Is that all right? Nope, that's good. So yeah, let's start from the top here. And we'll try to, as we go down, just also be looking, you know, keeping in mind other recommendations that we've gotten. So, yes, starting here with climate action. I thought that we added this first, yeah, go ahead. I guess one of the questions is if you felt like in the performance review, you felt like these goals elicited the response you were hoping for. And if not, we should change them so that you did get the response you were hoping for. But yeah, I don't have any issues with the climate action goals. Any response to Paul's broader question about, yeah, Mandy? Yeah, so it didn't. When I submit the manager evaluation, but specifically that the first part, the first thing that says, and to prepare the town to be resilient in the face of climate change, that is one that I didn't see much of at all in what the town is doing. And just an example of as storms and rain events get stronger and heavier and quicker for how quick they drop inches of rain, have we been expanding our stormwater capabilities as we've been putting new stormwater, you know? But there's no mention of that. There's no goal for that. That wasn't even discussed in the evaluation at all. So it's hard to do that. So that's where that sort of came from is to ensure that that's also part of the consideration. And then the one thing when I was going through stuff, and this is not listed as number one, but as I was thinking about the evaluation and these goals, the climate lens, self-evaluation focused a lot on capital. Climate lens as it relates to capital matters, but not necessarily as it relates to any other decisions or things going on in town. And I don't know whether we need to change number one. I mean, it says budgeting, it says involve energy and maybe that's too specific because there's other things beyond energy that need climate lenses or non-energy climate lens like stormwater pipes and stuff, for example, that's not energy. But construction, repair, hiring and other decisions, yet much of the self-evaluation focused solely on capital decisions and not other operational decisions. So maybe we need to revise number one to be clearer what that means. Yeah, I think, I mean, capital things are easily quantifiable and reportable, obviously, and there wasn't a request about the resiliency activities that we've done, which we have done, but that wasn't a goal, but something that we didn't, and maybe that's, I should have put that under other decisions, but it said involved energy. So it was really, I was focused on the electricity use really on that front. But I think you're right to add things about climate change, I think that's a good thing. A lot of the work that we do, MVP grants and things like that revolve around that kind of work. Yeah. Okay, Jennifer. Okay, so I was moving down to number three. So could I do that? Mandy, are you suggesting a change here? Did you want to take out these words? I would say use a climate lens when making budgeting, construction, repair, hiring and operational decisions that involve, I don't know, that involve energy and climate resiliency or something. I don't know, like... Can you just... You know, it shouldn't be... Can you just end the decisions? Or decisions, yeah, I don't, maybe that's the best way to do it. All right, Jennifer. Yeah, so I'm like, what we would like to see for this coming next calendar year or part of what we would want is that the, an RFP be released and responses received for contracting out the town, contracting out waste hauler services. And we may decide, you know, based on the responses that that's not the route we're gonna go, but I would hope that that would happen in the next year. I mean, even maybe beyond that, but that, yeah, so this year the, you know, that we, it's more than just moving forward, but that we have something that tangible happen. I don't know how Paul feels about that. Yeah, so I don't, we won't issue an RFP unless the council has said we want to do this. An RFP is saying, we wanna do this and who wants to do it for us? An RFP isn't just test the market necessary. That's what the RFI was about. So an RFP is like, you've got the funds set aside and you've got the laws in place to do what you want to do. And then we say an RFP is who's going to do it for us. So I think that the big goal is about the waste hauler bylaw. And you, we may find that once we set up that bylaw that it's gonna take two years to implement or something. I'm not sure what, what the rule, what we're gonna find on that. But- Oh, so you're saying that we will, I'm sorry. Go ahead, please. No, I think it wasn't, so we will get the bylaw passed and then we'll do the RFP? I think that's, once you get the information you need you decide what you want to do as a town. And then if you say we wanna contract it out for everybody in the town, then we do an RFP and say who would like to take this task on? Because if you do it prospectively, the RFI is just, you know, that's where we ask people to give us information. Which is what Guilford is looking at now. So you, like we don't actually do an RFP unless, if it's gonna cost us money, the comptroller won't issue it until we have an appropriation. We can't just do random RFPs. We have to have an appropriation ready to go. Because once you do an RFP- So the RFI will tell us if we wanna- It'll tell us a certain amount of information, yeah. Yeah, so you know what I'm saying here is, how do we sort of increase the pace of the whole thing? Yeah. Yeah, that's really my, yeah. So I don't- Yeah, it's a big goal. It's a big change of how we do things and operationally how we do things. And I think putting this in, it would probably, you will probably see something in the budget