 So I'm Carrie Brown and the executive director of the Vermont Commission on Women and I am co-chair with Lori of this Council and I I'm glad you all came. Thank you so much for coming today And I wanted to call your attention in case you haven't noticed The camera is recording our meeting today and you're from Orca, right? Yes. Yes, so right Welcome You can also help yourself to some yeah, there's plenty of it My name is Valerie and nickel and human resources manager work for the Department of Human Resources. I guess I'm an ad hoc member You're chewing sorry A racial justice organization My name is Brad. I'm the deputy secretary administration The secretary Would have been here today, but she has an appointment that she could not get out of and so anyway I'm here with him on her behalf and to and to sit in and listen to What you guys have going on and to the degree that I can contribute and And also I think Tom and I can at least give you an update on where we are Wonderful, thank you so much for joining us. You picked the perfect time and good to do something Hi, I'm Bill Myers. I'm a talent acquisition consultant with the State Department of Human Resources I'm like Valerie ad hoc member of this committee I also chair the disability employment working group, which is kind of a sub of this And partnering with usually like Hugh Bradshaw and they end up on us I'm here, but you know we want to work with helping bring more awareness to people with disabilities Opportunities within the state not just outside the other companies Hi, I'm Aditya Lagu. I'm a labor relations manager with the Department of Human Resources For a few months last year. I was actually the BHR desiccating on the council and now I'm an ad hoc member too And I'm Joe Nussbaum. I'm the director of Vermont's about protective services, which is the primary state component Responsible for investigating allegations of abuse and what an exploitation of vulnerable adults But I was actually appointed to this council sort of as an at-large member as well Representing the LGBT community Karen Richards, I am on the equity advisor or the racial advisory panel And recently retired from state government But still a member of the council But still yes an appointed member of the council But they're longer representing the HRC But you're the HRC's designee on the panel So you're here wearing two hats Well not the HRC, the appointment was personal so I'm not really representing HRC Okay, it was a personal appointment On the racial and equity Right, on this one for sure, yes But the HRC appointed you to the racial Yes, the HRC appointed me to the racial Thank you for coming and wearing all your hats Hi folks, I'm Laurie Valburn I head out the civil rights division at the Vermont Agency of Transportation I'm happy to co-chair the council along with Carrie And with Diane not being with us today at least not yet We have a distinction of surviving and outliving most of the other council members So this will be my 16th or 17th year on the council Outliving figuratively not, I hope Well we don't know, people aren't here so we have to know Hopefully it's just figuratively So happy to be here Hi my name is Rachel Allen, I am the BHR designee And I'm Tom Waldman, the general counsel of the Department of Human Resources Until Rachel became the commissioner's designee Rachel's a staff attorney in the legal division I was the commissioner's designee for the better part of last year Wonderful, so we have a lot of folks who are here in a variety of capacities And several ad hoc members from the Department of Human Resources Whose participation is critical to the council's ability to collect information and data And be able to hopefully move forward We are definitely missing several members of the council that are usually present for our meetings Especially for the annual retreat But hopefully some of them will be joining us over the course of the next few hours And so glad again, Deputy Secretary, do you prefer Brad or Deputy Secretary for Allen? Brad is perfect Alright, thank you So again, this is the perfect meeting for you to be attending to learn more about the council and our work But also to help inform our next steps since the annual retreat is our opportunity to recap the work of the council Last year as well as to do our goal setting and planning for the upcoming year And since we are an advisory council, we're always seeking input from the administration How we can best meet all of the administration's strategic goals and objectives in the area of workforce, diversity and inclusion So we have an agenda and hopefully you all have seen it and there are paper copies up there if you need one And we did not include time to talk with a representative from the administration because we didn't know that we were going to be here until after we had already sent out the agenda So my question is where should we put that in? Should we start with that? Should we start with summarizing our work? What do you think? Would it be more helpful for us to give you an idea of what we've been working on within that we've had input from the commissioner as well as other representatives from DHR And then you can weigh in on some of your ideas or would you prefer to share with us? One of the benefits of being in state government for almost 30 years, just shy of 30 years would be 30 years in May So I'd probably do different positions and this position here has been considerably different than any position I've had before in state government And so I get to sit in on panels like this or in other areas of government that I've never really been exposed to So other than being here and speaking on behalf of the administration and saying we're here to support the work that you do and we'll do anything to support you moving forward I'm also here for personal reason to learn as much as I can about what you guys do and if I can contribute that would be great So I don't mind sitting back and listening in if you have specific questions for me Then I'm willing to take a shot at him and if not then I know Tom is right there to jump in as well too But I'm here to sit back and just participate to the degree that I can That sounds great So I have a suggestion Why don't we start off with our number two on our agenda reports from the subcommittees and kind of update what we've been working on and where we are And that will help you kind of know And then with our section three where we're talking about 2019 goals and objectives Maybe we start with the racial equity advisory panel topic and then through that we can also talk about anything broader that the administration has in mind or that we want to say to the administration That sounds like a great idea Does that work for everyone? Wonderful So it was exactly a year ago at our last annual retreat that we decided to we made a conscious effort to come up with several different subcommittees who would be focused on different areas that we identified We wanted to put a particular focus on and the council as a group has held four plenary meetings this year but the subcommittees have continued to meet usually on a monthly basis and report out at our quarterly meetings And I don't want to mess up what the three different committees are I know that on the training committee along with Joe and with Karen and the details so we have good representation here And I believe we have representation from a couple of the other committees as well carrying you I'm on the data one and so Valerie Valerie Okay, great as covered Is the other group like recruitment retention and Bill you would be very well equipped to cover that one and to fill us in on the work of that group and there certainly ought to report out on the work of the recruitment division these days It's a happen in place So where would we like to start as far as the different committees since as you can tell none of this is rehearsed or orchestrated and we are we're going to sort of jump in Joe Yeah I wanted to talk about training a little bit there's really nothing concrete since the last one we met because we had one meeting in between and it got cancelled But I can sort of give an end of the year recap of where we are we really landed on three big initiatives one was which I think we have had the most advancement and was reviewing the sexual harassment training that was made mandatory for all state employees And there was a committee of us that all attended at the same time or had and we met afterwards just to sort of do a post-op review of it and from our perspective wearing our hats from this council how we thought it was received And we had some substantial feedback that we we wanted to give to caps around making it more pertinent towards it is very focused on from our perspective sort of liability and doing things to avoid liability to the state which were important components But it's sort of we felt lost a little bit of the forest for the trees in terms of how do you engage in the system what resources are available to you and emphasizing that And so Laura you and Karen was it just the two of you by the way? Yeah we ended up meeting with Kerry Minor who heads up caps and Brian Remer who is the supervisor of the team and we were able to share the recommendations and comments and observations And actually that's been moving forward nicely all of our ideas were pretty well received and have been incorporated into a very revised version of the training that's being rolled out for all new employees to state government That's a pilot program that's just launching this month and will continue into 2019 as part of the administrations there's a statewide task force on new employee onboarding And it was decided that there was a lot of training that we wanted to make available to all new employees in state government but in particular some of that could be delivered through online training So four hours of training would be delivered in person and that consists of two hours of preventing and addressing sexual harassment as well as unconscious bias and workplace civility So separate subgroup has been working with caps to develop that training and I think that we've made good progress and a pilot's been launched that the plan is starting in 2019 that agency of transportation will take on responsibility for delivering that training to our new employees And same with the agency of human services and caps will be delivered for all other new employees and I think that the goal is to continue to have members of our subcommittee previewing and providing ideas and feedback as that training gets finalized and rolled out And the sexual harassment one has been revamped considerably I was going to share anecdotally with the group I just had three staff members that took it last week and I scheduled a time with them afterwards I hadn't presented anything beforehand but I took our notes that we brought to caps and I sat down and I said how did you perceive this and on all fronts they said it was much improved from what we described So I was really happy to hear that. One of them did make the comment from my female staff so I sat there and I still felt like I died a thousand deaths because we have a long ways to go in terms of how prevalent this is and how not obvious it is Some of the examples were still very obvious and felt like we need to evolve beyond this and talk about this at a deeper level so I think Laurie as you said something will continue periodically to stay engaged with and review is such a key one And similarly the implicit bias is another one that we decided to focus on as a subcommittee and I think that one has been you've been much more involved in that from the beginning right So I'll say that Karen and I have been involved with it from the get go because the origins of it were from 2017 training that we co-developed and delivered to our DMV workforce in 2017 so Karen and Bo Yang worked with me and a member of my team and force and we delivered the training to over 200 of our DMV employees Over the course of three months a lot of sessions Really? I know time flies when you're having fun we start on Valentine's Day with all of the managers and directors and supervisors and then we rolled it out in five different locations and that was fairly well received However I think that since that time we have continued it's continuous improvement so since then we've expanded out the training a little bit and we've added some new components We were invited to deliver that training to the entire Department of Human Resources back in June as part of their employee appreciation day So we did that and since then we've had a chance to continue to do a lot of tweaking and we delivered it to A&R's leadership team and division directors And we are now in the process of rolling it out to our whole workforce starting with our finance and administration division starting this Friday So we have seven sessions scheduled for December and January and I want to extend an invitation to all the council members and everyone else here If you want to come and preview this since we do keep coming up with new components the whole idea is to get people really engaged and no shame no blame Even when there should be and to try to provide some good tools and resources so we're focusing even more than in the past on some pre-training and post-training Homework assignments and resources and among other things everybody's had to take the workplace, civility, self-assessment before the training And because all of our workforce has already seen the out video at least once in some cases many times we've built in some activities that kind of built from that one But we've asked them all in advance of coming to the training to re-watch the out video on their own and then we're using vignettes that are also part of the out series during the training itself So I'm excited about that. Our secretary Jeff Flynn has made this a pretty high commitment and high priority and he wants to see us roll this out to our homework force in 2019 He hasn't issued a mandate or directive in that regard but we're already working on scheduling that And there was one third item that the subcommittee is working on and it has the least traction, it's really notional still at this point But we're hoping to create an inventory list of any training offered by the state that deals with diversity or workforce equity And beyond the ones that are offered we also are hoping to find other resources maybe out of state Trainers that could be brought in if you have some things very specialized like a specialized accommodation maybe or issues around trans terminology for trans employees That kind of thing So again it's been a goal of ours, it's been the one that's sort of been on the back burner so I'm hoping in the year ahead that something that will produce Karen did you have stuff you wanted to add because I jumped in in the middle of Joe's in a detail No I think you guys want to know I think we'll cover it for you then yes, thank you It sounds like transportation is a little ahead of everybody else on the U.S. advice training Who I would say because I'm not aware of it going on elsewhere do you guys offer that? I think that the plan is that it will be offered if it's not offered already And that as Laurie said it's going to be at least one component of it will be part of the onboarding process for new employees Excuse me, was the DMV training a part of 7? Yeah it was, it was But it was also kind of a good springboard for us and I want to just give a big shout out to Karen and the HRC because they've been Incredibly generous with all of the material that they've developed and And we've shamelessly borrowed from all of that and we in turn have tried to come up with some additional things And you've continued Karen to provide lots and lots of resources as you come across them So there is a series of videos that we've talked about I think in this group before but the Grovo videos It's 20 different videos they are available free of charge and I'm not a huge fan or proponent of online training in this area Versus in person but these are pretty good and we're using them as part of our pre and post training And you've come across lots of other things and shared as well So once you start paying attention it's all over the place It really is It's a huge conversation right now in American Bar Association with women attorneys and the difference in the way that female attorneys are treated in trial And by juries and by judges and the effect that that has on the ultimate outcome of cases Which is really disturbing and interesting What's been the reaction of the employees and staff isn't, oh my gosh, was it aware of this? I think for me a lot of the reaction has been really positive That people didn't really understand implicit bias, didn't understand the science behind it, the brain science behind it And that didn't understand how it then affects their perceptions and behavior and plays out in systemic racism for example And so it's been interesting to help people make those connections And I think that the hope is that once they've made those connections They become a little more self-aware about when their behavior may be Over into something that's contributing or ways that they could maybe help get involved to help change the systemic racism or gender bias I mean I would agree that I'm always surprised at how positive the response is on the part of the employees that we have to go through the training And I don't think that, I mean we have anonymous evaluation forms It's really eye-opening for some people We're definitely trying to provide them with some tools to not just be more aware of it but to actually do something with that And that's the really hard part is changing the behaviors and giving them the tools so that they are aware when they might be engaging in it So you've created and helped to find a lot of great examples that gave people some real aha moments And that's what people kind of like to experience I think during the training You know there's one thing that always grabs people and it's the sound that you play when it's garbled It's these two different present So this is from I guess a tour bus let's say or it's from Yeah like a tour bus And so the first time that you play it you can't make out what they're saying at all It's completely garbled and then you play the tape again in the regular version And it's like the bus stops at Constitution Avenue And the next time you go back and play the really garbled version you can hear it perfectly It's so easy once you've heard it in the real version to then make it out It really is helpful for people to see how quickly our brains can operate to try to make sense of stuff So we work all the time with our hiring managers and other folks about bringing people into our workplace Where English is not their native language and constantly especially in jobs that are either maintenance or technical jobs We're always told that