 Good evening. It's Monday, May 17th, 2021, and this is a regular meeting of the Amherst Town Council. Governor Baker's March 12th orders to spending certain provisions of the opening meeting law still apply and allows us to hold this virtual town council meeting. Given that we have a quorum in the council present, I am calling the meeting to order at 6.32. I will call upon each councilor by name, and at that time they should unmute their mic and say present. Please remember to read mute mic. I guess that's word. This meeting includes audio, video, and is available live on Amherst media. It is also being recorded. There is not a chat room. So with that, Shalini Balmille. Present. Alyssa Brewer. Present. Pat DeAngelis. Present. Darcy Dumont is absent. Lynn Griesmert is present. Mandy Jo Hanneke. Present. Dorothy Pam. Present. Evan Ross. Present. George Ryan. Present. Kathy Shane. Here. Steve Schreiber. Present. Andy Steinberg. Present. And Sarah Schwartz. Present. Okay, we're going to put the announcements up on the bulletin board. Coming up on the screen, thank you. And I just want to mention a few changes. First of all, the TSO meeting that is on March 27th will begin at 730, not 630. And I also want to make sure people are aware that the finance committee has added some additional meetings and make sure you check their schedule. One of those is for the evening of March of May 27th at 530. We have two events coming up. We have actually several events coming up. One is race amity day and we'll be dealing with that proclamation this week, but also have some more information about it next week. And we want to make sure you start marking your calendar for all of the events for Juneteenth celebrations on Saturday, June 19th. Because of Governor Baker's upcoming order regarding the easing of all emergency measures, we have added an item under the 48 hour rule tonight, and we will take that up as a second item under presentations. I want to note that there are three opportunities for public comment tonight. Two are specific to a topic and one is general public comment. The first is during the budget hearing. The second is the general public comment. And the third is related to item 8A on the budget. And that's regarding mosquito control regarding mosquito spraying. I want to also remind people of our general rules around public comment. And that is I ask people to speak. And if you are not from Amherst, when you state your address, please make sure we know that. We will also be restricting people to speaking once at any public comment portion of the agenda. With that, I'm going to actually move on to item three, which is the hearing. And I'm calling on Andy Steinberg, Chair of the Finance Committee. And although this is a committee at which we are all in attendance, it is in fact the Finance Committee's public hearing. And Andy, go ahead. Well, first of all, I need to call the Finance Committee to order at 635. And present today, I believe, are all of the council members of the, all members of the committee, aside from myself from the council, Dorothy Pam, Pat DeAngelis, Lynn Griezmer, and Kathy Shane have all indicated that they are able to hear and be heard during the call. So I won't call on them for that purpose. The three resident members of the committee, I'm going to ask each of you to indicate that you can hear me. And other we can confirm that we can hear you. And Bob Hamner will ask you first. I'm present. And Brie Kubiak. I'm present. Jane Shuffler. I'm here. Okay, so with that, we can proceed to the hearing. This is a public hearing held pursuant to Section 5.58 of the Amherstown Charter. That section specifies that the council shall refer the budget upon receipt from the town manager to the finance committee, which shall hold a public hearing with no less than 10 days notice of the hearing. The notice of this hearing was posted on May 5. Finance committee then is directed to review the budget and make presentations and recommendations to the full council within 30 days of referral. The council must act on the budget by June 30. This budget does not include the funding for the regional schools. The regional school budget, which supports the high school and middle school, is considered on a different schedule and is a different budget process. That budget was already adopted by the council, as well as two of the town meetings of the other three towns that are members of the region. There was a public hearing regarding the regional school budget on April 5. The purpose of this hearing is to provide members of the public with an opportunity to ask questions and express their concerns about the budget and sections of the budget. It was described briefly and it will be described briefly in the next part of the hearing, which is going to be an introductory presentation by town manager Backelman and finance director Mangano. And has been posted on the town and the budget itself has been posted on the town website since May 3. During the recognition, I requested that each speaker limit the presentation to three minutes and begin as President Griezmann had indicated by stating their name and where they live and indicating the town if they are not an Amherst resident. If the speaker asks a question, I may respond or ask for a response from staff if it is regarding the need for specific information about the budget or the budget process. And I asked that no person speak twice during this period of public comment and hearing. The finance committee has been meeting with staff from library schools and different municipal departments in meetings on Tuesdays and Thursday afternoons at 1 p.m. Meetings are posted on the town website. Additional meetings are scheduled for May 20, May 27, 1 p.m. May 27 at 5.30 p.m. and June 1 at 2 p.m. The 5.30 meeting on May 27 will include members of the community safety working group regarding its proposal. Prior to that, the working group will be presenting to the town council on Monday, May 24. So, with that introductory statement regarding the budget hearing, I want to ask town manager and finance director for the introductory presentation. Thank you, Andy. And thank you members of the council for being here. So, on, we made a comprehensive presentation to the town council at its meeting on May 3. And tonight we're going to have a truncated version of that just to give an overview for the folks who are in the audience who might not have been paying, you know, paying attention on May 3, which most of us, most people probably weren't. Sean McGonough, our finance director, will be and I will be presenting the budget. We're also joined by our comptroller, Sonia Aldridge, who's here. The budget, all 279 pages of it is available online, along with the additional documents that are all under the town budget page. It's the result of a lot of hard work and difficult decisions made by department heads and especially our finance team, Sonia and Sean and especially Holly Bowser, our assistant comptroller. Their work throughout the year has made this budget possible. Okay, the next slide. The budget we're presenting is balanced and lays the foundation for recovery from the pandemic. It aligns the allocation of funds with the goals that have been established by the town council. While there continue to be many unknowns before us, we're well positioned to take on new challenges. The budget includes a modest operating budget increase of 2.1% for the town, the schools and the library. The budget includes funds to take steps toward addressing our longstanding capital needs, but we are still not where we were two years ago. We have, notably, we have produced a budget, a financing plan to address the four capital projects. This goal to show a solid plan to address these important capital goals has set the stage for action by the town council on the Jones library, the elementary schools and in the near future, the DPW and fire headquarters. We present this budget from a solid financial position. Our reserves are strong and our excellent bond rating has recently been reaffirmed. The 2.1% increase in the operating budgets allows for few new initiatives. One good news story is the availability of CARES, ARPA and ESSER. Those are all federal funding programs to meet the new needs that we have developing before us. And then lastly, I want to note that we are presenting the budget in a cleaner, more understandable format and using new tools like story maps and things like that. As a way for it to make it more accessible to the public because it's a complicated document and hard to understand. Sometimes we're trying to make it as accessible as possible. And in fact, you know, Sean Mangano is going to be doing and ask me anything starting tomorrow and we'll be out listening to all the comments that you have for tonight. I'll now turn it over to Sean, who's going to walk through the next few slides. And we only have about eight slides, I think total, just so you know. Yeah, can you hear me okay, Paul? Yes. So yeah, we're going to go through this quick. If you could go to the next slide. So I won't repeat this. This is a lot of what Mr. Backelman just described. So you can go to the next slide. So on the revenue side of the budget, we break it down into four major categories, property taxes, local receipts, state aid and other financing sources, and all three of those are all four of those categories are growing quite a bit. The bottom three are actually local receipts, you'll see a large increase. And that's mostly because we had a dramatic reduction in FY21 based on COVID. We reduce a lot of our revenue accounts in this section of local receipts. So the increase is a good thing. It shows, you know, we're anticipating that we're going to start to recover in a lot of those areas. But it's important to kind of look at where we were in FY20 before we went to FY21. State aid increase of 2.6% that's mostly generated by an unrestricted general government aid increase of three and a half percent. Chapter 70 stayed pretty flat. What we might see a very small increase in Chapter 70, which is the education funding account. But everything else stayed pretty flat. And in other financing sources, you'll see another relatively large increase. This is because we're projecting ambulance revenues to start to recover as well. Another area that was impacted by the pandemic and we're projecting the inclusion of a one time capital reserve rolled over from FY21. Next slide. So on this slide, you'll see a breakdown of our expenditure budget. The top section are the operating budgets. It's a little small to see, but it's municipal The two school departments, the elementary schools in the region and then the library. That's better. And so the the across the board increase for operating budgets was 2.1% and the elementary schools, Amherst schools came in a little bit less because of the adjustment for charter and choice tuition. And then below you'll see capital is the big change there. We restored the percentage of the tax levy allocated to capital from 5% and FY20 up to 8.5% for FY22 Or sorry, 5% for FY21 and 8.5% for FY22. And then the bottom section here is a breakdown of the municipal