that will support this work. Okay. And we don't need to specify that here as a goal. No, if you're saying this is what we want to develop a bylaw, then I would say, okay, when I build the budget, I'm going to, what do we need to accomplish this goal? And can we do it internally? Do we need to hire someone to help us with it? What do we have to do? Okay, thank you. Thanks, Paul Lynn. Yeah, I just wanna step in and say, we haven't made the decision that we are going to do this, okay? And until we make that decision, and before we can make that decision, we need a lot more information than just what the RFI has provided. We need to know what is it going to cost the town and what additional personnel do we have to have? And then we have to do a cost analysis to see whether that really saves residents any money at all. And so I have no problem with revising our bylaws, but I do not wanna jump to the conclusion that we are going to do this until we see what it really is going to cost the town and whether or not it will save residents money. Mandy, are you responding to that? Yeah, I have a suggested revision to number three that was in a CRC packet, which was start with support the council. So get rid of the take necessary steps towards, but it would read support the council in developing and bringing to a vote, a waste hauler bylaw, all the way to if adopted, initiate contracting and implementation. Jennifer? Yeah, no, I just want to say I'm sorry, I actually just admit my ignorance. I thought we made the decision based on the RFP responses, like if they didn't meet our goals, we could make it, but so I know I'm late in processing this, but we make that decision based on the RFI. So I'm not disagreeing with Lynn, I was just not quite understanding the process. And you know what, we can't all keep up on everybody's committees. And I think the suggestions that Mandy just made really make it more clear what that process is. I like them. All right, great. Is there anything else in this goal before we move on? Do you want us to go through some of the other things that have been suggested? Sure, we could. Just to put them out there. Yeah. Just from the CRC. And what I will say is CRC did not vote on any of these, is not recommending any of these, but had undertaken a discussion because of some prior discussions and consensus. But we only got that far. One was to add, there was a couple to add a number of ones. One was to add a re-establish an e-bike sharing network. One was fund an additional sustainability staff position focused on grant applications and implementing residential energy efficient programs. Another one was, so this is, I think the next one's similar to number five, which has developed staffing and strategies to utilize future funding surges targeted climate resiliency. And then there was a new add to the CARP, which was pursue, I guess it would be pursue grants for heat pump purchase and installation for all town owned and or managed residences than make available to rental properties. Again, these were just suggestions from counselors. So can I ask a question about, so if you, suppose you say, re-establish the e-bike sharing network, okay? And the way to do that is, that company went out of business and we're looking at different options for bringing it back. But the most likely way to, if we really want to move forward on that would be an appropriation of funds of tens of tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to subsidize it. And, but that doesn't fit into our budget, right? And because it's an, it would be an ongoing commitment. So I guess if the goal is to establish an e-bike sharing network, we can do that because we would join in with the other communities who are seeking funds from their own community to support it. But that would mean I would build my budget to include that if you put it in here, right? And that means we won't do something else because obviously we have a limited budget or there's some choices to be made along these lines. And it's establishing a sustainability position. I know that's not, you're not saying to do that here, but I would guess you might have something that's my say, economic development director position as well or us, and then we have the department heads we're looking at. So just the interplay between these goals is important with the development of the budget. We really want to align the two. So I just want to make sure there's some availability of space to say like, yeah, but we don't have the money to do it type thing, you know, or having the council prioritize whatever it wants to go on these things. Go ahead, Mandy. Yeah, so that's a very good point. But I guess how do we put in here or guarantee that the council has those discussions because we haven't had them related to goals. We haven't had them related even to our budget guidelines where you say, well, you can do this, but it will cost us this and we will lose why? Like to choose X means losing Y, to choose Y means losing Z, or how do you recommend we write into the goals, those conversations that I think are absolutely necessary. We have something in like management finance down on page four that says, you know, facilitate conversations with the council on the challenges of providing adequate staffing given the level of services. So that relates to staff and not other projects, but I'm not sure we've really had those conversations. So what do you recommend we put in here as it relates to some goals that, you know, the council has to have these discussions as to whether they're actually town manager goals or not and would we add them, but how do we mandate those conversations that are frank, the frank conversations? So I think the challenge we have is as these schemes come at you and us at