I can't understand what this person is saying and this is a safety risk And they can't understand me and it's a safety risk and stuff and there's so many different things that we can do about that But giving people concrete examples of how quickly we can train our brains so that we can understand one another Is I think a helpful thing So it's just one example Karen, is there some kind of measurement criteria that you have established or are planning to establish to be able to find out if progress is actually made in any way? No, we haven't done any follow up stuff in part because it's hard to do always But yeah, that would be helpful And with this training, is this training intended to satisfy a criteria that's laid out in Act 9 on Section 503 The training required there? About 5,000 and 3,000? The racial equity advisory panel training? The training in Section 5003 of Act 9 here is some training that the director is being called for work In conjunction with Human Resources, I want you to conduct this training for regarding the nature of the scope of systemic racism Or institutionalized major racism I don't think so I think that's something that's going to be able to do exactly the right thing Who wants to go next? I'll go next, I'll talk about the data and measurement group So we had a couple of discussions about that focused on talking about how we can complement the work of the executive director of racial equity And the racial equity advisory panel, which is focused on race And that we may be able to think of some ways to do some data collection that are around other demographics other than race Seems like it may be kind of an opportunity as we're focusing particularly on race It gives us a good opportunity to focus on some other things as well And so we're still formulating various plans about how we might do that And that's something we can talk about for our 2019 goals And we'd be thrilled to get input on that when we get to that part of the agenda Then the more concrete idea that we talked about was using an exit interview process to try to get some more information about In general, why people are leaving state service And then in particular, we've noticed that people of color leave at a higher rate than people who are white And seeing if we can get any information about what might be going on there So AOT has done exit interviews, they did a whole project with EVM, a research project to really look at what's going on with the AOT employees And so we have that as a pretty good model, both for the content, although we would tweak it some to get more of what we wanted But also for the process that they were able to work with DHR to get that out to the employees And so I talked with Chris McConnell, who's the director of field operations at DHR Who says, sure, we can do this, no problem So he and I are going to talk again by the end of the week to get a little bit more specific about what might be involved But he was talking about some kind of new software, something that CAPS has I don't know if any of the DHR people are familiar with this, that allows for easier distribution of things like surveys And it's kind of going along with the onboarding process that they're working on now So that there are things that are automatically going to new employees And so we've got an infrastructure that should make it pretty easy to get out, exit surveys as well So it would be a written survey? It would be an online survey And is there any way of ensuring that people do it? Well, no, probably not So not everybody in the AOT study filled them out In the AOT study, so we worked with UVM This was a two-year study that UVM did for us And probably the greatest takeaway in terms of a work product was this exit survey questionnaire That we developed on the technical advisory committee for that study And I think that we struggled with all the pros and cons of going online, anonymous, versus sit down face to face And I still struggle with it So hey, board So the process that we came up with We used the survey questionnaire, but the order of preference When a hiring manager sends to our field office An employee is leaving and their resignation letter Or retirement, whatever it is, separation Then the goal is that our field office reaches out to the employee And invites them to come in for an in-person survey Or interview, exit interview And if they're not available to do that, or logistically, because they're working in a remote location They can do it by phone And then the last best option is to do the actual survey itself Just fill it out on paper I think why we want to encourage people to come in and talk Is because people are going to be more forthcoming in in-person interviews sometimes And if they're not having to commit in writing And it also gives whoever's interviewing them a chance to tease out some of the issues I don't know, Valerie, you're nodding And I think you can probably relate to this because you've probably seen both We recommend the same approach Because sometimes somebody will make a statement And it's really unclear what they mean or what the context might have been So in in-person interview, you have an opportunity to impact some of that a little bit And work through it and really get to the root of what was going on So we have the same order of preference, I guess, when we offer them as well The nice part about having just the online survey Is that some people do feel more comfortable with an anonymous survey They're going to share some stuff that they wouldn't otherwise share Because they don't want to burn their bridges And they don't want to stir things up on their way out and leave under attack And the other thing is in terms of data collection Because if people are doing this all online then it's much easier to compile all the data It's already there, yes But that's great that Chris is open to Yeah, he was enthusiastic about it And I think there are only going to be limitations Because there will always be people who don't want to Say, you know, my supervisor was terrible No matter what format we give it to them No matter how much anonymity we promise them They're just not going to do that And so, but, you know, within that we may be able to get some information that we don't have currently And that it may also help to contribute to a culture throughout state government Of doing exit interviews or some kind of exit process Which I think would be really helpful because it's pretty spotty right now Right, yeah The other thing that we're developing and trying to launch is stay interviews As opposed to exit interviews And it's part of what the UVM study did was to also work with focus groups of those employees Who were actually staying to find out why are they staying And not just focus on the people who decided to leave So, we've just finished developing state interview questions For supervising managers to have their employees on a kind of regular basis To find out how it's going, probably enough So, we're happy to share those two Great, thank you That's an interesting concept Yeah I've done exit interviews before with individuals Where I got to know that individual better during an exit interview That I haven't had before And thought that it was an absolute shame that this didn't happen before Yeah So, that's a great approach We're trying to figure out all the ways that we can help build the relationship And the connection between the supervisors and the employees from day one And part of why I'm excited about the statewide onboarding process Is that it does include a lot of guidance for supervisors But it also helps in terms of making sure that There are regularly scheduled opportunities for sit-downs and check-ins And things like that Also assigning people a buddy as soon as they come on board Because I think that part of the reason why we are seeing a churn And people that are leaving Is because of that lack of connection And I don't think that supervisors have always prioritized that Because they've got a lot on their plate But hopefully that will make a difference And hopefully some of the data that we collect will also help shed light on the fact As Carrie said, of why the turnover rate for people of color Is almost double for employees who are white in the state government Or we should give you a chance to introduce yourself Yeah, I'm sorry I was saying I'm busy That's the truth and that's the excuse So, Borya, Executive Director of the Vermont Human Rights Commission Thank you for joining us Yeah, thanks for having me Our little subcommittee that you're a part of Already kind of shared what we've been up to in 2018 But we haven't yet talked about 2019 and beyond And I don't know if you want to add anything Not knowing anything that we've shared so far No, I totally trust that you've shared everything that was good and necessary Thank you And then some So, data folks, are you all set? That's it, that's our update I think you covered Well, Bill, you saved the best for last I don't say that yet I just wanted to kind of just touch on some highlights That I think are notable in the last met We do have a few other new people on our subcommittee Who are unfortunately aren't here KZ Dietrich and Dana Hutchinson Dana was previously a member of this council I think And she's going to be rejoining So she's part of this She might be part of the subcommittee too But Lori had already talked about in the onboarding project Which is a really exciting thing We're going to have a little more standardized Onboarding and retention process As far as when people come onboard They have the same experience regardless of which agency Or department they come from Lori touched on some of the themes around having a buddy Getting these hiring managers Getting scheduled emails of when to check in If not on them to try to remember When they're supposed to have their check-ins With their employees, their new employees And see how things are going I think Kara, you were referring to the CISTO software system It probably was the LMS that is the tool we're using To do these scheduled things And I think Chris was probably referring to that too Because we're kind of doing the same thing For onboarding and retention That's an exciting thing Lori had mentioned We are piloting now With a couple departments HR being one of them I think the labor is another And then we're going to take it statewide in the spring So we'll hopefully get all the butts out of it Anything, any communication problems or issues Or anything And have that up and running in the spring All over the state would be really consistent Because it's very difficult for people Where people don't realize that The onboarding experience Is directly related to the retention People's retention People make that decision to leave Within the last of the first month of their employment If they have an onboarding experience They're more likely to say This company does not value me And I'm going to look elsewhere That was one thing As you all know You're probably sick of me hearing you talk about it As we did I'm going to go live with SuccessFactors Recruiting our new recruiting software It's a cloud-based software And it is live We've been live now for about Going on two months And things are going to be all so far I think we've had very little issues With external candidates Or internal candidates Not being able to use the system We designed and designed Copious health guides So everybody can You know, if you prefer those guides Or need it We are also We have some person dedicated In support of people having issues With the system And then One of the reasons why I've talked about this before In other meetings But one of the reasons why We did go with SuccessFactors Recruiting is they have a very Very visionary about the future About They have actually a program In an issue called Business Beyond Bias So Work really, you know That really resonated with us With the Google Reviewing Systems And I think It's still on their roadmap So they haven't fully implemented it But they are slowly putting things In Into place Like Doing a job analyzer They have a job analyzer tool So you can look at a job description And right now It will tell you It will give you suggestions If there is perceived gender bias Within your job descriptions And give you suggestions So we're hoping they expand That to other types of bias too So that we can be very Mindful of those types of things When we do When we do write our job descriptions In their job postings And You know It was one of the things Valerie and I were in a meeting With some AHS leadership And helping them Kind of They want to improve their Diversity recruitment And helping them And they were very interested In hearing more about that And using that The other thing That came out of that meeting Is We're going to standardize Some language for all AHS Job postings To encourage more Minority People to To apply for For positions You know We're going to be more Explosive in our language I guess That's the goal anyways And working on For that I don't know If there's anything else That you know We're We stand on that Think of another project That you've worked on I don't want to put you on the spot No, that's fine Yeah I think it's borrowing From some of the language That the health department Is using And trying to expand That agency-wide And then Meeting with that same group This morning And also That led to a conversation Just about websites And you know What's the image Of AHS Or AHS departments out there And is that going to align With the language that we're using So I think it's going to Become a slightly bigger project But a meaningful one For sure And you've been working on The whole visual impact And branding The state of Vermont As an employer For a while And I think you did do Like the whole series of videos Maybe this past summer Or spring or summer Oh, it was actually Last summer Or summer before So we've been doing a lot Of like realistic preview videos And I've kind of We did one A NEO video A couple of years ago Kind of to Bring employees Kind of welcoming them To the state And people talk And various rules talk About why they Like their Why their work matters Why they like benefits Their team And things like that And so We I took some Of that raw video And edited it down So specific In specific For specific occupations Where people were talking Specifically about their job And why their work matters Because we got a lot of video That we You know That we could not fit Into the eight minutes Of the original NEO video So we sub-divided that Into some of the Some of these What we call Real job preview Type videos Some people were talking About that So just Our employer brand Moving that You know Forward The new career website Is a great opportunity Because it gives us That opportunity To market ourselves We are hoping to Put more emphasis On diversity Inclusion recruitment When we You know As we launch this We actually Taught a little bit More about it And then we are starting I know when we met When I did the demo We're working on the links To get proper links To the right things To that You know For more information Type of things So we're Excited about that What else do we want To talk about What he was here Well, yeah So It was self promotion Yeah Talking about Creative workforce solutions And our partnership with them And that Piper who You know Who's been my primary liaison And he's been You know One of my primary liaisons About working with Hiring managers from the state To Create more Awareness And create more Opportunities for people with Disabilities To Have progressive employment Opportunities And who can talk a lot More eloquently about that Than I can But You know Just more This is a program that Was That Creative workforce solutions Was offering to The state To more the private sector But we took it inward And offered it to state Hiring managers And I really think this year Has had We've had a lot of successes We have We've gotten a lot of Conversations going Between hiring managers And CWS's clients And you know The point we've gotten People acting fairly far down The road With even Permanent Job interviews And things like that So You know Hopefully You know I don't know how to Access that With that But you know Going forward I really want to continue That partnership I think That was pretty much it For me I probably have Spoken enough already You know Bill One other thing that comes To mind is Nat Nat is our business Account manager Currently in Central Vermont But he's moving into The mature worker program And he's working With the mature workers And Return ships And having Mature workers See the state of Vermont as another potential Avenue for Coming back into the workforce And we're finding more More people retire And soon realize Retirement isn't Everything they thought It was going to be Yes it is Including So that notion Of part-time Opportunities Or flex opportunities And openings For mature workers Right One that's also Worth exploring Absolutely, yeah So We're doing this Do you want To introduce yourself Sure I'm Hugh Bradshaw Employment Services Manager at Vocrehab, Vermont And I also Head up the CWS Creative Workforce Solutions Initiative In the agency Human Services Which is about Connecting folks With barriers to employment To employers Both in Public and Private sectors And Diane Is following me Very shortly We have some Infusion over Timing And time of meeting Exactly She had More pressing things Than I did I guess She's on her way I'm glad you're both Coming Since the work Of the group That you're Part of That feels A part of I guess I'm a part of As well Is like A subcommittee Of the council To carry out The 2016 Executive Order I think It is Worthy For us Some of the Highlight and successes I don't know that We managed to do That as much In last year's Annual report That we probably Could have Should have Because it does happen To be one of the Success stories And I think Creative Workforce Solutions I can't say Enough good things About The level Of service That you deliver And If there Any particular Things that come To mind That you want That we could Provide information On the things That are happening In the field But I can say Kudos to Actually VTrans Because VTrans Really an amazing Partner for us And Morris We've been Working very closely With We've developed an MOU Between Jail And AHS And VTrans Around work Experiences We've Supported several Individuals Yeah And so again Progressive point Is a continuum of options That we can offer Any hiring manager Whether in the public Or private sector Everything from Informational interviews To Job shadows Company tours And work Experiences Is a big portion Of the work that we do And it's really For lack of a better Description It's a try Before you buy Model for employers And state hiring Managers To see if it's A fit And make sure It's a fit Because In this labor market Right now It's a bit Of a challenge Finding individuals And oftentimes What we're seeing Certainly in the private Sector and I think State reflects this Somewhat Is they're hiring Folks and finding out Two or three weeks Into it That's really Not a match And they're so desperate That they continue In the cycle Of hiring And losing And hiring And losing And we see Progressive Appointed as a Really nice tool It's a great model Thank you And I know that We've talked At the council About the idea Of expanding it To work with Some advocacy agencies Outside of Just the pool Of people With disabilities To include More diverse Populations And certainly At its core Is an opportunity Both for the individual And for the business To look for that match So as much as It's geared towards Hiring managers It's all about the Individual Having an opportunity To explore And find out What is this Really like By being immersed In it For a short period Of time And it's just as valuable To find out That it's not a match As it is To find out That it is And often When you find out It's not a match That's a starting point For a conversation About where Is the next place To look And how These different Season departments Already Kind of de facto Employed when Of many Of the permanent Highers Into classified positions Come from The pool of people Who've been working As temporary employees It's just that The difference here Is that you Do such a great Job of supporting People Through their The process of Them exploring The employment process And providing them With all the supportive services and bells and whistles and you do a great job of vetting candidates as well. Yeah. Are you working on the offender re-entry as well? Absolutely. Big part of the work. We're actually in conversations right now around how do we build training programs in the facility so that folks are prepared on release to go into employment including we've had some early discussions around site capability so you could actually do an interview or an informational interview with an employer while you're still in the facility and you know we think that that level of engagement will help lower some of the fears folks have about on release where they're gonna go and who they're gonna talk to. So in the women's facility just very recently we started talking about certified production technician training in the facility to prepare people to go into manufacturing opportunities. That was some of the women in the facility and it was interesting they were wow I didn't realize that was something we could do and it was an eye-opener for them and I think there's a real opportunity to provide that. There's a lot of idle time in the facilities and so having training time and I had an early conversation I know the new commissioner is looking at reinstating good time and I'm floating the idea what if good time was a trade for workforce training so for every X number of hours in workforce training you have some time knocked off your sentence which would be an interesting model as well so yes we're very obviously in VR we see many of the folks in corrections as our customers because if you peel back the onion one layer you quickly find disability and trauma and substance use and all the other things that would make people eligible. We're happy that you're here so I want to give you a chance to get your coat up. I also want to introduce yourself we are being taped and so I just want to remind everybody but the organization that you're with is Onion River Community Access. Okay and so we'll give Diana a chance to introduce herself and I wanted to invite Hugh and Diane and board to grab some lunch because there's still a ton of food so yeah so is that all our committees yes I think we've run out of committees yeah we certainly haven't run out of ideas and things to talk about so do we want to let's talk about the racial equity advisory panel and then we can kind of fold in whatever that sounds great and also give her a chance to introduce himself as well so maybe we'll take a five minute break and that sounds great then we'll yeah we'll come back we'll introduce and we'll jump to agenda item three years. Yes. It's a good partnership. It is a good partnership. What do I do? Nothing but good things. And someday we'll get a connection to sex back up in your sex school statement. They probably have wrong information. You said something about inclusion. Well I was talking about like the product, the SAB product. They have an issue called business beyond bias and that's what they're working toward. Should we start back up again? I think we should and since we've been joined by several people since the first go-around would it make sense for us to do another go-around so everybody knows who's part of the discussion? Yeah, let's just do a quick go-around. We'll put more on the spot and you can lead us off. Diane Delmas and I'm the director of the program for the State of Vermont. Bill Myers, county acquisition consultant department of human resources. Curtis Reed, executive director, Vermont partnership for Therese University. Frank Hughes, executive director of justice for all. Joe Nussbaum, director of Vermont's adult protective services and LGBT and liaison. Karen Richards, I'm a panel member with the racial equity advisory panel. Lori Doburn, I'm with the office of civil rights and labor compliance of the agency of transportation. And Hugh Bradshaw, employment services manager, will rehab Vermont. Rachel Allen, I'm the secretary of DHR, designee for this council. Tom Waldman, I'm the general counsel of the department of human resources and the former commissioners designee to the council. It's still just hanging around. Hanging around. Which is great. I'm Carrie Brown. I'm the executive director of the Vermont commission on women. And Valerie Neckel, HR manager with the department of human resources. Well, thank you all. I think that it was great hearing from all the different committees about what we've been focusing on over 2018 and some of it also led to some of the ideas that we have for building on some of that work as we head into a new calendar year. We particularly are excited about the prospect of working closely with a to be identified and hired racial equity executive director a newly creative position. And I believe that that whole process has just gotten started with the racial equity panel being constituted. So Karen, you are the sole member of the panel that we invited. Carrie extended an invitation to all the panel members. But of course, it's a busy time of year. Schedule conflicts. Yeah, schedule wise. So we're fortunate to have you here. And I don't know if you can share with us a little bit about where you're at in the process and where we're headed. Yep. So the panel consists of Andrea Betts, who is the chair, Clarence Davis, Stephanie Seguino, Judge, Nancy Waples, and myself. And we had a meeting at which we reviewed job description that HR had hopefully provided us with a starting point for. Revised that job description and that was posted, I believe, the last week in November. And we tried to post it as widely as possible. It is on HR website or HR recruitment page, right? And then it also was posted in Idealist on LinkedIn, indeed. And I think there were a couple of other ones that were identified. We did a little bit of social media posting, too, for you. Yeah. And seven days, I think, is also going to be running. Seven days. So we are trying to reach out as much as possible to get diverse applicants, including national applicants. And the soft closing date is January 7th. And we have a meeting scheduled, I think, on January 14th, or 15th, I can't remember, to review the resumes that have come in at that point. But we will continue, be able to continue to accept applications after that point. And we are encouraging anyone who has groups that would be helpful in getting the word out to spread that word and help us spread that word so that we can really get the best possible candidates. We are behind schedule because we were supposed to have presented the governor with a list of the qualified applicants by January 1st. And he was supposed to make an appointment by February 1st but because there was a lag in the appointment. I won't say from where. There was, it was, we were not constituted soon enough to really be able to do that. And we figured it was better to take a little bit longer even if we're out of compliance with the statutory deadlines and make sure that really qualified good candidates, rather than to rush the process and end up potentially without such candidates. So hopefully we'll make it a month behind schedule. Can you say how many candidates you have so far? I can't because they're all going to HR. So I don't know. But Bill does. I'm sure they do. So I think they're, yeah, I think they're. They're not going to the regular. Oh, they're not. They're not going to the regular. They're just emailed. They're not. I see. So, well, I think all of us should be trying to put on our thinking caps and figure out ways that we can push this out there to as broad a cast as wide a net as we possibly can nationally, internationally to try to find the best possible candidates, as you said. And I think that the job description, as I understand it, does a great job of capturing what you're looking for in terms of experience. Yeah, I hope so. I mean, one of the things we talked about was that this is a position where really you're looking for somebody who understands organizations and how to make organizational change, right? Because that's really where you're looking for that person to be able to step in and be able to do the work. So that'll be a big part of, I think, what the panel's looking for anyway. So who should we address? Suggestions, in terms of where to promote? Sure. If you national bar association, for example, there's an association of African Americans in higher education education. Do you know if they're, do they cost money? Is money an object? Apparently it may be somewhat of an object, but I don't know. I think the bar association is like, if you're $60, if you're a member, and you're a member of the ADA. Yeah, the ADA is pretty inexpensive. And you have other items on your to-do list so far or plans for? No. I mean, I think that really doing the hiring is, because it's going to be interviewing, it's going to be an involved process. So that's going to really consume our time for reference checking on those. Yes. Yes. Some pieces. Yes. This is probably hard to envision, but if you could think ahead to how our council might be able to best support the work of the person who gets selected, knowing a lot about the work that needs to get done, and also to support the work of the panel, because you're going to be an ongoing panel, right? Yes. I think having this group have connections both with this panel and with the panel that's working on reforms of the criminal and juvenile justice system would be really key to making sure that that work remains coordinated, and obviously along with the Human Rights Commission, which this person is the executive director is also supposed to liaison with. So I think if all of those folks stay in some kind of contact with each other, we'll have the best chance of making sure that we're not working across purposes and that we're really all, you know, focused on the same things moving forward. And I think it'll probably be helpful to the executive director to be able to come to this group to say, this is an issue that I've spotted in, you know, state government that could use maybe the bigger picture of entire state government thinking about it or looking at it and ways that this group might be able to identify things that we can do that could be helpful in a, you know, kind of coming out things sideways as well. So I think there's a lot of room for everyone to work together, and I think it's just important that we maintain those relationships and ensure that they happen. I mean, I think that when we develop the model with having the three different subcommittees of the council, this was before the position or the panel had been created, but in many ways it reflects some of the nature of the work that's going to be undertaken by the new executive director in terms of data collection and analysis, training, and focusing on recruitment retention issues. So hopefully it will mean that we'll already have done a little bit of the groundwork, and then we can focus our efforts in the direction that the executive director sees if it's the greatest need. I'd just like to add that we've, the Secretary of Administrations Office has been rearranging offices on the fifth floor with the administration of the Governor's Office and there's not a lot of room up there, but we have moved people around and created an office on the fifth floor outside of the Secretary of Administrations Office and are just buying furniture now and getting that office set up for to be occupied by as soon as someone's hired. That's all in the process too. That's great. And then the only thing to add I guess to what Karen mentioned is that when the panel process, the panel will evaluate candidates and submit qualified candidate names to the Governor and the Governor meets the ultimate selection. Just an observation that the holidays tends not to be a good time to recruit who are distracted. Right, and that was one of the reasons we pushed the closing date out into January rather than trying to rush it was that once people get past January 1st and are focusing on their lives again that gives them some time to do it and I think if we don't get a significant number of applications and at that point we'll just maybe reschedule our meeting and leave it open for a while longer. Because we definitely want to have enough applications to make it work. Yeah, I think that was definitely a concern and it just worked out that way based on when the panel could get together unfortunately. So, has there been any sort of notice on social media about the position, about the work that the state's doing? I don't know, I don't have access to. Certainly one way, one of the ways that applicants would now would be if they saw something on News 1, if you know, throwing an article to the National Association of Journalists or Hispanic Journalists sort of pick up a story about what's happening in Vermont and then they could push the word out and say that, oh Vermont there's something happens up there and then, right. Well, so pushing the job description or announcement out to the National And doing it for free? And doing it for free. Money won't be the object. If News 1 picks it up or right in time, just picks it up then you know, I don't know if I even, maybe I can check Rebecca Kelly from the governor's office, she's a communication director and you know, can you say stop? So there's been a press release at the time that the governor had issued his executive order that's the companion piece of this and maybe that a follow-up press release could come out just to update and fill some of the information about why this administration feels that this is so valuable and important at this point in time? I know there was a press release out of the commissioner's office when the panel was constituted with everybody's bio and you know, a little bit about what the panel's mission, or immediate mission is, but I don't know whether that was sent specifically to the outlets that you're suggesting, I'm sure my guess is it probably was. Another starting point might be to probably choose the marketing and we updated their database about five years ago with 250,000 markets in terms of email addresses whether or not they have maintained that as a group or if they simply integrated it throughout their system I'm unaware of but I would send it out through their network because there's not much greater, but there's a no quantity of 250 minority markets that they're reaching already and so this information might be able to augment what they're trying to do in terms of selling this data for a while. I'm curious as well, so you recently retired and Gore was selected and appointed as your successor but that recruitment was relatively recent and might have attracted some candidates who might also be interested in this position, so how did the HRC go about recruiting and did you engage in a lot of social media? I know one thing and I know next to nothing because I was not part of that. Recruitment? It might be worth reaching out to some of the commissioners from the HRC and just find out how they planned and carried out their recruitment campaign since they obviously came up with a fabulous successor for Karen but it may have also attracted people from out of state. I think that their focus was more in state than it was out of state. I don't think they did a lot of but I could be one. I'm thinking about when this person starts and their first day or their first week and will the how kind of direction is going to work and supervision and because it's such a it's such an enormous beast of a job so I'm wondering if either the administration or the racial equity advisory panel together will there be kind of a little bit of an initial plan like here's what we want you to get started on or is that all going to be developed when they start and how is it going to work on an ongoing basis? The way that the statute is set up is that the supervision and management for the position is actually in the agency of administration so the person I believe will be reporting directly to Suzanne Young and the panel's role is really at a different level it's more a larger a bigger picture and the person has some responsibility to report back to the panel but it's not like the Human Rights Commission where the direction is coming from the commissioners it's more like an advisory relationship with both the administration and with this individual so but I think there could certainly be some conversations between Suzanne Young and the panel around you know how to help get this person started and who they need to know and get acquainted with if they're not somebody coming from in-state general orientation process but that hasn't really been teased on to some extent I will tell you the closer we get to February 1st whenever the hiring process is that's going to be at the very beginning of the legislative process it's going to be a very busy process there's going to be distractions so I think the sooner that the panel and Suzanne or the administration can get together and have that dialogue to develop a plan and onboarding plan then that's in all of our interest have there been any thoughts about priorities for this person to get started on not in sort of specific tasks but you know not that I'm aware of but I can't say those discussions haven't happened but I haven't been exposed to those discussions I think to a large degree the duties and responsibilities are defined by the statute and in many ways the position although it's within the agency of the administration is a creature is a creature of the legislature so I mean I think the idea is that the person is going to have significant autonomy to do whatever he or she sees fit to fulfill the duties outlined in the statute I just want to piggyback on that and Karen too the position actually reports directly to the governor yes it's the executive director or shall report and under the supervision of the governor to the extent such supervisor authority is delegated to the secretary of the administration so I mean it's the governor's discretion as to whether or not this position would actually work for the secretary of the administration so we don't want to presume further for the governor today what he's going to do I would imagine the other reason why we sought to try to create as much independence for this position as possible is the very things that we're discussing right now is that this position should have autonomy to act in the best interest of first and foremost mitigating systemic racism across the cargo I think this is organizational change that we're talking about because when you insert a person or position into a massive organization there are concentric circles, wrinkles that come out from that and if the path is not smooth for this position if the culture if the governor, the secretary of the administration if those folks on the governor's staff those folks in concentric circles there around appropriately prepared for what it is that we're getting ready to introduce then what we're going to give is exactly what you would imagine is is just basically calamity so my questions would really be more around how or how will we if we decide to do so prepare this administration to receive this position and set it up for success in such a way that it's going to be most effective what types of conversations need to be had with the governor what kind of conversations need to be had with the governor's staff mind you I'll stop here for a second is that we're inserting an executive director in a commissioners or at a commissioners level within this organization so there's already a somewhat of a disadvantage during deliberations and testimonies someone told me that title didn't matter matter so there's going to be some challenges already coming out of the game so I think that's the appropriate questions at least from my mind say this is how do we ready the administration how do we ready the governor's staff and the governor himself and those who are director reports therein to be able to set this position up for success great great point and it's made in a room where there are ears hearing it who can carry it back curious so you've brought up Mark that it's putting somebody into like a commissioner level and I'm not sure if that's a reference to it's not the reporting structure as much as is it at the compensation level because I think that's how we design this position so when we wrote this our initial our initial intent was that this would be an independent commission that this position would not report to the governor part of the reason why we vetoed the first place so when we sent it back up the compromise was yeah okay you can fire this position because that's the reason why you vetoed it and I think that well question is how many directors do you have reporting to the governor I don't know maybe somebody in this room can tell me I assume that the governor has a staff of commissioners and secretaries the governor has a cabinet cabinet members report directly to the governor and I think they are I'm going to say approximately eight which are all secretaries and then a couple stand alone departments commissioner of public safety commissioner of DFR commissioner of labor and corrections corrections commissioner reports to the secretary of the city and services who reports to the governor I think I think you made my point the governor has direct reports and none of his direct reports are title executive director they are titled secretary or commission and they are probably paying somewhere I'm not sure I think we put aside $150,000 in 80 or 90s direct compensation so I don't know what a commissioner makes but I would imagine probably maybe a little bit more I don't know but the thing is I believe maybe about 126 is where we started the conversation but I think that what I'm getting at is this is a I've worked corporate America I know what the chain of command means I know what it means to be in an organization and have a title and we're not going to fix that today we can talk about how do you create an environment within an organization where a new function especially a function that is sensitive is the one we're talking about has a chance to be successful especially if they don't have the same title as their peers I'd like to say we know that the administration and the governor in particular in the secretary administration they are very open minded about this they look forward to this position coming on board and they look forward to working on it and I'll tell you one thing that they take very seriously is following the law and I think it's laid out pretty clearly in statute the relationship that is going to exist with the executive director and the governor's office I think that it has to be a degree of comfort and at least to know that it is laid out with the wish of the city but to your point of how do we make this accessible to a possible count is a great point and I agree the more work we can do now laying that groundwork is again in all our interest and I just want to be really clear on that for clarity that the question the rhetorical if you will question I'm really laying it out with the discussion that we're having I'm not really trying to put anybody on the spot I was really engaging in such a way to say if we're going to have a conversation on what we can do which I think is what we were talking about these are some of the things that we should probably be discussing I would have to say though hearing that the fifth floor is being rearranged to accommodate having this person be that close to the governor says something in itself and this governor has been very focused on our chief performance officer in the work that our chief performance officer is doing across the state and it's our chief performance officer whose office is being moved around to become so that's any indication the level of seriousness and effort to make this work that's where we're at ultimately who's responsible for well I know that I don't have all the answers but they're great questions I know that our commission of DHR has been doing a lot of the support work and working with the advisory panel to onboard that I think the unifying secretary administration is going to play a very big role in that and in conjunction with the meeting with the panel it has to be those of the two key players I think that are going to be involved on an ongoing basis so can I charge the panel with taking the lead on onboarding on onboarding you're not hearing me say that you're not hearing me say that no no no I'm making some suggestion I'm making some suggestion yeah I I don't know I mean that's not part of the statutory responsibility of the panel and I think the problem with that that myself I'm not included in that everybody on that panel is working full time at another job and in diverse places and I think it would be difficult for the panel to be able to provide that level of I mean certainly can provide contacts and you know people that the person should know and talk to you about that sort of thing but I think but yeah so we have the nuts and bolts and with administration obviously the government will develop a relationship during the interview process and the government will work with this individual and then I think he will defer to the secretary to do as much as she can do as well to for access to the secretary will be much greater than that access to the government but I can find out a little bit more about that what is the plan would it be a good idea to perhaps maybe have the panel sit down with the secretary or maybe the panel sit down with the I think that's what we're talking about maybe I checked out for a couple of times sorry about that yeah I think exactly that not to try to insert ourselves but I think there are members of the council that are also very very invested in wanting to see this person be very successful in taking on these responsibilities and that we would love to individually and collectively reach out welcome this person and do whatever we can to help with the onboarding orientation process so I will personally volunteer myself and I'm happy to do so however it would be helpful in terms of I would do the same I think there's a lot of us who fought really hard a lot of us sitting around this table fought really hard to make this happen here and we stand on the shoulders of a lot of other folks so I mean I would certainly do the same I think one of the doable workable things might be for maybe even also a meeting of the panel and the council sometime early in the year so one of the first meetings of the council could be with the panel to talk about ideas around the onboarding and anything else whatever is coming up in today's conversations so that it's more ideas the better not all of them might work or be doable you know everybody can be hard that's a fabulous idea I know that it's also at a time when the panel is probably already feeling overwhelmed because you're already contemplating reviewing resumes and do you conduct interviews as well and interviewing and all that stuff so but in your spare time right well when would the next meeting of this group be? we haven't figured that out yet so maybe not January it could be our first meeting until February just so that we can make it I think that could be fine yeah maybe back to back or overlapping a little bit so we can intersect and not take up all of each other's time or you know if the meeting can't happen together I mean Karen you are the common point between the council and the panel you know with nothing else if everybody can't meet on board congratulations sorry I didn't mean to that's true she's retired and she didn't say it's working sort of rambling quickly though so I have just a budget question about this position and this work so it's being supported by the agency of administration and you're providing office space and all that which is great but then what about other expenses like travel for instance and is there a travel budget because I would hope that this person will be visiting different parts of the state and not just staying immobiliar all the time there will be and I know that you know we had business managers working with DHR to try to establish a budget an operating budget for this position and that's being back charged to all of the state governments and you know it's a best guess at this point but it does include cost for travel and for operating budgets office cost I don't know what the number is because nothing has been set yet as far as the budget comes I know that if it isn't sufficient that we had some carry forward money in the secretary administration's office that would also be available to get through FY20 that gives us a better sense of what 21 needs to be so it's kind of a stopgap for the first year so I don't think the budget will be an issue and in the FY2020 budget you talked about that being back to the rest is that part of the 20 budget it's not waiting until 21 and then how is that showing up like an individual department's budgets departments already get charged as a fund for everything just being added to the DHR charge and then being put into the secretary's office to fund that position in the operating house there's a human resource service internal service fund it's a fiscal year 2019 the statute cost $1.65 charge back for all departments in 2020 that is 3.3% charge back in addition to that there's a $75,000 initial general fund that goes in that obviously carries forward does anybody have any other questions for just a comment I would emphasize that it would be good for the panel and Secretary Young to come up with not just a list of priorities but also maybe deadlines for reports because if there's a deadline for a report that there is kind of urgency in terms of getting collecting data and information and if the panel I don't know if the panel has discussed regular meetings or whether they will convene whenever the executive director asks them to convene so I'm thinking regular meetings would be a good way to have kind of that regular content being that you guys are also busy we haven't really set a regular meeting time but I think that what the panel's contemplating is that maybe we would have quarterly meetings or something along those lines I like the idea of like a six month report for a one year report from the 80 I think the chair wanted to put into the ad actually that there would be quarterly reports to the panel but that went beyond the statutory scope so I think that's something that the panel will have to work out with the executive director it just says periodic reports so I think you're right establishing deadlines for when those would be doing would be helpful in making sure and those reports going to be open to the public and what about a website for the panel where things like that could be posted DHR I think is setting up a website so that we will be able to post our minutes and agendas and meeting times and all those things I think it was going to go through and the governor's boards for I didn't really understand what it was but somewhere in the governor's office there is a website for various boards to report to there's a share of all the board's commissions that he appoints somebody to he's going to appoint again so that would probably be part of that grouping I think that's what they were talking about was that the website through there you guys created a rubric for like how to review the resumes and the interviews and so forth I would just suggest that on that rubric to include definitely a part that that we really want to look for a person of color for this position and I would really want to emphasize that and so that could be part of the rubric because I think that would be really important there was a some challenges that we spoke about in our last meeting about just the feedback that I was getting from the general public and just the absence information on the recruiting process everybody's finding the rubric out here and Karen I think you can probably appreciate this because I believe it was I'm just going to out everybody now so it was the speaker's office and I believe the other one there was a selection that was actually a person who refused the selection or something like that but there were two positions that were not filled but from the outside you know what it looks like is is that yeah we've got this thing called Act 9 whatever that is and there's going to be five separate entities that are filling them we don't know which entity filled what position we don't know how to contact any entity we don't know if we want to apply for this position who we can even start with nobody even knows so there's organizations like mine we're trying to inform folks I think the speaker actually recommended to the secretary of administration that they might just create a site for that purpose because this process is ongoing rather so what we'll want to do is and folks need to know what we know right now there are folks across the state right now they don't even know what we know they don't know that there's a five I know there was a press release that was sent out it didn't get picked up what's the next steps what's going on after that and once that person is hired so maybe on that website that announcement could exist hello whatever so I think that what we got to do now is that forward-facing presence for this function in our community so I have something to say about that I'm with you I think this is really important and I think for this council it's important for us to be thinking about not just for this panel but broadly about boards and commissions and appointments to those and about getting diversity on those and getting the word out because right now they're all facing similar kinds of obstacles so there's this the legislature created the Sunset Advisory Commission last spring that's designed to look at all of the commissions and all the boards and commissions and decide which ones need to be sunsetted and some other things as well but you know to kind of like get that big picture look and so they're looking at this question about how to have a master list and they keep track of all of this and the statute that was passed said that the state needs to keep an inventory of this and the secretary of state is kind of coming back and saying it's actually a lot more complicated than you think and you haven't considered that and the other thing but one of the suggestions they've made is the state of Minnesota's secretary of state's office has a model for it's a website where all of the boards and commissions are openings are posted there you can get links to information about all of them you can look at all the membership so if you want to see all the people of color who are on all the panels and which ones it's set up really easy to do that and they have staff to staff it so this is sort of my little pitch on behalf of that because I looked at that and thought that would make our lives a lot easier and just make it better for everybody in Vermont but there's going to be resources allocated to the secretary of state's office to do that but it's a very good model so if we want to encourage movement on that there's something in place that can be pointed to and it might be worth us keeping it on our radar as we go forward as well. Is Jenette is Senator White responsible for she's one of the co-chairs she's also from Minnesota is she? that'll help did your someone change who was in commission's website it was based partially on Minnesota we've done the initial he made that one of his campaign promises because before he didn't know who sat on on the commissions but now you've got the statutory the statutes that are online already we have who's on the commission but there's no indication in terms of whether or not you're appointed from the Gary council or the governor it's only the governor's appointment and there's no indication of that so when you look at the list it looks like there are on our commission we have 16 members there are eight listed on his site and if you just went there you would think that the commission on women has only eight members I wonder how it is for this character it's a huge job it's complicated business I don't know having it moved from the governor's office to the secretary of state I don't know if I'd add another layer I think it's indicative of how challenging it is because the secretary of state does a good job with his technology and does a good job with a lot of things technology wise and even he's admitting that this is going to be a challenge right so it's just right, each administration that I know has tried and tried to approve that process and some have and others it's hard for the governor to know who's on all these commissions he knows for certain who his appointees are that's what we have it looks like it's well just at the commission on women every couple of years we do a gender analysis of the members of all the boards and commissions and so we know firsthand what it's like to go out and find everybody who's on there we also know it can be done in a busy agency that's doing a million other things every couple of years the way we do it isn't really sustainable or systemic but I'm hoping that we'll be able to join forces with the secretary of state's office where it ends up so we can cut down everybody's work and it feels like we're having two conversations to meet because on one hand there should be this master list but then again once something is implemented or as it's being implemented whoever owns it should own it so for example the attorney general's office owns the racial disparities in the criminal and juvenile justice system advisory panel and they got a website and they got all invented and all the incentives and all the meetings and all that other stuff there's two separate conversations here so the secretary of administration owns this and what they need to do is they need to embrace it and be able to pull it and provide all of the data that's relevant to it and make it public so everybody can see it so I think that's the delineation between the two conversations for that panel do you go to the attorney general's office or do you can you go directly? I think there's a website out there how you get there bookmark is my answer I think we all own our own boards and commissions in our state case and council they have a website they post their minutes, membership a whole nine yards so I think that's a lot of work over and above just keep track of membership absolutely but I do have to leave we are so grateful for your participation this has been very impressive and starting off with the committees that you have reported on it's fascinating everyone coming together and working bringing your different skills here on top of your regular jobs it's very impressive and I've got a list of about nine or ten that I am taking back and we'll be chatting with Suzanne about but I think that the panel and Suzanne Karen should be thinking seriously about getting together here in the next few weeks and addressing some of the questions that came up today thank you again happy holidays thank you so if there are no other questions of Karen or discussion about the whole racial equity director process should we move on to the next part I guess of agenda item we were going to talk in more and talk in more detail about some things that we touched on a little bit in our committee update section but we had identified several things on our agenda that we wanted to make sure we talked about in terms of what do we want to do in 2019 so maybe we just make our way through them I think so, I think that's a good idea I'm going to just look over Karen's shoulder since we're sharing an agenda but she didn't know that there's a whole pile of agenda right up there I know and I have it on my laptop too share it's a collaborative effort here so it looks like some of these easily fall into continued work by the subcommittees that are already in there and I guess we can go one by one or thank you now we're sharing now I have my choice I get it in stereo so we talked a little bit about section C and I don't know if we need to do anything other than to stay tuned and continue to offer up our support and it may factor into what we decide for a meeting schedule if we want to try to time it so that we can help weigh in on the orientation process should we be going item by item or seeing if there are things that we missed? well let's go item by item and see if there's anything that we missed after that so we have exit interviews first on our list we talked a bit about the exit interview process and I updated that I talked to Chris McConnell the director of field operations at DHR who is enthusiastic about helping us get a survey up and running and out to employees as they leave so the question is going to be what information that we want on that survey and our subcommittee can work on that or if people have thoughts right now I think it would be great to hear what can be added on to that and we were talking about using the V-Trans exit interview exit questionnaire as kind of a model which asks things about just for those of you who haven't seen it what reasons did you have for coming to work in state government in the first place and then some more nuanced questions about that but those are sort of the basic things so it doesn't include information about demographics or about race or disability or gender or age I don't believe any of that was on there I'm pretty sure not but I mean it wouldn't be that difficult since that's data that DHR has in the system crystals group could easily run a develop a query that in conjunction with the exit interview if that was going to be helpful I don't know well we don't have all of that data like we don't track disability status like there are certain things that we don't track we track like an EU of four categories and like professional job category kind of stuff but it's fairly limited I guess we have race, we have gender we have age and I don't do any report out on that I don't know that we so I don't know but yours in terms of this is just talking out loud if you're going to track some of this information I'm a little hesitant especially in exit interviews with the demographics you know people are easily identifiable if it's a smaller department so if you're trying to correlate exit interview data to demographics my concern is is that it wouldn't elicit honest responses because if you're looking at a smaller department and you know minority employees leaving they could be easily identifiable so you might not get honest inputs that's how I feel I guess I'm I was talking about the fact that we know the demographics and it's already being tracked by Doug Pine and it's part of the workforce report right but if a survey is anonymous then we don't know we won't be able to work them up what I'm trying to say is trying to link exit interview data with demographics is a great idea what are we looking at I understand that we might want to look at the demographics to see why people are leaving but if we try to relate that data the demographics with the exit interviews there is not going to be too much anonymity for certain groups of people exit interviews we have a contract to cause people and it's not anonymous and that participation comes to only me and my field operations manager so again not knowing how so exit interviews aren't done by all departments and all agencies as far as I understand so let me ask you a question do you get information on who provided the specific information or is there scope for anonymity if a survey is going out to people who left is there an option it's like the employee employee engagement survey there is a comment section if I wanted to I could add my name in there it's up to me completely but if I didn't want to so those are some of the things I think we need to talk through in terms of if we are looking at linking demographics to exit interviews I guess people are leaving us so they are much more inclined to be really honest about their experience good, bad or other it really depends I would think that it depends on who you are which department you work for and how comfortable you might be sharing that information so completely understand your point you might be comfortable somebody else might be comfortable I'm not sure everybody else is going to feel that comfort it may depend also on where they are in their career because they may know that they could be coming back to the state and people have people struggle with participating in the engagement survey too because everybody's worried that anything they say on all of a sudden an entire state is going to know that they said it so people have this weird assumption that if they report something in an exit interview everyone might know that they said it even if they're applying in a different agency three years later so there is some hesitation I am wondering though if we do have a coordinated initiative to increase participation in the exit interviews if we'll get better data from more people and that will complement the workforce data that we have and might help us spot more of those trends than we can right now it seems to me that if you did the exits interview survey in a way that doesn't tie the individual to whatever agency or department they worked for then you can get the demographic information because then you're not that person becomes less personally identified yes absolutely that might be workable but then you know it depends on yours the piece right before we get into this we need to figure out what is it that we want to do with this data yours the piece like if you're gathering demographic information for example across state government without trying to figure out which agency or which department what are the action items for x department versus z department that sounds like a great idea but if the intent is to look at pockets where you know there are more issues as compared to pockets or the lesser issues then that might not so then you can I mean I think you could when you're reporting it out right you can report it out without that information but that information could be coming to somebody who's looking at that piece of it so like the agency of education for example collects data on students where students can be personally identified within a school district they get the data right and so they can analyze the data and see what districts may be having a problem with this that or the other thing but the district itself isn't necessarily going to know that you know it's coming because of a particular set of data that the agency is looking at you know ways of like separating that out so you can still use the information because if we don't get the information about race for example then how are we going to get any information out of that that's going to help tell us why people are leaving at twice the rate right because then we just got a whole bunch of data that tells us that this many people left and we have no idea whether they're in that cohort or they're not absolutely it's just I want to ensure that we realize that there are two aspects of it we might want to go ahead and do this this way and let people know that this information wouldn't be shared it's still the comfort level of the person on the other side who's completing that interview so you know we still may not actually then get the relevant information that we're looking for because people might you know it's like I'm going to be easily identifiable I'm not going to participate in it so we have to balance all of those factors could you could you make the could you make it optional like could you make some of the questions optional so that some people could choose to answer the demographics question and some people could choose not to or I do like the idea that I would think that the goal really here is to identify who is leaving and why they're leaving across the board and then we already have information out there about retention at different departments right so like we know that DOC doesn't retain a lot of people we know that already so maybe we don't need this information to focus on department by department and comparing and who's doing great and who's not doing great maybe our goal really is just to figure out who is leaving across the board and why and like what you know I mean ideally like trying to figure out is do people with disabilities leave and why do people who are persons of color men women etc so I like the idea of collecting the demographics but we could also make that optional and then also not connecting it to the office because you're absolutely right like I know an AOT you're huge right but at the HRC if you're Asian and you leave we know who you are it's true it's true but even still I mean so an AOT you know I have made a point of inviting any of our I'll use with quotes around it non-traditional employees so non-traditional could be people of color it could be women that are performing non-traditional careers it could be people that are people with disabilities but I almost always reach out and invite them to sit down with me whether or not they're also having an exit interview with HR face to face or a survey and ideally I've already got a working relationship with this person since my group is the one who's out there doing a lot of the recruitment I sit on hiring panels I'm part of the new employee welcome so this isn't like them sitting down with a brand new person and feeling like they have to share things that they're not comfortable with but it's a totally voluntary thing and my concern is always to identify if why they're leaving and whether or not it has to do with the fact that we're not making people feel welcome or we're singling people out or they're feeling like they're the one and only and what we can do better about all of that and that's a discussion that's a little bit off of the script and it's not going to be the same exit interview type questions although I am going to try to touch on all those things and I definitely don't want to try to plant seeds or to try to influence people in terms of what they decide to share but you know I'll give you an example we had a succession of so these were our wins we kept hiring engineers in our contract admin section that were not only people of color but were also not native to that they were new Americans and they were coming on board and bringing a lot of great skills and qualities and unfortunately I also saw this turn and in some cases they were even the supervisors and for whatever reason they were not staying and that was a huge concern for me because I wanted to make sure that after a while it starts to doesn't look like a coincidence anymore right and so I really did want to try to explore this and the reality is that I got some wonderful feedback and information in the course of having sit-downs with people and it could just be over a cup of coffee and not a formal exit interview per se but I really need to know so that we can try to figure out what we can do differently in terms of changing our culture and welcoming people and without exception all three of these engineers who had come and then unfortunately left all left to move to big cities and Vermont just wasn't coming and especially Montpelier Vermont and what was remarkable to me was in many cases they were talking about how what great relationships they had built in the short time they had been there with many of our other engineers and the other staff in contract admin and that these were going to be lifelong friendships and so I don't think they were just telling me that to make me feel better but that was important information instead of me just like looking at statistics and data and going uh oh we got a big problem here because we do have a big problem in that it's hard for us to attract people who are going to feel comfortable in a small rural very white state like Vermont but it's not necessarily because we are making people explicitly feel uncomfortable in our work environment so when we did our study with UVM the takeaways were that the reason people were deciding to leave overwhelmingly did have to do with things in our culture and some of that was favoritism and it was also a lot of dissatisfaction with the quality supervision and that seems to be across the board that's not just unique to our agency and I'm not sure how that impacts and whether it impacts people of color more than it does for our white employees I just have to say that the notion of exit interview feels like incomplete data you're only tapping those individuals who are leaving so I wonder if you augment that with some kind of focus groups or talking to individuals who are still in the workforce because you may very well hear from some people I'm actually feeling very supportive and I feel that I'm in a good place here and you want to hear from those folks as much as you want to hear from folks who are leaving so I just wonder if exit interviews are part of an overall strategy for information from workers including incumbent workers who are still in the workforce Before you got here I was talking about how we're just starting to do stay interviews and to be able to develop not just a series of questions but also some cheat sheets and pointers for our supervisors to be having sit-downs with employees to find out what's working and what we can do better sometimes you fall into the trap of assuming that our ball is not working well in fact there may be elements that are working very well and we want to make sure there's already a replicating one to go right so if you take your example of those engineers yep and the whole body of engineers who've left black, white, never gender is there a common theme around my pillow is just too small and they need for a larger suit is that is that a function of race or is it a function of age where other people might want to have more options but we have been losing people to the fact that we're in central Vermont versus let's say Burlington area we're a lot of the consulting firms that we work with and we lose them to the consulting firms for a lot of reasons including location as well as the pay so I don't know whether or not it's that any of it is race based or not I really don't well and people leave for multiple reasons so I think the idea that anybody is leaving for one reason is not true like people leave for economics plus lack of diversity plus lack of inclusion plus lack of supervision our goal I think as a council is to capture why the inclusion piece of it right because we can't necessarily fix the economics I wish we could because that would fix a lot of the diversity piece too I think but if we want to capture the inclusion piece of it and then I just want to respond to that to that what you mentioned about favoritism I absolutely think favoritism is related to race because I think we don't have diversity here we have we know there's implicit bias we know people know each other so when employees complain about favoritism I mean I think you have to dig deeper to see if there is race behind that and also even the perception of that is as important as it actually being favoritism or not I think favoritism is code for sometimes an old boy network and that's how I interpret it when people identify favoritism as a reason for living at least for our agency since we're heavily now I'm excited that we can at least move forward with exit interviews and so nothing is cast in concrete if we come up with something and figure it out and try it and improve it over time yeah absolutely just a question sorry it sounds like you were talking about the exit surveys rather than interviews right because going back to the distinction of interviews you know a face to face where they know you and they've worked with you is again completely different than a survey which is going to gather data and there's going to be some kind of analysis on it and again not I don't sound like a broken record to your point great that you got that feedback but you got that probably because it was positive feedback right or if they were leaving the negative feedback too I was just giving in those examples where I was seeing a trend that was alarming to me I'm not but I sat down with some of our people of color who've cycled through pretty quickly and I've been told flat out that they felt like they were being treated very differently and because of their race so I've gotten both you've gotten both okay from what I was hearing I felt like people would be more comfortable sharing more positive feedback rather than negative I wasn't sure if you would receive that or not so thank you for clarifying that and again you're the diversity for some words you're not the supervisor who they are working with directly and so that person isn't going to get that kind of honest feedback because that person is going to be the reference in the future or so forth but going to your point like small department right leaving from HRC I mean not that I'm looking at leaving nor that I have any concerns or issues but you know even within the HR right I mean so from that perspective I think we just need to keep that in mind so it's a really important point and it's clear and we're always counseling people don't burn your bridges right and that people have to not necessarily leave like under a cloud or but I do think that the only way that we're going to be able to and you may have already said I care what they said it was the end we can collect all of this data about why people are leaving but if we don't figure out a way like for was suggesting maybe an optional category for collecting the demographics then we're never going to know which aspects are influencing the numbers because we do know that people are leaving at a much higher rate than white people well what's the problem with leading with these interviews I think if you are doing an exit survey or interview or whatever and you say what's your reason for leaving everybody's automatically going to think like I don't want to burn any bridges here but if you opened it with a prologue to the survey or an interview and said I want you to know why we're doing this we recognize that people of color are leaving at twice the rate as everybody else as the general population and we want to do better at that and if you know anything that would help us be better at that we would really appreciate hearing that from you so that it signals to the person that this is there's somebody listening with open ears and this is something that really could can we clarify too that exit interviews serve what purpose is it for the department to learn do they report that they're they did an exit interview who do they report that to like or is that just like if I do an exit interview that's for my own record for my own purpose yeah well it does the difference between a survey and an interview what I'm understanding about the survey is that it goes into a common pool and information is not disaggregated so that supervisors or departments can know what the trends are of folks that are leaving and for that reason alone I would include demographic data on the survey as well as having that go back to the department so you don't want that because the idea that there's a general big report about why people are living in the state is good but giving each department information about what's happening there is burning those bridges then how those departments improve their performance right I understand this is the conundrum because you're not going to get an honest answer Vermont is so small you're not going to get an honest answer from why born has left the Vermont Human Rights Commission because I mean I happen to be the boss now but if I were my one and only boss is my reference I know nobody else in the state of Vermont so you don't want information from the survey necessarily to come back to the department because that's the thing that it will scare people off from telling the truth this is the dilemma so actually then trying to I mean having listened to kind of I'm just thinking right question first is what are we going to do with the data what is it for so exit interviews have been different departments do it some departments don't do it that's a specific tool for themselves that's a face to face conversation that people like you are in the field are having with their employees but looking at it from the perspective of this council supporting the executive director I actually like your idea having the data be collected across state government you know and be available so that the executive director actually has that data and the executive director actually has the data available for department specifically doesn't go anywhere else so the director then is able to look at those trends and analyze and work with individual departments without those departments knowing how and where it came from specifically that's kind of I think if the concern is whether people are going to be honest in their answers it doesn't really matter whether that information goes back to departments or doesn't or appears in some big report or doesn't because I as the former employee filling it out I don't know what's going to happen with it I just know that I'm putting my information out there and it might make me identifiable I'm going to be scared or if I'm going to be reluctant to be honest then I'm going to be reluctant to be honest whatever we do with it but if we make all of the questions optional then some people just won't fill it out at all and that's always going to happen some people will fill every little bit of it out some people will fill it out except for the department that they left or whatever they think is identifying and so we won't necessarily get we won't get 100% complete information that we send it to but we'll get a lot of really good information that we can then use in various ways if we want to go down to the department level in our analysis we can I think but we don't have to if we decide that's not useful so that's kind of where I would lean is just put it all on there and make it all optional I was just kind of thinking if you for example if one of the pieces of feedback that you get to identify as a person of color in those exit interviews is I didn't feel like I had anybody that I could go to who was supporting me right then you might be able to on a statewide basis say you know people need a buddy people need a mentor and they need an assigned mentor and we especially want this will happen anytime you hire somebody who is in any kind of protected status they will be assigned a mentor who will be expected to work with them so that you can use that data in a larger kind of context without having to necessarily go and say well this department is having a particular problem with that so there might be ways of doing it from there as well there might also be ways of trying to elicit from people their perceptions of whether we have an inclusive welcoming culture that provides equal employment opportunities and does so in a nondiscriminatory way without necessarily like saying to somebody is the reason why you left X, Y or Z or just using codes like favoritism, organization of culture and stuff like that I don't think it would be that hard for us without trying to plant the seeds of doubt or try to influence people's answers to get them to reflect on the things that they perceived and experienced and observed while they were employed by us and whether or not that influenced their personality and that shouldn't be that hard to even tweak some of the questions that ended up in our exit survey questionnaire. I just want to pull a couple things together that I've heard because it sounds like obviously there has been a lot of discussion historically within this group about the whole idea of exit interviews and it sounds like one of the things that I've been driving that is I guess the times two turnover rate of people of color which is usually an indicator of other problems because I'm sure there are turnover rates that are high maybe not as high of other demographics that are vulnerable and I think that the exit interviews for that purpose I think they're good for other purposes, for management for administrative purposes to make things better in terms of processes. If this is a data discussion it seems like there should be multiple points of data leading all the way back to the point of entry where a person when they come into the employment with the state we should know that the unemployment rate is two times higher for people of color and they should know that the dismissal rate inside of the state is twice as high for those who are black as well at the inception of that relationship and throughout various review periods I know the state does reviews over a period I basically have got to out of management just being neutralistic but the thing is during those periods maybe it's a 360 or something like that but there's got to be at some point or another say an opportunity to gather, to get a data point here to get a data point there and so forth so I think that the exit interview should just be a culmination of a series of data points where information was collected and disseminated with this particular employee and the survey is simply a tool that would augment that process there are not two different things the survey in my opinion it would seem as though it would be a tool that could be selectively chosen maybe not always but maybe say yeah this person seems after having a conversation with this person seems like it's a good idea to give this person a survey besides they ask me or whatever you know so the whole data collection piece I think it really goes back to one thing is what do we want to find out and I think that the committee on data or whoever has this responsibility to determine this whole thing about exit interviews not surveys should make that determination and come back with some kind of recommendation and say this is what we're really trying to learn otherwise I think we can kick this for the rest of the afternoon Speaking of having different points of asking those questions I think we get to talk at one point about adding a few questions to the employee and nation survey I would like to lose that thought as well so let's get that back on them yeah and then I said this many times and I need to and I actually identified somebody and never reached out but we should have a member of Invest EAP on this council we provide EAP services for state employees and I'm betting that they hear this stuff right so we can identify somebody from that program if that's I see naughty heads does that seem like so I mean since Myra has retired I think Bobby's taken over and he might be available and willing to join the group he's a possibility I was thinking more about a clinician is seeing people are hearing these things more directly do you have anybody in particular that you're thinking about? Steve Vickens who's the program manager have recommended somebody I can talk to Steve so we have that conversation it is a great idea to the next meeting one note about I'm going to go back to the fundamental reason why we collect data we don't collect data to assembly to collect data we collect data to improve the delivery of services there's no way to attach that data with the person or department that's delivering the services then collecting data is a waste of time and energy for your balancing is seeking out and getting accurate data with the need to improve each department level that's the balancing act here which is wanting to get as accurate as possible the data that we need versus the ability to give to each department the information that they need it is difficult and I'm not saying that one is more right than the other but in a state that is mostly white it is so important for people of color to have anonymity when they are saying I am leaving partly because of this and so I'm also like if we gave all the information to one person the new ED or someone in HR but that information was but we shared with the people that were the employees that have left that this information isn't going back to your department to give us that guarantee and yet there would still be the ability for someone at HR or the new ED to know that this is the department that needs more help or that this is the department that doesn't but that we don't necessarily need to provide that information back to each department so I'm not opposed to necessarily connecting it to the department what I'm opposed to is the department receiving that information and the accuracy of the information you're getting is just not going to get it so the other thing we have to keep in mind because I agree with you and with the DD it could be done that way but I would argue that we want the executive director to have it not HR HR has its own ability to impose itself going to your point connecting the piece to you would so again just thinking conceptually is you would connect that data back to a specific department only if it was like a trend or you know something which is it wouldn't be like one-off situation where there's a specific concern it might just be that one-off situation or like somebody leaving because they just want to move to a bigger city as an example and it starts going into a trend that is where the executive director and they could work with that specific department for an action plan or strategies without linking it back to the specifics given the geographic distribution of the color of the government you're going to know and then the question becomes when the DD looking at the trend box besides that this department needs some sort of intervention that department heads can be scratching his or her head the same well why not department acts or department why assuming that going to both is that we're the executive director depending on how the data is going to be it's going to be data points at different different times it's not just the exit survey so assuming that the executive director will work on data that is coming in from various other you know data sets points in the employees tenure with that department so it's you know if the exit interview is giving specific information that specific information is probably going to come from other places as well within that department so then it becomes difficult right for a department to be able to connect it to employee X who left 2 years ago let me kind of agree with what you're saying except for I think we're talking about things on another layer of abstraction because first of all as far as you know anonymity I'd rather have justice frankly okay I don't really I don't really care to be if it's going to cost me justice so I don't so let's just you know table that for a minute because what I'm getting at here is that the other abstraction is this race data collection from a whole another level and that has to do with let's just use the best example we have in this state this is our police title 2023 666 did you stop them did you search them did you give them a ticket did you arrest them so all of those data points if you will are highly critical decisions that are where discretion is provided discretion is provided for this particular law enforcement officer all that information is aggregated it's correlated it's the presentation level there and I think there's also a compartmentalization component of the data as it's presented to provide it's specific use to a specific persons okay because inside for administrative and trading purposes the data could be used for one purpose whereas for us on the outside it may be used just to present to us that there are racial disparities so I guess what I'm getting at here is that you can you can use the data can be used for administrative and training purposes internally as well as being presented for other purposes to prove disparities not so much to prove disparities that's really important to show progress towards parity okay it can have it at the same time same data set the compartmentalization is the key here so just if I may going back to your earlier point about the you know justice is more important than anonymity what I think what I'm trying to say is not that we should be providing someone who's giving that information anonymity what I'm trying to say is that the person might want to remain anonymous and hence wouldn't actually provide the information that we are looking for which is why it's a thin balance I mean you know for somebody it might be so important that you know I'm going to share all this information about my negative experiences I don't care I'm moving to California is there a choice though yes but on the other hand somebody might think I'm going to continue living in the state of Vermont and I might want to go back working for the state of Vermont and that's why I choose not to share my experiences I don't want to be easily identifiable which is why I'm saying I'm not opposed to the idea what I'm saying is that we need to take that into account from the person's perspective I think we need to be able to give them both really that compartmentalization so one other thing I would add to that whole conversation is we would have to figure out what the public records issue is with that so if the data is actually being collected and it's identifying departments but we're saying well we're only going to give that to the executive director of the racial equity panel we may or may not be able to do that in the sense of saying this is off limits to the general public who might want to know which departments are doing what because I don't think once you collect it, it's public record which is probably going to apply to a lot of the work that the executive director is doing I think what we'd envision with the executive director is a model that's similar to what I just explained with the police what are the two or three major data points within your business process whatever your business is across the state where there's a high level of discretion and its impact on those decisions are huge so it could be it's the decision at six months whether to retain the person or whether to put them on probation absolutely or move them forward that's definitely not the point it's a huge discretion what's the erase demographics of the data with that particular data point and there are others who decides whether who gets disciplined and stuff like that so collecting those data points and creating breakouts for race demographics in those data points and then analyzing those data points on a recurring basis and moving forward that's what we envision for this particular director that type of work it's a lot of work because it's a huge state the thing is the thing is even the collection of that data would be compartmentalized because at the end of the day we would want the outcome of that to be made public whereas when you start getting down to the individuals who make those decisions on a regular basis just like we do with law enforcement we have that data it's just not public you don't know who made those decisions we have the data down with the state police down to the point where we can look at an individual officer in the decisions that they made race based decisions that they made on very critical decisions over years so how do you have it? I don't it's internal data to the state police I would never have it so I'm conscious of time this has been a great discussion I think it's touched on actually a lot of different aspects of our work not just this one particular question about surveys which is great but maybe we should move on what do you think? I think hopefully we give it the data committee it's done yes it's fantastic so the next item seems like it's something we already touched on when we were reporting out on the 2018 work and this has to do with the implicit bias training there's already a lot in the pipeline on that one since we've got the new employee onboarding training for state government and that has included both implicit bias training as well as the preventing and addressing sexual harassment training and the pilot started the trains left the station one of the things that the subcommittee from this council had specifically asked of CAHPS was an opportunity to come in and either preview or observe some of the training as it gets developed and delivered in order to be able to provide ongoing feedback and stuff so I didn't know to what extent members of the committee wanted to partake of that now that they have overhauled the preventing and addressing sexual harassment and they have it in a pilot model and I think that I'm very pleased at how many of our suggestions were incorporated in there but it would be great to see it in action so that's one thing that I think we might want to be doing is setting up times either individually or as a group again to go and sit in on the training and I'm also totally open so I know that AHS and AOT are also going to start delivering very similar training to our new employees starting in 2019 and we've been given the flexibility to be able to tweak the training so that it's a very similar curriculum but can be a little bit agency specific so In my understanding and what was proposed to Carrie that she was receptive to was not just implicit bias training but any diversity to correct any new things in my understanding Yeah so and I don't know what she has in the pipeline in terms of what she's planning to offer through CAPS either with her trainers or with outsourced trainers that's going to be in this realm but maybe it would be good for the subcommittee to have some kind of regular meetings with her at least a check-in meeting early in the year to see what's in the pipeline and we can sort stuff out so Lori just point of clarification is the is the pilot that started including sexual harassment and implicit bias or it's just the tweak it's both I believe so it's the four hours of training that the secretary of administration I think is going to be mandating for all new employees starting in 2019 it's originally going to be in early 2019 then it was going to be like in the late winter now I hear it's going to be May or June that it's going to become effective but the pilot is for three or four or five departments that are participating and I believe it's all four hours of training so we provided our entire slide deck as well as our handouts and everything from a workplace ability slash implicit bias training that we provided to DHR this past June and we continue to tweak ours for our own workforce and I don't know what the schedule looks like right now but the train left the station right and Joe said that you had some employees who attended recently and noted you know when I sat down afterwards and went through our feedback most of that was incorporated which I was really happy to hear I think we just started last week was that the training that was in Waterbury for the entire state I think Christine said she was there I was talking about the pilot part of the onboarding attention I don't know but just implementing that with the pilot departments DHR is one of them you said DHR is the tax so maybe our goal for 2019 is to have the council have an opportunity to review the training both the curriculum as well as the delivery and provide feedback and also identify what other training is in the works either through camps or other state agencies and departments continue with the work that we had talked about doing of creating a fairly comprehensive inventory of training that's being offered throughout state government and maybe also a list of trainers that are being used so that we know what's out there I'm also very open if any council members want to attend the training that we're starting to roll out to our workforce just let me know so we start this Friday we have two more sessions next Wednesday and then we have four sessions in the first two weeks of January and I'm happy to share our training schedule and if you don't mind sharing absolutely so and all of our training is right now at least being delivered at our training center on the very Montpelier road and some of it will definitely be another road show like we did with DMV 2017 and we already have our construction section that we're going to go to regional offices and stuff so for any council members who are I don't think too many of us are in other locations in other parts of the state and this is the implicit bias or is it? It's both so it's a three hour training that really weaves together implicit bias and more placeability sure anything else that the training group wants to tackle? Other plans in 2019 to address the requirements the training requirements that are laid on in Act 9? So that wouldn't necessarily be in our purview other than the fact that we could definitely work with the executive director and make available resources and recommendations but I'm sorry I was really more directed towards the folks that represent the HR organization because that is who is tasked with that I think it was the racial equity director in conjunction with HR I think that you're right There's nobody from CAPS as a training over here but I would think that would be once the executive director is in place they would work with them Presumably they'll want that person will want some data and information before making a training recommendation I don't think we'd want to make a recommendation or they've had a chance to No, I think my question was more around whether or not there were plans on your calendar in 2019 to have that activity as action items for the year to plan in conjunction with the racial equity director the training framework that would be for coming Yeah and that would be probably a question for the CAPS director Carrie Minor I don't want to recycle something we already talked about but Diane you mentioned something about questions about the engagement survey I just want to note that now would probably be the time to propose suggestions if you did want DHR to consider adding or modifying any questions or content of the survey because that will be launching I think in late February early March this year Thank you There is a summary of the engagement survey of responses from the last time it was administrator available I think historically going back several years as well as the resources website Traditionally it's been part of the workforce report so it's usually at the end of the workforce report this year it's separated it's not going to be part of the workforce report but I believe it's going to still be published online when it's completed It's going to be a little later like Val had said earlier said Yeah it had been administered in the fall for several years running this year they decided to postpone until the spring It is for the workforce as a whole although by department department division has which is new Yeah So should we move on to the recruitment and retention subcommittee Yeah So who else is on your subcommittee at Dana Dana and Casey Oh and Casey Tom Well he conveniently left Yeah So but I think that also you have certainly members of the council that are here that are interested and that you partner with to you on some of these things So I'm looking at you and Diana Yeah I mean obviously Yeah exactly but to keep on going with the great work the great partnership of CWS they've been I think we've worked together really well so I get it's gotten to the point now where I did you know directly contacted by some of those So you know you know you know you know directly now because we've been able to have so many contacts in that you guys have been able to kind of connect with so they may feel comfortable enough now that you just go directly to me and say hey you know I have a client who is interested in this area and you know is there something you know somebody who can set it up for an informational interview or a mock interview doing a shadowing job shadowing things like that so we certainly want to continue there I definitely want to know one of the things you know we're looking to do is you know be much more you know recruiting I would love input you know from the community to see like how best we can do that how we can get target we can improve our strategy our recruitment strategy there you know that's definitely something that's on our radar improving our system making it accessible to everybody the new system success factors is out of the blocks has is by the way compliant in relation to the American American Disability Act so that was a huge that's a huge mid for us as opposed to having to sort of manually go in you know the system we had now manually go in and try to fix things documents and things like that now it's now our software vendors, SAP who provides the software provides out of the box so that's one step forward for us and then just partnering with departments you know we're getting much more proactive about partnering with agencies and departments to see how we can support like we do with AHS and other departments how we can support their diversity and inclusion and recruitment initiatives you know we have two we have two other talent application specialists now which is unique from the state previously the job this job was titled employment coordinator it was a transactional role where they just got a list of candidates from the system they said they had some qualifications then forwarded a lot to the hiring managers right now we have people who are actually working directly with hiring managers to strategize on how they can get better at recruitment they can do better so we have a lot more assets available to us you know within recruitment to help hiring managers improve their period so we have down Derek's office immensely helpful in a variety of ways I have two thoughts that I don't know how or whether you want to incorporate but in terms of being able to increase just the recruitment overall for state government Curtis and the partnership have a website that actually is very very helpful for recruitment purposes and you're probably more than happy to share the link or but you can also talk about and we this year updated a document that is part of our on the job training manual for women and people of color though it's a highway construction but it's also a standalone document it's called hiring and retaining a diverse workforce and it includes a lot of live links and updated links and suggestions about social media and all of those different things which I know that you're already doing a lot of that but every little bit helps probably we're doing it in a broad sense we need to do a little bit better about being more intentional I think more specific I'm happy to share my link and you want to talk a little bit Curtis about the work you're doing before that I'm talking to the state police yeah if you've not spent time with them and they're restructured recruiting function you should go and talk with them I think the last couple of classes of troopers they've had like about 15% of their new recruits have been persons of color holding in can we invite someone to come here sure if you could or gary scott gary scott gary scott or england but this is the result there are numbers of results of about six years worth of work strategic work positioning the state police in markets where they're largely folks of color the state government that's one of the places that is what's happening the other is a website that we're building out right now iaminfomontor.org and if you're online you can go to it right now iaminfomontor.org and it's a unique resource for persons of color that are considering relocating to ramon or school or we have two of the five regions built out so far and it's a list of profiles of ramoners of color who talk about ramon in their own words unedited and why ramon is their home why they call it my home and the with the good that i have to ugly but ultimately where it comes back to is quality of life you know sections on culture kind of multi cultural ramon from an artistic standpoint performing arts visual arts recreation in terms of who comes to ramon and who's already in ramon in terms of our association with the national worker of steers or out the rafro black cyclist black motorcyclist to let people know that there's a fact there are in fact people out here that are fully engaged you know you go to barry to see the michael jackson review band that's your that's your thing or you go down to jag and you wouldn't stop to see black playwrights show their works so it's a work in progress and if you're who that's your are you online there? yeah right here so we need we need about $45,000 to finish building out the site what you see there is a prototype with shankley valley and south east of ramon we'd like to be able to complete the entire project within a year from now and then we would make it a closed subscription site so that employers that are committed to do sort of certify for the world that these are employers that are really focused on inclusion and equity and this is one way that they can demonstrate that to candidates that have come in rather than having the deer in the head look of a person of color asking well let's like my hands are here and that's where at least in the private sector where we work a lot of people decide not to come here based on the reaction that the interview community or anything I can ask when asked a question so we talk to each other about the job my complications match what your needs are but once the conversation is off topic in terms of well what's like my family here and you choke on the question they say well you're not ready for me so I'll take you jobs in place out so this type of design that's awesome because I was recruiting for another company and most of the people I was recruiting for here in Vermont before I was here most of the people I was recruiting for were from out of state and that was the biggest thing that the interview community if they're going to be bringing their family and you know by themselves coming here the connection to the community their community is is paramount to that decision whether to come exactly the case that you know I think there's more too I mean I am that person I'm that story I've been here for ten years now and I can't be here to take a job because I've chosen to stay here anyway but the question is is not what gives you here is what keeps you here so I want to you know politely kind of push back a little bit on your courage but support you because I think in good conscience I have a hard time asking somebody to come here if I don't think the conditions are right or suitable for them to really sustain here I think not to sound pretentious but I'm a little bit of an anomaly to have stayed here for ten years eight more years than I've ever made anyplace else in my life but the conditions on the ground right here are very tenuous for people of color in this state and we gotta be really transparent about that and we gotta do the work to fix it so we can keep people here not just get them here and I've only been here for 40 years oh it's all I've only been here for you're still doubting for mine and yes there's that as was all my advice to people is if you want to be a couch potato this is not the place to be amen if you want easy access to the mall if you want if you want then this is not there a little bit but that the and yes there's a post of color in the state of the mall share the same challenges post of color everywhere my pitch though is 15% of the population where do you go in the world and I've traveled all over the world 15% of the population are knuckleheads I'll make 15 I think you're being generous well I can think of a couple of countries where it ends up to about 25 but the question one has to ask oneself is where the other 85% do it and if you can demonstrate that our foreign government in terms of civic engagement in terms of town meeting in terms of access to policy makers access to the decision makers that affect everything from you know the tree warning to school board, select board then this is the place to be because you're not going to find that it's very true anyplace else so if you want to live on a human scale this is this is the place but it has to be balanced with you know maybe amity in the car and drive to Dublin from Brattle World to see Stump or the Barry Albert House to see the Michael Jackson review band or fences at the Flynn or so that there's there's a we just have in Brattle World Chris McBride you know who's like a Grammy Grammy winning bassist so there's a lot of things to do here that's what's got me here it's very positive it's very positive we can train your HR departments yeah I think the challenges it's not traditionally the HR department that has the front line experience with interviewing and hiring to Bill's point we're taking a more active role in supporting hiring managers but it's the actual supervisors that are typically engaging in those conversations in the interview so it kind of broadens the audience a little bit who are the people we should be training to make a reality but with that it was state police and they had incredible five or six years which is interesting because they're struggling with recruitment in general so the fact that they've had the success of recruiting minority populations is actually very interesting in the light of the overall market for their recruitment I guess this is a place where I work on a daily basis so I've got to chime in but I've got to chime in the question is to what end why are we recruiting back and around police officers to reflect the community I would think hopefully so I can get my incarceration rates now hopefully so I can get my arrest rates now as well because if they're reflective of the community then that means their actions are going to be reflective in a manner as such that the disparities are going to reduce correct so that's where we start counting the success so we still got some counting to do I'm sorry I don't want to interrupt I know they're getting close to the end of the time and we do have other lists I do want to talk about something but before people get out of here I don't know what is the history of this council in terms of supporting legislation when it is like proposed legislation but I would really because you my guess is you're an advisory council to the commissioner is that correct it's an advisory council to the governor and to the secretary of administration so sometimes there's legislation and I anticipate that there will be some it would be really nice to have this board or this council advise or provide really take a position on some of those pieces of legislation and so my hope and goal here today was really to see if you have any willingness to do that in 2019 when there is pending legislation whether this council can take a position on it and advise the commissioner or secretary young or the agency of administration to take a position about some of those that is a novel suggestion that I'm going to turn to Diane because I think she and I started around the same time on the council like around 2002-ish and to the best of my knowledge we have never taken a position on any legislation but I'm not sure why not or that there would be any problem with doing so what do you think I think we could certainly take a position and we could certainly advocate with the commissioner and the secretary of administration I don't know I think this is something for Tom or Rachel in terms of you can go as a citizen to the legislature and testify on anything any time regardless of your state employment but I'm not sure that the chair of this council could go to the legislature and testify right and not so I'm not really necessarily asking that anybody do that so much that more so that if you took a position on a piece of legislation you could advise the people that have that you're supposed to advise which is the commissioner on that legislation and then we could develop or at least discuss it in our meetings and work on that and I think what you're suggesting would be maybe a fourth subcommittee that's what it sounds like maybe no I'm thinking that because we know that legislation comes up really fairly quickly right so if there's legislation at the you know January or February or there's a bill that there's proposed and it directly involves equity, diversity inclusion, state government or whatever the people that will be testifying there will be the HRC the commissioner Tom, other people it would be nice I think because one of the questions is this council's job is to counsel the commissioner and give advice to the commissioner the question is can we take positions can we take a position on a piece of bill and advise the commissioner to take that position on that bill no see we we have a special unique to us part of our statute that doesn't allow us to put restrictions on us but I think it's ridiculous they don't want women to suspect it seems to me that this test might be whether it is aligning with the governor's priority or not do we serve at the pleasure of the governor on this council some of us could advise influence that's all I'm saying could you advise the governor or the commissioner to take a certain position it's not that they have to take your advice but it would be great if the council voted or agreed that we when we look at this bill we think this is a good idea and we would like DHR or the commissioner or the governor to support it or be against it because I think that would be a really useful thing for this council to do whether it's public you're taking a public position that might get into a slip versus advising the powers that be feels absolutely like that I don't know what goes into the report which I think is the only public piece although we're being recorded today I don't know I don't know what is public or not but I guess everything that we do is public and I think so we have two reports per year and the first one is through in mid-January and it's basically our accomplishments and our goal setting for the next season and then in April we submitted updated kind of EEO plan for state government in general and both of those documents I believe are on the website the website isn't real updated I think it's still got some 2017 stuff including the roster but pretty much our meetings are all open meetings we are now being recorded if I'm not mistaken we're going to be recorded moving forward in 2019 maybe I thought that was if you request it I requested you requested I know Chris Green personally we probably will be recorded unless there's some serious objection to the group doesn't seem to have had a chilling effect on our conversation today so I mean I'm all for transparency and I think that we are this is part of the democratic process so I don't think we're going to have some closed door discussions I do think that there is a question about we are serving most of us at least at the will of the governor because he's the one who appointed us or continues to sign our paperwork there's a couple of agencies and departments including Carey yours and Department of Labor that and you that are automatically on the council no matter what but the rest of us I think are serving at the pleasure and will of the governor so the entire council exists at the will of the governor but I think I like the idea of us of our advisory process saying we think this legislation is good or we think it's bad or offering input it could possibly get a little sticky if there's something that we're really opposed to that the governor is really in favor of and so then we I think we talk about how do we proceed in that case or maybe it's just presented as advice and not as this is our position we're going to issue a press release but here's our input I agree and I think it's just about being transparent we can advise the governor and he could just say thanks a lot but we're going to do this because it's a problem he's the freaking governor so that's I mean I think it's okay to have the public see that as a governor I'm receiving advice but I chose to do otherwise and I've seen often where a leader turned out to be right in instances like that you know against better advice so transparency is always good I have those of us who work for state government work for the governor and so pretty much have to support the positions of the governor it's much more important at the commissioner level but all of us too there's an elaborate process or a comprehensive process within state government to review bills to do bill review forms and you know it goes up the chain and there's positions taken by the administration ultimately based on input feedback from departments so it's not such a good idea it's not such a good idea being born well I don't know so I think that it is a good idea for our council to at least the made aware of bills as they're proposed and pending and for us to be discussing it and I think that there is an opportunity for us to weigh in I don't know that it's any one of us individually taking a particular position as much as we as your council are recommending the following position on this pending bill and I think honestly if you asked the commissioner of DHR and the governor would you be interested in our input on this bill they would probably both say yes I don't want to hear what the GWDC thinks about this bill it affects the work it's a charge for the council to do that exactly so board do you have any particular pieces of legislation in mind that you think are coming down the pike I cannot say yet but I do believe that there is some coming up that I think would be definitely in the realm of being more equity and diversity focused and fair particularly to persons of color and so certainly I think that I would really love to see this council give the advice that would be in support of those bills but and when we know what the language is and what the bill is then I would certainly come here and share that with you so that we could discuss it and share whether we want to advise I think that that sounds great I think logistically because as somebody said the bills come fast and furious and the activities and our council at least last year's schedule was meeting quarterly and then having subcommittees meeting more frequently that's why I had thought that maybe we were talking about a new subcommittee but it sounds like not necessarily and I think that if there's a way for council members to just keep each other and the rest of us all in the loop as things like just send a link to a bill if you become aware of it and say this I think this might be of interest to the council and we can see how soon thereafter we're going to be having a council meeting or whether we need to communicate just the emails and stuff like that I would just ask that people be really careful and discreet about anything that we're committing to because we don't want to cause anybody any embarrassment including ourselves I know there will be probably four or five coming from us alone to include the constitutional menu so there's going to be a lot of activity that's great, that's great to hear so so are there other others as far as things that we haven't yet identified or talked about for things that we want to tackle in 2019? I just wonder if we want to revisit quarterly meetings it just feels like there's a whole lot going on and so I think that we're now segwaying into our like business portion of the meeting which is all of the things that we usually discuss how often we want to meet where we are going to meet where and when, how often and then also electing chairs or co-chairs or whatever so I agree with you Diane that for me quarterly meetings is too far apart for us to meet as a group and we lose a certain amount of continuity and particularly if we don't I think the whole premise was easier for because we were lacking consistency having everybody attending the meetings when we were holding them more often but we lacked the consistency even if we only held them quarterly so I would want us to consider maybe going back to every other month but I think every other month maybe skipping the summer so we do five meetings five meetings a year I think that that would make sense and then there's nothing to say that the subcommittees can decide when and on what meeting schedule they want to meet and some of that may be driven by some of the focus of their activity at certain times of the year you could say that the subcommittees could meet on the opposite meet on the opposite so do we put that to vote but I'm recognizing that technically I think we only have one two three four five of us, six of us that are actually voting members at the table but I think that's still a quorum maybe possibly I don't know how many total members we have right now I think who we're missing at today's meeting so Dana who just wrote to us and said she was sorry she couldn't come we're missing Ruben Jennings and I'm forgetting somebody who? well no she's actually at Hock oh Kasey oh Kasey thank you Kasey's from the AG's office so if we're only missing three then maybe six is a quorum um sounds like it I said with great confidence so should we go ahead and vote on that is there any discussion on the frequency of the meetings pros, cons, what do you think? I think every other month is great I'm just trying to think about when which months that would be and if we skip the summer so if we we could do February, April and June and then we could do September and November pastly have still an annual retreat in December is that too many? Cheryl let's give that a try I like it, February, April June September and November September and November and then maybe a retreat in December okay okay and let's just go if we can pick a date and times right now that would be great can we do that and then we can just vote on a whole yearly schedule we had been doing Mondays, well we were alternating Mondays of Tuesdays that was part of the promise what you did right? Mondays are my only bad day really yeah so I think that we were doing good for you but is there a particular day first of all does CAPS work for people or are there groups or folks that want to advocate for alternating with Waterbury or I think right now we happen to have the majority of members that are located here on Piliu but I know that doesn't help you guys but it's fun sure I think CAPS works in terms of usually for availability and meeting space and parking parking was tough today depends on who's in here for training let's wait Tuesdays and Thursdays are SSG so those are like days for CAPS for training there's another activity happening this morning too so women use something you should probably know yeah meeting about the 2020 suffrage well it's Wednesday a better day is that a regular Tuesday Thursday for supervising state governments at least through this month I don't know what they're I think it changes because I'm about to take it and it's Wednesdays but I don't think we should choose our day around CAPS parking I think we should do it instead of meeting there's other people so Tuesdays 2 to 4 just for the sake of consistency it seems like first Tuesday second Tuesday third Tuesday doesn't work for me because I got a classification committee but the other three Tuesdays I can this Tuesday afternoon work for most of us and 2 to 4 works so do we want to go with maybe the fourth Tuesday of the month or the first or second I just realized we're not meeting until February so maybe have the first the first tends to be bad because so much stuff happens at the beginning of the month the second Tuesday of the month going once going twice second Tuesday 2 to 4 CAPS be there be square and I'll reserve the rooms and send out the advice and if I notice that we don't have many people coming we can always try to find another alternate day okay second Tuesday of February April June I like Tuesdays better besides the fact that we don't have to worry about losing Joe is that frequently we got holidays on Monday not frequently so do we need to go with eyes and stuff or like okay all again so and we're going to continue with the same committee structure so that's going to work and committee groups will be deciding if they're scheduling in there and within the next month we should have an updated website with all of our information on our minutes and I'll post agendas there when I can so I'd have to be trained on how not to ruin the website first which is necessary for me pictures of my dog I hope yes excellent so hopefully that will help too providing information to other people who want to come too so now comes the favorite part of the meeting for everybody and it's the election versus the nomination of co-chairs and then it's the campaign speeches and the passing out of candy and the kissing of babies and then the actual election by Australian ballot so so I always like to make a whole perspective grow it open to folks who haven't previously had a chance or exercise I nominate Mark he's great he's never nominated good luck thank you Mark very very very welcome your presence and participation was extremely welcome today thank you so much I really appreciate it I'm guessing also that are we limited to the chairs have to be members of the council those facing rules and I think we've lost another voting member lost a couple there goes the quorum but is there a reason I guess what I'd be interested in hearing is if we ran away did she leave or did she just leave I think she's gone we better vote then so who's left so we've got Karen and we've got Carrie and there's me and we've got Joe you're not a member? I'm not so Rachel and I don't I'm just a commissioner I'm just a commissioner I'd have to look at the board I think we would want it to be a broader but I'd be interested is there any reason that our co-chairs don't want to continue or I would be perfectly willing to continue it's really challenging for me to find the time to do it just honestly I don't feel like I've been the greatest co-chair thank you so much I wonder if if we can send an email to everybody saying asking for nominations and then vote at our next meeting we can easily do that that makes total sense if you're comfortable Rachel with having I mean it's not like we'll ditch you between now and then we'll continue I don't know they're usually rarely are there co-chair emergencies like that's the best I just get a message that says if this is an emergency please hang up and dial 911 so I think I like that maybe I don't know if you're planning to create notes meeting minutes and share with the whole committee and that way we can have it as an agenda item for the February meeting to have an election do we want written nominations in the meantime or I'm just going to ask the same question would you be soliciting nominations from I mean we could have them in our I think that would probably help I'm also curious for those members who are here Joe and Karen whether either one of you is eager or interested not particularly happy as sort of a civic contribution but I I'm thrilled with the leadership we have well thanks did you already serve once or no kind of a newbie so that's two years on would you also sit on this council representing a population that's important to remember as we're obviously something that can be pushed a little bit to the side if the focus is strictly on racial diversity so it's important I think Joe that you are representing absolutely thrilled and continue to once important to agreed okay so what else do we have I think we may be done actually I think we identified the things that we're going to be doing in 2019 so we have that information and we set a meeting schedule and we made a decision about the chair election process and it all happened before 4 o'clock pretty good and now circle this day well thank you all for coming and participating and I'm looking forward to the council doing all kinds of good things in 2019 just feel like an important year coming up and the new person coming on board so I'm really excited thank you all so Curtis you're the one who I think gets the award for coming from the furthest away yes so take some snacks on your way home I'll just shoot our estimate description to people and there's a lot to do there