 So please know this meeting is being recorded and it will be available on YouTube if you just typed in ECAC building task group. It will come up as well the previous recordings as well, and you may even get the other groups recordings also which you are welcome to to watch if you if you would be interested in knowing what the other groups are doing as well. So thank you everyone for making the time to be with us today we really greatly appreciate it. I'd like to start first with reminding everyone that should anything happen if the meeting gets embalmed please know that we will immediately end the meeting and then we will send you information as to how we can come back together again. Also, I know I was having some trouble with my internet connection today so if for some reason you are having trouble. Please feel free to turn off your video. I may even have to myself today a bit. But feel free to turn off your video that should help up somewhat and please stay muted when you're not speaking. And we'll remind you if you start to speak will remind you to unmute if if you haven't remembered to do that yourself. So thanks again everyone. I'm going to read again our statement of the indigenous heritage of the land to start our meeting today. We humbly acknowledge that we stand on nanotuck land, acknowledging also our neighboring indigenous nations that the Nipmuc and the Wampanoag to the east, the Mohegan and Pequot to the south, the Mohegan to the west and the Abenaki to the north. And with that I will turn it over to Gazikaya. Thanks Stephanie. So today you may notice that we do not have ASL interpretation, but we're going to continue to encourage everyone to speak at a just thoughtful, slow pace to allow us all to reflect on what we will be talking about and we're going to have you raise your hand before you speak again so that we have a nice thoughtful pace to the conversation. And I'm just going to remind us of the agreements that we went over last week, and then or not last week last meeting, and then offer if anyone has one that they would like to adjust or something else that they'd like to add. So we talked about putting people and relationships first to remember that these issues affect real people in their real lives and that we're not here to win or to get individual goals met to but to really understand each other and work from that place. At any time you need to take a break to check in with children or to get a snack or to step away to use the restroom, whatever you need we encourage you to just go ahead and take care of yourself and step away as you need. We want to avoid jargon or technical terms as much as possible, and to keep that slow, steady pace. If you tend to be a quiet person, we want to support you in speaking more, and if you tend to be a person who has a lot to say consider sharing a bit less and allowing for that silence to invite everyone to share, and we want to remember to keep everything that is shared here private and to not dig for more details or personal stories if they're not being offered, and not to ask for proof when people state their needs. And then the last one is just to always remember that we want to stick with our own experiences. And consider that our versions of right and wrong are most likely related to our cultural values and are likely to differ from others in the room so be open to learning by asking a lot of questions. And lastly, when you are at the first time that you share, go ahead and introduce yourself with your name and your pronouns, which I failed to do when I started so I'm because I have my pronouns are they them. And the first piece of less. Oh, I wanted to make sure and pause. Did anyone have adjustments that they wanted to make to those agreements or something that they think is important to add for our group. And if something comes up midway. Jim, did you want to add something. Just quick. You know, we do take notes of everything. I just want to sort of one of the things I think is is worthy as a part of an agreement is that everything that everybody says, while it's not going to be attributed to anybody, we get we are taking that down so that things don't get lost. You know, you may make a point or comment that that the conversation moves in some other direction after that that comment will be, we're going to hold on to all of those things. So nothing gets lost in this process. Great. Thank you, Jim. And the flip of that is also to remember that while we just have this group together right now this recording is made public. So anything that you don't want to become public. Just keep that in mind and keep that to yourself. And we're always willing outside of meeting time to have you share thoughts that that won't be recorded and made public that you maybe want to make more anonymously. Okay. So the next piece that Sorry, I had her hand up as well. Oh, thank you. I was just learning how to use the process and I think it's very good. I'm happy to raise my hand when I have something to say. I also wanted to follow up a little bit on the notes and on the initial statements by asking for a reminder of the purpose of this group. Because even Chris, I think mentioned the question earlier, what is the goal? What is the purpose of the building task force? What are we hoping to accomplish at the end of the day? And I wanted to thank everybody for the notes. I did read them thoroughly. I followed up with Gazette with a question. It was answered again thoroughly. I appreciated the clarifications. So thank you for running a great process and let's just keep going. Sounds great. Thanks, Ludmila. This is Jim Newman. I use he, him and his pronouns. Well, I'm going to let Pazikaya sort of finish. And then when I start my process, well, I'll briefly review the purpose of the process after Jesse and Sarah get a chance to do their sort of introduction. So thanks. We'll get to that for sure. Okay, so Jim, did you want me to go ahead with the homework then? Great. Okay, so I was going to just touch on some of the highlights from those who gave feedback on the homework questions. Thank you to those of you who were able to do that. If anyone had not had the opportunity to send in their responses to those questions, you can still send those in and they'll still be made a part of all of the information that we're gathering. So if you didn't get a chance, I encourage you to still send me responses if you have them. The question was around what are people's experiences with buildings that were fixed quickly and cheaply versus more slowly and for the long term. Most of the responses that I got were around housing and landlords. And there were about eight or eight or 10 experiences of having things fixed, only when they were at a very broken point and just enough to get appliances or things functional. And there were several comments about things being done by, I think the term was used like a jack of all trades type of a handy person at a complex and the feeling was that things hadn't been specifically fixed by an expert so that they were needing repairs very often. The materials were the cheapest so that they again needed repairs very often. Lots of landlords coming in and out of people's space to repeatedly repair the same things. And let's see. The other comment was about the roads which I know is not necessarily about buildings but someone had shared that the roads need to be fixed so many times and that they constantly need to be fixed again. Another theme was around the outside of apartment complexes not being kept up to the same extent that maybe the inside repairs happen but the outside repairs really rarely happen. So those were some of the themes that came through and thanks again to everybody who did give their input and please send any further information that you have. Thank you. And, you know, those are topics that we can get to in our conversation as we go along. I'm now going to hand the process over to Sarah and Jesse for. John does have his hand raised. Thank you, John. Yeah. I just had one comment on what she had to say, and that is she focused entirely on the responses related to people who are renting. I know you got at least one comment from a person who's a homeowner. The reason I bring it up is not because I feel neglected, but because my experience as a homeowner is so different from that of renters homeowners are much better positioned to control their ability to deal with these building issues. So, I think it's important to keep that in mind that this is probably not exclusively but primarily an issue for people who are renters, and that part of our job is to see if we can find a way to put them in a better position or now. Great. Thanks, John. Good. Good. Does anybody else have their own information from the homework process? Homework another bad term, but hey, we're sort of like homework. Great. Thank you. Mila, your hand is up. My hand is up because yes, this is Mila of Lava Gillum and my pronouns are she hers. I'm going to try and start my video as well. I apologize for not having sent the responses. I think they were sitting in my draft folder. I never got sent out because I was trying to answer thoroughly and I had also queried other people in district one using my district one neighborhood association to see if others wanted to work with me in helping me provide feedback to this task force. Hopefully our process is a little clunky at this time, so I wasn't able to receive any feedback. But as I have a, I could give it to you verbally if you would like now or I can send it to you by email. What would you prefer? You can go ahead and share it now. Okay, so on the building's question, I can tell you that also I'm a homeowner. I have used all of the possible mass save program incentives to air seal my house and to provide installation in the attic. I'm currently looking at replacing a very old oil burning boiler, but my budget is not permitting very much. We have to be sure that we can afford the payback of the loan over the next five to 10 years, however long that takes. And so it's a more complex evaluation for us, but I know there's 0% interest loans that are available from mass save and I'm looking at those possibilities. So I do have experience with short term projects, and those were specifically in my home with the mass save program. But I also have experience with long term projects as an architect and project manager at UMass, because we do large scale commercial buildings and institutional buildings. On the transportation question. It's I recently. Yes. So what are you going to have for the other groups why don't you just email me those just for the sake of us. Yeah, thank you so much. Awesome. Sarah and Jesse. You're on. Great. So maybe you can see the screen. And you'll have to forgive me even though I draw for a living. I'm not super good at it. Let's Sarah talk. Thank you, Jesse. I think it's great. I like it. I'm Sarah, my pronouns are she her hers. He him sorry. Thanks, Jesse. In our previous meeting, Jesse identified two key goals for our work, which is to increase the quality of life and decrease carbon as it relates to buildings in Amherst. I'm going to speak for a few minutes on the reduction of carbon in buildings. And the goal of this conversation is simply to offer up some shared language and definitions. And as you can see, as I speak, Jesse will provide some visuals on screen to hopefully help illustrate. So I'm going to go over three key terms and define them a little bit and give some examples. Operational carbon embodied carbon. And a system boundary. So the first one operational carbon. This refers to the greenhouse gas emissions that come from people using a building. So this includes all the things that we do both in and around our buildings that require energy. So examples would be the use of hot water, heating and cooling, plugging in a toaster using your computer, turning on lights, etc. This energy can be sourced from gas, oil, wood or electricity. And generally there are two strategies that work together to reduce operational carbon. The one is to just use less energy, right, to not plug in our toaster as often, or to use cleaner energy, or perhaps a combination of both. So right now, clean energy is available via solar and wind, the sun and wind, and it comes to us in the form of electricity. So for buildings specifically, we're looking to eliminate unclean energy, such as burning fuels like gas or oil, and instead install equipment that uses electricity from a clean source. So operational carbon, the way we use buildings in the carbon that they emit is relatively easy to measure. And there are proven pathways to eliminate it. And in the case of a net zero building, you may have heard this term a lot, net zero means that a building produces as much energy. So for example, via solar, right, it creates that energy, it produces as much as it consumes and they offset. So both new and existing buildings can be net zero energy or even produce an excess of electricity. So this little scenario is one important piece of the puzzle. And that's generally speaking, how we can think about operational carbon. The second term embodied carbon refers to the emissions that come from the entire process of creating or renovating a building. For example, the process of manufacturing and making concrete that goes into a building releases a tremendous amount of greenhouse gases before the building is even occupied. And those things need to be accounted for in the total of embodied carbon. Other materials that require a lot of energy produce or we could call them high in embodied carbon include glass steel and the high tech components of mechanical systems or insulation, for example. So as you can probably start to think embodied carbon is a little harder to and more difficult to measure than operational carbon, because it looks at the entire process of building or renovating a building. So I'll give an example. We could factor in to the process of renovating a building, the gasoline that's required for all of those materials to be transported from their source to the building. So the gasoline that that truck burned right in order to help renovate that building would factor into the embodied carbon. So you can see how things like that get tricky depending on how we define it. But this is also where it gets exciting. There are building materials that hold carbon and can be used to make building projects carbon negative, like a tree, for example that absorbs carbon from the air to produce wood. And in fact, lumber used in buildings, when it's properly harvested can do this. The more examples would include things like fiber fibers of hemp or straw. So this means the initial act of fixing an old building or building new can have a positive impact right now. That's where we need it most in the near in the near term right now. So the last term is system boundary. And a system can be whatever you define it as a school, a property, Jesse's town that we're looking at right now, the earth, we can define a boundary to keep us honest and not get too overwhelmed. So for example, if we think back about a net zero energy building in that system we look at the operational energy used and produced by the building. And that's a relatively easy and manageable system boundary to understand. We can then expand the boundary of that right to look at the source of the energy. Is it coming from wind or is it coming from a coal fired power plant. We can also look at embody carbon embodied carbon. How we build it how long it lasts, how long it lasts. That tends to get more complex and it's harder to analyze, but expanding our boundary in this way is much more likely to lead to a lower carbon result. And a system analysis also looks at other factors that we're really interested in such as human behavior, mindsets, economies, etc, which then feedback into how a building is used and where energy is consumed. And then also how it can be reduced and ultimately how we can enhance the quality of life, which is really important to us. So where we decide to draw the boundary of a system may affect the type of actions that we then end up taking to reduce carbon. So the goal of presenting these definitions is to step into the weeds a little bit. To keep us from getting maybe too distracted by them to keep the conversation moving with a beginning of a shared understanding of these terms, some examples, some kind of time to think through, which then lets us look at analyzing specific actions. So in summary, brief summary, we have operational carbon, which results from producing the energy, sorry, the energy used to operate a building what we do in and around the building, embodied carbon, or the energy used to make or renovate a building. And then the systems boundary, which are kind of the interrelated parts that help us decide how we're going to analyze our options. Thank you, Jesse, for your lovely, lovely sketching. If that feels like a lot. I agree. It's a lot. It's a lot for me, even as I was speaking I was tripping a little bit over where I was in the overall thought. So if there are questions. Now we can probably dialogue a little bit. I'm not sure Jim, or we can make time to speak offline with Jesse Jim myself or for anyone else I think I think it takes like quite a few reads and it takes a lot, it takes a lot of time to really like get it to sink in. So, yeah. I would highly recommend that people have questions right now about that description and the lovely pictures. Go ahead. And now's a good time to ask. And you can just speak up in this situation. Because I can't see everybody. And I'm going to let Jesse or Jim answer those questions. I want to know about the magic of drawing on there. That's incredible. Thank you. That's so cool. Yes, I would echo that very helpful. Jesse nicely done. Why you said the system boundary widening the system boundary tends to reduce the amount of energy sent into the atmosphere I don't understand that please explain that. I think the idea is we're using this concept of a system boundary to define what we're talking about for two reasons one is sometimes we need to keep it simple. I think in the example of net zero. If we're looking at one building and one solar array. You know, we count the amount of energy it produces we count the amount of energy it uses. Right. That's a very simple analysis it's math, an electric meter can sum it up for us. But if we draw a slightly more complex system boundary that maybe looks at, well here's the factory that makes our pink stuff that makes the solar panels and so we draw that circle that includes that factory. You know, we have to offset and I'm not saying we shouldn't do solar but now it's a more complicated analysis, but it's a more truthful one. Well there was energy required to make those solar panels so we need to be sure they're going to offset that or in the case of a new building. There is in this embodied energy all the energy it took to make a new building. It's going to go right away and so if we don't look at that wider view, we could be missing large amounts of emissions and maybe not make the best decisions on this is really designed. How do we make good decisions how do we make smart decisions. Yeah, I think that's a great description, Jesse and that's why I think one of the things that is worth them worth commenting about is including people in those boundaries and people's experiences. I appreciate it Jesse that you said the reason why we're talking about this is because this is the way that we can, or this is a tool to help us make decisions about what, like new buildings or also fixing old buildings is that correct. Yes. And I mean I think ultimately these these three terms. I think are kind of boiled down a lot of and a lot of a lot of decisions it could be to decide a new building versus a renovation it could be. It could also be. It kind of goes outside of the building's task group but an example that comes to mind is this someone mentioned fixing the roads. And if that's an energy intensive process and if you have to do it every five years. No one's asking what the end you know one saying what's a net zero road look like. So we need to draw a circle around our, our Amherst system that includes, you know the manufacturing of that asphalt, for example, and at the risk of, but also not make it so complicated that we can't make decisions so I think it's just helpful for all kinds of decisions. Do we replace the boiler, do we a great one might be ventilation. Well, let's the system would include the people in the building. The energy the new system uses or the energy the new system saves the embodied energy of that piece of equipment and we look at all those things and then decide, in this case, well yeah the new ventilation at the school is a great idea it's going to save energy it's going to improve the lives and it's going to make you know a safer space and sorry I just had a few more questions. One is about can you define this word offset that you're using. Yes, so let's say I, let's say for strictly for energy if I plug in a toaster and make toast, which I love. It uses so much electricity, and to offset that. I would want to connect within that system to something that's generating that much electricity without the use of coal or natural gas, or other dirty power sources so let's say there's a town solar field or solar on the roof or solar. Here the building that's feeding clean electricity and I want to make sure that the amount of toast I make equals the amount of electricity green electricity that's coming in so it's that balance of energy used versus energy produced clean energy produced. Okay, so was that has to do with when you're talking about net zero. It doesn't mean the building isn't using any energy. It means the amount of energy that is used is the same or less than how much energy is getting made by a solar or a wind thing. Yeah, I think that's a great way of putting it the amount that gets used over the course of a year is is equal to or less than the amount that is being produced in a green in a, you know, a low emissions way. Okay, thank you. I'm assuming. Can you hear me. Okay, thanks. That. These are things we could embody in goals for building an Amherst for example if we're talking about adding affordable housing. We can talk about if there's new building to minimize the amount of embodied carbon in the design and construction of the building. Similarly to minimize the amount of carbon. Once the building actually becomes operational, there are people in it, and so forth. So, the question I have is, are there good tools that would help us or others with that analysis, and also would offer alternatives to, for example, whatever building materials you decided we're going to go into a new building. Yes, absolutely. There's a lot of tools, and I think, and I don't know, and I think Jim, or someone interrupt me if we're getting too deep in the weeds. There's a lot of tools coming out from the state there's even new building codes that are being developed as we speak. They just released the 2021 documentation that even includes the option for a state or a town to a building. A new state or a town to adopt a net zero energy building code. So there's a lot of really exciting tools that are both happening kind of at a, at a government scale but also there are practitioners out there that have are able to deliver these buildings these projects. Help groups measure their energy, help verify that there is it's a whole industry. And yeah, for better or for worse. Um, so, so Jesse and Chris, this is a great, I think, T up for us to move into the next stage of conversation. That really is aimed at defining. So, so Chris, you're asking, well, how does you say, there it is. Sorry, it's not did put her hand up. Just a moment. So how does, you know, how do we use a particular set of tools to achieve, you know, this net zero thing. Well, I think there's a good a point where we need to go before we start talking about tools to start understanding. What is it we're trying to do. Where do these things really matter. And where do we want to push on them. What is it that this group feels are the most important places activities actions to really, to really move some of these things forward. And I think, then, when we serve land on those things and there is a question about how do you implement those goals. And that's when we can start to talk about tools and why they're so important there. So I would like to. So let me just remind everybody of the sort of principles that we came up with in the last gathering. Oh, before I do that, let me let you had a question, or a comment. I had a comment on the system boundary because I thought it was worth repeating the, the second thought that I think Lauren or Sarah, Sarah was providing, which is a system boundary could also be used to define human boundaries. And the one that always comes to mind for me, at least in this context is financial boundaries and organizational boundaries. So, who is going to do what to what purpose. And to ensure that the town of Amherst buildings reduce their carbon, or are we hoping to define strategies and tools for all residents in Amherst and all businesses in Amherst to use and businesses do different kinds of work and use a different set of energy. To scale than residences do. So, and they also have different financial options. The financing available to the municipality of the town of Amherst is different from what's available to me as a homeowner is different to what's available to a commercial the economy piece of it and the people and activities piece of it, which is really important when defining systems and the system boundaries of what you're talking about are always kind of essential for me to think about because then I really understand who is involved, who is committed to doing something and who is expected to be brought in in an educated or engaged or support it so they could also take action. Thank you. Yeah, that's a great, a great comment. Okay, Jesse. Yeah, thank you for bringing that up. That's huge. I think one of the examples that just want to quickly stays, you know, if you were to analyze our town, the municipal buildings represent maybe 3% of the carbon emissions. But if you include in their system boundary. All the people that are looking at those buildings all the people that interact with those buildings all the people that could be inspired by those buildings it might actually be a really good place to invest in these improvements in in low embodied carbon, low operational carbon, etc. So I think that's an example that really points to what you're saying with Miller. Where, where are the dollar signs, where, what are people seeing, how are we inspiring each other, how, how, how are we affecting each other. And I think that that that question about who's inside the boundary and who's not inside the boundary is a really important one we're talking a lot about earlier, because he was talking about sort of the experiences of people renting apartments and, you know, what the the experiences of people renting apartments with things happening in those buildings. So, you know, our is somebody who rents within a building, part of the boundary and if the answer is yes well then that's going to change how we think about what we're actually doing within those buildings and obviously the answer is yes but but but it changes the answers in a way. Yeah, because he kind of and then Chris. So, I just wanted to throw out there that I really appreciate seeing this once but like Sarah said this takes a while to absorb these concepts, and that many of the people in this meeting have had previous exposure to this information. So, for those of us who are not necessarily ready to formulate a question because we're still digesting. There's going to be more opportunity to look through this again at you know to take it, take time with it. I wanted to just add to what you had just said Jim that if you're considering you know who's in the system. It might also be helpful to consider and what kind of power do they have within that system. Because you might, you know, need to adjust how like what role they play based on the power that they have or don't have and how the other people in the system need to, you know, advocate for them or shift that power to include them. And add to that quick, add quickly who benefits or who suffers from certain actions and what are the what are the unintended consequences a great example from our last meeting was the bikes that took away the access to the buses. So really understanding and, you know, or who owns the energy. Who, who benefits if the price if the price of energy goes down, who benefits if it goes up, etc. Great. Yeah, that's, that's ideal. Chris, do you have something quick to say. Yes, I do. Well, I, at least one of our goals, I think is should be to address climate change. In a national governmental panel on climate change says we should be to net zero by 2050 so I, I would say that we should be to net zero by 2050. I think that's the future of the planet's at stake and that should be a pretty important consideration. If that were so, if the town of Amherst were to decide to be a net to do what it takes to get to net zero by 2050. There are pretty big implications for a lot of, and a lot of areas, the area that I'm particularly focusing on the existing building stock. There are a lot of buildings in town. That probably are mostly residential and then some commercial. I think that the intent is that are the limits of our, what's your phrase, Jesse, the, the, our, our scope range does not include the university and the two colleges. That's something we, I don't know if we've formally adopted that, but let's assume that that is so. So we're talking about the existing building stock in the town of Amherst. I did a rough calculation that there's a, there's a suggestion that that that suggests that we need to upgrade the buildings in town, so that they are energy efficient, and that we need to invest in clean energy in some way. And then that has very vast just saying, okay, let's let's upgrade all the buildings in town so that they are very energy efficient and then so that so that they can be close to net zero. There are a lot of buildings in town. And if you go out and walk around and you will get astounded by the scope of the problem to say, okay, yeah, all of these buildings have to be at zero. I figured it, I, I round numbered a figure of a billion dollars to to upgrade the buildings and add the hundred dollars. I used a hundred dollars a square foot and tried to figure out how many square foot there were. It's a very approximate gross calculation. It's a huge number. So if you spent a billion dollars on all the buildings in town, you could get get the get the building stock to be net zero. And there would be a strong benefit to all of their owners of all of those buildings and all of the users of all of those buildings to doing that. They would have much more comfortable spaces, they would have, they wouldn't have drafts, and they would have much lower cost of energy. That's fine for a lot of people like me who have a house and I can, I could upgrade my house and john could probably update his and Lou could probably upgrade hers and so forth. But of course of 30 years and we'd be better off for it, but what about the rental stock that's that is to my eye the biggest question. How do we upgrade all of the apartments in town in a way that allows the same residents to stay there and and allows there to be. It keeps it from being too terribly disruptive. And where's that money coming from. Because I'm concerned that's the question. That's the thing that we have to answer. How do we deal with the existing rental housing in the town of Amherst in a way that makes it energy efficient, and allows the same people to stay where they are and rent there, and not have a, and not have to move out and have the places be gentrified. That's my, that's my speech. Nice speech Chris thanks. That you, you point up a couple of key values that I think are embodied in some of the principles which I'll go over in a sec about sort of who where benefits should live upgrading and improving the quality of life and the quality of buildings, especially for people who don't have control over those buildings I who are renting or who are using them in other ways, and to, to not do it in a way that displaces anybody. I think those are those are great values to include in this, in this process. I guess he kind of you want to add to that. Yeah, I just wanted to say thanks, Chris, for mentioning the concept of not displacing people or making it too difficult for people. I just wanted to comment about that when one of the first places I lived here was Pomeray Lane at the, the, I guess it's Amherst Housing Authority houses and Pomeray Lane and they changed the windows, which I think was like a probably to more efficient or something better. But me and my next door neighbor were both like eight and a half months pregnant, when they decided to do it and it was going to kick up all this craziness. And my next door neighbor was planning a home birth, which she like went ahead and did with no windows, which was just she's like a remarkable, like amazing adaptive human who is just very resilient. And it had like a, I couldn't handle it, I just couldn't imagine bringing home a baby to no windows. So we ended up moving but we lost our place in public housing because of that because they just like wouldn't, they had no other options for us. And then they put us up in like a hotel for a couple of nights. And it was really just ended up creating a lot more problems because the other place we moved to the, maybe there's some sort of message here but the landlord took the doors off the day I went to the house and I was like, Oh my gosh, like this, this baby deserves to have some windows and doors. And it was all just like really, really stressful. So keeping that as a principle. I think to remember that like sometimes maybe people don't think about the people who are actually living there and they're like, Oh, well you should be happy we're upgrading it and it can be just really, really hard to deal with having no say and how or when that happens. Yeah, disruption this key. Thank you both. And when we looked at when we develop principles at the last meeting. There are sort of four things that came up there were a bunch of other things that came up as well and those things are all you know in the notes and you've seen a lot of them and all that, you know is incorporated into this process. One of the four sort of big principles, one of them was to prioritize accessibility of buildings for all residents including physical access and healthy and supportive spaces. One of them was to prioritize the accessibility within governance and decision making structures and processes to support inclusive community participation to help us meet our goals. And each sort of both this is this conversation is talking about both of those principles and they're such great principles that I'm thrilled to, to sort of use them as guides, along with the values that that Chris was articulating. To prioritize actions that improve the quality of life for all residents, especially those most vulnerable while reducing carbon emissions. I think we're pretty clearly connecting to that. And then the fourth is so sorry I just want to interrupt you for just a second Janine unfortunately needs to head out. I just got something going on with her kids but I wanted to thank Janine for being here and just have everyone give a see you soon Janine and thank you so much for being here we appreciate you. Thank you. Bye. Thank you. I was going to ask Janine if she wants to say something a little bit ago. Sorry. Yeah, she's she's got a crisis with her. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Great. Thanks. And the fourth principle is to connect clean energy and carbon neutrality to all aspects of life and Amherst so that everyone has a reason to care and get involved and get involved. Those principles speak to a the goals that Chris was talking about which is, look, we know we have goals that are important climate goals that we're trying to reach because those goals affect all of us. And we also know that there's lots of different pathways to get there. And that as you say, Chris, yes, we're going to have to somehow touch every building. And we're going to have to somehow, you know, change how people move around and we're going to have to think about all of those things we're going to have to change how we deal with outdoor spaces and but the question is how do we do that? Who participates? Who benefits? How do we think about that moving forward? So, to sort of guide that conversation forward, we identified sort of the two co-chairs and myself and Lauren and Stephanie working with the notes that we took from the last meeting identified a couple of what we're kind of recall calling big moves or big things. One of the things that we've already been talking about. The first is getting to net zero energy and net zero carbon for rental housing. So obviously it's a topic we've already talked about. The second is to just to just get to and touch and renovate. All existing buildings. Again, what Chris was talking about. And so we sort of what we decided was that we asked the sort of set those two topics up and then start our sort of jump back into a wider range discussion, which we've already done pretty well at with a couple of questions about those. One of those questions is what needs to those actions address in town who will be most impacted by those actions. And then, and we probably start there. Second question, which is what are the different kinds of potential carbon reductions related to this action. I think that those both are great questions for us to to get involved in looking at first that question of getting rental housing to net zero. And second, the question that Chris so eloquently stated of having to touch every existing building and what does that really mean and have who benefits who who does it hurt who does it impact. So let's open that up for questions and answers around those topics and if you think there's something we've missed. Let's hear about it. You can just jump in go ahead, Lydia. Um, yeah, my mind's kind of going crazy about a lot of things. She her. I remember, I'm old enough that I was young right after World War two and I heard stories from my families about things that the government forced everybody to do for the welfare of everybody. And in our community here, there's been, you know, just watching how decisions are made. There's always a lot of worry about forcing anybody to do something they don't want to do or stepping on people's toes or whatever, but I've been recently reading about communities that have actually taken some brave stands. New York City being one of them and putting big requirements on people. And so I'm, I'm hoping that we can start at a point where we know probably everybody's going to suffer because everybody does suffer under climate change that we do want to improve our quality of life but that may mean a very different thing than we're used to under capitalism. It may not mean that we're all going to get richer or, you know, have nicer things or whatever, or even warmer places or cooler places. So I, you know, I just want us to be bold. Initially and not just wait for boldness to have to happen five or 10 or 15 years down the road but to really think about like, could we be a model as a city. Could we really take on all the absentee landlords that we have in this town. I campaign door to door a couple years ago and I really saw the condition of much of the rental stock, the small build the small houses that are, you know, being occupied and what poor condition that they're in and trying to imagine them upgrading, you know, but yeah so yeah really taking on some of the those those tough things so that renters don't have to suffer, the landlords have to suffer, which actually is happening right now under COVID when people aren't, you know, are being excused from having to pay rent but yeah so I want us to be bold and I mean I just read yesterday about making new buildings be bird bird proof in New York City. It has to not kill, you know, 80% of the birds in town or whatever, because the glass, you know, is such that the birds right run right into it and that, you know, but there's a lot of people who love birds and if you can make new buildings like that, why not make them, you know. So anyway, I don't tire. It is but that I mean, okay, so there's a sort of thought about we should, what does it mean to be bold? What does it mean to be bold in this situation? Emily, you have your hand up. Thank you. I'm Emily Boss, she heard hers. And I, this may have been discussed at other meetings, but I wanted to go to the systems boundaries point and just make a comment about thinking about buildings and also thinking about the external outside and natural spaces and the effects that they have because those can be strong on energy use, also human and wildlife experience. Jesse, did you have a point or did you want to Before Jesse, before you get going. Emily, you want to do you have some specific thoughts around that. I just wanted to make two points about the indoors and outdoors, citing and building and there's a lot of impacts that trees and green spaces can have in terms of energy use, and then also on the other side. This is beyond the purview perhaps of a group talking about building specifically. But if we then look at the town as a whole thinking about the green spaces is another place where we can think about our overall impact and carbon. And I work, I work for the Franklin interest and work on conservation. So that's, that's a very much part of the equation for me and, and then there was also access and accessibility and social equity issues, always with conservation and natural space and parks. So those are things to keep in mind too. So I just wanted to raise all those issues to have them be part of the conversation. That's, thank you. Fantastic. Jesse. Yeah. Well, I just, one of the things I'm really glad you brought this up, because one of the things that's really exciting to me is the idea that there are these other groups right now that know what we're doing, and we know what they're doing. And there is a group focused on land use. There's a group, you know, we said to be net zero, you have to have, you know, reduce the energy and have the energy coming in be green. There's a whole group that's dedicated just to making the energy that comes to the buildings be low emissions, no I think it just, I think it's, I just want to remind us that we are not the only ones talking about this and there is a very coordinated effort and it's kind of exciting and hearing Emily talk about the landscape and land use issues and know that if anyone has ideas that they think are relevant, not to buildings, but relevant to this larger systems that we're talking about, bring them up, tell us because we can funnel that right to the other group and make sure they are hearing those ideas. So thank you. I think the I perfectly reasonable to include outdoor spaces and adjacent outdoor spaces into a building boundary. Absolutely. And the, the role of So, you know, outdoor spaces can affect energy use from a shading perspective, reducing energy demand and warmer days, they can improve the sort of stormwater management if you know in days in situations where it's raining a lot you get big downpours of rain which you know is another part of this sort of adaptation or resilience thinking, looking ahead, dealing with climate change, but they also have big effects on how people feel. And we know that that's the case. And that's probably worth as much as any of the other things. And that that sort of understanding was like new people's health which includes their mental health is part of the boundary that we want to be thinking about. Yeah, because he can Lauren had a hand up. And then after, after you say something, Lauren, I was just going to comment on what Jim said. Thanks. Hi Lauren, she her hers pronouns. I just wanted to jump off what Emily was saying. And for those of you that were in the last meeting you heard me speak about my appreciation for the US design building which is a building that incorporates natural elements on the outside to make the building itself more sustainable. And just kind of wanted to offer up a thought around thinking about how our buildings connect to their environments and integrate with their environments and support their environments. Because I think what I appreciate about that building and sort of I'm considering as a potential way of thinking about building projects more just in my sort of career and in general is as as extensions of our, our natural environment or just as things that can be more integrated with our natural environments and in ways that are mutually sustaining and supportive. I was just going to comment that I really appreciated hearing Jim that the idea of the trees and the, you know, the nature around the building being included. I know we're talking about in the land group, land use group but I like the idea of thinking about it here too because they they have cut down like 20 trees in our complex in the past two years, and we've all really noticed that it's a lot hotter. Um, but also the kids are really sad, like they had like relationships with the trees, you know, and like it's always like a funeral every time they cut down another one. And so I really like the idea of keeping it also as a topic here, so that it would be a conversation with landlords separate from I feel like in the land use, we're talking more about like recreation, which is also a place to, you know, talk to landlords that like, that's an important part of having a complex is to think about the outdoor space. But but I'm glad to have it brought up here also. So thanks for making that connection. I think that's, that's a great comment. And I'd, I'd counsel us to not get too involved in how to achieve the things we're talking about achieving right now. We'll have a whole another conversation about how we achieve things. We're talking about, you know, changing what happens in rental housing and around rental housing, let's just set the goals like what, what needs to happen here. And we'll figure out it, you know, once we know what the goals are, we'll see if we can figure out a way to actually make it happen. And, you know, that way may take a lot of different turns and paths and we know that. Stephanie, yeah. I mean, of course, you know, absolutely believe that the natural landscape contributes a lot to the quality and the sustainability of our buildings. I think there's also an entire industry that is so entrenched in doing things in a very specific way. And I always appreciate architects like Jesse or Chris who are definitely forward thinking. But I think about the contractors and the developers who come in to just get things done quickly in a very routine sort of way. And I think, you know, there, I think, you know, how we do this, I know Jim you don't want to focus on that too much but I do think there's just a way in which to really bring that mindset to alter that mindset and to change that mindset is so important, because it's, it is again it's so embedded in sort of process and just, we do things a certain way and that's how we do it because we've done it this way and it's quick and it's easy and we need to get it done. And I think changing that whole framework is really important. Like, that's just such an important piece of all of this and. Yeah, I, you know, I, working in town I deal with people on from all different kinds of perspectives. Some which are very different from those that we're all expressing here and who don't even see this as an issue. So it's trying to sort of change that framework as well. I think that's really, it's just important and I think that's where the education piece comes in and where the leading by example comes in. John you've been relatively quiet. He's muted. Well, you know, I've just been listening to this group. And then one thing I find interesting is that it appears to be a pretty sophisticated group. People have a lot of experience not only personally but it appears professionally with dealing with these kinds of issues, which I think is great. I think it's really helpful. I mean, at some point, particularly listening to Stephanie just now. We should point to the places in town government that we want to influence and I don't just mean people but I also mean things like zoning bylaws, or other kinds of regulations, which need to change if we're going to reach the kinds of goals that we've been talking about. Absolutely. That no question there. I love that. I love that comment. I think that's so I one of the things when I hear Stephanie's comment and then your comment John one of the phrases that comes to mind is, how do we make it easier to do the path of least resistance, as opposed to, you know, if you're trying to do something good. Why is it so hard, and where, where are the stumbling blocks where on that process and is it the zoning. You know, is it the building code. Do we need to have a whole town department that's designed to lobby the state to improve the building code, because that's where that gets changed and it's really it. I think you're spot on that. Chris. I just wanted to point out my recent experience with the building of the Hitchcock Center and the current center. There, there really was a change that was affected with in the building trades. I think that Jonathan Wright documents in his book on this topic, probably worth reading. But by the end of the process, the trades people who did the work became understood what was behind building a living building these are both two living buildings that are at the Hampshire campus. There was a definite change in mindset there wasn't just get it done fast. And had to be, they understood the, the guys pretty much the guys and ladies pretty much understood at the end of the process that that there were bigger issues at stake there. Yeah. I think that's a great example, Chris and I want to dovetail on that that I was really proud of a lot of my colleagues in planning and inspections who worked on that project because it was a really unique situation where there wasn't necessarily regulations that addressed some of the things that were happening, or allowed for the permitting and somehow they found a way to make it work. And that was expressed when the building was completed and they had a ribbon cutting and a, you know, a ceremony around opening the building and I think that to me that was an example of. Yes, we can, we can make these things happen. I think it's easier when they're thinking about Oh, this is just the one project and somehow they can make it work for that one project but I think that's where we need to sort of expand on that thinking like you made it happen you didn't necessarily have everything right before you you didn't have the regulations right before you to make it work and yet you did. So how can we do this on the bigger scale I think it's just that kind of thinking like expanding what they did and expanding it into something broader and bigger for other buildings as well not just one specific project and I think again because it's easy to get your mind around that, but when you start talking bigger people kind of, you know, put the brakes on a little bit it's like too much change. And I think that's the kind of thing we want to get to. Sarah you also haven't had a whole lot to say since you're beautiful soliloquy. I'm loving every minute of this conversation I'm trying to like facially be engaged because I a lot of what's being said here is really exciting to me. I think what's striking me is as Stephanie and Chris and john were speaking about the last few threads. I like to not just be bold as Emily said but to think outside of the box right outside of the boundaries that keep us doing things the way that might be comfortable or routine or the way we have to do it. I'm just chewing on what what does that look like right to create these like cross pollinating avenues of us to think about things in a really different way. I think that the example of thinking about the rental housing complexes is a, is it is is a good one for that thought, because we're the, the problems. If you follow the pathway that has been laid down from the problems are not solvable. That suggests that well we're not does not follow that pathway. And so what it what's the new pathway you know how do we change our mindset and our view to find a new pathway where the problems actually are solving the problems is the natural move as Jesse describes it. One thing that I'm thinking of as we're talking is about how how hard we've worked to have the perspective of renters be in these meetings and how how it seems that that is going to have an impact in the way that this plan is going to be put together and one of the like cultural shifts or systemic or institutional shifts that would be also really helpful here is to to have it become an expectation that the that renters are included in conversations with town governance, like just that simple that town governance consults with renters without a doubt since, you know, 40% of our residents are renters. And how, how can that be something that those participants in this group, who are homeowners and who are likely to go on and be on other committees like this and other groups like this, how can, like, how can we support those people who will naturally be called upon and naturally have the capacity to serve in that way to look around rooms and to remember this experience and say, Hey, I'm noticing that we don't have these voices in this room, and I had an experience where we did and it had this impact, and, you know, to, because other committees or processes may not incorporate these voices. And so, how can the other people who are likely to be on committees again. Bring that back up. Go ahead, Jesse. So, excuse me. In response to that. I'm curious and Stephanie or Jim, or people who know more about the law and towns and, and things like that. One of the things that strikes me is who has disposable time. It tends to reflect people that have disposable income. And are there ways to create compensation and unequal compensation for groups like this for town council. Is there, you know, is that something that we can put in a climate action plan that says, we can raise the taxes on the top so that we can come, you know, fully compensate the time of people who ordinarily couldn't afford to be at the table like is that appropriate thing to do. We've got a certain amount of support in this room, I gotta say. I don't know if everyone knows this, but the community leaders who are participating in this process are being paid. And it is for that reason that we have had the ability it's that's the only way that I'm in this room. That's the only way that all of the community leaders have been able to participate. And if we were not in zoom, then they would have been also given access to childcare and food if a meeting was during a meal time. And we have offered interpretation. So the sort of magic for is like compensation. Well, five I would add transportation would also be a consideration right so you need to make sure people can get where the meeting is make sure they can have childcare. If they're paid, they can have food, and they can have interpretation or accessibility needs met. So, yeah, it can certainly be laid out from what I understand in any type of a process if the people are willing to push for that. Well, and I would add to that that it's. It's all made possible because it was written into a grant and there was specific funding allocated for it for this process. So, I think part of that is getting the town. I mean it was a model for the town right we wanted to create an opportunity to say here's an example of how this can work. But again, it, you know, it was outside funding that made it possible. So it's how does the town, you know, it's, again, it's that whole systemic thing of the town looking and prioritizing like what are the priorities in this town, what's important in this town, how where do we, where do we put this I mean you've got 40% of people need to be resent represented and heard in all town processes and if that's not happening then how do we create it I don't know that it does and I think one of the things that just sort of popped in my head and I don't know how appropriate is a lot, but just even having, you know, a representative from each housing complex be able to represent their complex and be involved in what they're making and I don't know if that would be like a coalition of people or how, you know, I, because he can I'm seeing you nodding so I'm looking, you know, you're you're the, you're sort of leading the charge and a lot of this so, you know, a way in which creating sort of an opportunity for a group like that to exist, and how that group interacts with, you know, the various town boards and committees. You know, and again it's just like getting the town to sort of look at this getting the town council to sort of look at the, they're a new town government, you know it's a new town form of government this is a great time to be doing this right it's a great time to be bringing it to their attention and to having them really look at this. So anyway that was just a few random thoughts I'm just sharing off the top of my head. And briefly so as not to take up, you know, too much time but the Providence Rhode Island climate plan had they spent an entire year beforehand formulating a racial justice and equity committee that that had then the town agree to a set of principles and then that they were consulted with and worked with their ECAC their version of ECAC and and is also been made available to all the other committees in town from what I understand. So there are models out there where there is, you know, a lot of intentionality and consistency around bringing racial justice and equity, which includes usually, you know, issues of financial insecurity and housing and renters rights and all of that. So there are models that where these kind of things have been brought to the forefront. And I think everybody in town has heard me say at least 20 times that I think that community captains representatives of each complex would be an excellent way to ensure that people's needs are being heard at least at a bare minimum. And yeah, and I think, you know, having that having that voice sitting right on the town council and being paid to do so seems like an appropriate way to move these ideas forward and in a in a smart fashion. Yeah, that that is such a. It's such a clear and obvious I sort of idea and set of goals. And and well, there may be three or four ways to actually make that happen. The it's, it's, you know, it's interesting that it's such a strong statement from this, from this task group. I'm going to, I'm going to try something a little weird here. And that is, in this conversation when we talk about representative voices within decision making structures. Are there people who have something different to say that people have maybe seen some bad experience in that setting or something like that, that we might want to take into consideration as we're sort of thinking about how do we put this into a plan that would have an effect on making it better, essentially. Sorry, I just have to jump in really quick. Ludmila had to jump off because she had an issue that she had to deal with. So she apologizes and may join us again if she if she can. Great. I noticed that somebody jumped off and I couldn't remember who it was. I'll speak. Since there's not much silence. We like silence. The idea of paying people who otherwise don't have the time or the resources to be able to participate in town government processes is probably the most radical idea. Maybe as radical as net zero that we've discussed this afternoon. We all white guys who are retired and are pretty happy with the way things are going now are not going to do stuff that would upset the apple cart. I mean that's just the way this town government is running right now. There's a lot of openness to looking inward to looking at the ways in which we don't seek input from all sectors of the population of the town. It's not happening and there are any number of things that you could point to that happen every week in town council, or in committees outside of town council that demonstrate that. So, while not saying I'm opposed to it. I do want to acknowledge that that's a huge hill to climb. And that this is a very small group. Right now there are only I think five of us who are strictly speaking town residents. It's a much bigger group not necessarily in these meetings but in what we want to, if we want to accomplish the kinds of goals that we're talking about. I would just throw out into the mix that the town manager and town council are currently discussing how to use $80,000 that have been that has been designated for some type of social justice effort. We are certainly seeking input, and that while we are not huge in numbers in this room or in this process. There are some very influential people, including yourself john in this process and I wouldn't. I think that that the town generally is influenced by a small group of voices. And so those voices do actually have a ton of power. This is a very interesting conversation. Yeah, I just just say that, you know, we had town meeting, which was becoming more diverse year by year, actually. A certain group of people, I think we're very threatened and got rid of it. And now we have a much more conservative, less representative form of government so we have our work cut out for us. But I think we've seen people, people of color organized in town more recently and I think, you know, renters going to have to figure out how to actually get a rental organization or coalition or something. I don't have an idea about representatives but also just whether funding could be found for community organizer to really work be, you know, not within the system, until there's enough kind of power and numbers there to be able to come forward. You know, it's a great idea and I don't, I don't have it. I don't have a funding source in my mind other than that $80,000 that could help organize. But I wanted to go back just to throw this in before we're done is that even though the town buildings are only 3% of the emissions in town, I think that when we when we retrofit and renovate and change them, that will be in the public eye and it will be a model of what we need to do in the whole town. Yeah, so to not, you know, that push that to the side is, you know, oh yeah eventually we're going to do that or whatever I think that people will watch that process and hopefully learn from it. So to not ignore though that 3%. I think that's a really cool. Chris, you had your hand up. Let's see. Well, I was just liking what Lydia just said, I wasn't, I wasn't, didn't mean to respond to that but but I mean, if you think in terms of say the town hall. Turning the town hall into a net zero building is pretty big challenge that's brick building it's. And so that would be a large expenditure that would be on the scale probably of the other big projects that we're talking about now, certainly doing something like that would be very would get everybody's attention. And it would be a very good thing to do. So I like what you just said, the other thing. Oh dear, what was the other thing I've forgotten what the other thing is because I'm old. I don't fall into that category. Stephanie and yeah, go ahead Stephanie. I just wanted to say that I, you know, I agree and I'm glad Chris you pointed out the expense of doing something like town hall but then I also want to point out and this is where we're in a little bit of a conundrum is that those projects do require a lot, a lot, a lot of capital. And when we're, that's why I said something like when we look at prioritizing our needs. Some of the things that we might do might not specifically address renovating a building so I'm just going to sort of throw this out there just to put it on the table but like it I know it's not necessarily an and or we're talking about are we going to create funding for people to be more actively involved. And then we're also talking about renovating buildings. I mean there's a lot of other categories and a lot of other things that have to happen in town that require capital building. So, I'm just saying these are the things that we need to look at prioritizing. I mean, sort of in my mind yes it's, it would be great to do that for town hall, but is the expense that it's going to cost to bring town hall to be a net zero and worth it as an example, versus paying people to get more actively involved and have a voice in our process. I'm not saying it's necessarily one or the other, but I do think those are the kinds of questions that come up because if we're talking about all doing this for all town buildings. It's a lot. Jesse. Yeah, go ahead. Interesting side note. North North Hampton has issued an RFP for seven buildings all of which I think are bigger than our town hall they're all load bearing masonry buildings similar they're all basically big versions of our town hall there's seven of them. They're issued an RFP to make them net zero. Whoa. And it's that happened. It in the last month. And, and, and it's interesting. And it, and it, and one of the things that occurred to me that sort of combines Stephanie and Chris. Part of that is a technical solution. Yeah, but maybe part of that is how we use these buildings. What temperatures were comfortable with what, you know, does the building take a break or shut down in the cold this time I mean like, when we talk about bold ideas. Excited about hearing things that are like really change the way we live our lives because I'm not sure net zero by 2050 in an equitable fashion looks like the world we're living in right now. I think it's a we're living differently. We're making, you know, and for some people, I think it's got to get better for some people. I think that's what Lydia alluded to before I think maybe me needs to maybe I need to dial it down a little so raise my taxes and do something good with it please. I just have a question about when we talk about this goal about the net zero by 2050. Am I saying it right. What does that actually mean does that mean every building in the town has to do that individually or does that mean you're going to add up all the energy used by the town, including all the rentals and like maybe all the landlord say no we're not going to help at all. What does that mean, you're going to do that offsetting thing and try to get a lot of solar panels to make a lot of energy to make up for anyone who doesn't get involved or get their own green thing. So the answer, go ahead, Chris, you want to answer that question. I have an answer for that which is that I'm thinking about the alternate a is to go through all through all the buildings, one way or another I don't have the solution, and make them do a deep energy to fit of all those buildings and then all at the same that same time put enough solar panels on the roof that each building individually is net zero. That ain't going to happen. But but the there's, it's probably going to be some mixture of things, but we think think about the electrical group electricity group. I'm sure that the electricity group could could supply renewable energy through the plug every time I plug in plug something into the wall, and do that townwide, and grossly increase the capacity of doing that. And then all you have to do is to electrify all the buildings, and, and get rid of fossil fuels, and then you could get all of the buildings to be net zero. I don't think you want to go that way because that's a huge increase in the amount of electrical capacity. There's probably some combination of alternate a and alternate the plus some additional. There also is the matter of needing to sequester the carbon that's in the atmosphere that you are producing. And that has to do with the site group. If it were that we could produce agriculture with healthier soils, for instance, and we could grow a whole lot and plant a whole bunch of trees that we could that could balance some of the extra the chemicals that we do use. Anyway, so there's it's not going to be, we're not going to go, we're probably not going to attack all the buildings and make them net zero, but we have to do that with a lot of the buildings. Perhaps the houses, the single family detached houses that's not easier to imagine doing then the large masonry buildings, but even you can even do that, I don't know, it's going to be a mixture. So that's, that's the answer. Yeah, I think, well put Chris, I think that the by saying the statement net zero by 2050 what that has done is it's set the boundary around the whole town. So this is well, it's not that each thing item within there has to do this thing it's that the whole town has to do it. And so some things are going to be doable and some things are not going to be doable so we're going to have to do you know, probably going to have to do all of something. And to get that whole boundary. So it's like the whole math problem of all the different things that go in and out of that, and the circle is around the whole town. So right. Right. Exactly. That's, I think that's really helpful for people who are here this goal and have like, no idea how, like, how are we saying that's going to happen. Yeah, I think that was really helpful. Thank you. Beautiful. I just want to jump in that the to correct everybody because we're talking about net zero by 2050 and the goal is carbon neutrality by 2050. And they're different. So, and I know it's but just just to be I just want to clarify that point though because net zero is talking specifically about electricity energy use and energy use and carbon neutrality is bigger than just electricity and energy use. Yes, so that's a good point. It's, this is, I'm going to caution us not to jump into the conversation about the difference between energy and carbon. And because, while it's a simple concept, the functional differences and roots you can take are quite myriad and you can take them in a resilient ways. But Jesse you have something you're trying to get across here, I think, I think quickly. Yeah, and I think this is what everyone's been saying, but it kind of is everything. It's the, you know, it's the tailpipe of the bus. You know, it's the carbon that's going into the trees. It's the carbon that's coming out of the buildings. It's, it's the food we eat. This is another one that may be radical, but if simply the entire town ate local vegetables and stopped eating imported meat. That would probably do have the job I don't know what the real numbers are but it there's, or it's the waste we produce it's the things we consume I think it's, and that's where the system boundary if we draw it too big. It gets very overwhelming very quickly. But I think it's important to at least on a conceptual real level, acknowledge that it is our entire lives being being measured here it's not just the buildings. And we've broken it into these component systems groups or these component groups to digest so digestible bit so the buildings in town is what we're thinking about. And the reason it's a whole group is because it represents like a third of our emissions in the town, or more, it's a, it's a big wedge of the pie and we can really do something great with it and it's really doable. And if we try to bite up if we try to do the whole pie at once, it's not doable so I think that's, that's my kind of quick point on that. That makes sense. Yeah, go ahead, john sorry. I'm gonna unmute. You're unmuted you're good. Consistent with what Jesse just said. I'm a little worried about having too much of a focus on the year 2050. It's not that I don't think we should have long term goals. But I am concerned that we ask ourselves or create a process that allows the town to ask, what are the most doable projects in the next five years. We want to go from 2020 to 25 and not do anything, because we still got 25 more years till we get to 2050. So I think it's important to talk about, or to find really a set of priorities that are likely to get the least political pushback they'll have the broadest support to take the best advantage of whatever available technology there is, and say, Okay, these are the things that we think the town should focus on in the next five years, and try to get that through, then doing something that is as broad as what we need to do to get to 2050, because between now and 2050. I'm not saying priorities will change but the technology will change. And so there are things that would be very costly to do now that may be not so costly to do in 2030. I think we should think about or create a process to allow us all to think about what are the things that we can do now. And I'll just want to mention one thing specifically because you all know I'm a big advocate for affordable housing. The town, I think is going to acquire a piece of property, which is or has been the Hickory Ridge golf course. And there's a strip of land right along West Pomeroy Lane that is buildable. And from my point of view, that should be used either for 100% affordable housing, or maybe some kind of mixed development with 50% affordable housing. When that comes up at this point in time, well, there are some town councilors who say, now we should really sell the property to commercial developers. Because then we'll get some of the money back that we're paying to purchase the Hickory Ridge golf course, and we'll get more in regular tax revenue coming into town. Well, that's a decision that could come up in the next year. And that could have an impact in the availability of affordable housing in the town in the next five years. Because there's a fair piece of property there, it's not huge, but it's still a very good opportunity. And I think we need broad advocacy in order to get the town council to adopt something like that, as well as other things that people may feel are doable in the next five years that we would really like to see the town move forward on. And that's a great example. And I just Chris, before you start, I just like to say, are there other things that you see that should be on that list of things that should happen in the next five years. Chris has got a few. Okay. How about you, John? Well, let Chris go. I'd like to adapt the goal of taking, say, five prototypes. One two-story multifamily housing, single family detached housing, a downtown mixed use commercial 19th century, early 20th century mixed use commercial. Gosh, I had I had two others. But let's say there were two building prototypes that are common and solve those both on a physical, you know, how do you how do you make those buildings net zero or carbon neutral. How do you also solve the the organizational, cultural, financial problems, like particularly how do you, what would it take to take a colonial village and make it nets, you know, carbon neutral, not just physically I know how to do that. How do you, where do you find the money and how do you compensate the owners who have that partly and how do you manage the moving out or the actually doing the physical renovations in such a way as to not be too burdensome on the tenants. Take some prototypes and do five of them in the next five years and those use those prototypes be have those prototypes be the model for what we do in the remaining 25 years. Okay. It's a great thought. Any other thoughts about that linear go ahead. We, you know, with our utilities we all pay into the mass save program. And I like. To take an advantage of that in my own home and been able to make it a lot more sustainable and a thoughtful place to live. And it seems like there've been attempts around the valley to get to go door to door to get people. Anybody who's eligible at all for the mass a problem to get an assessment, you can have one every three years and right now they're paying 100% on insulation till the end of this month. So some kind of campaign to get anybody who's eligible and I'm not, I can't remember exactly. I think if you have more than four units rental units you can't do it but using that money that we're already spending on this. Exactly, we're already collecting. Yeah, great. So it is 255. It is probably time for us to kind of wrap up the conversation. I'd like to really. Really appreciate the thoughts, the thinking bold, the real real thought about governance and what does it mean and how do we do that in a way that makes sense to make these decisions that we're trying to make. So really huge, really huge topics. I am sorry that Jeanine had to leave us during this conversation and that Georgia couldn't make it. Because of work. And we appreciate and understand that everybody. You know, things change and it's a chaotic time. But I'd like to appreciate those, the folks who wanted to be here and had a hard time making it. Sorry. Thank you. I just wanted to add two cents on the first five years, things that we could do perhaps is especially if you hadn't discussed this earlier but I think looking at ways to engage neighborhood. So I would like to thank all of the associations and neighbors in supporting each other around the use of the massive program, especially for landlords of small rental properties because I think some of the things that I heard that really I've been sitting with since the last meeting, especially from the point of view of those who rent and live in apartments that have issues with pests and really poor exterior envelope. Matt one of the benefits of the mass save air sealing program is that it plugs up holes that permit mice or insects or other things to breach the exterior walls. And I found that my home and the interior environment my home got improved tremendously, just because of the air sealing. And I know a lot of properties and property owners don't have the finances to invest in improving their home, the homes that they're using as a resource and as an asset to live that we're not very wealthy necessarily, but for whom renting a room or an apartment is really important. And so finding those early sort of those ways to improve both accessibility quality of life and the building stock with the basic improvement strategies that may be a little bit hard cognitively to approach. But once you've done it, it becomes easier to keep doing more. You're taking the low hanging fruit. When it comes to finding people to adopt these initial practices, then also prepares you to handle the more complicated issues that are going to be needed over the next 25 years. So making sure that everyone is doing the basic minimum, I think will help us continue conversations. And I do think it's important to establish on ongoing person to person campaigns that we can sustain for 30 years. In order to get to 2050 because those are the most important things to work on on an ongoing basis, we all have to prepare our minds, our purses, our, you know, ability to tackle this difficult problem together and starting now is really important. Thanks, that's beautifully said. Anybody else have final things to say, I'm going to assign everybody homework you're going to love it. So we have a schedule the next meeting as soon as we do we will let everybody know we'll go ahead and put it on a calendar for you live Miller. And and so homework sounds like the homework needs to be to advocate in whatever way works for you with the town manager for providing some funding to get community captains funded to participate in city government. That seems obvious. So we want to hear about how you did it. And our next sort of the next conversation we're going to have was what we did talk a lot about principles today and values, especially thanks to Chris and good Zikaia and Jesse and Sarah for that really great introduction. We also talked about actions and there was a lot of discussion of specific actions. At our next meeting, which will be in about a month. We'll take the opportunity to think about how we actually achieve those things and what ways are most effective and valuable for us to do that we've already talked some about that today. So we're we're teed up well for this conversation. I sort of never got to this, but you know, what we're up to here, and I've said it before, is that we're up to writing a climate action and adaptation and resilience plan for the town of Amherst. So what that means is we're going to create a document and a series of plans that suggest to the town of Amherst what action steps to take and how to take them to reduce carbon emissions and to prepare for a changed climate and to strengthen the community and communities of the town of Amherst. So how we do those things, what it is that we do, and what standards do we hold ourselves to are all very, very important. Next time we're going to talk some about how we do these things. Any other questions or thoughts. Stephanie, can I just amend the homework just a little bit that I would encourage people to reach out to their elected officials, which are their town counselors. I think the people I, you know, I'm not saying don't contact the town manager, but I really think you want to speak directly with the people that you have elected an office to represent you. So I would encourage people to do that as well and I'm happy to help. I'm sure guys he has help happy to help if people need to identify who they are. We can help you in that process as well. Great. Thank you for that clarification, Stephanie. Jesse. Jim, would you say, is it safe to say that our next meeting will be increasingly concrete in the things that we're talking about. Well, that's the, that's the plan. Okay, great. And that I think, I think people will be welcome that. I think that that seems the direction we're going. And then the other thing is just to offer up either through Kazikaya or however it works if anybody wants to follow up on the presentation Sarah and I gave and kind of dig into that language and those terms and feel more ready to speak, speak, speak that language at our next meeting I am as available as needed between now and then I'm happy to like set up a just like a little informal discussion on some of the tech and the science of it. So I'll throw that out there. And great. Thank you. Thanks Jesse. I hope thoughtful of you will also Stephanie I haven't said this to you but I'm thinking we might try and extract out your presentation. You're in Sarah's presentation as a sort of standalone item that people can can check into because it was so lovely. Let's see if we can, we can do that. Stephanie I'm sure we can figure out some way to do that we can handle it. If we can get to the, to the recording. Anything else. Yeah, but no. Is there what did I miss like a position brief that could company this advocacy on our behalf to our counselors for funding. I think there's a little blur, we've had a conversation about it. So maybe what we'll do is we'll send a little note out that has sort of what we were talking about with the notes. We can't as part of this sort of structuring the committee advocate. And so we have to ourselves learn myself. I think it's funny about advocacy. And Stephanie can't really advocate and probably easy AC members. But you can. And so we'll put together some notes about what we talked about. And I would be happy. Yeah, and I'm happy to connect you with other people in the community who could talk about, you know, that the work that's done around advocating for, there's many people organizing as I think someone mentioned before so always looking for more people to get involved. So I'm sure I can make those connections for anyone who's interested. Yeah, fantastic. All right team. Thanks a ton. And we'll see you next time. Thank you everybody will be in touch. Thank you.