different times of year, it's not a coordinated thing. So we're, you know, you might get an e-bank thing one time and get a waste hauler thing another time of year and all these things are gonna require money. There's usually a money thing and we don't wanna wait a whole year to get to the budget oftentimes on many of them. So I think that's the challenge. I guess what the purpose of the goals is that we would like to see this, right? And maybe it's to bring options to the council. If you're, this thing is to establish an e-bike sharing network perfectly doable with adequate funds, right? And all these things are gonna have the caveat subject to funding. So I guess this goal thing is to establish the things you wanna see the town do through the manager's office, right? Yeah, and maybe one way to say this is to explore the impact of climate action initiatives such as, you know, so that we're saying we're asking that through, like Lynn suggested, these have to go through finance often to explore the financial implications. There are other implications. So if there are several initiatives or two or three initiatives that we would like for, to have the impact of those explored, then perhaps we have a broader language than then specify the initiatives such as the bike share in there with some level of priority than maybe Lynn. Thanks. Let me just speak to the first point that Mandy Joe made and that is you might remember back in some iteration of scheduling and goals, we talked about actually twice a year having a meeting at which the town manager and the council discuss progress on goals and some of the challenges. And, you know, we might wanna re-institute that. I'm sorry about that. We may wanna re-institute or institute something like that where, you know, in a six month interval some of these things come up and, you know, Paul can present to us, here is what this would cost and here are your choices. And so it doesn't all happen at the same time, we all recognize that. But I'm trying to suggest that there could be a process and that process was something we had discussed in a previous iteration about goals. The other pieces, again, I think it has to be explored because if we say re-established, then either the town manager does it or doesn't do it and he fails on that. So there we go. And when I heard Mandy-Jo say about the staffing and strategies for climate resilience was staffing supported by grants. And then the only other comment I wanna make is pursue grants for heat pumps. You know, I'd like to have it be more broad, pursue grants for climate resiliency for rental properties because maybe this year it's not heat pumps but it's solar panels. And that may be what the state's putting the money out for. So it would be more broadly something about climate resilience for rental properties. Thank you, Lynn. Jennifer. Yeah, I agree with what Lynn said on all those counts but I think it's a really, that would be great if there could be a check-in halfway through the year. Because I feel like it's also more fair to the town manager. So if, you know, because we just evaluate the end of the year and there may be, you know, which I'm sure there is very good reasons why maybe something didn't happen. And so it's would be very, I think it would just be helpful because it's a long time to wait a year, you know? So I think that that is a good suggestion that we have a mid-year check-in as to what's going on, you know? I mean, because it may be that, yeah, that there's something came up so that this goal, you know, there's a hiccup and how we can, you know, I just think it would be helpful all the way around. Thank you, Jennifer. Mandy. A couple of things. I don't like the word explore. And the reason I don't is in my past five years on the council, I've seen explore in there. And all we get at the end of the year is I looked into it and it doesn't work, you know, we don't get what the exploration was. We don't get why necessarily it doesn't work. We can look at the economic vitality of explore the possibility of funding an economic development director position. And I think Paul's self-evaluation said, we don't have the funds period without anything more than again, going back to discussing with the council, whether it's options or reasons behind the exploration, once you've explored or something like, well, why don't we have the funds? What would we give up if we wanted the funds for that? What could we give up? Those conversations is what I feel is missing from both the fulfillment of the town manager goals in a lot of this, but also budgetary discussions. And so explore on its own, I think is almost too vague for what the council wants to see, which is discussion with the council after exploring some of these initiatives. And I will say for a lot of these, these, as I said, I don't necessarily support or not support some of these to pursue grants again. Well, if you have to hire someone, are we saying hire someone to pursue grants? That costs money, even if the grant money coming back would more than pay for the person you hired, right? Again, it goes back to those budgetary decisions. And I'd love to find a way to write into these goals, including the council in how the manager makes those budgetary decisions in terms of priorities. Is it a priority to have all those grants and hire someone to do that over having an economic development director? Which ones, yet I haven't, this is not just the manager's issue here, it's a council issue too. The council hasn't had these conversations. Yes, Paul. Yeah, so I think that's precisely what the challenge is is that we're making a wish list here. It's truly, it's a desire wish list, but there's no cognizance of what the financial impact is. And then, I mean, goals are supposed