budget. So it's the Our categories within the municipal budget and the largest increases to community services. And this is due to two adjustments. One, we restored a reduction to pool funding that we made in FY21 when there was uncertainty around the pools. So that's being restored to pre pandemic levels. And then the other adjustment is the reallocation of 130,000 from the police departments budget to the social services budget to begin implementing a community responder program. So that's the big the two big adjustments in that community services section. Next slide. So we break down our sort of adjustments to the budget into three categories, things that are additions, things that are adjustments. So additions would be sort of new funding for the year adjustments are reallocations of funding within the budget and then reductions would be actual reductions to the budget. So Additions are pretty modest. Again, as I mentioned the the pool operations, we restored the 40,000 that was eliminated in FY21. We added a little bit to software because we have a lot of software. So we've been implementing, especially related to the pandemic. And a lot of the costs to for maintenance are is increasing for those programs and then we've added funding for school committee stipends As part of the charter change. We needed to get that funding into the budget on the adjustment side. There was 80,000 added last year for diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. And that was put into the benefit section of the budget is sort of placeholder that's been moved up to the town manager section of the budget. So it can be used and the facilities and facilities, we've shifted some funds between two different facility accounts based on where the costs are And then again social services. I mentioned a reallocation of 130,000 from police to social services for the community responder program. And then an employee benefits. We do have a reduction of 137,000. This is a one time reduction that will have to restore in future budgets and it's related to a premium An insurance premium holiday that is expected in the fall of FY22. Next slide please. On the enterprise fund side you'll see we have four enterprise funds water sewer solid waste and transportation. Both the water and sewer fund, you'll see pretty large increases. This is mostly driven by debts. We have new, we have a couple infrastructure projects that were approved. In the last year or two and the debt for some of those projects is starting to come on to the books for those enterprise funds. So in water, the two big projects that we're going to start having debt payments are on our the centennial water plant and engineering for that. And the well number four that had some repairs as well. So those two water projects and on the sewer side. We have the gravity belt thickener some engineering costs for that that we're going to start making payments on and there will be future debt related to the centennial water treatment plan and the gravity belt thickener and future years. Solid waste is a reduction and that's mostly because an FY21 we had a one time increase related to a Grant that we had where the town had to have a match for the roll off truck. So we increase the FY21 budget temporarily and then brought it back down. And then the transportation fund, you'll see a large reduction related to the revenues that we're projecting that were hit pretty hard by the pandemic. And so that reduction is being made up by reducing the indirect costs that the transportation fund pays to the general fund and that's anticipated to be temporary until the pandemic starts to subside. Next slide. On the capital improvement program side again, you'll see we're storing eight and a half percent of the levy for capital. We incorporate the plan for the for the four building projects. It does begin to address some of the deferred maintenance issues and it does keep a high commitment for roads and sidewalks compared to what was spent in the past. And this year we really tried to have a strong focus on climate change when we looked at all these projects to see what projects could help reduce the the energy consumption of the town. Next slide. So how to get involved as the town manager mentioned, you can go to the upcoming budget section of our website and you'll see all the documents related to the budget, the capital improvement program, the story map. If you go to engage Amherst and you go to the FY 22 budget page on engage Amherst, there's two tools that you can use one to ask a question and those questions come directly to us and we can provide a response directly back to you and it will also keep that response on the website so other people can see the question and the response as well. And then there's also a submit a feedback where you can provide your input on the priorities of the goals of the town manager and which ones are most important to you. You can provide that feedback or other comments directly to the town manager and the council. And then there are some important upcoming dates around the finance committee. And I will pass it on to the town manager because I'm a dog against parking. Thank you, Sean. Yes. So we have a finance committee meeting tomorrow at one o'clock that we'll be discussing the DPW and the enterprise funds with the superintendent of public works on May 20 Thursday we'll have general government at one o'clock. Then next week, a week from Thursday is the conservation planning development and health departments that may on May 27 at 1pm. And then the community responder program will be discussed at the finance committee meeting on May 27 at 530pm. So it's later in the day. And those are those are the that's the presentation. Okay, so thank you, Paul. And thank you, Sean. And I believe that the town clerk has a clock set up to assist everyone and being able to monitor at the time I want to turn to the public because this is the opportunity for the public to express to the finance committee and the council since the current. Council meeting. There are questions and concerns and I gave the introduction previously don't need to repeat. So again, though, please identify yourself and say where you live and indicate whether if you're not a resident of Namor story, what provide that information. And I'm going to first ask for that somebody who has identified themselves is phenom administration or administrator is to please join us and identify yourself and see I also about that. I'm on a work account. I was unsure how to change my personal. My name is Timmy Sullivan. I live in district two of Amherst, which means that both of my counselors are members of the finance committee. And I'm coming here today to appeal to you emphatically asking for a funding of this CSWG program at $2.4 million redirecting $325,000 into Amherst regional school system and cutting the Amherst program. Amherst police department budget by 45% for fiscal year 22 also requesting the downsizing of the Amherst police department officer force by 50% over the course of the next two years. I have a question for the council and it is what are the priorities that you all have set out when Amherst police department salaries are over 87% above the national average. Why, why would that be when we have police officers whose annual salaries are $172,000 a year when our teachers at the Amherst program regional district have starting salaries of $43,000. That doesn't make any sense to me why there is such gross disparity between what we pay our teachers and what we play pay our police officers. I'm asking how this is justifiable in the wake of the nation's largest protest movement in history, which had one clear demand to defund the police. It is irresponsible that we are not abiding by that demand, and we cannot see ourselves in our community as separate from this national trend. Within the last year, I have moved from a predominantly white neighborhood in North Amherst to the colonial village apartment complex which has a much denser population of people of color living in it, and to say that the disparity in police presence is dramatic is a complete understatement. Very rarely was I witnessing police cruisers passing in my neighborhood when I lived in North Amherst, and now I cannot go for a walk at night without seeing so many police cars around this housing complex. We in this town and this community have to confront the fact that we are also embroiled in the fact that police departments nationwide exist to enforce a system of racialized police violence. I yield the rest of my time to whoever is next to me in line. Thank you very much. Next, I'm going to ask Patricia Rector to join the meeting and for anybody in the list, if I mispronounce your name, please accept my apology and correct me, but Ms. Rector, please proceed. Yes. My name is Pat Rector and I've been an Amherst resident for five years. I'm retired and I'm 74 years old. And I am specifically asking the counselors. I'm also I should say I'm from district four. I'm asking the counselors to cut the Amherst Police Department budget in order to fully fund the Crest programs and restore funding that was cut from the school budget. For me, when I compare the nearly $6 million that goes to policing services in our town to the paltry sums that are currently out allocated to community services. The choice seems pretty obvious. The community safety working group proposal formula is pretty simple. To me by investing money in education and social services at the front end, we reduce the need for costly, costly policing services and I echo the remarks by the previous speaker. Regarding the the high cost of policing services in our town. It seems that the Crest program also would help to stop the decriminalization of nonviolent behaviors. I know that only currently in the budget is only $130,000 is being allocated for the community. The Crest responder program. And that just seems like such a fun, such a small amount that we couldn't adequately even test the ability of this alternative nonviolent alternative for community problem solving to really see if it could work well for our community. I also support the proposal for full funding for Crest support, because it seems to me that it's an approach that's more consistent with our values. And so nonviolent non criminal situations that involve mental health issues or substance abuse or trespassing. Don't seem to me to require the intervention of those who carry lethal force when we really have other alternatives available. Thanks. Thank you very much. The person I am asking to bring in. And if I, again, if I mistake your name, please correct me and accept my apology. Hi, so I'm here to ask that you fully fund the CW CSW programs at $2.4 million and redirect 325,000 into Amherst and regional schools that you cut the AP and that you cut the APD budget by 45% to cover those vital community resources. I also want to just state that, like, like someone else said before, this is the, this is the biggest movement that's happening in the world right now is to move away from policing communities and policing, especially, especially because you can because police police black and brown communities more. I have also moved away from living within the premises of UMass Amherst which is a bubble into the colonial village spaces and can clearly be policing of this area. I can't go on a walk as a brown woman without feeling unsafe, not because someone else is going to hurt me but because the police might stop me in the middle of the street and I might not have my ID with me and that could cause some trouble for me. My partner is a black person local person from this community who has been heavily police constantly who has had, who has had a weapons pulled out on him by the police department when he's just been living his life. He has been, he has had to walk around this town that has been his town for the last for his whole adult life with a chip on his shoulder, simply because he has gotten stopped on the side of the street and been asked to take his shoes off in the middle of the winter for walking. These are the things that we are funding, and I see no reason for these funds people's money to be going into things like this, when they could be going into building community building places of education, making sure people don't have to go down a road of doing any kind of petty crime or anything that you attach criminality to. When, when, when they have no other opportunity taking away those opportunities like policing them heavily makes no sense to me as a person as a human being and I plead with you that this is not this movement that's happening worldwide and this movement that's happening in this country right now is not just a movement happening in Minneapolis or in Georgia or in New York it's happening in Amherst, Massachusetts where we think we're so protected but only some of us are protected and some of us are not, and I would, I plead with you that we create a community that is safe for everyone, and understand that safety isn't the way that we always want safety, the way that we always think safety to be. And I'll yield to Florida who else is going to go speak with us. Thank you. I'm Mattia Kramer on mute and corrected by pronunciation of. Sorry about that, Mattia Kramer, East Pleasant Street in District one. I've been involved with the reparations for Amherst initiative which we'll be hearing about later in the agenda, and with the help of the Jones Library Special Collections have been researching the racial history of this town. The town has been sobering from the deliberate falsification of the role of slavery in the early Amherst economy, all the way up to the present day pattern of exclusion and maltreatment in the Amherst regional public schools, as well as the differential policing that other folks have commented on. I can say definitively from this research that it was not by accident that Amherst today is a town in which wealth and power are overwhelmingly concentrated in the hands of white people. So now this council took an important step back in December, unanimously passing a resolution acknowledging the history of structural racism and committing to equity in the future. Today I ask you as a finance committee and as council members to find not only the political will for that kind of resolution, but also the budgetary resources to genuinely begin the long road of repair, and that should start with dedicating the requested funds for initiatives proposed by the community safety working group. Thank you. Thank you very much. Cordero, please unmute yourself and proceed. Yes, thank you counselor I'm James Cordero I'm also a resident of district two. You know, I just want to echo everything that has been said already about fully funding the community working group proposal by $2.4 million, as well as investing in Amherst regional schools by $325,000 and cutting the APD budget by 45% to do this. And you know, I just want to make a point that a lot of people speaking prior have noted rightly so how this is an issue of power equity, as far as race goes. And I also want to expand on that to help you to understand that as leaders of a community when you invest in things that help people like education and social services rather than things that harm people and criminalize them. You are benefiting every single member of that community this is not just about privileging one group over another this is about ending the privileging of one group over another. This would absolutely benefit residents who are black and brown residents who are of color, and this would benefit every single white person in Amherst as well. So I just want to make sure that we have a collective prosperity, or at least get us a lot closer to it. As as leaders of this community I'm asking you to think about the people you hold dear, think about the people who you consider your loved ones, and please make the choice that will create a more serene, just and equitable community for them, and for all. Thank you. Thank you. Zoe Crabtree. Hi everybody. I'm Zoe Crabtree and I'm a resident of District five. Like others who have spoken before today I'm asking that you fully fund the CSWG proposed programs and cut the APD budget by 45% to cover that. I'm calling on you to follow through on what you said that you would do during the budget process last year, which is funding an alternative to policing. This year after many community members like they are tonight, urged you to cut the police department budget, you told us three things. First, that we were reacting to national news that wasn't relevant to our town. Second, that you didn't have enough information on what alternative to policing could look like and what it could look like in Amherst, and three that cutting the police department budget without providing an alternative would be responsible. Those were your reasons for not taking action. However, because of the vital work that the CSWG and the seven generations movement collective did over the past year, you can't hide behind those excuses any longer. The report that seven gen created for this CSWG demonstrates with many heartbreaking quotes from community members of color that racism in policing is a local issue. You can't pretend anymore that Amherst is a special place where racism doesn't exist. Seven Gens report also included information on how other towns are approaching alternatives to policing. So you have that information. And the CSWG worked very hard to design and present their Cress program, which is the alternative to policing model that you requested. However, the budget that town manager Buckleman has presented you with only allocates $130,000 to Cress. That's less than 10% of the budget that the CSWG projected the program would need. The whole DEI office that they envisioned has been adapted into what's basically a title change for an existing employee and some shuffling of grant money. And I understand that the town council is not able to create amendments that add or reallocate funds in the budget. I also understand that last year, when faced with a monumental public health crisis, we were able to adapt our processes and enact a one month budget to give the town more time in the budget process. To ask you, is racism not an equally urgent public health crisis? I urge you to honor the challenging and emotionally draining work that the CSWG has toiled over these past six months by finding a way to fully fund all of their recommendations. Anything else is a slap in the face to each and every member of the CSWG who against all evidence decided to take a chance that this time the town would listen to community members of color. The APD budget by 45% would provide enough to fund all of the CSWG's recommendations, as well as giving $325,000 back to the school budget in a year where the last thing we should be cutting is education. And after a 45% cut that the APD would still have more than $3.3 million to continue responding to calls, like one reported where, quote, police assisted a South Amherst woman get her son back into the home after he went outside wearing only his underpants. Truly a public safety service that requires an armed officer. Additionally, I ask that you freeze all hiring at the police department, including for the four positions that are currently vacant and work to shift half of the full time equivalent positions in the APD over to the Cresc program over the next two years. Again, I ask, is ensuring the safety of all of our community members less important when the police department is putting residents in danger than when the novel coronavirus is the threat. I see my time. Thank you very much Miss Crabtree. Again, we'll request that people just please let us know if there were a sense of Amherst and where they live. District is fine left Ben Ezra. Please join us. Thank you very much. My name is left Ben Ezra and I'm the executive director of the immerse survival center. I live in Greenfield, Massachusetts and have the honor of working in Amherst and District one, and I'm the honor of working to support the three to 4000 Amherst residents we serve annually who are represented by each of the counselors present here. And speaking tonight to express my support of fully funding the Cresc community responder program. I believe that such a program better meets the needs of our residents or community as a whole, and the emmerse survival centers organizational needs. Because of the long term economic impact of systemic racism, the emmerse survival center serves a much higher proportion of black indigenous and people of color, specifically black and Latinx community numbers locally that are present in our population overall. Because of the nature of our work. We also serve many residents living with severe mental illness, and those who are currently experiencing homelessness. Many residents who are undocumented at this time, as evidenced by the testimonial shared and the research compiled by the community safety working group. These communities are those most poorly served by current policing methods, most likely to be harmed and interactions with police, most fearful of the police, and thus best served by a community responder program such as Cresc. As an organizational leader, I long for an alternative response provider to call when we need help. Our staff successfully deescalate the vast majority of challenges that arise at the center, but there are times when we need backup. And what we need in those situations is someone with mental health expertise. What we need then is crisis intervention. What we need is someone who can help an individual access a bed for psychiatric hospitalization or make their way to a peer respite or to a safe place where they can detox. Even in situations where the APD responds with consummate professionalism and skill. There is founded fear among much of our community. There is risk of further escalation escalation, and there is trust lost when we introduce an armed police officer with a bulletproof vest and a gun. And so, we almost never call an alternative civilian an armed option would give us a resource to call sooner to provide service and care to someone in crisis, and to ensure that we're able to provide a more welcoming, accessible and safer and more survival center community for all who come. Thank you very much. I see my time. Thank you. Isabel. Hi, my name is Isabella. And I'm in district two of Amherst. So I am asking that you fully fund the community. I'm asking that you fully fund the community. I'm asking that you fully fund the community programs and redirect that money into redirect the money that goes from the APD budget into Amherst and regional schools. I also just want to say that as a lot of other people have emulated today. I think that the community piece does not keep the community safe it keeps parts of the community safe but we want to keep all of the community safe criminality just creates villains out of people and people are people like all of us. And to keep that in mind when you are making the decisions that you are making, you guys hold a lot of the power and we are doing our best to make sure you utilize that power to help the community that you say that you are here to help. So I'm here with you to take away the funding of the APD by at least 45% to cover these vital community resources that we need as a community because that's the job that you're here to do is to represent everybody, not just institutions of the state. Thank you very much. Thank you. And I just have a first name for trip leaders Lynette. Hi, my name is Lynette Arnold. I'm a resident of district four. I'm also like other speakers asking that you fully fund the CSWD programs so the $2.4 million requested and redirect 325,000 into the Amherst schools, and that you cut the Amherst police department by budget by 45% to cover these vital community resources. I'm really stunned by the disparity between police salaries in our town and the salaries that we pay to our teachers. My daughter will be starting kindergarten in the district in the fall. All our children deserve a high quality education which can only be provided by our teachers, especially with pandemic disruptions and schooling over the past year working parents like myself have experienced every day how important our teachers are. If you drive or walk through our neighborhood and in fact in many parts of Amherst there are many many houses with black lives matter signs out front. Our town budget is an opportunity to put our values into action is a chance to put that statement into action by allocating our town budget away from the police and towards supporting CSWD programs and schools. Thanks. Thank you very much. The next person I think is a markup on Dari, but please correct me if I have stated it correctly. No, that's okay. It's but but that's fine. That was close enough for right now. I'm also a resident in district two. And I'm asking that you fully fund the CSWG programs at the at $2.4 million redirect $325,000 into the Amherst and regional schools and that you cut the Amherst police department budget by 45% to cover these community resources. I'm going to say things that a lot of people have said before me but these things cannot be the importance of these things cannot be underscored. I'm making this ask because I do not believe that the police keep me or my community safe systems of policing have never been neutral institutions they are inherently discriminatory and violent and we must recognize this. I cannot go into the details of the countless instances of police brutality and violence that have been documented all throughout US history, because we already know of these horrific incidents. And these instances were because of the police living in Amherst knowing how much discomfort trauma and violence that the Amherst police department has brought to myself my friends and my family. I cannot possibly condone the overinflated budget of the Amherst police department and neither should you. This is a call from your constituents directly to prioritize justice and equity. You talked about during the presentation about capital improvement in the budget. You talked about climate change and prioritizing that the Amherst police department spends $117 a day on gasoline. We are aligned with the climate and environmental justice values that we are supposed to be prioritizing. And this overinflated spending on gasoline is because of excessive patrolling. And once again as a resident of colonial village I can attest to the unnecessary and honestly scary amount of patrolling in this area. I'm a brown woman and this area is populated by brown and black people and policing. I'll say it again is racist, but I say all this because racial justice cannot exist without defunding the police. And since you all mentioned that climate justice is one of your priorities. I feel that it is really important to mention that climate justice cannot exist without defunding the police. I want my community to be nourished and I want it to grow. I want schools to be resource properly I want teachers to be paid properly. I want there to be adequate access to mental health resources to food to housing. This will benefit people of color who have historically been marginalized and criminalized but also all of us because all any of us need is a society where we can flourish. And this is how public safety can be reimagined. Unfortunately, I'm even in a position here to make this ask, because resources are concentrated for all the wrong reasons in institutions like the Amherst police police but budgets are not created in a vacuum. We have enough money to nourish our community and keep it safe. It's just that this money is in the wrong places. I also recognize that the tides of history are changing, and people all over the world are demanding that the police be defunded. We should be on the right side of this tide. This is why I made my ask and I hope that you seriously consider and fulfill it. You'll whatever time I have to the next person. Thank you very much. I'm going to ask the next person I just have initials of RS. Hi there. My name is Robin Sittle I currently reside in Sunderland, but I was a resident in Amherst last June through December in district four. As many other people have said, asking you to fully fund the CSWG programs at $2.4 million cut the Amherst police department budget by at least 45% in order to fully fund these programs and reinvest in the Amherst and regional schools as well. I'm originally from West Philadelphia, a hotbed of unrest and response to police brutality for many decades my sister lives around the corner from where Waltis Waller Jr. was fatally shot by police last fall, which is just one example of a horrific outcome of armed police response to a person having a mental health crisis. While many white Amherst residents may think of this town as a progressive location where these things are not a problem the lived experience of people of color in this town. This is a very different story on the subject of mental health crises one community member shared with seven Gen MC that police were called for a family member with a mental health issue. And there were 10 cops surrounding this person's family member all with hands on their guns, just the site of police holding their guns before even asking questions was beyond scary every time this person walks by the police where this happened it triggers them. I imagine that this incident was not particularly helpful to the community member in crisis, drawing a weapon on a community member in crisis is an act of violence through intimidation and threat of physical harm. I would like to imagine instead a scenario in which this call could be directed to a mental health expert who is trained to help this person non violently, determine what they need and help them access the resources needed to solve their crisis. As the future that is possible through a fully funded cross program with trained unarmed mediators mental health experts and social workers on call to respond to non violent and non criminal calls. I recognize that I have the privilege as an able bodied white person that I do not have to live in fear of interactions with police. It is not in spite of but because of these reasons that it is my responsibility to speak here today to not turn a blind eye to the black indigenous and other people of color in my community. It is essential that we as a community work together to create a safer and more equitable future for our black neighbors brown neighbors, indigenous neighbors neighbors of color neighbors facing mental health issues, neighbors experiencing houselessness and many more. I hope that Amherst can take steps today to be a community that leads by example, that chooses to be proactive rather than reactive and create a future beyond policing one that is shaped by community needs. We do not need to wait to react to another incident that causes harm to Amherst by pot community. We do not need to watch an underfunded crest program struggle to reach its goals because of the inaction of the town's budgeting decisions. We need to listen to the testimony of our black and indigenous residents and be proactive in reallocating funding from the violent institution of policing to community centered alternatives offered by the crest program. It's for these reasons that I'm asking for this reallocation of budgeting in order to create a future that centers the needs and safety of the black indigenous and other community members of color in Amherst. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. Katie Curtin, if that's correct, please turn us in. Hi. Yeah, quick Katie Court and thank you, my, I'm Katie I live in Belcher town. I've been working as an educator in Amherst for over 10 years. And in addition I send my child to school in Amherst. I'm here tonight to add my voice and support of the community service working groups recommendations to fully fund the crest program at $2.4 million. To support reducing the APD budget by 45% to reach 50% fewer APD officers over two years and to freeze APD hiring. I noticed the theme of the budget this year is a year of recovery. It's better to help this community recover from the past year than to show a monumental commitment to the people of color in our community. This issue is important to me because while as a white woman, I may feel reasonably safe calling the police if I need to, this simply isn't true for everyone in our community. I'm very enthusiastic about the research done by the community service working group and I feel that now is the time to fully fund their recommendations and help people of color feel safer and Amherst. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. Thank you very much. Hello, I'm great. I live in district two. And I am also asking for you to fully find the community working group recommendations and request program, and also to cut the APD budget by 45% and less police officers have less than half over two years. Fund back into the schools. And yeah, when I saw that it was 8% to the press program. I was really disgusted I think it. I was not as active. I don't think I kept up as well as I could have, but I have been following it for the past year since they've been working on it. And I know that they put in so much effort and work and like really went into this, doing it the right way and I think I haven't liked commissions. I don't think of them well, but I believe that what the recommendations they have made are really well thought out and that they can work, but they will not work on 8%. And I will do everything in power, so that it doesn't turn out that it is funded by 8% and fails, and we continue to enforce the police state and terrorize the people of color in our community. I am really done with hearing you all talk about caring about these things, and then doing something as setting this program up to fail. And I really hope that you do not do that tonight or in the coming month. If you need to make another month of a budget, I think you should do that so that you can actually fund the press program and make Amherst safe for all of its residents. Thank you and I see my kind. Thank you very much. Adam Gibbs. I am my name is Adam Gibbs. I'm a resident of district four as an Amherst college student and I've been here for the past three years I've many friends who have attended Amherst public schools as well. I'm here to support the calls to fully fund crests, which was recommended by the community safety working group, cut the Amherst police department budget by 45% to fund crests and give money back to the schools, and also reduce the number of Amherst police officers over the upcoming years. The system of policing was designed to instill fear over the community, and specifically target black and brown communities, and to continue to invest in a system like this is investing in a system that actually harms everyone in the community, especially black and brown people in our community, but not not just them. Many of the duties of APD could be performed performed by trained on our professionals who are not a part of Amherst police department, whose sole purpose is to help the community and nothing else. And so I urge you to not fund this system that creates these massive power disparities between our between people in our community, and rather invest in things like public education social systems and non violent community safety systems that do much more than a policing system ever could. As someone who grew up in a low income family I can say that the policing system has actively harmed me. Little trivial things like a tail light infraction can cause a massive ticket that can harm like your family's budget for weeks, and that can be devastating to a kid who just wants to eat and go to school. So I hope you can see that the policing system really doesn't help everyone at large and really doesn't do what a lot of people think it does it's actually designed and has always been designed to harm people and have this kind of fear and violence. All it does is help the wealthiest members of the community, who are not the vast majority of us. So, I mean, I sit here and I can see like adverse physical responses of my friends people of color in my community when they see a police officer. And when I see things like this. There's no doubt in my mind that investing in the Amherst police department will only continue perpetuate violence. And so I hope as the council and as the town of Amherst seeks to push for racial class and environmental justice. It realizes that I can't do this while continuing to fund the Amherst police police department. And I hope you can take these funds defund the budget by 45% and give it back to press education and other community safety programs because they would do a whole lot more for the community than the policing system ever will. Especially for kids who want to move forward and, you know, kind of come up into the system defunding education will not do anything for them and policing certainly will help out there. Thank you very much for listening. Thank you very much. Brian. Sorry, just a second. Brian's using an older version of the zoom so we're having a little trouble. Let me see if I can bring in. Here we go. Ryan, you should be able to unmute yourself. Hi there. My name is Ryan carb. I've been a resident Amherst for off and on for 15 years. I bought a house last year in district two. I work at many hands farm core where I also where we also help run the Amherst mobile market in a few different communities around town. And today I'm here to lend my support to everyone who's spoken before me to fully funds the CSWG programs and reinvest in Amherst and regional schools. I have a personal story about how the police were the only resource available to call an emergency and how they're training and their focus on punitive approach to community safety. Not only were insufficient to prevent harm but also caused harm to myself and my friends. Many years ago, a friend who was staying with us had committed suicide in our house, and I was the one to find her. We called the police immediately and we were driven to the police station where I was interrogated for an hour and a half. I was told that there's no definition for suicide that police don't recognize suicide and that has treated like a suspect in a murder case and where looking back now I definitely feel like a, like, I've gone through that traumatic event, like I was a victim. And, and that that was completely ignored. And at the end of the interrogation, we were just, we were driven there we were just left to leave find our own way home, and kind of just dumped on the street. So I would like to just, I just think that there's, and I don't want to demonize the police. They were doing their job they're doing what they're trained to do. But what they were trained to do is completely insufficient for what was needed that day so I just, I hope that there's a way to find my to find a better way to spend money and promote other kinds of training than what we have currently. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Carl. Hi, my name is Lydia irons, and meet yourself. Hi, can you hear me. Yes, I can. Hi, my name is Lydia irons, and I am also asking you today to fully fund the CSWG programs by $2.4 million and redirect that money to the Amherst and redirect $325,000 Amherst regional schools and that you cut the APD budget by 45% to cover those vital community resources. Something that I heard from all of you, and have heard many times in these meetings is that the town manager has repeatedly said that the 911 call says fallen in half. And last summer the town council said multiple times when we when the citizens showed up here in these in this space and asked for defundment of the APD to go towards services to make our community more equitable more just and more safe. We heard that they didn't want to defund the police without an alternative to fund. But I have been given that alternative you the Crest program as written by the CSWG is a wonderful way that you could have those programs funded in this town. But in this budget, the town manager has proposed to only give it 6% of what that of what this BIPOC led council recommended. We have sat in so many of these meetings over the last year, feeling at the best ignored and at the worst completely belittled by many of you in this space. In this budget coming up, the APD is going to get an increase in this time of austerity, where we're asking so many other services to be cut. 8% of police calls in the past year were related to anything approaching violence. So, when we say that the majority of the calls that go into APD are nonviolent and could be could be directed to something like the Crest program where there is a mental health professional where there is an emergency health professional. It, it would be a majority of those calls. So the Crest would take those calls. The majority of nonviolent and criminal calls coming from our community yet only to it. It would have a budget that's only 2% of the size of APD. And that doesn't make any sense at all. If you look at those numbers critically. And even if Crest only covers calls of the kinds directly called out in the original proposal, they'd still be covering 20% of all the calls that go to APD. It's been mentioned in this town council space before that the police officers and Amherst have said that they would be dancing in the street if they had an alternative to answering answering these calls. And so I am asking all of you to vote no on this budget tonight to, if you have to make a one month interim budget, so that you can go back to the drawing board and fully fund the Crest program for what they need. Keep those open police officer positions frozen along with the two others that were earmarked to fund the CSWG program and cut the number of police officers by 50% over two years and cut the APD budget by 45%, which would fund Crest and put money back into the schools where it belongs. I have a personal story that I'd like to share with the end of my time. We have a lot of speakers yet to speak and so we need you to ask to stick to the time limit that we had. Oh, I can't the clock isn't running so I couldn't see it. But I will see the rest of my time to all of the people here who made the time tonight to show up. I appreciate it and thank you very much, Lydia and I guess for future speakers. I have a lot of speakers and I wanted to try and give everybody some chance, but given the number of speakers who have now asked if you could possibly limit to two minutes instead of three, we certainly as a council would appreciate it because we want to hear from as many people as possible. Kathleen Trapegan. Hi, thank you so much everybody for your time and for your service. My name is Kathleen Trapegan I'm in district six. I'm certainly happy to hear about the Juneteenth events. I'm looking forward to that. I'll say though that your decisions on the budget will be the real signal of your commitment to racial equity. I'm asking that you fully fund the CSWG program at 2.4 million redirect 325,000 into the Amherst and regional schools and cut the APD budget by 45%. So, in July of last year the idea was wait to reduce police funding to fully explore alternative options of providing services. Everybody said we need to slow down wait we need more information not sure. Let's be measured let's be rational. So now, the community safety working group has provided the answers with the assistance of the seven generations collective. It's a comprehensive well done report. One thing that's abundantly clear in this report is that white people and people who are black indigenous and other people of color are living in two separate realities in this town when it comes to the police. So after reading this report, the town manager decides to include only 6% of the request of funding in the budget. Reading the transcript of some other meetings and discussions I learned it's because we don't quite know enough yet. We need to know more we need more information we're not sure about this. Let's not move too fast, and I say, this is the same old story this is the white playbook. What a colossal dismissal of Amherst BIPOC communities this represents. How many commissions reports task forces analysis and studies do we need to actually listen, understand and put our money behind our profess values. We have again asked the BIPOC communities of this town to retraumatize themselves by telling us about their experiences with racism, and they have done so. And now we're on the verge of ignoring them again. Do you not actually believe the black people and other people of color stories in this report. Because if you do believe those stories how could you not vote for change. And if you don't believe those stories. Please ask yourself, why you don't believe it. This is your time now to do the uncomfortable work. The decisions that will make the power structure in this town very uncomfortable and you may become unpopular. That's where your bravery comes in let's just not go to Juneteenth events. Let's make a real commitment. I see the rest of my time. Thank you very much. Allegra don't have a last name is joining us to identify yourself and proceed. Hi my name is Allegra Clark. I'm a resident of district two. I am the 18th person tonight, joining my voice to say defund the police at 45%. And move that money back to the schools and fully fund all of the programs that the community safety working group proposed, including the community responders but also when they thought safety in the community they thought not just reactively but proactively. And what does this community need to be safe. It's not funding for police it's funding for community services. So the community safety working group is looking at what services do we need in this community. And they thought about a youth center. They thought about a cultural center, both of these led by BIPOC people to create a safe space for BIPOC community members in this community. They thought about an office of diversity, equity and inclusion. So these are all programs. In addition to the communities, the, the Crest program that can create a safe community every day, not just when there's a crisis. I want to thank all the members of the community safety working group for their hard work and the consultants that they worked with the seven gen movement collective as well as the community ambassadors and the community members who shared their stories with, with all these groups. I am going to share just one quote from the report that was given to the seven gen MC. And this is a quote from a community participant saying, I got to my house is the father of the minor who had called the police because of a white intruder. And the police officer approached me in an aggressive manner, an officer I had just interacted with the week before at my job in a professional capacity. Racism and policing does exist in Amherst and we need to change that by reallocating funding from the police to the community. Thank you. Thank you very much. Bailey baddie. Hi, um, my name is Bailey batty. I'm a resident of District four, and I have been living in Amherst for the past five years. I do first of all want to say that I appreciate public comment being in an earlier section of the meeting today. This is very helpful. Thank you. Um, I am also asking that you fully fund the community safety working group programs with the 2.4 million required to make them successful and redirect money into the Amherst and regional schools and do this by cutting the police budget by 45% to cover these community resources. Um, the 130,000 currently allocated to the Crest program is honestly insulting, but fully in line what I think with what I think the town's values are I'm so glad that a lot of people have been bringing up. This isn't in line with our values today. Um, because frankly, as a town, I think the values of Amherst are really like just wanting to be seen as progressive without doing anything and this really is such a symbol of that that we're going to give a percent to this so that we can say that we did it, but not really do it for real and not really give it a chance to be successful. Um, if it's not like something that you can tell other people that you're doing so that you can seem super progressive. This, you know, clearly not a priority in Amherst. Um, so you can keep insisting during meetings that you listen, that you're concerned about the racist policing in Amherst and that you're sympathetic, but it doesn't matter what you say if you continue to do nothing and make excuses. We don't appreciate being placated and honestly often mocked. Um, but beyond that your job is not to respond by saying things your job is to respond by doing things you are the people who have the power to directly make these changes. If these are in line with your values, then you are the ones who can act on them. Please use the power that you have to cut the police budget and fully fund the Crest program, the schools, and the other community safety working group suggestions. Thank you. Thank you very much. I'm Rita. Hi town counselors and finance committee members. I'm on Rita. I live on three evergreen lane. I'm in district two, and I'm a rising sophomore at ARHS. Um, I completely agree with all the things that people have already said about fully funding the Crest program and the schools and defunding the police. The budget cuts to the schools that have been decided and are being decided right now will impact me immensely. I love theater. I fell in love with theater and elementary school when we did a production of Susie called the musical. We can all agree that this year was a disaster for all of us. I did online school for almost a full year and everyone was trying their best but it was still a lot harder to learn and very isolating. I had theater class in the fall and was in two productions this year. And honestly, if I had, if I hadn't had that I might not have come to school at all. It's a place where we can be ourselves, where we can begin to understand ourselves. It builds community and friendships and belief in ourselves and in a time such as high school, when we are also lost and confused by the world and our place in it, it is essential. That theater class made me feel like I had a community and a personality and a little bit of control in a time when we were all spinning. Life began to feel okay in the two productions I was in. Sure, it was different but it proved to me that the world would be okay. I met people and made connections that will, I think will last a very long time. I helped create something that brought our community together and I felt normal again, and I felt hopeful. Well, I know the ARPS budget was already approved on May 3rd. I'm asking you to please try your best to protect and risk elementary school budget by cutting the police budget and increasing the schools funding by June, by June 1, sorry. In this cut we risk lowering the quality of our art program as well as the ELL's program and special education. Even though the ARPS budget has already been decided, you still have a chance to prove that you want to recognize that you want to prioritize education through the elementary school budget. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. See holy. Hi, good evening town councillors, town manager, Bockelman and members of the finance committee. My name is saw holy and I live on Hartman Road in district one and I just want to say that I would like to use my entire three minutes because I've been waiting here since the beginning and I think I'm one of the few youth on this call. But I'm a current area chess senior and I'm preparing to leave for college but I've been in the Amherst and ARPS school system since sixth grade. And finally to my dismay the ARPS budget was approved on May 3rd with little questioning or discussion amongst municipal leaders despite a lot of pushback over the last few weeks and months. And I'm not exactly sure what the discussions were behind the scenes but I can't exactly say I'm surprised considering the budget cuts to the schools that have been happening nearly every year. A couple of other students and I organized a town hall a few weeks ago regarding budget cuts and invited municipal leaders in an attempt to demonstrate just how crucial the schools are to not just people in Amherst but all over the pioneer valley. And while we had some great speeches from the area chess principal teachers and students we saw a few of the people we invited to attend. While I understand that as enrollment decreases some classes or programs aren't needed as much. Not all the budget cuts are due to that reason and I've been able to speak with people involved in the school budget planning process and learn that the ARPS district won't be able to provide the same level services next year that they provided this year and that's really disarming to hear. Unfortunately the school committee is limited to the budget that the town council and manager sets for them and it shows clearly in the proposed budget that that amount isn't enough. The town committee may not be able to decide how municipal funding is organized but the town council finance committee and the town manager can. Honestly at this point I'm not exactly sure what it'll take to change everyone's minds and I'm not sure what goes into everyone's decision making process but it seems like the dozens of public comment petitions and emails aren't part of it. But once again I urge everyone while there is still an opportunity to make recommendations for the elementary school budget to take another look at how funds are being allocated in our town. The evidence and reason your constituents have provided for decreasing funding from other public services such as the APD and prioritize restoring the $400,000 budget cut to our elementary schools. Amherst has prided itself on being able to provide a great well rounded educational people with all kinds of interest and I'm honestly proud to say that I'm a product of the district's efforts. I'm turning off to Brown University as a proud area chest and Amherst schools graduate to pursue STEM, but with the way these consistent budget cuts are going I'm afraid that it'll be harder and harder for people to receive a quality education that I've been able to receive. So as I end this public comment I urge everyone on this call again to please reconsider the budget cuts you made for the elementary schools and the ARPS budget. Thank you so much. Thank you. I apologize for mispronouncing your name at the beginning and I wish you well and what's ahead for you. My name is Abigail Newman, but I go by Birdie and I'm a high school student living in district four. I'm so moved by the public comment today, particularly by people who have made themselves vulnerable and sharing the experiences and stakes that come from their individual experiences here in Amherst. I'm asking that you fully fund the community safety working group programs at $2.4 million redirect $325,000 into the Amherst and regional schools and cut the Amherst police department budget by 45% to cover these vital community resources. The community members spoke up to Amherst government officials about the need to be fun APD for FY 21. Our government argued that defunding the police was not viable because there was no alternative in place. Since then, as other commenters have pointed out the BIPOC led community safety working group has devoted hours upon hours to forming recommendations to incorporate racial and social justice into public safety and Amherst, including a community responders for equity safety and service program that is exactly the alternative to policing town officials seem to want. And then you are town government proposed funding the Crest program at just 6% of what the community safety working group recommended. There is still time to do better. I really hope you do better and I have a feeling you looking back will hope you did better if you go through with this. That is the tides change and you come to see what policing is doing, which I would imagine you could see already from listening to what everyone's been saying that you will look back and hope you made the right choice in this moment and the question is whether or not you will please respect the voices of the group whose work you asked for put yourselves on the right side of us in the industry and decrease the size and scope of policing and Amherst to increase racial justice. Thank you. Thank you. Margaret Sawyer. Hello, can you hear me. Yes, I can please proceed. Okay, great. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. There's been amazing comments made tonight and I am just so I want to honor and really, I so respect the work that the CSWG and seven John have done in listening and hearing the truth about so many aspects of our town that are so hard for us to see. And I think that the work that you did, especially as an almost all white council. I think that was really an important move, and I'm embarrassed by the thought that we wouldn't fully fund what they're asking for. The work that the council's offering is so small and also has been offered with no idea towards the future. No ideas on how to reach the goals that the working group is asking for. We know that we live in a mission driven town. Part of what I've seen is how much we invest in our nature and our natural reserves and our beautiful trails, and a very extensive network of wetlands administrators and other, you know, miss municipal employees who preserve our nature, which is so important. But our people are a value to and it's hard for me to believe that something as smart and wise as the Chris program and the, and the new ideas about a cultural center, a BIPOC center where people can feel welcome and part of this community couldn't be funded. I'm actually surprised to see that nobody's talking about how to hire seven gen and other people to do grant writing this money we don't, you know, I believe we should be pulling off the 45% from the police budget, and we live in a place of abundance we can find more money there's more money out there. I actually want to lift up the testimonial of the executive director of the survival center. I know that each of you, and myself, we all really value the role of the survival center in our town, and they are telling us that they prefer not to call the police, the people who you've taught in our town to keep us safe are not the people who are one main provider of social services wants to call because they're scared because they're afraid the police will escalate instead of deescalate, and they would like press. Finally, I just like to say that I very rarely almost never see police in my neighborhood in South Amherst, the money that's spent on policing in our area. We never see police. What I know is that they're in colonial village and the testimonies tonight were terrible to hear to hear about that disparity. So I hope that you'll look at our history as an organist as a town and lift up the harms caused and help us to grow in the right directions, where we can do better as a town. So I hope you'll listen. Thank you. Thank you. Maya. Thank you for giving us all the opportunity to speak today. My name is Maya Hussein and I live in District four. I'm here to also support the calls by the community safety working group in support of funding crests by defunding APD by 45%, which should amount to roughly 2.25 million dollars. I want to respond to the idea that this is just a response to national outbreaks of violence that aren't related to the Amherst community. As has been demonstrated clearly APD does perpetuate that exact violence through the testimonies we've heard, but outside of that, even if for some reason that wasn't the case. I've decidedly false idea that this specific police department does not perpetuate violence is irrelevant to the demands that myself and so many other people are voicing. The violence is in how police moderate our communities through fear and punishment punishment for being poor or not white or otherwise marginalized crests is a positive movement forward driven by the leadership of people most impacted by policing. This is a huge opportunity to dramatically change the status quo in which municipal governance is controlled by white wealthy educated people who make decisions on behalf of the rest of the community. This could be an opportunity to move away from this paternalistic form of government and ensure direct accountability and the elevation of the community members that the council has claimed to care about and support. So unheard and forgotten so often APD as has mentioned been mentioned before spends at most 8.5% of its time responding to calls that near violence. And Amherst has 18 times more police officers employed by the town than public health workers or social workers a 45% call to defund is honestly the floor and it's the bare minimum, because there is evidently no real demonstrated need for APD size or budget. The community is already moving to take care of itself and this is an opportunity to structurally support that. The answer is certainly not to increase funding for APD by $30,000 as is outlined in this fiscal year 2022 budget. Please vote no on this and consider the scale of a $5 million police budget relative to the other departments as many students from the region have been advocating for. The community to divest from fear white supremacy and invest in community care to bring more harmony cooperation and strength to a community that has a chance to forge a new future that includes all of its members. You all have an opportunity to disrupt this racist status quo and history will thank you for it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, everyone. I would like to emphasize that all of the amazing public comments speak in today, definitely be taken into account in the budget process and not only seen as just visuals. I'm Emily Foss and I'm a 14 year old resident of Amherst. I am from District one and I live on 30 Harris Street. I am also the defund the police, the code to fund the police project lead at Amherst Sunrise, which is a prominent local organization towards climate justice and racial equity When I was five years old, my mom's heart was set on me attending Mark's Meadow elementary school in Amherst. All excited getting ready for my first quote real school experience my mom hoped and advocated for me to attend a bilingual immersion program. As everyone knows, Mark's Meadow shut down because you Matt stopped funding the building as a public elementary school. This was the first time, although definitely not the last. Many of my education was affected by budget cuts. As a teacher, my mother has always had to work twice as hard for half the pay she deserves, even as she participates in the crucial role of raising and educating my generation. In a global pandemic, the need for a steady well rounded value education has dramatically increased. And with this knowledge Amherst deciding to cut from severely underfunded budget and undercut the young people in Amherst. This is not a must. This is not necessary. Amherst police department currently has thousands in excess funding, operating a $5.15 million budget with salaries, 87% above the national average and 6% higher than teachers. There is access funding regarding operating maintenance, as one example, gas and uniforms as expressed by defund four and three Amherst, $155,625 can be cut from this entity. Police officers on average spend $117 on gas, policing neighborhoods that are disproportionately of color and low income. $108,683 could be reallocated from step raises. Amherst College or UMass could recognize the crucial services Amherst provides to them and give back by funding our schools. There are so many opportunities here and I urge you to listen. I urge you to listen because if we don't, we continue this budget budget process because objecting is too inconvenient. You will be actively suppressing the education of young people such as myself. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Katie Lodowski. Good evening. Not fully funding the CSWG's proposal is a slap in the face to the CSWG as Zoe Crabtree highlighted. Furthermore, it continues to perpetuate and uphold the ongoing racism in this town, which is clearly outlined in the presentation delivered by the reparations of Amherst. I'm Ms. Katie Lodowski of District 2 and I've lived in Amherst for over a decade, and I am one of the consultants of the seven generation movement collective, who was hired by the town to examine the role of safety services in the lives of the BIPOC community. I'm very close to the data and listen to and read through pages of transcriptions from over 40 hours of interview data. The report, if you've read it, provides the words and sentiments of BIPOC community members. If you've read it, you realize also that the recruitment process of that of those participants was in itself challenging due to the fear that that people have and speaking about their experiences in fear of retaliation. I learned by doing this work that we have a major public safety issue in our town of the close to 50 BIPOC community members that were interviewed, all but a few do not call in the police in an emergency. They fear that the situation will escalate because of their presence as a person who identifies as a BIPOC member. They do not feel safe. The policing does exist as others have highlighted and as the report outlines. We need to move beyond the town's MLK breakfast, race amity day, Juneteenth celebrations. This idea of heroes and holidays doesn't cut it. We need to put our money where our mouths are, and all of you have the power to do so. More importantly, you have the responsibility to do so. We need to fully fund CSWG's proposal, reallocate the money that needs to go to the school budget and cut the APD budget by 45% and police officers in the department. Invite you to make history. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. My name is Irv Rhodes and I really, first question is to land. If I'm speaking now, does that preclude me from speaking at the regular meeting? Not during the other public comment. No. All right, thank you. Listening to everything that is transpired is stunning. Stunning on a number of different levels. One of the things that we need to do is that there seems to be a huge amount of sentiment for the cutting of funds to the school budget. And that that school budget cut, those, those school budget cuts are then related back to the police department. I think that some education needs to be done here by the council and also listen very carefully to that there is a huge amount of sensitivity to those school budget cuts. Now, given my background on the finance committee, I would have some serious concerns. Second, second is that it is, it is the police. The policing calls calls for the cut and the police budget, and the calls for funding the community safety worth in working group. The police amount needs to be fully examined in terms of if you looked at those budget that budget that was put forth in terms of over the $2 million in terms of its subcategories and related back to the particular salaries and the payments for aid, the counselors themselves for any other volunteer group out there, the amounts of money being asked to be paid. We're, we're out of line and that that's the amount of that that's an educational issue that the council needs to take on. The point is that the studies that have been the study that was done and I'm out of time, but I think that overall, my feeling is that the council needs to get some education in place to sell to some of the comments that I've heard. And that there is an understanding a of the budget and how that budget is being applied and that the crest program on all those ones. There's no doubt that the budget that Paul has put forward in terms of $180,000 wasn't an appropriate amount, given that it's going to be a startup budget, a startup budget for a program that everyone says needs to be done. Everyone says it needs to be done. It's a police alternative program. You cannot under any set of circumstances go full bore on any program that's being implemented. Managerial wise, it would be unwise. Anyway, I'm done and we can talk later. Thank you. Thank you. Megan leaf. Do we have, can you unmute yourself if there's a problem. Oh, yes, can you hear me. Okay. Thank you. Sorry about that. I'm ironically I'm in the middle of teaching a class and I'm about to talk to you about being a teacher. Bear with me. Here I am. By the way, just I listed my name is Megan defund APD but I assume you didn't say that as my name so I'm just letting people know that was the name I listed. I'm asking that you fully fund the CSWG programs at the 2.4 million level redirect 325,000 into the Amherst and regional public schools and that you cut the APD budget by 45% to cover those vital community resources. I've been a resident of Amherst for nearly 10 years I live in district one I'm a graduate of UMass Amherst and I currently work as a math teacher and interventionist. I worked in the Amherst high school for three years as a paraprofessional in the Amherst middle school from a graduate school student teaching placement. I know that police and placing are not actually what keep our community safe, making sure that everyone's basic needs are met and that youth have positive ways to get involved in the community is the most important way to keep our community safe. Police officers have a 6% higher starting salary than teachers and para educators in our schools and almost three times the starting salaries of paraprofessionals. I personally don't believe police are valuable, but let's say counselors presumably you do, but I'm wondering if you can explain to me why they are more valuable than teachers. If you can explain to me why you feel they are three times more valuable than paraprofessionals who despite their misleading job title have an incredibly crucial exhausting and valuable job, supporting students with disabilities on IP achieve equal access to their education both under the law and in the law of justice. The job of a paraprofessional includes hygiene emotional regulation support, assistance of note taking focus content remediation small group support testing accommodations and so much more than I could list in my two minutes. During my time working in Amherst public schools I saw many talented passionate and highly competent paraprofessionals leave the district because the wages were not high enough to live on and they had no upward mobility. When I left my job as a paraprofessional in 2016. I was making less than $25,000 a year, I had to work three jobs to get by and was not even able to afford a car. It is shameful that the people entrusted to support some of our most vulnerable students are themselves subjected to poverty wages. How many students would have learned how much more math reading or emotional regulation skills if highly competent personnel could be compensated appropriately and kept in the district. I'd like to challenge you to show me the data that proves dollar for dollar that the police are doing more valuable work than teaching our children cooking and dancing theater giving them core subjects and small class sizes of excellent teachers and appropriate one on one support. Of course, the Amherst public schools are not perfect. They have a long way to go combating racism and classism in our students education. If this does a different call I'd have a lot more I could say about that. But all the same I'd rather build a better world of a teacher and a textbook than on the other end of a person with a gun. Many people working for the ARPS schools are tirelessly trying to bring racial justice to our schools. I'd rather fund them than work with the police. Thank you. I see my remaining time. Thank you very much. We're well over the time we thought we would be allocating so I asked you to continue to limit your time and I will ask the council president at some point to indicate whether anyone comes on after this point with a raised hand as somebody I should recognize, but I want to continue on and ask Anisha to join us. Oh, sorry. Hi, this is Anisha pie. I have lived in district four for two years by counselors are Evan Ross and Stephen Schreiber, and I also work in downtown Amherst as a data scientist. So I'm asking also that you fully fund this the community safety working group programs at the $2.4 million redirect $325,000 into the Amherst and regional schools, and that you cut the APD budget by 45% to cover those vital community resources. The cause is important to me, because even in the two years I have lived here, I have seen and heard from friends and neighbors how the APD responds with unnecessary aggression to people of color and makes us all feel unsafe and Amherst. I would personally feel a lot more comfortable reaching out for help in an emergency or in a distressing situation, if I could reach out to someone trained in safety and mental health, and not primarily in violence and fear. This is when I have had distressing situations in my building and I've had no idea where to reach for help. There are so very many accounts that you all have heard and seen, proving that the APD do not provide safety to BIPOC in Amherst, and that there is no need for such a large and overpaid police presence in this town. I think as a town that prides itself on being progressive and safe, we should show that in our actions and respond to situations that do not require violence appropriately. We have youth empowerment centers, transitional housing for our houseless population, rental assistance, a multicultural center and so much more. But we can start firstly with really and truly listening to the BIPOC who led the CSWG committee and fully fund the Cress program, fund true and effective DEI and cultural programs, and give our schools the money they need to prioritize safety and education for all students. It is so disgusting that today we need to plead to a committee that is majority white to do what BIPOC people are asking for, which by the way is just a small portion of the resources and reparations that we actually deserve. So please listen and follow through and do not insult us by making us do the work and then disregarding it. Amherst should be leaders in this global anti-racist movement, not rushing to catch up after the fact. Thank you. Thank you very much. Maita or Maita? Please get my pronunciation correct and join us in. Hello. My name is Maita Ives. I've been living in Amherst for over three years and I've been working at Amherst College for seven years. Today I am one of this large group of people asking you to cut the Amherst Police Department budget by 45% in order to fully fund the community safety working group programs at 2.4 million. You asked for that community safety working group and should listen to their recommendations and respect the work they've done. And also to reinvest $325,000 into the Amherst and regional schools. Thank you. Thank you very much. Someone whose name is Lexi didn't give her last name, but please join us. Hello, can you hear me? Yes. Hi there. My name is Lexi Monison Olson and I've lived in Amherst for 14 years. I have three children, two of whom attend the public schools in Amherst and who are actually here with me tonight watching this council. I wanted to speak tonight to ask that the council fully fund the programs proposed by the CSWG, including the press program, and that you cut the APD budget by 45% while also putting money back into the schools. I was present during many of the council meetings last year during which counselors talked about wanting to fund community safety saying they were not able to make the changes asked for by community members last year due to time constraints on the budget process. The town put a pitiful amount of money aside to work on systemic racism. The community safety working group put a tremendous amount of time and work to present the town with programs that would support our community and public safety. It's based on the proposal. It's based on careful research and community input. To give them only 6% of what they asked for is not only disrespectful and insulting of the community service working community safety working group, and the residents of the town of Amherst but deceptive and irresponsible. By failing to fund the program you're setting them up for failure. This is just another instance of those who have power in this town dismissing Amherst Spipock community and failing to follow through with the claims of care and support. They've done nothing but make claims of wanting to change. I demand better. I expect better, especially after listening to this council's discussions during meetings last year and since then policing does not keep our community safe. The Crest program can they focus on mental health care housing issues and community support. This is the alternative that you kept saying did not exist when we were on these exact same calls with you last year. Our job is to make decisions that are beneficial for our entire town, not a small privileged portion of it. Failing to follow through on the statements that you've made failing to defund the Amherst police department and failing to support the Crest program is not in the best interests of our community. In fact, failing to do so is negligent continuing to put so many of our community members at constant risk and it is shameful. Increasing the police budget when the schools are seeing huge cuts is unacceptable. I expect better of my town and of my town counselors. I ask you to vote no on tonight's budget. You can do better than this. I would also like to wrap up by just asking you if you could tell us how many people are on this call tonight and how many people were here at the highest attendance. Yes, my, my numbers show that at 103 at the highest attendance. We're in the audience. So, thank you, Linda. