 Is this all we're expecting tonight? No, I think Liz is coming and I know Cedric is in practice until seven. I know he had an appointment today to be sworn in, so hopefully he will attend the meeting tonight. We have someone in the audience, Lauren Mills. Once we get the meeting started, you probably want to wait a few minutes, and then we can, if she would like to speak during public comment, we'll give her that opportunity. I do know that Geisy texted or emailed and said that she will not be able to attend. Yes, she emailed, yeah. She said she would not. Mm-hmm, hi, Liz. Hello, Miss. Hey, good. Hello, Stadonio. How are you? Oh, could be better. Could be worse. Yeah, don't use my legal name. DCIA will come after me. I say. Hello, Erica. Oh, my God. Ben, like that. I'm Ben. He was in legal name, man, I say. It's a double-all life. Gotta keep it undercover, right? Yeah. Oh, boy. All right, so should we get started? Yeah, if you want to start the meeting. Yeah, let's bring this water. And, you know, as you guys know, our chair is not able to be with us tonight. So I'll be doing the chair duties. However, I have to leave at about 6.55 because I'm also part of the housing trust. And I have to be in that meeting because we are voting on some stuff tonight that I need to be in there. And I would ask that somebody would volunteer to take over chair duties after leave. So do we have any volunteers to take over chair duties? I think that just means that you kind of follow and guide the agenda. And then you end the meeting at that point. OK, so any announcements, you know, that people want to make? Do we have a chair who's going to take over after you? I can't do it because I'm taking notes. Yeah, if we don't, then we'll have to end the meeting at that time. Try to find the agenda, but I'll do it if I find it. OK. We can also pull the agenda up, right? Does somebody have it? Yeah, I don't have it on my phone, but I don't have it on the thing, so. I'm going to grab it. Yep, I have it. You have it? OK. So, yeah, so let's, any announcements to make? The commissioners, anybody has any announcements? One once, going twice. All right, so let's review the agenda, see if we have any additions to the agenda. So right after, you know, right after we'll approve the meetings, the approval of the minutes. And after that, we'll have some public comments if we have anyone who is in our, what's the name of it, in the attendee waiting to have some comments. We can have somebody do that. That will last about 15 minutes if we have any public comments. And then we will go into HR commission reports. And everyone who's been doing some self out there, please report. I know I'll have a few things to report on. And then number three, and we'll talk because of certain things we might get to this or not. The role of the commissioner, the chair and town staff liaison, selection for 2020-21 of chair and vice chair, that most likely we're going to table it until the November 19th meeting, OK, so that we can have a fuller and more robust discussion on that topic. Then started planning on conversations and on human rights commission involvement in recognition of the quality of Black lives in the COVID pandemic and the town community safety committee. And I'll do a little bit of report because I'm on that one. And then any other types of upcoming events, the follow-up events that we may have talked about or thought about, we can talk about those things. Then anything else that was not anticipated in the last 48 hours that people may want to put in the agenda minutes, we can discuss those. OK, we're good. All right, so let's go into the approval of the minutes. Those minutes were sent. I was not in the last meeting, so I will defer to folks who were there to check the accuracy of the meeting minutes. And then we can have a motion to just accept the minute minutes as is or with corrections. So if everyone has checked the minute minutes, we can proceed to accept them. Somebody create a motion and we'll accept them. Or if there is any corrections, please state so as of design. So any corrections, please? I see your hands up. Do you want to say something? No, I was trying to figure out if I was on mute or not. Oh, OK. Nope, you're on. So all right, so no corrections. All right, so anybody want to make a motion to approve the meetings for September, meeting minutes for September? I move to approve the meetings minutes for September. OK, without corrections. And second. OK, all in favor, say aye. Raise your hands. I'm sorry, who was that who seconded? I couldn't tell. Liz, hey, good. Liz, Liz, hey, good. OK. All in favor, aye. Aye. Aye. For ayes, I'll abstain because I was in the last meeting. So meeting minutes approved. And we'll go from there. All right, so let's look at public comments. I think we may have somebody in the public who is. We do have one attendee in our list from the public. Lauren Mills, I don't know if Lauren has something to say. Lauren has something to say. Yep, the hands are up. So let's give Lauren a chance to have a comment. But do you want me to pull her in as a panelist? Yeah, just to the comments. And then we'll just see what comments she has. And then we will put her back in the attendee. Yeah. Six up. Hello, Lauren. This is the time for public comments. If you have some public comments, please state your comments. Yes, sure. Hi, good evening. I would just like to address the Human Rights Commission on the issue of recognizing that there are vulnerable communities, most often of color, and in housing complexes in Amherst, who still are trying to find a clear way of working with the different agencies, such as the police department, the town, and the different branches, such as the Human Rights Commission, to make sure that their concerns, their complaints, their input and their actions are perceived abuses. Also, racial inequality are being addressed, making sure that those concerns are addressed in a complete way. And as a resident, it has been unclear as to how those things are being addressed with the new initiatives, as I know of, are the hotline. Also, I know as your agenda is going to discuss the community safety working group, there has also been information about health ambassadors and all these new initiatives, which are to improve on community safety, the fact that there needs to be alternative methods and other tools that the police are using and that are part of the community's way of ensuring their health and well-being. I just want to reiterate that as a resident and as I'm sure a resident feel that there needs to be a clear way to address these concerns. And so I just wanted to attend the meeting to make sure that that was a clear concern that the commission knows about. OK. Yeah. Thank you. And definitely take your notes. And Ms. Nubar was taking notes. And we will bring those forth not only for discussion within the commission, but we also will make sure that we bring it to the other authorities. And as you said, there is a working group, a safety working group that will be coming forth with a new group of people who will be looking at a lot of the issues that you have stated in your comments. OK. So truly appreciate you coming in and putting your views out there. OK. Thank you. Appreciate it. Oh, no. Just saying hi. Bye. Oh, I was saying hi. OK. All right. Thank you. So, Jennifer, can you put it back on the attendee group? Yes. OK. Right. All right. So this is the time now for us to. We don't have any more people in the public session, right? At least not that I can't see. There was only one person. There was Ms. Mills. And that's it. OK. So, all right. Human Rights Commission member reports. That's report on things that you're working on, things that we discussed last time. I know some members are working on different pieces. I can start. And as most of you guys know, I am part of the housing trust. And I think this was stated last time. That there is a second round of the rent assistance. And the application is out there. So I would encourage folks to encourage people who they know are in some economic niche. And they have some rent that is behind for them to apply for the grant. Because it's important in these times, as we know that there's lots of folks who, unfortunately, due to some ineptitude for my government, are not getting some additional money that they used to get, which was $600. And that has had a severe impact on many members of our community. So if you can encourage as many people, as we know, that need some help with their rent, then they should definitely apply for the grant. The second is I am part of the group who will be choosing the members for the safety working group. And yesterday, we had our first meeting with the town manager. And we came up with ways to look at who we're going to interview, questions for the interviewees, how the interviews are going to be conducted. And I think most of you guys know that six of the nine members are going to be people of BIPOC descendant or from underserved communities. And we will be looking at all of the different identities and intersectionalities within the group and come up, hopefully, with a group that is representative of our town and that can then start working on a lot of issues. But this is more focused on policing in our town. The idea is to try to interview, if not all, most of the people who applied. There is an application process that they have to go. It's a community. Help me with that form that they have to fill out, Jennifer. It's a community. Activity form? A community activity form. So if you know of anyone who's interested in being part of this group, have them fill it out. As of yesterday, there was 12 candidates. And except for we did figure out a few qualifiers that we want in there and the certain things that would probably disqualify people from participating in this group and all of that was decided yesterday. But we had 12 people and we're hoping to have these interviews done properly within the next two weeks. We know that people's schedules are pretty much full at this point with lots of folks in that group being administrators and community activists and professors and other types of engagement that they're in. So when we do understand that, people's schedules are full, but we're just going to try to get this done within the next two weeks and have this group ready for the council to approve and then start doing the work. So that's my two areas that I'm connected with that I'm reporting on. Anybody else? I just want to piggyback a little bit on Sid's first announcement about housing assistance. I do know that it is on the school website so that people in our school communities can apply and it gives them information there. So just so that your committee knows that the school is also supporting and trying to help with that whole entity of rental assistance for some of our families that may need some support. Can I just triple back on that? So the community participation officers and the town manager have been visiting with the mobile market over at Fort River and on East Hadley Road. And one of the employees from the mobile market gave us some incredible feedback about how the first rounds of these funds were being issued and how difficult it was so that we ended up putting a process in place and contracting or collaborating with not family center, but Amherst family outreach. And from there, we were able to give them under COVID funds to help support staff. And they actually hired folks from the community that other community members will know so that it's making the process easier for everyone. So that was pretty good. Question, you said that there were some difficulties in the first round. Do you know if that feedback was passed on to the housing trust? Because the housing trust is powerful. I do believe that John is aware of the difficulties that have been there. OK, because we definitely want to take that into account to make sure that in the second round, because I'm going to do that meeting right after this, making sure that the second round, that the community members do not encounter the same type of difficulties that they encountered on the first one. Yeah, no. I mean, most of it was about the application, I think. But I don't know how much that could change because the application is a federal form. But I think that having somebody help guide you through that application process is easier than just being overwhelmed about rental and other financial issues in food insecurity and trying to fill out like a multi-page form and get all the documentation. So. Correct. Yeah, OK. Because I know we discussed all of that and we're figuring out ways of having help, including translators and people that speak other language to help with that process because definitely can be convoluted. And simply we can make it the better off we are. So also, the mobile market is on its way. It's entering the last month of the season. And I just would like to let everybody know that it's incredible. So it's like affordable fruits and organic fruits and vegetables that are sold. And everybody is eligible. And so they have these two spots, three. One is at Butternut Farms. One is at Fort River on Thursdays from 3 to 5.30. And the other one is Saturdays from 11.30 to 1.30 on East Hadley Road at the bus stop. So typically myself or Angela and the town manager will be out there as well a little bit behind them just doing some community outreach and talking with folks. And any time, if you guys need any help with that, just I'm offering myself. I'm not offering the commitment. If anything that I can do to engage more than like to do that. That would be great. Yes, it just took the words right out of my mouth. So just reach out if you need anything. Yeah. So the community participation officers, we've also been going to the Survival Center. And so this month, we're going to go to the Survival Center when Jen Brown goes, who's the acting health director and town nurse, while she's distributing flu vaccines. So we'll all be there on the 27th for outreach. Thank you. Great information. Thank you. Any other commission member reports in the videos? Yep, Ben. Yep, just plug in the school equity task force again. If we have a meeting next Wednesday, I can send anyone the link that might need that or might be interested in. Hey, Ben, you want to send me that link? Gotcha. Thanks. Yeah, that would be good for everybody. And how is that coming along, Ben? Work in progress. Progress being the key word, we're making progress that hasn't necessarily been made for a while. So it's slow. But it's going. Yeah, I mean, as long as, as like we say in social justice, as long as there's, you know, you guys working on some action steps and you see some some outcomes, you know, that's that's what matters. Because sometimes this work is tedious and it takes a while. But, you know, it's as long as you know that there's going to be some some good stuff coming out of it. You know, it's good. Any other reports from my commissioners, Erica, Liz, Deb, and you guys have anything else to add? All right. So like I said, the, the role of the commissioners and stuff is on the selection of the chair. We will table that for November 19th meeting. Okay. So, so we'll go into the planning process. And what I'm going to do, however, instead of just starting this conversation and I'll have to leave because I have to leave in literally two minutes. I will just, you know, just give the mantle to Ben to continue chair chairing the commission meeting and you can start that conversation. And what I'll do is at some point, I'll watch the end of the meeting and we'll go from there. Okay. Because that way I can exit right now. So thank you everyone. And I hope everyone has a good night and we'll see you on the 19th. So. All right. Thank you. Cheers. Thanks. Right. So planning of conversations in human rights commission involvement and recognition of the equality. Of black lives and the COVID pandemic and then town community safety committee. So, um, Do you want to give me some background there? Or give us some background. I feel like you're on mute and talking to us. Because I was explaining dinner process to a kid. Oh, no. I'm just trying to pull up the agenda now. And because I'm on my phone. So I can already know that I can speak on. So typically the human rights commission supports the different proclamations that are requested. Or we put in for the different proclamations for the town council to approve. Along with like a flag raising ceremony of different heritages, different heritages. And so, um, right now. I speak spoke with Martha and she. They weren't able to, we weren't able to communicate for them to do something for the Hispanic or Latino heritage month. And so November is also, um, Puerto Rican history month specifically, but there's, uh, some type of. Issue with the. The way that the government on the 19th of November. And it's not really their independent. So it's similar to like art. It's a false independence given. And so they don't wish to celebrate it. Celebrate it this year. That would help too. If my mic was down. And, um, so. There's that we, I sent everybody the human rights day proclamation correct to take a look at. So typically what we do for human rights day is we meet on the town common. Um, a proclamation is done by the town council. And then we read the declaration, which is about four or five pages, but there's usually a circle of people and we have little candle lights. So in theory. We can still go ahead and move forward with that as it's an outdoor. We never have more than 25 people. And, um, But it's, it's just a good celebration or we could do it via, I think the dog is on trying to get the food on the counter. Um, we could also do it via. Zoom and have it posted on Amherst media or something like that as well. So the choices are up to you guys on how you would like to proceed with that. If you don't want to do it live and in person. It's also very cold in December. Right. So. Sounds. That gets my vote. Yeah. So I'm, I, we just have to put in that the council has changed the way that they approve proclamation. So I need to submit it like as soon as possible. Um, so that we can have an approved for the December 10th date. Perfect. I just being zoom bombed here. Yeah. So, um, there is that. And then, so I was thinking like last year we, we celebrated Kwanza and perhaps we could do something similar this year, but just we would be doing it virtually or at least. Some significance. Or at least put up the different. Kwanza meet meetings. The days of Kwanza on our, on our web page or, or somehow to, to keep promoting stuff. Like I feel like we don't want to stop completely promoting these things. I was in Worcester yesterday meeting. Um, with their urban planner and. They are still doing everything. I mean their, their offices are open only. They're still doing their proclamations. They're still doing their proclamations. They're still doing their proclamations to. To by appointment, but they are, you know, still doing their proclamations and still doing their initiatives. And so that we should still continue to. Right. So that we don't lose that momentum. Um, or as much as we can. So. After human rights say there's not another proclamation, there's not another proclamation. There's not another proclamation. There's not another proclamation. But they. January 15th. Correct. So. I would, I would say that we're, if we feel we can do it safely outside. Um, insisting on masks that we should go forward with in person. To the extent that we feel we can do it safely. Because there's so much isolation right now. And I, so I just think it would be meaningful. To be able to do it safely. I think that would be a good idea. I think that would be a good idea. I mean, Huge chunks of time online. So, um, we can talk about it more at the November. Meeting the 19th. I think that would give us, if I started advertising on the 20th for the event, however we're going to do it, that would be fine. I just, um, I needed you guys to vote on the proclamation. So I can move that forward. Does anybody want to make a motion? I would just. Yeah. Go ahead. Okay. So we just got to second it. Even seconding any second. So show, I guess. Roll call vote. No, we don't do that here. Right. Just show hands. We get a vote. All right. You got to show your hand, Erica. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Sorry. Here. Oh yeah. So, um, Hey, Yeah. Hi, Petua. We can. Uh, my dog is like attacking me. So. I don't know what other things that are happening. Most places have kind of put a halt to those things, but I think that we can move forward with proclamations that we typically do if that works for the group. And can I just piggyback on what Deborah said? Is it Deborah or Deborah? No, it's Deborah. It's, it's Deb, actually. My phone is my full name is Deborah, but I don't know how to switch it. It's dad. So I just want to piggyback on what Deb said. And I have to say this. With everybody knowing that I do not like being cold at all. Okay. But I also think that, um, It was a meaning into her saying we've been on screen so much. So, um, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't have any minutes to do what we normally do. Um, I think that it would be beneficial to not only us. As a committee, but the town in general. Agreed. Yeah. Uh, So the, um, Town, are there any updates on the. Um, the town community safety meeting. Committee that, uh, said, didn't talk about. Yeah. So as he's, so they haven't formed the committee. We just created the interview committee, right? Because there was a lot of pressure from residents that, you know, they didn't necessarily want or feel like trust. Um, the town manager to appoint these individuals and they wanted more of a general consensus. So we're having, um, Amherst residents. Sit on in the committee. And for an interview process. And so like Sid said, there's about 12. We have a list of about. I would say close to a hundred people who we are trying to. And so Paul has sent out a blast email to all of those individuals. I will be the staff liaison for the community. Safety working group. Um, And that, you know, that's all we really have right now is that they'll be interviewing shortly. Unless somebody had, you know, more questions about in regards to their mission or. What exactly that there was going to be doing. Um, Well, I would love to have more of that filled in if you have those details. So this committee is really to help the police. Find either alternative ways, whether it's them or they hire someone else's people might know. So we had been advertising. We had two police. And so we have not filled those two positions. In the thought that we might hire a social worker. Of some sort or a counselor to come in and work with the police department for some of those calls that they get that don't necessarily require police. Um, the police, you know, that are more mental health based or. You know, I don't want to say domestic violence, but that are more mental health based or dealing with the homeless. So it is to try and then it's also to try and, and, and build that gap between the police and the community. Um, so different initiatives for the police and, and the community. Right. I think as the group gets together, they'll define it a little more. It's pretty broad right now. So I think that's a good point. Thank you. So then the, uh, conversations and human rights commission involvement and recognition of the quality of black lives in the COVID pandemic. How does that. But what was the motivation behind that being on the agenda? Is there a comment in between those two? Or is it just all one thing? I'm sorry. I still don't have the agenda in front of me. Um, Is like all one. Um, I think that's a good point. Um, I think that's a good point. Um, I think that the people who are more vulnerable are. Have a different or having more difficulties with the COVID, right? So it's been on a national level. Known that the BIPOC community is. Being affected by COVID in a different manner. Then, um, people of non BIPOC communities. So. I guess we could say one is like, I think that's the biggest issue. The issue is. The issue is, um, people's needs are being met on a local and national level. And then perhaps. Um, Yeah. We should be checking in with our BIPOC community and, and trying to minimize that marginalization there. Are there any thoughts on like what we can do as a commission to kind of. Support our BIPOC community. some of it could be general education, right? We're making sure that folks have access or know how to connect with resources. Sorry Erica. No, it's okay. I, if this is hitting a little close to work right now, related to some of the students I'm working with, of any ideas on how we can support the community better. Yeah, so I'm at a roadblock. So I know like when we've been, so one of the things that has been really, really hard for us as community participation officers lately is just trying to engage with the community because it's everybody's, you know, typically I would have suggested that we just throw really big barbecue at like certain different complexes and have LSS Ecom and bring all the sports stuff and maybe the fire department and just have like this really good nice block party in each different little neighborhood. But we can't do that. So all we've been able to really do right now is try and kind of connect or piggyback off of existing events that are going on in town, for instance, Survival Center or the mobile market where some of those folks we would often see there. Otherwise, it's just really hard right now. I know that we, I did make a connection with the Chinese community, like I kind of found an ambassador for the Chinese community. And so, you know, there's not much that can happen right there right now. So the best I could do was come up with a flyer that he sent out to all the folks that he knew that just had all of the different resources available. And he translated it into Mandarin as well. Well, yeah, that was going to be my question that I had is if we have flyers with resources for like housing assistance, food assistance, medical assistance, if we have those type of flyers and we can do like a mailing or if we could go out in the due outreach within the apartment complexes. Yeah. So one of the things that I find is also to and maybe because you guys are human rights commission members, as opposed to town government employees, is that there's like a distrust, right? And so you have to be very careful, at least I feel like we have to be very careful on how we infringe on that. So when I, when we decided to go with the mobile markets, we had a conversation with the managers at the mobile market, like, how would you feel if we came and we literally sit away from them. And then we both, like the mobile market employees say, oh, you should go stop over at the at the table over there. And then we tell people to go over to the mobile market. But we're also giving out free masks and stuff like that. So it gets people a little bit more engaged than we have. So it just you just have to kind of be delicate of the fact that sometimes when you say like you're from the town, it puts people on edge. And then so there's still the survey. I don't know if we want to go through with the survey or not. Why are you rolling your eyes? Are you talking to me? Yeah. I'm feeling some type of way about surveys right now. Um, I feel like there have been so many surveys that have been sent out. And my fear is that a lot of these surveys are not going to our low income families because of accessibility to computers to internet and just accessibility. We'll just leave it as a six ability accept accessibility. And I feel like the best ways to communicate to some of these families is going and being personable and being like, Hey, and showing up because I would I as a low income person would rather somebody show up and show me that they're willing to take the steps as opposed to getting another survey in my mailbox. Right. So I think that the the distribution of the survey would have been an all hands on deck type of distribution because you're absolutely right. And we cannot connect with that population that is mostly affected by all of the things that are on the survey via just putting it on the website. Right. Like that's not accessible to people like and it's I just remember being when I was just a resident and not employee of the town. I would never look to go to the town website to look for anything like what I'm going to go pay my ex tax in the building and that's about it. Right. So I do understand that and then that is why it would have been had to be more hands on deck and even still it's it's the fact of approaching individuals necessarily. Right. So everything has to be kind of done delicately. So there's also the thought of finding ambassadors for the different complexes. Right. And so you kind of have that ambassador person that you can give the surveys to and she can help the folks or you know maybe you could pair with an ambassador at Colonial and Petro could you know work with an ambassador from South Point and Deb could do that little complex that nobody ever talks about behind the Cumbies in North Amherst. Right. Like we could we could kind of like work it out. So it's you know we just really have to kind of be mindful and and think about the different ways that we can approach it because honestly too like perhaps if you are an immigrant like an illegal immigrant here and somebody comes approaching you with the survey you're going to be like well and that's why that's why if we go out and do it we need to find I think that's with who we are as a commission as a commission we have enough connections within the community that we know who to who we can approach to kind of be that liaison between each community. Right. So we can yep go ahead. That sums it up. I'm sorry I just got distracted by the dog. We can definitely work on ambassadors if everybody has a like know somebody in a different community that they think might be or who they feel like is kind of a leader because all complexes kind of have that one person that's a little bit of a leader there. So we could you know we could do it that way. I mean there's the challenge with COVID is just it's such a challenge. Everything is such a challenge. Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. And then maybe we could give them a little stipend or like a gift card to Big Y for their work and their effort right because we don't want to just keep asking from people and not being able to compensate them. So we want to come up with like a plan for that or? I think we should right because otherwise it'll take next month before anything happens. We can kind of start taking steps now like we're gonna like carve out the town like figure out start off doing that getting our liaisons together that kind of thing. Yeah I mean Liz and Petra Ben and Deb and Erica do you have anybody an idea in the different complexes? I know a couple of folks over in South Point the Boulder's area that could do that. I think I don't know like I could do like I know a lot of people in like like Palmarie Lane too and also the butternut farms like are in that area like I know a lot of people there but I also think that we could possibly like at least for me because I'm in school so like there's clubs in the high school and they're also like LSD and other connections so if we want to because I know like a lot of young people want to be involved and want to like put them themselves out there and wait well like with permission with it from their parents but like they want to put themselves out there and like make sure that like they feel like they're making change too so if we I think it's really important that we include young people too in this and maybe we can work with like clubs or like I don't know if we're doing presidents for like graves or stuff but maybe they can be like the school ambassadors to help bring like momentum so that we are so they so that the young people can also be engaged with the government as well yeah yeah do you want to take that piece on since you're our our high school rap yeah I can do that great and so um all right and it actually you're absolutely 100 percent right because you know a lot of times it is our young black boys and Latinx boys who are and Cambodian who are or being that are affected by the different things that happen that are a more of a negative I don't even I'm trying to be very careful and um Erica you got somebody in mind for over there you want to do it yourself or what you got to hit rolling green too I have to unmute I can't think of any um I don't mind doing it here that's I'm talking really long I don't mind doing it here I can't think of anybody that I don't know anybody that lives in rolling green anymore to everybody everybody that I know Sharon were hazard yeah oh yeah that's right a restaurant and joiners yeah joiner still lives there okay and Martin knows there too so there's a couple of people does somebody want to reach out to them Liz you want to reach out to them I'll reach out to you Ron um I was thinking uh Lisa Wentworth still lives there too does Tony no she moves she Tony um yeah she's not there anymore and Tamisha's not there anymore either okay okay and um so I know that um Johani in South Point I don't know if anybody knows Johani but she's heavily involved and she's very big on community participation so um I would check in with I will check in with her to see if she can kind of um do the South Point boulders Mill Valley area um and that area so big it would probably be worth having more than one ambassador out there so if anybody else has any other names for that area Ben Harrington Ben hello I suppose I could do some assisting and um I actually have so I know that say how has been like the ambassador the Cambodian ambassador for like everything and for a very long time but I actually just met up with say safe Seth Seth who lives down the street here off of West Street and so he's willing and is excited about being coming involved and so maybe we could utilize him as the Cambodian ambassador because again that is a population that we have very little um connection with and we don't really ever hear from that community and um you know they've got like three four generations over there so is there anybody uh like Village Park in Olympia well I've got somebody for Olympia and I have someone for Village Park too I think right because um coach um Antonio Antonio but I was thinking his wife um Shirley Charlene um so there's still loose that I have somebody who might be able to do with that loose behind that unspoken apartment complex behind the Cumbies in North Amherst Mark Keenan will fail your sawers oh wait did I say you have some names both does Jenny live back there yes and she's retired now so she might have some time I know because every time I would ask her for such she'd be like I'm just too busy uh huh yep yep um ties ties over your laugh net you guys see hi Ty um he's been laughing at me for a very long time and I don't care okay is that all of the complexes depth you presidential puffed in yeah oh did we hit um North Village what is going on with North Village I you know there was a lot going on about them having to leave um oh they were redoing the apartments over there so are are they still living over there oh I don't know there's definitely still families over there because like for transportation we have we have uh bus pickups at North Village so okay you're a good resource I try so Deb we need to be able to task you with something right I know I feel like I'm going to be fairly useless like if um if we had to work to get people from like the Jewish community to fill out the survey I probably would be useful um but I still think that that's a fantastic idea yeah I mean I can be liaison to the Jewish community of Amherst um and the JCA is doing they are very heavily involved with the equity task forces that are working through town and they're very invested in that work so that is you know every group needs we all need to work together yeah so that works and there's a small group of people from the yoga center which will be closing um but there are a few people that are continuing to meet to push for reparations in the town and they are connected to a lot of people so I can definitely encourage them to encourage others to fill out the survey yeah um so I think right now we should connect with our ambassadors and um once every once we have a good list of ambassadors and it seems like we have all the areas covered um and then in the meantime we can work on the survey so Liz and Erica you guys are probably in Cedric are the only ones that didn't receive a copy of the survey yet and so I will I want to make some I keep saying I'm going to make changes to it because I think things like transportation and food insecurity really need to be on there um um just not just like have you had what were your experiences like or that you've seen about you know people going to the different town entities so Jennifer did you send that out I don't remember receiving that oh yeah you commented on it oh my god well that was probably last week and I mean how can I possibly remember what happened last week you and Petula and Geisy were the only ones that gave me feedback okay right that was so much appreciated oh my god um but I can send that out and people if they reply just solely to me with their um their input then I can make changes what we can't do is send everything to every to all of us because then that makes it a quorum and then we're in violation so there's like these little tricky things about being uh on a border committee from the town so if I typically if I send you stuff out I'm gonna ask you just to reply solely to me fair enough all right so that's the plan for we'll have all that so you'll send that out tomorrow I mean I can send an email out and I'll put a time deadline on it because what we're notorious for is saying that we're going to do something and then it never gets done right and so we um and the community is really feeling that way as well like the feedback that I've heard from some community members right so we want to stop that because we want to be as proactive and supportive to the community as we can possibly be so I gotta I gotta oh wait oh no good um can when you send out the survey can you recap what we're doing like what you oh what each person's doing yeah yeah yeah that's gonna be in our notes that should be in us um that'll be in the minutes and Deb is really great at getting me the minutes the next day so or the day after so you are you're so good at it is that a plug for me to get them to you sooner so this is just like the I think that's what that was because you need them sooner no I mean I think I've got it right like so Liz is going to connect with Charon and some folks in the rolling green area Erica is going to connect or be the the ambassador over at Colonial Ben is going to assist in South Point we're going to also ask um Yahani and I'm probably going to try and ask one more person it's just so big over there between Mill Valley the Boulders and the Brook and New Hollister and South Point right so maybe we can find a couple more and Petua's got the Butternut Long Metal Drive Pomeroy Lane area covered Deb's got the uh JCA community covered right so Petua Monica lives in Butternut so she would be somebody that could possibly help you because she knows a lot of people over there and you know um the Carreras are over there so Lainey and all of them and um actually the woman who just spoke to us oh you weren't here um what is her name I think she lives I think she lives in Butternut too she does yeah yeah so you have some resources over there okay yeah um so quick question for the minutes um Jennifer I did not make a note of who which community each person is going to be approaching do you want that in the minutes no I mean I've got it it's fine okay yeah yeah yeah I just hope everyone knew who where they were going and I'll probably check in with Geizi and Sid because as we know Sid is very well um connected with the Cape Verdean community and Geizi just knows just it's like a human resource herself so you know I'll check in with them and see if they can connect and you know Cedric is really good because he's got all the parents um so I'll check in with them individually too so that's the plan we'll have all that together for next meeting well no we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna already hopefully given out the survey to our ambassadors by the next meeting hopefully like so I would say like maybe a week a week and a half before you to have connect with your ambassadors and then during that same time period we'll be working on the survey together but sending it back individually just as a reminder and um that way it can go out as soon as possible right because partially wrap next meeting then yeah right and then so you know the thing that about COVID right now is I don't feel like we've really gotten the repercussions fully from COVID and the means of people with food insecurities people um without employ who are unemployed I don't think we've really felt or dealt with that yet and it's just on the way to come so it would be great if we could all be more proactive for when that happens absolutely all right so that wraps that so then upcoming events fall planning oh did anyone have any more to add to the last we're good we're solid on that I don't know if anyone wanted to punt yes we're good we're good okay so then um yeah upcoming events fall planning what do we got well that was the whole this is it right well no but that was also the whole like uh flag raising and proclamations and stuff like that right so that's typically what we do last year I collaborated with local what with community members who celebrated Kwanzaa and just tried to make it more publicized um right because I I've come to know that a lot of people of like oh I've heard of the name Kwanzaa or I've heard of Kwanzaa but I don't know what it is right and so we just want to educate people a little bit right and so we can talk about that the November meeting but I'm thinking we'll probably do something and try and link with Amherst media so I will talk to the Shabazzes and Laura Mills was the other person that I worked with in regards to that so so for Kwanzaa as a um advisor for Poku and which is People of Color United by the way it's a club at the high school in Petua is part of that club and we do a Kwanzaa celebration every year we're not sure as of yet what's going to happen this year because of um our pandemic but it might be um if we're going to do something for Amherst media and want to explain the principles and and all of that it could be um that some of our students also participate in that and I will bring that up in our next meeting on Tuesday so that next meeting is Tuesday and then um we will meet again November 19th so that could give us enough time to kind of orchestrate that yeah right and we can all kind of think start thinking about creative ways to make that connection and to make it happen and again I'll talk to D. Shabazz and Mr. Shabazz and Lauren actually I love that I love that idea about the that the home rights commission would collaborate with Poku that's a wonderful idea get more young people like you know just make those connections that's awesome and all at the same time people who probably would never who watch Amherst media will will see it like right and so we'll put it on the town website and we can actually have a live link from the human rights commission page I mean we can do and then Petua oh right the the website or the Facebook page right so things like that we really need to try and get out on our Facebook page so that we can last it and um I keep getting notices about people liking it but I'm like what is there to like it's like really dated so we should work on that yeah I will connect with Petua to somehow work on that and I didn't mean that in a bad way like it's dated so people shouldn't like it but it's dated right like it's trying to look it up right now oh I liked it okay yeah sometimes I'm like oh I forget these meetings are recorded down so are there any topics not reasonably foreseen by the chair in the last 48 hours that's how it's worded right not anticipated we're going to talk further about um you know just educational events in the town right after taking up after that webinar I was just in a two-day zoom training with human and common do you guys know this organization they did a fabulous training on interrupting races or I thought it was fabulous on interrupting racism with a just a multi-pronged approach and it was just a really well thought out I mean I don't I don't know we it's probably not appropriate to be plugging any one agency but I just thought that they they were very skillful at working with white allies blind spots so I just I want to I don't want us to lose track of that idea of us promoting more educational opportunities for people to to learn and grow and you know make the town a more welcoming and inclusive community so do we want to start thinking about different workshops that we can promote right I mean I think part of the survey was to kind of ask what the community wants but I think we can take that out and I think we can just show have different workshops and then people will start to hear about them and sign up for them or not sign up for them right and we'll get a better gauge that way you know I like this idea buddy oh sorry the thing about meeting at home dogs kids that's why I banished my husband to the the store dogs kids husbands so buddy he's like 115 pounds there's not much I can do with him he's just monstrous and um if I have a 530 meeting I'm you're guaranteed to see me zoom bombed by everybody in my household because they're all like we've missed you all day right um you you are right though and I had forgotten that that was in the survey was about educational opportunities so it is true we might want to just wait for the survey result well I mean I we can talk about it and we can talk about it next month if you want to like I'm more than willing to take that piece out of it the survey because it kind of directs the survey in a different to a different area versus I think that if we advertise for two weeks or three weeks that we were going to have a um a workshop on equity right that people would sign up we we have some come someone come facilitate it and you know we do it online and I think that the people would sign up so it's up to you guys maybe we can do like introductory kind of things because like people who don't know a lot about government and want to get engaged like they might not know anything about government so they could see maybe this can be an opportunity to like introduce how like your role in government even if you aren't like a human rights commissioner but like just a citizen like what you can do and how you can be engaged that'd be a cool opportunity for all people okay yeah no and so there's three community participation officers I'm just one of two of three so we can include them in it and then the and come up with a like a a full workshop of how to get involved and and you know people don't you're absolutely right like people outside of here don't really understand the process is that things go through or why it takes so long for everything to happen um so oh great perfect and the other topics going once going twice so somebody wanted to make a motion that would be the end of our agenda right there so what at 7 36 nothing to say unless somebody wanted to uh elaborate on anything we've already discussed um can I ask a question which I kind of thought I feel a little weird asking it um well whenever somebody says can I ask a question that's already a question right so I apologize for that here I am I'd like to ask a question I'll say that um this was here say I don't remember where I heard it it was something about you know the college kids partying you know sort of which was responsible for the spreading of COVID and the police felt like they could not interrupt they could not address the partying because it was not a neighbor who made a noise complaint it was people driving by and did anyone hear anything like this and this this felt to me like almost like a human rights issue because it meant that our the positivity rates went up and our children could not go to school um and I wondered why the police are so free to you know enter you know the high density living areas but are not free to interrupt the college students and I and I feel weird introducing this because again like this this was here say I'm not exactly sure where I heard this information did I read it I just cannot remember so I'm kind of tossing this out as did anyone else read this did anyone else hear about the reasoning behind why the police did not interrupt the parties so um a couple of things so one I don't know if people are aware that we now have about 20 COVID ambassadors um who walk around different hours and times to help educate people although you know and or you know if somebody's not wearing a mask and one of the mask zones to be like hey you know just here's a free mask you should put it on you know and help your neighbor or you know help keep the community safe we also have the COVID hotline where people can call or email us and um typically there's someone there answer except for those ones that come in after 10 o'clock you know like 9 o'clock at night that's those ones are a little hard but we do end up sending so if we get people who complain about a party like on a Saturday afternoon we can send the ambassadors out there and then the ambassadors can reach out to the police if they need the backup although we're hoping that they don't right um and the police have been responding to people who file noise complaints because then they can charge everyone who is on that lease two to four hundred dollars and that is makes a you know so it's like $1,200 per house of you're not supposed to have more than four people in your house that are not related so um and they dismantle the party then right so when they go and they file and then every and the party uh dissolves I can't really speak on them not going to places based on you know cars making a noise complaint or cars making a complaint but I it just seems like the best way to go about it is to file a noise complaint which is tricky because it typically has to be in the evening right because there's hours where there can be such so much noise like during the day and then after nine o'clock that that changes but it also have to be a neighbor you can't just be like a passerby who is alarmed seeing all these college kids you have to be someone with a vested interest yep and as somebody who answers the covid hotline it's you know it's understandable where our residents are how are or why our residents feel the way that they do right because we've been pretty low numbers and then this occurs and then the numbers spike so it's right and I think that there's an issue with you know why didn't you mass be more effective or have a more discipline than than what they've been doing and it's like if you if you have them leave school then they're still here because they're off campus right and so it's like this how to where's the medium right because then we lose all control over them and they're just regular residents and it becomes just straight police issues versus them being school and town issues because when they are fined through the town they get fined through the campus too I don't know if anybody saw that how that you mass issued out like 200 citations for party goers basically I just I think I just wondered like where that came from that you know because it it feels like we all had a vested interest in breaking up that party not just if you lived nearby right if you had kids in the school who were then not able to go to school if you have a compromised immune system if you know what I mean like we all we all are breathing the same air you know so I don't know if that like a just a general civil rights that they have a right to you know I just don't know where that comes from that the restrictions about the police being able to respond I um yeah uh the noise complaints is the only thing I can really to defer to I don't really I didn't hear about neighbors or people driving by with the issues I mean I have seen them report it to the COVID hotline and then we send the ambassadors out right so I haven't necessarily seen it with the police being involved so I can't speak on that okay so essentially if you're driving by call the hotline yeah live near you follow the noise complaint yeah got that all right so does anybody want to make a motion right because trying to get out before eight is that what we adjourn the meeting at 742 p.m. like that is there a second we got a second that motion oh who won that all in favor yeah hi sweet so we'll see in the emails see you next meeting yeah good night everybody that's right my bad what I was gonna say see you all in the email but no we're not gonna violate no everybody stay safe out there stay safe yeah stay safe