to be achievable and if you put it on here, it implies to me that you're gonna, maybe it implies that you're gonna fund it, but what does that funding mean? We know what our resources, how our resources are limited in terms of just getting the basics done. So I think that that interplay is really a challenge to work through. And if this becomes sort of like, we have a hundred things and we hope to get 50 of them done, no one will succeed, right? It's the idea of a goals list, I think, is to prioritize. It doesn't mean to be comprehensive. It means like, what do you really wanna, what are your top priorities? What do you really want us to focus on? Cause we really do pay attention to what you put on this piece of paper. And if it becomes like everything, it becomes nothing, because it's DPW just sort of says, there's so many things that you want us to do. What are the top things that you want us to do? It doesn't mean we won't do anything else, but I think where this document becomes valuable is not that it becomes a checklist. Did you hit this thing or that thing? Because we're not gonna hit them all. But if you said, these are our top three things for climate action, that would be huge. That would be huge for us. And it doesn't mean there won't be anything else done, but it just means it, by setting, the council's values and setting the priorities for the town. That's how I feel about it. And I'm just gonna raise my hand. Here we go. I, yeah, I just wanted to add, I know I'm leaving the council, but just thinking about the role of the president in terms of leadership and looking at the goals and the goal document and bringing forward discussions to the council through agenda setting that hit on some of these areas that we really haven't as a council necessarily had full discussions about. And I think Lynn's done a really excellent job. But my concern is that Lynn isn't necessarily always gonna be in that position. So if somebody new were to, for example, become president in the next council, that maybe hasn't even been a counselor yet. And then they're tasked with managing the operations of the council and knowing, trying to figure out sort of looking at this document, which agenda items should be brought forward and taking some measure of leadership on that. So one of the things that I think we did, but I maybe, I think we did in our first year in my term was that retreat where we really honed in on what the priorities were. And I think that I really hear what Paul's saying when it becomes everything, it becomes nothing. And then it's really like a waste of everybody's time. So I think we could do a lot better to be more clear without being overly prescriptive in the goals, but really getting together early on in the council's term and having, whether it be through retreat or otherwise, a very clear set of priorities that Paul can rely on in terms of moving things forward. Lynn? And I appreciate that comment because that's exactly what I feel like we're missing here. And it's gotta include the new councilors because they may not have some of the same priorities, they may have different ones, they may not see some of these the same way. And the earlier in the year that you do that, February being I think the latest you can do it is the best. The other thing that I think is important is assuming that you keep the same committee structure is to start looking at how these priorities break out across committees. Because I think what we're seeing is we're ending this term is how many things have we had to say, that's not the way it's gonna go forward because we've just run out of time. Two year terms are very tough. And particularly on committees and getting stuff done. I have no other comment. Thank you. Paul. One thing I do appreciate is that you're working from the current document because there's consistency and that really is helpful. We're not like, the council could say, let's create something new, but this one it's building on what you did last year. And then you can, you're making adjustments where you feel like, okay, there's been adequate progress made, no there hasn't been. And so I think the consistency from year to year is very valuable. All right. Is it time to move on to community health and safety? Okay. So let's see, Paul, if you have any questions or any comments related to this goal or if any counselors do. I think we did make a little change here to develop programming. So we wanna go from exploring options for the youth empowerment to develop programming. And we talked last time about how this has sort of already been in the works and that you process of, and so how do we take it beyond that exploration and actually develop a plan? These are all good ones. Okay, great. Yes, Mandy. This is where I think we've, we've as a committee received a number of comments regarding senior programming potentially. And so number three, if we, a mirror of three or an addition, whether you can add it into three, I'm not so sure because of some other things, but an additional one that's developed programming for seniors or something. I'm not sure how it would be worded. You could actually just change youth empowerment to seniors and instead of incorporate input from youth incorporate input from senior, you know, right? We could, we could just rewrite or copy it and just change youth to seniors. But I think this is a appropriate place given the comments we've received. If we want to consider as a council adding goals relating to seniors and senior services, this is the community health is where it should go, I believe. Yeah, I agree. And just looking at the recommendations that came through by email. There's some good language in there that we might wanna tap into when we come back to this that was provided by seniors, Paul. For both youth empowerment and seniors, are you looking for just programming or you're looking for space as well? You'll see in capital buildings, the space issue. Okay, good. Good question. So, and I guess on the programming for seniors, I assume that that will mean, I mean, I feel like I think our senior director feels like they do a fair amount of programming if there's more specificity to what that, if it's just more or different, it'd be helpful to know what that looks like from the council's point of view. All right, why I think is that, Pat? Yeah, one of the things is, you know, for me is that we have all this exercise equipment in the senior center and they can't use it because there's nobody who's qualified to teach them or be there. So I, you know, that's again, an employee issue. I'm not, I don't know. So I'm, it isn't just the programming. We have programming we can't implement. So. It's actually a building design that we're trying to address. Yeah, that's okay. Then I think we should say that. That's why I was asking about the space issue, which will come down later, it sounds like. Yeah. Okay. So economic vitality, if we're complete with that one, we can move on. Yes, Manny. I've got a lot, but again, from some of the comments at CRC number two would change from explore the possibility of funding to fund an economic development director position in the FY 25 budget. Again, I recognize there's a lot of conversation that needs to go with some of these, right? Because there's a lot of funding implications to many of these. There's no council agreement that we want that. So. Right, right. But that was one of the things that one counselor in CRC had asked that be considered for these goals is instead of explore fund, which is why I say we need to be at the council to discuss a lot of these. There were two additions in economic vitality. One was hire a design consultant for form-based zoning and propose a bylaw to adopt form-based zoning. And another one was review all policies and propose revisions if necessary to support an increased year-round population in town. Sorry, I wasn't quick enough, Mandy. Hire a consultant for form-based zoning and propose a bylaw to adopt form-based zoning. And then the, a different number five, I guess, would have been review all policies and propose revisions if necessary that support or to support an increased year-round population in town. It's sort of the second half of that housing year-round population is the economic vitality side of, are there services, things that we need, I think is where that request came from. And Athena, there's the word increased in front of year-round, I believe. Right, Mandy, increase. Yeah. Okay. And Athena, if you would just go back and would you asterisk number two, because I think that GOL to Pat's point should have a discussion about which language would indicate that this discussion hasn't, or that the council hasn't agreed upon that particular approach. So when we come back to this, we can have that discussion. So you want more GOL discussion about this one? Because the council will give feedback on all of them. Right. I don't think that it's sincere to put fund in economic development director position yet because we haven't agreed as a council that that's the approach that we want to take. So... So did you want more GOL discussion? Or because my assumption is that this will be discussed along with everything else at council when you see the first draft on the 20th. So we don't need to put notes that each one should be discussed at the council because you'll get feedback on all of them. Well, no, I mean here in GOL. So let me ask then, is there a consensus in this body that we are proposing to the council funding? Because these are our recommendations to the council. So do we have consensus in this body that we are proposing that the town manager funds an economic development director position? Because I heard Pat say potentially that we didn't have that consensus. So I really, I wanna make sure that we're accurate there. Lynn and then Mandy. To me, this goes right back to the trade-offs. What, if we fund this, what can't we fund? And the last time we came to this discussion, we funded a DEI director instead of an economic development director. So I think we can explore it, but I don't think we can say fund it until we know what the trade-offs are. Mandy? So we have this same problem with number one that says in climate sustain action, fund an additional sustainability staff position, right? And we haven't had that conversation either, but I think the language is in there, fund it. What I think would be helpful is be it Paul or someone on this committee identifying all goals in these policy doc, the policy side, all goals that would require funding above what is already included in staff in the current fiscal budget, in current, and getting us that list because I can't predict and how much that funding would be or something because I can't predict what exploring strategies or what the e-bike network would be or what for some of these other ones when we get to housing and what proposing by-law costs would be or what the waste haul or by-law support would be. And so I think we need a list of what goals cost money so that we can have those trade-off discussions before we immediately just nicks one or the other. Jennifer? I want to suggest for number five under economic vitality if the word necessary, maybe we mean if relevant, if it applies to. Yeah. I'm sorry, I was trying to spell consequences. Can you repeat that? Where the word necessary in five. So it's this, yeah, maybe if relevant, I don't know if that's the best word, but I think that's what I mean. Can you repeat that? Maybe the word relevant, you know, if it's relevant, I don't know if we wouldn't say it's not necessary, but if it applies to the policies and revisions for Richard, it applies to. So I think maybe relevant is more precise. And this is on... I don't know if relevant's the right word, but I don't think necessary is probably exactly the right word. We'd probably just take it out altogether. Yeah, just take it out, right. So are we, as I've heard a couple of different things, back to number two, do we wanna go back to explore this for now or do we wanna, what language do we want to keep in number two? I heard Lynn say we can't include fund. I heard Pat say something similar. I said something similar, but then Mandy had a good point about having that list. I just don't want this to get overlooked when we... I personally feel strongly that we can't say fund right now. I think that that is, you know, if we never came back to this and this is what went to the council, to me, if I was not in this committee, I would read that that the GOL recommended that funding of that. And unless that's what we're saying, I think we should go back to explore. Is everyone okay? I don't agree with that unless we go back and change number one. Okay, let's look at that. The sustainability position. We didn't even have a conversation on that, yet it was left there. And so I took this document in the first conversation at the council of being, here are the councilor's recommendations with our wording as best as possible and not GOL's recommendations because we haven't heard from the council. And so leaving fund in there tells the council, there's at least one councilor that wants to get funded, right? Okay, I can, if that is the framework for which the first discussion with council happens, then like that means basically I could throw in there, you know, fund a pajama party once a month. Well, I like that book. Okay, so if that's a framework, that's fine. Then let's leave it, if everyone's okay with that and let's move on. Good, all right. So housing affordability. This one seems like there were quite a few changes. Any councilor comments, Paul, any comments? So I think there was a request, multiple requests. That was actually talked about earlier in this meeting that isn't, I think in here yet, which is that maintain and publish up-to-date data on affordable dwelling units in town. Yep. I think that was on the CRC list like three times. So many councilors asked for it. Yeah, and I brought up a version of that. So thank you, Mandy. And then the only other one that was, there was PAM's developed staffing and strategies to utilize future funding, surges targeted at housing shortages. And then there was also an advocate that UMass build P3 faculty and staff housing. I think that one came from PAM too. I'm sorry, I'm not quick enough this morning. No, I'm too quick. Advocate that UMass build P3 faculty and staff housing. Was it faculty and staff housing? Yes, yes. Thank you. Did I get seven right? This is wrong. And strategies to utilize future funding surges targeted at is what PAM's language was, I think. What does that mean? Yeah, what does it mean? That's a good question. CRC didn't have any discussion on it. So PAM Rooney would be the best to tell us that. So maybe we asked her to suggest that at the town council meeting and not, yeah. I think just in the spirit of what we just talked about, like it was put out there, let's throw it in there. And like we're putting everything in there and then we can hear from PAM about what that means. I'm wondering if funding surges relates to like government funding that we receive, whether it be through a bill or through, you know, special like rescue funds or things like that. That's kind of how I read it, but. Lynn? Yeah, please remove P3. That's a very specific kind of funding and unnecessarily the way they would do it. So it would just be to build that UMass build faculty and staff housing. I also basically would like to see us advocate that all three higher ed institutions do that. And just so you know, we have been advocating for that at the five college level. Yeah. Pat, just checking in with you and timing, it's 1120. Can we take this right out to 1130? I think we have to. Okay, all right. But you didn't have anything else that we need to. Oh, we always have something else, but this is. All right, there's, there's one set of minutes in the packet to approve if you want to do that quickly at the end, Michelle. Okay. All right, so we, any other comments or questions or anything on this? Okay, let's move on. So I think the major change we made here, Paul, was that we took out the word building in this goal. And we discussed, because we discussed that not everything that might need a capital investment would be related to one of the building projects. Correct me if I'm wrong committee, but I think that was sort of the one highlight of this particular goal. And are there any other comments or questions here? Oh, we talked about the roads in the sidewalks. Yeah, I would point out we don't have wording for it, but that parenthetical about youth empowerment center and senior center that's down there of how do we add that in? Exactly. Yeah, and when I think of that, just so you know what I'm thinking of, I'm not looking at like here is a proposal for a new building that's called senior center or youth empowerment center. I'm talking, I'm thinking about where do we create facilities or places for people to gather or expand them or accommodate for both of those goals? I sort of see those in companion goals in some ways, but separate structures, separate entities in essence. Great. Any other comments here? I just want to respond to Paul with the separate entities. And it's been my thing with a youth empowerment center, senior center, why separate entities? Is there a way to word this to talk about community centers that might include senior centers, youth empowerment centers? There are benefits to intergenerational. Yeah, so a lot of communities did go down that road and then senior centers typically pulled out and they did not like them because it's different for whatever they like their own space. But by definition, we do our senior centers in our community center and it's not going anywhere for the foreseeable future. That's really interesting, Paul. Thank you for sharing that. All right, so racial equity and social justice. Oh, sorry, Athena. Okay. All right. Mandy, do you want to just quickly say, I thought number five came from you last time and... It did. It's in some sense part of the reparations initiative and the resolution of ending structural racism, which is you can't end it if you haven't identified where our problems are structurally. And so number five was sort of suggested by me to formally start that process from... It's not to say it hasn't been started. Let me be clear with that, but from a council, what does the council need to do? We need to find ways to identify and remove the legislative structural, which would be bylaws regulations that we adopt or don't adopt and things like that. And so that's where the background for where number five came from in terms of its wording and stuff. And that was in the structural racism resolution that we passed very clear as a goal of that resolution. So anything else here? All right. So we can move on. Maybe you have a good answer for us, Paul. How do you define essential? We ask employees, everything's essential. So... I think it goes to that conversation I've been urging about trade-offs and the fund and whatnot too. And how do you make those decisions? I also asked that question, should we define the word essential? That was one of my questions. I think it's keeping the trains running on time. What you do. And it's interesting how if you talk to different people in the community might have really different ideas about what is essential. And that's part of the work we're doing. So I think it's good. Jennifer? Yeah. I always think of essential is that you notice them in their absence. And I bet you though, still there, I might notice something differently than somebody else would in its absence. Right. But I mean, if the water doesn't turn on, you know it's... Yeah. Yeah, trying to define it is sort of like, it's ridiculous because everybody has their own definition and their own priorities. And unless Paul wants to tell us his, and we can agree. Well, there are certain state mandated or federally mandated service, like providing water in a town, right? That is... Yeah, but do you have to define that? I guess part of my questioning was because it says as the goal for that, maintain essential services. So what would we say doesn't... Like if he doesn't do... If X is not maintained, has this goal not been met or if Y has not been maintained, has this, you know, if the... For example, I'll just give one. If the pools don't open or the golf course doesn't open in the summer, would we say this number three has not been met? Like that's the like, in terms of what are we referring to as essential services for maintaining those municipal services, I guess is where I was thinking, not necessarily whatever. I don't know, it might be impossible, but yeah, because I don't care about the golf course. In fact, it's very expensive to run, not bringing in much money. All right, so moving on to personnel management. I just want to note that it's 11.28. Yeah. Yeah, you know, good, good, good to say. Is there anything because actually, yes, I think I'm going to follow that and say that I heard several counselors talk about pilot as something that they wanted to discuss with Paul. And have we done that today? No. So I'm going to go, I heard Jennifer mentioned that and then I also heard Lynn had something to say about that. And so maybe we'll just skip to that for now and come back to whatever else. Jennifer. For sake of time, I can wait and bring it up at a council meeting. I mean, is that, you know, like we can all, we'll be discussing this at the council meeting. So instead of taking up more time here, I could just wait. Okay. So I'm going to go to the next meeting. It's on Monday's agenda. No, not until the 20th is my understanding. Do you think I should do that? One more time to look at this and bring it. I believe if I look at the work plan, I can wait till the next meeting. That's what I'm saying. The next time it's discussed. Yeah. And Paul, will you be attending the next time we talk about this? So we'll check. What's the 15th. Oh, the 15th. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause we did. All right. So do we want to end there then and we'll. Approve those minutes and then wrap it up. Does that work? Yeah. Thank you, Paul. Thank you very much. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. That was a really great discussion. Okay. I'm just going to say I moved to accept the September. Is it the 19th minutes? I have here approval of July 19. All this. July 19. As. As presented. That is. All right. Let's vote. Jen. Yes. Pat. Hi. Lynn. Hi. Mandy. Hi. I'm an eye as well. All right. Wonderful. Anything else. Michelle, I really want to thank you for. Thank you. Really was helpful for you to do this today. I appreciate it deeply. Thank you for giving me the opportunity. It was fun to be. You can do it next meeting. I think you should carry on on the 15th. Anytime you need me, I'd be happy to. So I really enjoy. I enjoy it. So thank you. All right. So I will adjourn us at 11 31. And have a great week. Congratulations everyone again. Thanks. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks.