 I think we're all here. There's a few members in the audience. Okay. So we should, um, I'll go on and introduce ourselves for people in the audience, even though we do that every time. Um, I'll begin. I'm Gail Lansky. I've been on the CDBG advisory committee. This is about my fourth go round and I'm actually in Canada. I'm not sure I'm supposed to say that. Hey, that's fine. You're here. Okay. I can't see who's next. So somebody just jump in. I can only see you. Nathaniel. All right. Which one's that? So I guess I go, I'm Nate Maloy. I'm a planner with the town and I help staff the committee. I'm Rika Clement. I'm a relatively new member just elected in June to a, a full term. I'm Becky Michaels. I'm also new. This is my first time going through this process. And I think June might also have been my, my start date. Also new member. And I'm that Larson, the other Nathaniel on the committee. And I guess I've been through this process a few times. Okay. Are there any announcements? Nate. I don't think so. I think the, um, You know, this is for everyone who's listening, you know, this is the. Um, 21, 2021 block grant application process. The committee has received proposals and asked questions of applicants and tonight they're going to review and prioritize proposals. And the application to the state is due by September 10th. And the, um, there hasn't been any changes. So, you know, Oh, you know, months ago, the state had equivocated about deadlines and certain things, but it's not, um, nothing's changed. So, you know, I will say that they are trying to review these quickly. And, uh, make awards in January. And then the 22 round, usually the 22 round, you know, would start now and then applications would be due. You know, in February, but they may, I think they're going to have the 22 round. Possibly follow the same schedule and not be due until September of next year. Or, um, maybe in the summer of next year. So, you know, I'll let the committee and everyone know that. More information is available, but. I think they're thinking about switching the cycle around quite a bit. That changes everything, but you'll keep us opposed posted. Are we ready to move on to reviewing and prioritizing the proposals, which you kind of already prioritized them for us. So you did the math and everything. Should I do the, um, share that the ranking screen? That'd be great. I don't know how visible that is for everyone. If it's big enough. Yeah. I don't know where the committee wants to start with the social services. Typically we start with and, uh, or the non-social service. Yeah. Let's do so. Let's do the non-social service first. Yeah. I think it's a little bit easier and easier because there are, um, There aren't as many to consider and it's right here on the top of our screens. So as you can see, Watson farms came in, um, four out of five. So. Does anybody want to discuss or do you want to just roll with what we've got here? Any comments? I just had a quick question. Yeah. I mean, I think for non-social service, all the non-social service ones, they're blocks. So if you don't, if they're not fully funded, does that mean that they just don't sort of happen? It's really hard to partially fund a roof, right? Yeah. That's a good question. I think usually we have to build a budget up to 825. And so for non-social service, you usually have about, you know, 536,000. And we can go over the numbers. But there's a lot of different ways to build a project. And, um, Maybe Kellogg have. It's a pretty, you know, there was a detailed line item budget. And I think if you, if those were reduced by, I mean, I think a little bit might be okay, but by a lot, then I think the project might shift. Okay. But there is some give and take as far as the actual totals to make the project actually happen. Yeah. I don't, you know, I think. Watson farms, I think they had said or what they're doing with the siding this year, but they didn't have a budget. So they could, you know, they could have a budget of about $6,000, about $6,000. So they could have a budget of about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000, about $6,000. So maybe they would only, I see four out of five buildings. And for Kellogg have, you know, if the town, if the budget was reduced to fair amount, we'd, maybe put more work on staff or, you know, maybe take out. You know, something. Yeah. I just didn't know because if, if, if you were going by full totals and you had to fit fully in, you know, you could have a budget of about $6,000. Right. Okay. I mean, usually the committee would recommend, you know, their projects. Then we worry about the budget after and see how. Okay. I sort of had that same question as well. And I am sorry. Can I ask one question to Gail? The non-social service projects. Is there a number, a limit to how many we can fund? In the same way that there is with the social service. So it's, it, you, sometimes we used to be able to fund more. We funded four or maybe even five at times. I think. So they, I think they've always had the three rule in there. They've just been. Pretty relaxed about it until this year. Which actually does make it harder because actually then that, you know, is asking applicants actually have a pretty big project. You actually have to have a pretty big capital project then to. You know, You know, You know, around out your grant application. Whereas before, you know, communities could piece together different projects and add up to a grant amount, you know, grant total. And so. I actually think the three, it can be pretty limiting. Well, I mean, it kind of makes our job. Pretty easy. We just take the top three recommendations, right? Right. I mean, essentially. Right. But, but even if we pick the three most expensive ones. That's still only gets us to four 76. Out of. You know, five 36. Right. So then we can, we can then. We've done with social service. We could figure out a way to pro rate the budgets and maybe, you know, if there's three projects, you can add. You know, divide the remainder by three and just add that amount to each project. You know, as an equitable. Or some way to do it, the typically we would, and I do think that. I agree that it's interesting. You know, I think, for instance, like what the Watson farms, Amherst housing authority, they found with the siding project that we funded last year, the price of materials went up so much that the project costs almost doubled. And with this roofing project, they factored it in, but not. Incredibly. So it's like, if. By the time, if the money is not available until next summer, and the prices keep going up, you know, the product cost may increase quite a bit. So. You know, I know they build in the contingencies, but they probably didn't build in, you know, a 50 or 60% contingency is probably 20%. And so what you just said now was, was that you, we would divide up the remaining funds from the three that we're going to fund and then give those to each entity. And so we're kind of overfunding them. That's, that's one way, you know, I think the committee could. That's that's one solution. And then we can always ask the applicants, you know, you know, is this is, you know, is there a way to incorporate this money into the budget? I mean, you know, I mean, you know, you could pro rate it based on the project cost and then have, you know, some. That'll be a tough conversation to have. Yeah, very tough, very tough. I mean, I could really only talking about 20, not only, but it's $20,000 extra to each one. If we found the three most expensive. So in the grand scheme. I mean, if prices go up at all. For either labor or materials. That'll be eaten up. Yeah. Yeah. So what's the process? Like, do we just say, great, let's do Kellogg, Hickory Ridge and housing authority. And we vote. Well, if the. Yeah, I mean, based on the chart, you know, so for the public as an attendance, these are. You know. Committee members rankings. Yeah, I mean, if the committee would, if that, if Becky, if you think that's what the chart kind of shows, are those three in the committee, you know, votes on it, then. It's, it can be, it could be that easy. If it's that clear. I mean, there might be one or two that may need to be discussed more. I mean, it looks like the Hickory Ridge. Was third was fourth for. Three people. Yeah, sometimes I mean, I think for the committee. I think like you were saying the housing authority. And Kellogg have, I mean, you said the housing authority, but maybe Kellogg have or two. To the higher priorities. I ranked them and we got. Come in at Watson farms Kellogg and Hickory Ridge is one, two, and three, as far as the ranking that I, when I just plugged them all in as numbers. Yeah. This is such a confusing chart for me. I thought the left hand column was the ranking. But that's not there. You have to count across to figure out. Right. Right. Sorry. Yeah. Everybody's votes. Yeah. It was really hard to, you know, sometimes there's a clear pattern and I was trying to, it just says ranking. That was what was so through me. Yeah. Ranking one through five, but that's not. Not quite. Right. Okay. If you read across then. Right. Right. So you'll recognize one of those lists as yours, Rika. Yes. I, I see that now. I just. Yeah. We came into the meeting. You're thinking right. I saw what you were thinking. Yeah. I had compared my rankings with what I thought were the rankings on the left-hand side. And now I realize, no, no, I totally misunderstood this. Yeah. No, I had the same name when I opened it at first on my phone, I came into this thinking. And then I noticed what it was an actual spread. Right. Okay. Anyway, so actually, yeah, for me, I'm happy with the Watson farms. Kellogg Avenue and Hickory Ridge. Those. Having that. I would prove that we vote that we. Fund those three and divide the remaining 60,000. Among them. I was second to that. That makes sense to me. The only question I have and, and maybe they're all the same, but in terms of dividing them three ways. Is it. Is it possible that the. Pedestrian connections, the pathways and stuff might not be as subject to as much. Inflation as the other construction projects, or are they all kind of pretty much. You know, the same. I mean, I don't know. Given that the, I mean, given that the Watson farming farms, roofing thing is an ongoing and multi. I would, I would actually sort of almost. Being inclined to give the remainder to them. Just because I prioritize roofs just personally. But, you know, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's a discussion for the committee. I think, you know, there's, I don't know if there's, you know, there's probably a few ways to do that. But you had initially said pro rate. I thought you meant pro rate based on the budget. They gave us as opposed to divvying it up evenly. I mean, I think I said both. You could do it. Or you could write pro rate based on budget. Right. Although then the Hickory Ridge is the biggest budget. So. Although I don't know how we could theorize that. Maybe things haven't impacted them as much. I mean, I, I would have no idea. I feel the same way. Yeah. I mean, in the end, their budgets are so similar. Yes. The total. They're close. Yeah. Definitely easier to just add 20,000 to each. Yeah. And we do have to keep in mind, and I know Nate has said this in the past that all we're doing. Is we're making a recommendation and then, you know, we're going to change it. So, you know, we can't, I don't, I don't think we have to spend too, too much time splitting hairs because we don't really under know. The final numbers will end up anyway. Right. Yeah. Okay. So we, so we do have a motion with a second on the, on the floor, so to speak. So Watson farms. Number one. Kellogg out of number two and Hickory Ridge, number three. Correct. Correct. Okay. Anybody opposed. All in favor. Yeah. I have to do a roll call vote Gail just by name. Okay. Lucas, how do you vote? Hi. Nat. Affirmative. Becky. In favor. And Rika. In favor. And I'm in favor as well. And I think that's everybody on the screen. And many got everybody. Okay. That was easy. You listed the, the. Each project. Are we just adding 20,000 and each then. Nate, do you think we should do that or should is, is it important to do that? Or where should we be on that? Given the fact that there were leftover funds, extra funds kind of sitting there. I think, I think it'd be good for the committee to have. You know, a recommendation. For the town manager, if it's, you know, we don't have to, I mean, if it's divided evenly, or if we're going to say pro rate on budget, and then we can start to figure it out or, you know, or if you. You know, Lucas said. You know that the roofing project is important and we don't want to. So I think that's a discussion for the committee. What, you know, what's the way to do that. Yeah. Well, what we just voted on was the 20,000 to each. So we can. Unvote that, but that's what that was what the vote was. Yeah. I'm fine with that. I just was throwing out another idea. I just wanted to clarify. I wasn't sure. So. If that's what the vote was, that's what I voted in. I don't mean to, I'm not trying to stick anybody with that. I just wanted to. Oh yeah. Yeah. So we're okay with a $20,000. Overage going being divided evenly between these three projects. Okay. Yeah. The $60,000. Overage. 20,000. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry about that. Okay. Okay. Any, any other for the discussion. Questions. No. Okay. Okay. On to the tougher work here. So we're moving on to the social service projects. And neat was your, your plan, our plan to have people speak. Now and time it or we're for the hearing next week. Okay. And this is still the committee. Committee's discussion. I don't know if you want to recognize them, but I think the, it's really just, you know, the committee's chance to make the recommendations. Okay. All right. So I'm on to the social service projects. So as we see it. It's pretty obvious that survival center is the first choice. Second. Feels kind of up for discussion. The way it looks to for Amherst community connections, but no majority. And. What's the number of these that are the, how many proposals do they accept in this category too? Five. Five. Yeah. So. We're very. Yeah. So it's. So it's. So it's. So it's. So it's up to five. It doesn't have to be. Five. Five. You know, but you typically the town funds five and then. You know, the, the trickier part then is the budget piece. Because, you know, there's been more money requested than available. So. Okay. I mean, but. I was kind of curious. No. Yeah. So it's up to five. It doesn't have to be. Five. Five. Okay. I'm curious. No. Some of these are showing up all over the map. There might be a. Project or proposal that gets a two and gets an eight. Yeah. Ranking. So what I thought I would do is. Do an average and median. And see where we come out. And it was interesting to me that. The. Both average and median. There were four. Top. Yeah. Rankings. And there were three bottom rankings. And number. Three in the middle. We're far too in the middle. We're really close. Close. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I just took the numbers and. And added them all up and then divide it by the number of. And I came up with a. Basically a scoring system. And there's. Yeah. When I look at the chart, we're in front of us. I see Amherst survival center and then. Big brothers would certainly be in. Top. Three. And then Amherst community connections. Kind of. Yes. And then it gets really tight around literacy project. Craig's tours and center for new Americans. So now what did you, when you ran the year analysis, what did you have? Yeah, so, so the. At the top four. We're pretty clear survival center, big brothers, big sisters, family outreach and community connections. And then Craig's doors and literacy project were kind of pretty close. And then. So. One was higher in median one. The other one was higher in average. And then. Center for new Americans. The CES. Food program and. The television one. All were seven, eight and nine for both average and four median. If we agreed to the top. X number. And we look at how much they requested and we. I mean, I'm not sure what process we might use. So one possibility might be to look at the top. One or two or two, I'll say. That seemed pretty clear and allocate the funds and then see what. Remains and how we might want to split it among things that are so close. You could do it. Do you want to say that again? Just explain that again. Yes. So it seems so Amherst survival center and. I'm going to say big brothers, big sisters, looking at this chart, I've not done the analysis, the numerical analysis, just looking at the chart. If we say, if, if we were to agree that those two we want to fund. And we look at how much they've requested and we fund them in full. Then we see what we have still to work with. I mean, that's just one idea of how to. Go from there. I mean, you're, you're almost, you're, you're really, I mean, you basically can fund the top three and then you're out of money. Okay. This is. You know, which we like to do. We could say we're just going to do three. Yeah. It's true. So I wonder if we should just talk about the organizations and what people's thought processes were on. Making their determinations. Do you think we should do it for all of them? Or I guess I was suggesting, since there's such unanimity among some, we didn't need to spend time on those, but yeah, we could agree on the top. I mean, it's really tight. I mean, I would say we can agree with the type five and then start talking about it from there because. You know, then at least we have four off the table. That's the way that's the kind of the way we've done it in the past and it sort of makes it. Easier to have. I mean, we've already. Done our score, our each individual scores and I think it's easier when you kind of take it in a grid fashion and just. Eliminate some to for the sake of kind of streamlining the discussion for what it's more top heavy than what's more bottom heavy. Yeah. I mean, I would say that we're basically somebody. This is my assumption. So please. They were basically talking about the literacy project. I mean, I would say that the literacy project and Craig's doors is the number five slot. Well, I'm going to just push back a little bit because I think that, and I'd like to hear what other people have to say, but I think each one of us, like obviously we made our choices for different. For our own reasons that we bring into this. And I guess I wanted. I mean, first just to say that obviously every single one of these organizations provides critical services and it's. A shame that we have to even be. Choosing amongst them and they should all be fully funded. So I think that we're, I think that we're, I think that we're, I think that we're a perfect place. But obviously we're bringing our own life experience and work experience and volunteer experience and our living in the community to the choices that we made. And I'm interested in knowing why. Somebody picked a literacy project is the first choice, right? I didn't. Put it up there anywhere near at the top. And so I'm curious, why did somebody do that? I'm really. I think that we all have the same. The same thing. We all have the same outreach really toward the bottom. And it's not because they don't provide absolutely critical services. So I think that we all have. Value. To, to bring to each of this. And I think that I, before we start saying, we're definitely not going to talk about this one. I think we should talk about. All of them. I mean, maybe we could don't have to talk about the survival center. Or. Amherst community television. So those are, we can rock, put those out. But I think the other one should all be fair game for conversation. Yeah. I think that risks having an endless meeting, but I think it's really important. But if we set a time limit. Sure. Okay. So Becky, you can, you can jump in. Go ahead. Okay. So I, I went through and I, you know, I'm sure, I'm sure we all did like in a way, what this was, I sort of like making us decide what we think of as our own priorities. And it also made me really realize how important it would be to have other voices on this committee, people who would have lived experience. And maybe people were here to have it. But I think it's really important to be aware of that. And I think it's really important to be aware of that. And I think it's really important to be aware of some of these services and, and. You know, and I don't come from that. I come from having volunteered for a lot of them. And given money to, to a lot of them. But what I realized sort of the, where I. Was focusing for me was on food, shelter and children's mental health. Those are sort of the things that I think about most when I think about what I think we should fund. I think it's really important to be aware of these different organizations because I've done fundraising a lot. I lived in New York for a long time where most organizations are funded by their boards. And I look at an organization like Amherst community connections where really the board members are people in the community who are not necessarily on that board, because they're going to be able to donate money, but because they're bringing a value to it in some other capacity. I look at the family outreach board. And I see some of the wealthiest families in our community. And I look at how else can they raise money? And family outreach does incredibly important work, but also has the ability to ask people to give more and has a really strong fundraising arm in really wealthy families and households in our community. So that's why I put them at the bottom and had nothing to do whatsoever with their work, but with their ability to probably raise $50,000 from. Their own higher income community that's there. And so that, that was something that I thought about a lot as I was going through and looking at these organizations. I also looked at Amherst mobile market, which is something that has, and I put that as my number five. Because I am hearing so much sort of in the media and on just in people that I talked to about what an incredible difference that program is making in people's lives. And I think that the, the grassrootsness of it, how community-based it is that they pulled together the farming community, government aid and community members to make fresh food available in a community where most of us, I think take for granted that we can just pull over to a farm stand in our car on the way home from work and buy healthy food, but that's not possible for a lot of people. And yet we're surrounded by healthy fresh food. And it seemed to me that pulling together sort of that, that need for nutrition along with the entrepreneurship of giving people jobs in their communities and that it's an organization or a program that came, that was based out of the community. The community asked for it and created it and created jobs for it and figured out a way to make it work. And found in a farming partner. That to me was the kind of program that, that has a huge impact on physical and mental health. And it is a sustaining business and changes how people eat. So to me that was a, even though it's maybe, you know, it's another food organization and our survival center also is obviously doing in a much broader scale for that. To me, that felt like a really important organization for us to fund. So I will move on and let other people go. Cause that was sort of my, my highs and my lows on my, on my chart, but that was my mindset as I was dipping things up. Thanks Becky. Does anybody have a question for her? That makes a lot of sense. I like the way you look at boards. And I kind of look at them the same way as well and question a lot about the capacity of the board to do lots of things. So I'm on the same page as you. Anybody want to dive in after Becky? Sure, I will. I had kind of a different approach and I was kind of looking at all of the factors that we were scoring. So I didn't really make a ranking until I, you know, put in all the numbers one, two, three, four. And then, um, you know, looked at it that way. So. Maybe a different process, but I guess one, um, thing that I realized in doing it that way is that we have, you know, nine, you know, really good proposals here. And some things might score higher on, you know, community priority or, you know, impact. And other things might score really well on project description or, you know, more kind of process oriented things. And also there are some organizations that in some ways overlap. As Becky mentioned, you know, it's food and nutrition. You have the survival center. And then you also have the, you know, kind of farmers market thing. Or you might have center for new Americans as well as literacy project that are kind of adult education. Um, and then for the homeless there too, um, there's both, um, community connections as well as Craig's doors that address that need. Uh, so. You know, I was a little bit, um, you know, when I actually did the, the rankings after filling in the one, two, three, four and adding them all up. Um, you know, I wasn't sure whether. That meant that. If in my top five, there were kind of two food and nutrition, but there weren't, um, the adult literacy. Does that mean that. You know, we shouldn't give to that organization or, or vice versa, right? Um, so. To me, I think it's, it's, you know, a valid question. You know, do we. Want to. Um, You know, consider the various needs and try to fund, um, an organization that addresses each separate need, even it, or is it okay if we, um, you know, don't fund. You know, homelessness, so we don't fund. You know, adult literacy or adult education. So I think that's something that, that we might want to consider even if we're. You know, looking at the, you know, kind of. Top four and then trying to come up with what's number. Five or, um, but I think overall in terms of. Are we. Really getting the, the most out of the. Dollars that we have to allocate. Thanks. Not anybody have a question for that. No, I think I will say though that, you know, Rico and you suggested just, you know. Um, Having the top few and then funding them fully, you know, in the past, the town likes to try to fund five activities. And so, you know, my thought would be even if the committee wants to. Um, Fund the top three or something to still provide, you know, at least the top five because the town manager would want to see that. And. Um, you know, I think it also then becomes a numbers game. You know, you know, you know, you know, if an agency doesn't ask for a lot of money, doesn't mean that it's not important or that, you know, they could fundraise that difference. And it might not because of their capacity or the program. And so. Um, you know, I, you know, I don't want to. It's funny. You don't want to set a precedent and maybe we wouldn't, but if we said, oh, let's just fund the top three at the full amount when we see everyone started asking for a little bit more over the years, just because. If that's a trend. Um, so I don't disagree with that. I think, you know, the committee has discussed sometimes how do we fund five and what are, you know, like NASA, do we fund five different. Um, priority community priorities too. Do we try not to overlap? And I think. I think, you know, those are really difficult discussions. And so. You know, I like hearing that people use the ranking chart because it. You know, I think if there's need out there. Uh, then you could fund the same priority with two different activities. You know, the state doesn't, um, you know, we're not disqualified from doing that. It's a local decision. You know, ironically, when. The town wasn't a mini entitlement. A few years ago. Uh, the state said, oh, we funded you out of need. Uh, kind of like as a kind of a joke. And I was like, It was myself and some of those from the town were, I think they thought we're going to laugh a little bit. And we all just kind of looked maybe stone-based or shocked. And they're like, Oh. Uh, you know, I guess that hasn't happened. And we're like, no, but. Sure. An ideal world. Maybe after you get 10 years of grant funding, there wouldn't be a need, but. That's not the case. Right. So we're not, it's not like, you know, even if we build a permanent shelter, we're not going to be able to do that. We're still going to need services for homeless individuals. And so it was, you know, I think that. You know, in their proposals, if, if the agencies document the need, then it's there, right? So we don't. I'm not, you know, I'm not questioning that, but it is funny that the state kind of had that assumption at one point that, you know, we could fund ourselves out of. Out of a need. And maybe we could, you know, I don't know, certain instances, but. I can speak about my process a little bit, which was somewhat similar to. Nats. I. I found it very difficult. All the proposals. Are very compelling and demonstrate a lot of need. And what was interesting to me as I went through it and I ranked them. Or I mean, so I read them and I scored them. And there's, so there's sort of my gut feeling and then my rankings. And. Sometimes they don't exactly line up. So, you know, then I go back to the proposal and I look at. Project need. I, I, I ranked that highly. I mean, interesting. The comment about. You know, looking at the board. Which I did. I don't, I don't maybe know quite as many people. So I, I don't have necessarily the same impression, but I would say that. While I did rank the Amherst survival center very highly, I see that as an organization that gets incredible support. From this community. And so. You know, to me, they have a lot of fundraising capacity. And they demonstrated that very effectively. And so. You know, to me, they have a lot of fundraising capacity and they demonstrated that very effectively. And still I ranked them high because I feel like the service they're providing is so important. And I want the town. To be supportive of that. You know, I. I guess that's, that's what I would say about how the process I used. And the process I used was. Simply. When I see in the world, I see it. The eviction mid moratorium is going to, are going to end. So I prioritized housing. I think housing is. Fundamental to stabilizing life. You know, I've known and experienced a little bit of. Uncertainty there. I'll say that. And that's one of the most disorienting things you can have happen in your life. Then I prioritized food and, and then over. I sort of overlaid on top of that. A sort of maintenance of the status quo and sense of people who. You know, the organizations that seem to be churning through the community and doing. Continual. Continuous processes. Or projects. I sort of prioritized that. And that was basically what I did. But I, you know, I didn't look at the boards very closely. That is not something I'm. It's not sort of in my purview from my personal experience. So thank you for that education. I will. More attention to that. Thanks, Lucas. Anybody have any questions for him? Hi. Well, I guess I do a mixture of a lot of things. You know, on the one hand, I would love to be able to spread. You know, I would love to be able to spread. You know, on the other hand, I would love to be able to spread the five. Active five. Grants. The funding that we have over five different agencies, but there's so much overlap. I think that housing is really important. And homelessness. And Craig stores and Amherst community connections, getting people a boost because once you have housing, then it's really easy. Not really easy, but as much easier to get work and to have a stable life. And I think that's really important. And I think that's really important. And I think that the work that we do, the diversity project and center for new Americans, they always have a lean budget. They ask us, don't ask us for very much. And they really give people the grounding and what they need to get jobs and to speak the language and to be able to function in the world so that they can become self-sufficient. So I think I look at a lot of self-sufficiency. I also am always really trying to break brothers and big sisters, but I think that's really important. I think that's really important. And that's why I'm kind of left on, you know, I left the mobile market as my bottom, not that I don't believe it's as important, but I just felt that something had to kind of fall to the bottom of the list. And if that, if fresh produce was something that went by the wayside, they could still get it at the survival center. So I'm a little bit all over the place, but I've always been a big fan of literacy project and center for the community to be on the road to self-sufficiency along with stable housing. So that's, that's what I've got to offer up. So the Laura Reisman from Family Outreach has our hand raised Gail, if you want to call on her. The other thing quickly before that is, so yeah, thanks everyone for sharing. I think, you know, I think the next discussion would be right. How do we go about ranking or what, what would be a consensus on, you know, if you want to do top bottom or, you know, start working our way to the middle. Sometimes we do that. There is, you know, we haven't had nine proposals in a few years. So it's a lot, it's a lot, you know, so I think the most we've had at one point was 12. But usually it's, you know, not, we don't have quite as many as nine. So that is a lot of activities to fund. And, you know, I did preview this list with the state they want. You know, for both social and non-social service, they asked many entitlement communities to preview it with them. And I did, and I didn't hear back, which I think is a good thing, which means they haven't questioned the, you know, eligibility of the activity. So, you know, I sent them the description and, you know, if they were really concerned about something, I'm sure they would have in the past, they, you know, I'd follow up questions. So I think that we can feel comfortable, you know, with our recommendations. All right. Laura. Yeah, Laura, I'll allow you to speak. You have to unmute yourself. Hi. Hello. Oh, yay. Hello. So I've obviously, since I was called out, I feel I need to address what Becky said. I hear what you are saying, Becky, and I understand that having, you know, a lot of funds beyond the board is really wonderful. And is when it comes to fundraising, that's the challenge and that is the challenge, particularly if you are doing a lot of fundraising, because you are very committed to having unencumbered, you know, funds. And that means when you apply for certain money and CDBG is one of them, you have to do a certain service. There's a service that that funder is expecting and you need to work within those parameters. And so when you have unencumbered funds, that means that you can do all sorts of things that other funders can't. Oh, you're not, you don't have a family member who's 13 or under. You don't have this. You don't have that. When you have unencumbered funds, you can do whatever that family wants when they come in. And that has always been the philosophy of family outreach of Amherst. You call, you need help. We're going to help you. And so the more unencumbered funds we have, the more of that work we can, we get United Way money to work on our immigrant services program. It's, they give us $7,000 a year. It's a much more expensive program and we fund it with unencumbered funds. And so that goes on and on. We have a contract with the department of children and families. And what happens is they make us terminate that family when they are done. And so if that family still needs help, and I guarantee you 90% of the time they do, we can help them because we have unencumbered funds. So when you look and you say, oh, they've got so much money. Oh, this board has so much money. That means we can serve that many more families. And so what I'm asking when I apply for a grant through CDBG is help us fund, because it's more expensive than what we get, but help us fund this. So we can ensure that nobody loses their, their housing in Amherst because if you do, you never will live in Amherst again because of the high rents. We work very closely with the landlords. We work very closely with the housing court. We are making sure Amherst residents don't lose their housing. And we get money very gladly from CDBG. But there's a lot more in that budget. And that comes from, shall we all say it together, unencumbered funds. And so I get it that you look at one struggling little program and you look at a program that feels very healthy and you think, well, why aren't we helping the program that's struggling? And what I would say to you is, first of all, I hope you support them as well, because of course they're doing good work. But the reality is that the healthier the program, the more people we can serve, the better we can see. We have five case workers. They all speak Spanish. They are immigration specialists. They're housing specialists. They're parenting specialists. That's important. It's important to have that strong staff. And it's because we have the money to do it. So I get it why you are saying that, but I also think you have to look at it in a different way about what struggling families and Amherst need. And what we're giving. Thank you. Thank you, Laura. Thank you, Laura. And Laura, I just, I mean, just to be clear, and I think I made it clear, but just to be, there was no question that I think family outreach services are essential. I was, I was looking at it of like how, you know, who can raise money in other ways is what is essentially what I was thinking as I was looking through this. So, but I really appreciate your comments. Thank you. If you have a question, any, any other questions for Laura? Thank you, Laura. Thanks. All right. So are we, where are we in our discussion? Do we want to go back to the top four that. We want to go back to the top four. I think we want to go back to the top four. I'm not determined with his calculations. And discuss those, or do you want to talk about the ones that fell off. The list and see which one we want to boost up. To that top four grouping. Anybody want to weigh in? No, there are two more people raising their hands. I don't know if we were. I can't, I can't see. I'm sorry. Oh, so, you know, you know, I guess I hadn't made you a co-host. Let me do that. Yeah. I think I would, I'd recommend it for now, maybe. We can call them in a minute. I'd be curious to hear. You know, if we can, if the committee has any. I was on it. Can you see this, the, the Excel spreadsheet? Yes. I was just trying to put together the, you know, you know, at least the social services and a spreadsheet so we can start, you know, I can try. Moving things around for everyone to see. If that's easy. And I don't know what, you know, the. So the survival center was something that was mentioned. And then there's big brother, big sister, family outreach, Amherst community connections, Craig's doors, literacy project. And then there's, you know, Center for new market, New Americans mobile market and then Amherst media. So I don't know if there's, you know, people feel comfortable with. Having a one, two or three now or if there is. Yeah, I think this is helpful. So I guess this is what we've been saying a few times if we, if we have a pretty clear list of the top four. And the bottom three. I think that's what we're talking about. I think that's what we're talking about. I think that's what we're talking about to be the fifth. Was it, I mean, yeah, I mean, to me, it seems like, you know, hearing Lucas and Nat that, you know, My thought is that. I think, you know, all of these. There's whole block right here. You know, there's set a set of proposals here that are vying for. For spots. I mean, I'm not, I don't know if there's been agreement that survival center. Is rent. I mean, they were rent pretty highly. So, you know, is that. There's no agreement. And I think that's why I'm saying that the survival center is one of the five and feel comfortable about that. And then discuss the remainder. I raise your hand if you're in favor of survival center being number one. At least one of the five. All right. Okay. So that was for those in attendance. That was, you know, that. Yeah. Just kind of a straw pool. Yeah, just trouble. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I mean the reason I just back up the reason we have the charts and we do the math is so we don't have to have endless discussion. So we have hard numbers in front of us so I kind of like going to adhering to what's here because the math is true. So are we good with big brothers big sisters being in the top five. Yes. Okay. All right, and we're at family outreach as the third in the top five. Are we okay with that. Okay, again, this is just straw poll. And then on fourth would be Amherst Community Connections. And we're okay with that. Okay, I can't see that Larson, because I only have X number space in my screen. Hi now. And then, so that brings us to Craig's doors and the literacy project which seem to be 156 respectively and then we've got Center for New Americans the model market and the inverse media. So I think at this point we can take Amherst media off the table, because it's very low on the scoring sheet, and that leaves us with Craig stores literacy project. And if we want to center for new Americans in the mobile market. We've got three people raising hands. So, Nate, how do we feel about taking a break and letting people speak for like just a couple minutes each at this point. Yeah, that sounds fine. So participants could limit their comments to, you know, like three minutes or less. That's great for the sake of time. Okay, it looks like Laurie, you can unmute yourself. Okay, thank you. So, you know, all of this is pretty challenging because you have tremendously valuable projects programs and you have more programs that you can fund that that that are seeking funding and all do very valuable work and all collaborate and all serve some of the same people and a limited number of projects that you can fund. And I guess I wanted to say two things. There is an Amherst master plan which prioritizes, which I think sort of helps to govern how projects should be funded and one of the values that the Amherst master plan champions is diversity in the population and it specifically says that for the community that Amherst values to thrive, there need to be support services. And if you look at the demographics of the Amherst public schools, you can see that Amherst has a much higher percentage of immigrants in the public schools, then you can see surrounding communities in the state at large, and then the census data might suggest so. You know, I think, you know, Gail's point that the literacy project and Center for New Americans provide a stepping stone for people on very limited budgets that give them access to all of these other services should be acknowledged, with all of the refugees and asylum seekers who have recently moved into town because when you support those folks you're not only supporting the adults you're supporting the children who rely on them. And given that, you know, you've got a very logical process here, and I just wanted to remind you that you have prioritized adult education and that the town has prioritized diversity and the services that support that. And I guess I would say that if ultimately you decide that this is the way that you're going to go. And they're all good programs. There is another opportunity for CDBG funds, I guess, in this year, because the scheduling is so unusual. And I wonder if you would at least consider supporting some of those programs that have gotten left out because for us. It's really a significant hardship to lose this funding. This this will have a significant impact on our funding and we'll have to think twice about whether we can continue to pay rent on the buildings that we rent. Whether we can support the program at the current level, and that's challenging because we offer classes at multiple times of the day to help people who work. All kinds of crazy overnight hotel ships, all the jobs that no one else takes. Just to share that reality. Thanks, Laurie. Does anybody have a question for Laurie. Thank you, Laurie. I really appreciated that comment about the diversity in the town plant master plan. I actually was not familiar with that. I, me as well I didn't, I didn't know that. Can I just pause from it and I just want to throw out there to the committee that as we look down the list of activities household state that we all agreed upon and we set as our priorities household stabilization support services for those experiencing homelessness youth services economic self-sufficiency food and nutrition. And I think that we should try to fund, you know, one of each, because it feels like we're sort of spreading the wealth so to speak so as we look at the top for where we are, we don't have an organization that is supporting economic self-sufficiency adult education job training in that top four so as we look at number five I would like to just think about that for a moment. I agree with you Gail and that makes me want to fund either Center for New Americans or the literacy project as the fifth personally to address that particular issue. Thanks. All right. Just to just to remind us all and if my memory is correct that the last go around. We're not able to fund both, but we did fund Center for New Americans but not literacy project. Is that your recollection, Gail or Nate? I think so. Yeah, it's, it's, let's see, it's flip flopped, but I think for last year, which is, you know, the 2020 CDB grant which we were, which we started this spring it was Center for New Americans that was funded right. Okay. And not the literacy project. Okay, thank you for that. Can we call on Judith to unmute herself and, you know, limit it to three minutes please. Sure. Good evening everyone. I, first of all, I wanted to thank the town for considering our application. And also for keeping social service organizations in the CDBG budget. The literacy project adults students certainly use the other entities that you funded the Amherst survival center, the housing and support for homeless and etc. We are the only program in the Amherst that does adult education that what we always called the GED and now is also called the high set high school equivalency test in the Amherst. I mean, it's in mess the whole state. And I just want to encourage you to support adult education Center for New Americans is our partner. Once students are fluent in English they often come to us for the. I keep calling it GED because I'm so old fashioned but for the high set high school equivalency and to move on with their lives I think we all know that access to education is the road out of poverty and the road to self sufficiency. You know, all of us in this meeting, you on the board are here because we've had access to education and are able to support our families well, and that's what we're striving for providing for adult students. They, we talk about community college and it's not just the two year community college degree. It's often the workforce training that the community colleges provide. For our students and our students are mostly all working in the Amherst area as Lori mentioned they tend to work the overnight shifts and, and other jobs but they want to move up and want to get ahead. And of course as you know in the Amherst we have a very diverse population in the adult ed programs. The preponderance of students are students of color. Who are native born Americans along with immigrants and refugees who have learned English and then come to our program for the high school diploma. So, our role is to give people hand up to support them to be able to move on and make a better life for themselves and their families by being able to earn a better living. Thank you. Thank you for considering the application and doing the good work that you are doing. I understand it's a difficult choice. Thanks. Thanks Judith anybody have a question for her. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Paulina. Ma'am at yourself and please try to limit it to about three minutes. Hi. Thank you, Gail. My name is Paulina Adams, I use she her pronouns, and I'm a case manager at Craig stores. I am actually new to this whole process. I jumped on working with Craig stores in November of last year, and I have just seen my passion for the community grow so much. I think everybody who is part of this process. Oh, I keep cutting out. Are people able to hear her. I don't know if it's just me or if it's other people. I can hear her no problem. So keep going. Sorry about that. I just wanted to highlight the, the impact that I've seen as a case manager. That's happening with case management at Craig stores. So Craig stores is a low barrier homeless shelter, which means that the folks that we serve are oftentimes the most acute members of our community. So these are folks who have a incredibly high amount of need where they are not necessarily able to meet that need within any other area within our community. Oftentimes, these are folks who are turned away in a lot of spaces in society, and are able to access people who are patient and willing to give them a second or third, or sometimes a million chance and to work on the things that they need help with. These are people who are coming to us with no ID, no nothing like they have literally nothing to their name and we are working with them to pick up the pieces and sometimes working with folks who have very limited like communication skills, whether it's because of disabilities, or mental health, or just an incredibly wide variety of needs that these folks have. And all of us that are working at Craig stores as case managers are folks who like, we are sitting with folks for hours on end to get one task done. And I don't mean one task is in like, we are applying to an apartment as one task I mean like one task like, we are getting the document together for them to be able to fill out to get their ID. Again, or their Social Security card again, and that's the first step of them even being able to go get their application started for their housing. So I ask you to wrap it up in the next minute. Thanks. Yeah, thank you, Gail. I'm just speaking a little bit about overall like the needs of our folks are so high and oftentimes there are really limited services that will serve them because of how high their needs are, because we're a low barrier shelter. And we encompass so many areas that oftentimes folks don't have access to. But I really appreciate everyone letting me speak and welcoming me to this process. Thank you so much. Thank you for sharing Paulina. Anybody have a question for her. All right, on to Caitlin Markey. You can unmute yourself. Thank you so much, Gail, and thanks to the rest of the committee. I really do not envy the position you're in. This is an amazing slate of candidates for this grant funding and listening to all of my colleagues speak about the work that they're doing it. It's just so moving. So I like I said I don't envy where you are. And I know I just want to mention every single one of these services that's on the docket here are used by as far as I know by the employees of the Amherst mobile market and I just want to give a huge thanks to Becky for recognizing what is special about the Amherst mobile market program. You know, I can't see exactly where the scoring came from. But I do think that what makes the Amherst mobile market stand out among these programs is actually the opportunities for economic empowerment job readiness, you know, we submitted the application as a food and nutrition program. It really makes a huge difference in that aspect and we have seen as a result of the pandemic. Just what a huge issue of food insecurity is I've been talking to the Amherst Survival Center in the Northampton Survival Center. And I just know what an influx of customers they've seen clients excuse me they've seen in the past year and a half and you know I, I don't envy them either it's a huge issue. And yet because we've done so much community engagement because we've had really in depth conversations with the communities. We know that those services are amazing and so useful to them and they don't go far enough. And at the same time, you know, we are also, we are the folks who are employing the folks who are using literacy projects using the Center for New Americans using these programs that are positioning them to really succeed so I think what the Amherst mobile provides in this slate of candidates for funding really stands out among the rest. I've heard this committee say you're interested in funding new projects you're interested in racial justice and equity. I think that we really can help you meet those goals, and I would love to see that happen. But I just echo so many of the candidate of the other folks who have spoken tonight and just saying that there's so much good work happening in Amherst there's so many amazing organizations. Everybody's just really trying their hardest it's been a really tough year and a half. And, and you know I really thank you for your time and attention and I'll wrap up now but thanks so much for considering us. Thank you, Caitlin. Anybody have a question for her. All right. I think Amherst Community Connections is next and I think they're the last one to speak and then we'll go back to our deliberations I'm going to, the timer is running. Hello, good evening. Miss Gail. Thank you so much for having me and the honorable committee members. I want to just make a general comment about the process. Year after year, you have so many wonderful, worthy organizations coming to you for funding. And I want to say affirm the work of every single agency asking for funding here, even with the newest person or newest entity Amherst media. We all are here, hoping that you will fund us. And I want to say that a little bit of funding, you know, for all of us will give us a boost of our morale. Money really helps, but the morale. It's also wonderful through the expression of money. And yet I understand you can only fund up to five projects. So for those of us if so unfortunate not able to get funded at the morale tend to dip a little bit. And the money needed tend to be less a little bit. I was wondering if the committee in your deliberation for the next round, which is coming very soon, will be willing to consider the idea that you had raised earlier in the season about funding and categories say this year for food and shelter next year for youth and literacy and diversity, something like that that everybody will have a shot at it. After all, the morale need to be raised and we are all worthy of your consideration. And the idea of maybe if you will be willing to consider another way doing it in addition to focus on different categories of entity, maybe, if you would also be willing to maybe if an agency, any agency has received funding three or four or five however numbers you want to say consecutive fundings, then the agency entity itself will understand if there is a rule here that after say for consecutive fundings, you will be rotated off and let others to have the opportunity to shine. So therefore you can bring in agency such as the mobile market, for example, to allow new ideas, new project to be expressed to help with new project to help with the racial justice issues that raised by the mobile market. So that will be another way to consider to take care of the different needs expressed through these different agencies. And I just want to second, every one of us, nine entities here we all do important work. And we help people in different segments, and they all have important needs to be met, who is important, but adult education, but helping people who are new to this country to learn their skills is also important. And Amherst media, the newest one, they are new, why not give them a chance. So this all said, I want to thank you for trying so hard year after year. I remember 10 years ago when I first started the process. I think the Gail, you might remember me. I was a most unhappy camper. Every meeting I will come and I will complain. I'll write letters to you. And you are so receptive to the proposal suggestions I have made over the years. I want to say, every year, the committee is getting better stronger, really representing the diverse views in this community. So with that, I want to give you as a chair of the CDBG committee a shout out for the wonderful work and the leadership you have demonstrated in this process. And your time is up Wailing. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks. Sorry, I didn't get a chance to give you the one minute warning. Thank you, Wailing. And we have Lev Ben Ezra, whose hand is raised and you may unmute yourself, Lev and try to keep it to about three minutes, three to four minutes. Please. Can you hear me. Yes, thank you. Thanks so much for having me and I echo all of my colleagues and collaborators sentiments regarding the incredible value of all of these programs. And I really appreciate the committee's deliberation. I wanted to speak to just one particular component of that was certainly weighed heavily in the MR survival centers approach that we put forth in this proposal. And I imagine may also have weighed in some of the other organizations. And that is around kind of the true stabilizing capacity or potential of various services that have been offered. And I wanted to just speak actually somewhat anecdotal but relatively soon after getting my position at the MR survival center and as I was researching food pantries and best practices and all sorts of information around emergency food provide provision. I'm really really stunned to find out about relatively low efficacy of many emergency food programs at alleviating food insecurity. And what it seemed like the research showed was that by providing a very small amount of food and not the types of food that people wanted or wanted or what was what worked for their families that many emergency food programs were providing enough food for people to survive, which is no doubt an incredibly important outcome in of itself. But we're not actually providing enough food that people became food secure and therefore could shift their resources and energies and emotional and mental bandwidth and time to focus on other aspects of their life. I just wanted to speak to that particular component as I hear the committee weighing in around all of these different priorities I know that at previous meetings, many potential applicants spoke to this ways that all of these different things overlap. And I would just say that that's certainly true for the MR survival center that while we're absolutely very firmly applying under the food and nutrition component that that's really a core goal that we've set forth with this CDBG proposal is to increase the food provided. And really to the level that we are providing for food security for those 2000 Amherst residents, 2000 or more Amherst residents that would be served. And that to me feels like a really incredible commitment in terms of the stability of those families and their ability to participate in many other aspects of their civic life. And so I really really appreciate all of the different comments spoken around the variety of these services but are required to support families and really stabilizing and moving to their next step. We're hearing about adult education needs and the family support needs and all of these other programs and youth development needs which are also things that we all refer families to as well as shelter. And I'm not so appreciative of that collaborative nature, but I just wanted to speak to that component, because I heard a couple committee numbers, kind of weighing the household stabilization. And that when we look at that of what can actually happen from sustained funding year after year in terms of supporting the expansion of programs and moving forward and really providing a more complete picture of what families need can be really powerful. Thank you so much and I really appreciate all of your efforts as volunteers on this committee. Thank you love does anybody have a question for her. Okay, I think those are all the raised hands that I see in the moment so here we are back with trying to figure out if we're still all in agreement on the top for what should be number five so do you anybody does anybody want to jump in on recommendation for number five. And I appreciate everybody's comments and I think that we set priorities going around for the next year to have a discussion about funding organizations for subsequent years and how that would weigh in with the new organizations. Alright, so. I guess I would like to follow up gales comment earlier about the literacy project and being able to fund the adult education self sufficiency goal through one of the five and so I'm sympathetic to that but I'm wondering if anyone else wants to make the case for instead of this project. Craig's doors was anyone interested in taking that advocacy. I don't know that I'm ready to advocate for anything just yet I think each person who just spoke persuaded me that everything they were saying was exactly right and that's what we should fund in the moment that they were speaking because each. It's all correct and I agree with all of it, even though some of that you can't agree with both but I do. You know, I. Seek the work that Craig's doors does as literally keeping people alive. In a way that isn't obviously what the focus is of the adult education programs right and so I am in no way, Wayne anything right here it's just sort of looking at you know what I think of what Craig's doors does it's literally taking people who could go nowhere else and with no barriers whatsoever giving them a place to sleep and food to eat and you know I spend my day in court as a prosecutor and see people at their very very worst and knowing that there are programs out there, helping people like that is, I mean it's just such an essential part of of a community. I agree with the concept of supporting adult education and that we should support. You know, I like the idea of having one of each category in our top five, but it's hard for me to, to say that we wouldn't support Craig's doors. And again I'm not really advocating when we're the other I'm just sharing that that's kind of where I'm at. I understand it's it's this is this is hard and it's hard from our heart and we share from our heads and that's the hard part. Anybody else have a comment about potential for number five. So I just want to. Sorry, I just want to make sure I understand so are we saying that, or is there agreement that survival center big brother big sister family outreach and and risk screening connections are four out of five. I wasn't sure that we were there yet. We were prior to everybody's game kind of work. Yeah, with a strong call. Yeah, that makes sense to me. Yeah, it makes sense to me I mean the prop it's just it's it is really challenging to think about omitting anything from here. But I feel like we, I'm willing to stay with the strong fall as it reflected those top four. All right so where do we go. I mean if we want to fund five. I guess that's the question we're trying to get to. Right. And I think, and I wholeheartedly agree with what Becky has just said, but I feel if we fund Craig's doors that family outreach Amherst community connections and Craig's doors are all organizations that support household organization and I feel like, you know, we need to address the other priorities that we created or listed so I'm torn. I mean I think another thought that I have is kind of what Lucas was talking about earlier about housing right now and the eviction moratorium coming to an end and the fact that in this moment housing. It's not an issue but it has sort of a particular focus right now I think on the fact that so many people are becoming homeless and struggling in a way that maybe in the past. I mean, I've seen seen seen bigger now. I guess just sort of as a sort of a comment that it would make sense I think in this moment, given what we're living through for out there to be a stronger focus on housing. Point. Anybody have any other comments, do you want to take a vote on Craig stores versus the literacy project maybe that's the way to do it. I just want to ask is my screen is that screen still visible the spreadsheet is that still. Yes. Yes, and very helpful. So can we just say in the moment Rika if you had to make a recommendation between Craig stores and literacy project and I'm just picking on you because you're top of the screen, which you would choose. I would choose the literacy project. Okay. Matt. I think it's, it's really hard choice because I think that, you know, the way Becky framed it is that. Yes, the need for housing and keeping people off the streets and you know safe inside does seem maybe more important than education but I do have the family outreach and community connections, you know really supporting that need also I guess I would be inclined to support the, you know, the immigrant, the newly arrived. You know, in that sense and try to help help them and both Center for New Americans and literacy project, do that really really well but if we only have room for one of them. Since we did support Center for New Americans last time, I would be inclined to support literacy project this time. Thanks, Matt. Lucas. I'm, I'm pretty torn on that one. I think I'm going to be swayed by the panel and save literacy project, just because you have two things for housing. I will say that I don't know but the timing next spring I think it's going to be that that's when because the moratorium is going to have to end. And I think that's probably what they're looking at. I don't think they're going to end it through the winter. The timing would be right, but you know there is already support for that in the community, and I think keeping it a little bit balanced even through this is probably important. So I'm going to go to literacy project. Thanks. Becky I know think I know where your vote, which I don't know I really that I was saying I was not really advocating I was really just describing. I don't know what my vote is, but obviously choose. So I, I think that and I guess actually it doesn't even matter right because there's already a majority vote I don't even have to cast a vote. Okay, decided. All right. It was over before I voted to be fair. I think I'm not comfortable with Becky abstaining. No, it's a difficult choice for all of us. I know I wasn't actually going to abstain. Okay. Yeah, I wouldn't that would not be that wouldn't be fair. That's tough. But I actually think that I would go for the literacy project to I think it's important to support a lot of different kinds of organizations. And since I advocated for them to begin with, you know where my vote lies so is it inappropriate to recommend people that, you know, make sure they just any overflow when they send it the other way for the housing stuff, you know, from breaks doors, they have overflow. They can try to reach out to the other community projects and housing that you know it's ridiculous for me to say that right. You can't even fund any of them in their entirety. Well, you know, you could maybe for the meager ones. You know, like literacy project is 20, but anyway, we're not there yet to the numbers. So okay, are we good I'm going to make a motion that we find the survival center big brothers, survival center, literacy project big brothers big sisters family outreach and Amherst community connections. All in favor. Hi. Hi, any any put any opposition. Okay, we're all good to go we had a ton of discussion so so should we should we talk about the numbers then for each. Yeah, so we're good everybody's good with that and I really appreciate the input from all the representatives from the organizations tonight this is never, never easy and I have to say that we've never done it. You know, I mean, it's even harder when you're in person and you have to see everybody's faces and the supporters from each organization so yes we can zoom from our homes and it makes it smidgen easier so now we get to the numbers part so we have 165 available to fund out of the overall amount once we've taken up the amount for the, the capital projects and on social service and so we've got to take. Thank you for doing the math here. Nate. So we've got on 60,000 more and asks, then we can actually fund. So in the past. And that remember if you just want to refresh my memory how we've done this we've done like a proportion of each ask relative to the overall amount is that how we've done it in the path you're the mathematician in the Yeah, we've, we've done it in, in different ways. And so, I don't know that there's anything that that would really bind us in terms of how we would look at these. I was just going through these numbers and just maybe it would help if I'm happy to start out and throughout a little bit and other people can attack it or discuss it or or agree with it. But so just, for example, survival center. I penciled in 60, which is 86% of what they asked for literacy project. Big brothers big sisters and what percent and that's what three quarters I guess 75%, 75%, right. Yeah, okay. And then big brothers big sisters I penciled in 27 which is 68%. And this is, this is formatted as. Right. And then for family outreach. I penciled in 33, which is 66%. Sorry, what's family outreach I missed that 33. And community connections at penciled in 30 which is 67%. And that gets us the full tally. So, I mean, it's kind of rough numbers, but, but when I was penciling the men I thought well survival center was clearly kind of the, the consensus top choice. So their ask seems like a pretty fair amount they can do a lot with that literacy project, even though it was like number five for us, their ask is pretty small so 15,000 out of 20,000. And then the rest kind of between 66 and 68. And there's not really that much difference there but kind of dividing up what was remaining. I mean, the math. I think we're all just kind of mulling the numbers over before we comment, correct. Yes. Seems like a fair approach. Right, I mean I think that the Mount over is so much that it's like you can almost, you know, it's almost like you would eliminate two activities if you funded that a few at their asking budget so it is difficult to whittle down the budget. But every budget is, I mean all of them are doing so much with every dollar that they get, I guess. I wonder how much. I mean the idea of funding somebody funding the organization for all that it's asking for and not sort of having any of its work be to make up any of the funding. I think it's worth thinking about doing that for a couple of them that seem particularly bare bones and then giving less to others. I don't have you ever done it that way and just thought okay. Literacy project is asking for $20,000 and if they don't get that five what does that actually look like does that mean that they can't have an is that a whole class that they can't host, you know, or teach. So I was actually trying to just pull up budgets to see where the money's supposed to be going toward. I think that's a good question back a few years ago. When the town had reduced grant award, I think, you know, we could we did we couldn't we weren't eligible to apply for a 25 and so we asked, you know, this is a number of years ago like what was the minimum and you know, say for instance if an organization is asking for a position, say 50,000 funds a three quarter position or a full time position if you get, you know, 66% then then that's actually you know like a two thirds position right so it's like it, you know, there's a, there could be a pro rated level of service that would be offered, depending on the funding and so I don't you know we you know staff we make that adjustment internally so if for instance we're you know if the literacy project we we keep with these you know that suggestion and they're like oh well that might mean right we do have to reduce our programs a little bit if we would apply to the state we would adjust the expected beneficiaries that they said okay you know we've lost the ability for something so we, you know, staff works internally with the recommendations and the organizations to, you know, adapt the application as necessary so it's a good consideration I will say that you know if for instance if some organizations like we you know we can't take it or it makes it really difficult. You know the next step in the process is uses a public meeting but then this gets publicized and there's a public hearing next week and we can hear, you know, comments in the town manager would have previewed this and then if there's any compelling reason to make a change in the announcements and that could happen after the hearing as well so there is the ability to to make that if you know if someone says wow this makes it really difficult or right there a program you know, if that 5000 for instance meant that a program just couldn't happen at all, then then we you know we could hear about it. Thank you. Nate, I feel a little sense of discomfort with the survival center, and I know that the magnitude of their project and the numbers that they serve is so much greater than the others that's why they ask for more money, but to fund them 86 when you've got and I've always said this is that literacy project and Center for New Americans asked for so little their budgets are lean. I also feel that, you know, big brothers and big sisters are the only organization that are serving youth that we've selected. So I just feel like I personally would like to see survival centers just scaled down so there's more of an even spread maybe at 75% and then to take those remaining funds and see if we could boost big brothers big sisters a little bit. And also maybe family outreach and literacy project. I tend to agree with Gail I feel I don't see the need to give 86% of the survival centers budget I'd like to see a little more even split and yeah I would I would land there as well. I think the average is 73.33% if you just that's how much of the budget that's asked for that we have. If it's there, if that's what that we come at that to that amount that would give the survival center 51,000 that gives us an extra nine to play with out of their percentage so we could reallocate that, you know, that nine other places. I personally tend to like the just evenness of, you know, set amounts. But I, you know, as a junior member here I. No one's a junior member we all get an equal say. There's something to be said for experience. Yeah, Lucas just I just did that quickly, you know, a 73% allocation right of the ask, you know, gets pretty close right to the 165 that's what you had said that to me that feels more comfortable and more equitable. Are there, is there ever been a consideration of sort of doing a maximum amount that you can ask for in the sense of like if there's a, you know, in comparison to the budget that's project I know that's, you know, the timeline on that it's messed up but I just, if there's any way to dissuade people from just asking for, you know, I don't think that's actually happening, but you know. That's a good question though we haven't, you know, when Craig's doors first started over 10 years ago with block and money we funded them quite, you know, more than any amount that's asked now this year so I think that, you know, has been suggested that there's probably different ways the committee can develop the process for proposals there could be a minimum and maximum there could be funding priorities limiting the number of activities and so, you know, some communities might put more of their budget toward the non social services and not fund the social services as much I think. So I think there's probably a number of different ways that can be done. Yeah, I think it's difficult when you have to parse the budget right the numbers. But we don't you know, unless the committee wants to have some clear guidance, you know at the beginning of the application round. You know it could happen next year for instance, but not, you know, you know some of it is. The difficulty of doing that is we don't know what could be what what might happen or what might come in right so what if there is an agency that just needs a certain amount and there's a really critical need and maybe the committee that you know funds that at a certain amount or you know I, but right yeah. I was purely academic. Oh yeah I know I know it's a good question though. I, and Lucas the organizations who are applying do understand that we can only fund five and that we have limited funds we only, you know, 165. And they know that, you know, as Nate always says some communities just fined three organizations and fund them fully and we try, we tend not to do that just because out of nine it would feel even harder to pick three so the organizations applying are aware of the limited funds and the fact that they're only five we can select five. Yeah, I hear you. So how are, how are we doing on this, this new revised formula. I, I, I like the option number two, I like the, I would vote for that one over the first choice. Should we go Goldilocks though and do an option number three, whether there's too hot to cold and this right. Right. And option number three where there's what Nate. I was just saying you know like with Goldilocks right there's a three. Okay. I mean if we if the committee likes the option to, you know, there is, that's one way to do it, you know, in terms of, you know, from the town's perspective, it, you know, it makes it's a, it's a rational approach to the budget but I have no, you know, I mean I proposed option one and I might favor that over option two but I'm happy to be in the minority and have option to pass I think, you know, both are, you know, valid approaches, and there's no one right way we're not going to be able to satisfy, you know, the needs for all five, much less the worthy ones that we didn't even include in the top five. I think, I think, I think majority wants to go with option two I would not object sprenuously. Well one of the reasons I would prefer to is simply that I only put Amherst Survival Center as my first pick because I felt like that was food security done, you know, that that was sort of check that box for me. And then I went on to, you know, well what do I, who do I think is going to do sort of serve the community better in, in these other categories, you know, and so I had to weigh them higher, kind of puts what I did on on the sheet on the sheet a little bit out of context. Do we have want to have any more discussion over option two or is there an option three, three. I just wanted to complicate things out. Thank you. So it's 842, where you are it's 942 where I am. So for the sake of time, I am. I would love to see if we could have a take a vote on the recommendations that are labeled option two. Do you want to discuss any further. No, I guess. Option two doesn't come fully to 165. Right. Do you want to. If you if you run the literacy project personally, if you if you round them to 51 1529 37 and 33 then it comes out to an even 165. Okay. I think or, or what Lucas suggested we just put 750 with the literacy project that I would yes I like Lucas's recommendation. Well, just everybody I don't know this but the experience on the panel seems to say that they are very trim budget so that's why I said that I know it's kind of ironic actually because I'm just trying to sort of figure this out like when gal was saying that 86 felt like too much for percentage wise for the survival center to get because we have these other much leaner budgets and then in the recogulation literacy project ended up with less. Not significantly less right but they ended up with less and they have the first time around I guess there's, I don't know there's no fair way to do it I guess there's like a piece of me that for no particular reason thinks that we should fully fund the literacy project and big brothers big sisters because they both seem like they're such lean budgets and are paying for staff that, you know, makes such a difference with each person that they're working with. But I think that's probably the same for all of them. Is that is that option three. Super excited for me. I have another option after three I can go for you know. That would just be then you divide up the red like if we said okay we're going to fund fully. Okay, brothers big sisters and then take the remaining 105,000 and divvy it out. We can look at those numbers. So many want to play them out in the next column. Do that. I'm not a wizard, except you know, I don't have that map. What were we were saying, the literacy product at 20 right and open brother big sister at 4040. Yeah, let me just format that. So, you know, if we fund those two at 100%. And we just felt an I just voiced that I felt uncomfortable and survival center at 86 and everybody at lower amounts. How do we reconcile this. That would just be what 33, you know, there's an even list option to that is hard to get away from. Yeah, the rationale for option to feels very comfortable. That's gonna be short a little bit, but yeah, it's wasn't isn't it 35,000 each. Oh yeah, I was just doing quickly. Yeah I mean the workup I had was everybody got was roughly was very close to that but the extra five went to the survival center instead. That's sort of what I had had in my notes. I think I like option to better. It feels more equitable option to is just sort of easier to, you know, feel the objectivity in that. And even though I like option to I just want to mention the only thing that gives me a little bit of doubt is that, because it's all basically the same percentage of the ask it does kind of reward. The agency that's, that's, you know, kind of asking for a larger amount. But, but I do like the objectivity of option to. I agree with that. Yeah. I do you want to motion Gail on option to or do you want to make it Rika. Sure, I'd be happy to make that we vote on approve option to as our funding as our budget allocation. Anybody second, I'll second. And we've discussed any just for the discussion. All right, shall we vote. Make sure again. Call vote. All right, Rika, how do you vote on option number two in favor. Okay, not in favor. Lucas in favor. Becky. I didn't hear you Becky in favor. Okay. Okay. And I'm in favor as well. So. I think we have our majority. And we'll call and for funding recommendation option to. To go. To the town manager. All right. Okay. Well done everybody. So yeah, it looks like the, you know, the non-social service activities have to be within a target area and they were, right? So they were funded within the town center and the. Hickory Ridge or the. East Howley road. Pomeroy village center. So that's, that's good. You know, for instance, the months in library was recommended. It's just outside the. The library is the one we have. There's a lot of. Pomeroy village village centers. Then we'd have to recommend adjusting those boundaries. So we don't need to do that. I was just going to share the agenda again, just so. I think we've. You know, I guess it would just be any outstanding public comment or other items. I think we've covered. The. The majority of the meeting. I mean, we've now given our recommendation to, or we will have obviously after tonight to the town manager. So is that a hearing for him to hear? No. That where we could. Change the recommendation we've made. Yeah. So the, the state requires that the municipality hold a public hearing to allow comment on the recommended activities. That would be included in a town's application. And so. I don't want to say it's perfunctory, but. You know, I think the committee, we, you know, some communities, I don't think go through this process where we have an RFP and we do a pretty. I think it's a pretty robust review and questions and then recommendations. And so. The hearing is a chance for the town manager. You know, if the town manager's office wanted to. Change the recommendations. They might before the hearing, but they might also then wait. And see if there's any, you know, anything, any significant comments that come in. You know, so I think it's, it's, you know, they, in the past, the town managers felt comfortable making changes before the hearing. And sometimes they'd make it after. And so I think. You know, I think the current town manager knows the process. You know, I think it was done well. So they don't, you know, they, you know, they understand the process and how the committee makes recommendations. So, so really the public hearing is for the public, you know, for people who've submitted proposals and for any other comments to come in. You know, the public manager will be notified tomorrow, the recommendations and. And sometimes. They might want to make changes before the hearing and sometimes they'd make it after. And so I think. You know, I think the current town manager knows the process. And sometimes might want to meet with Gail before the hearing. I think we've done that in the past just to. Discuss the process and deliberations that from this meeting. But yeah, like I said, I think. Do any deliberation. Sorry. We don't as a committee do any deliberation then. Well, the way the agenda's posted is, you know, receive public comment and then afterward, there's a chance for the committee to deliberate again, if there's, you know, if there's some reason to write. So it's, it's, it's some sort of a context. So I'm not sure whether there's that. Agenda item or that, you know, you know, Ability to do that. But we don't have much time. So if, if after the hearing next week, you know, I'd want another vote just to finalize everything. And that gives us about two weeks to. To get the application done, which is. With Ben's help, that's sufficient, but it does take about two to three weeks to put the Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, for instance, you know, there were some, like you said, there were some discussion around some of the social services and, you know, the town manager may have, you know, what if the town manager thinks, oh, maybe there should be one that's one that isn't or something maybe would wait to hear the comments from the hearing to see if maybe there's a switch that would happen, for instance, right, like that was the case or, you know, if there's really if the committee was really on kind of undecided about a capital project. Maybe they would wait. Okay. Thank you. Anything else we need to talk about. No, I think I was going to let you know that, you know, we have, you know, the 1718 and 19 grants are done and we're working to close them out administratively with the state. The 20 grant is underway and the two capital projects the town's mill lane project and then the housing authority Watson Farms is behind schedule. The Parms one was delayed because of the high cost of material and the you know the price escalation. And so they've been working with their architect to try to figure out how to complete the project, the scope of the work in, you know, within the budget so that I know that's been difficult for them in the mill lane project we're hoping to get that going this fall, whether it's started in the fall or ready for the spring, we do it, you know, it does have both those products need to be done by next, you know, next June. So, and then, you know, the state typically has requirements that you have to spend 80% of your, you know, the previous grant by the time you apply but this year because of the staggered schedule. They don't have those same requirements but I think when we apply for the 22 grant. They'll have to have they'll have some requirements in terms of project expenditures or contracts and so, you know, for behind they'll, they could reduce the award we can apply for so, you know, that's a, that's just a requirement to have and this year we're fine with it but I think next year depending on what time the 22 grand is due, you know, if our 20 projects are still delayed will, it could be in a little trouble. Thank you for that. I remember we had a former meeting we talked about something going on with East Hadley Road and there was money that hadn't been spent that's like in the back of my brain and is that my. Do you remember that. Yeah, I think. This is how the road project came in under budget as the 2019 grant in the inner inner. The DCD is one year action plan and the town's plan. The process is to then the first priority is to put money in the existing activities and the second one is into housing. So, Valley CDC had been awarded money for their affordable housing project and that correct the amount it might have been like 19,000 we allocated to Valley CDC's project, because it met those two pieces of the action plan and our grant management plan so if it was something, different, if we didn't have that activity as part of our grant, we would have to have maybe held another product, you know, another public hearing to reallocate it. But given the time, we only had a few months left in the grant and that activity met those two priorities, we just, you know, we allocated the money to that. Thanks, thanks. Okay, do we need any other comments from anybody. Hi everyone to the committee in the public. I think that, you know, every year it's a difficult process to review proposals and make decisions and, you know, I know you're volunteers so thank you. It was a very thoughtful discussion as always and I love that we all bring different viewpoints and but then we can come together in the end to do good work and make proposals that we feel reflect the work that we've done. So we're meeting next Thursday at seven on zoom with a public meeting and we will be listening to folks and we will try to kind of clump them together so that we aren't hearing from representatives from the same organizations, six times consecutively. So what we've done in the past is we've just sort of like a run through going through the first, you know, have a one run through everybody representing an organization let them speak and then we can go to the top again. If time allows and limit people's speaking time to three, three to four minutes felt like people managed to fit that in tonight. Yeah, I think three minutes is pretty comfortable. You can say a lot actually. As long as we have the timekeeper on on, you know, on duty. All right, do we need a motion to adjourn because this is being recorded. Sure why not. Okay, any second, I'll second, I'll second things all in favor. Do we need to do a roll call for that Nate. Thanks everyone. All right, we'll see you next week.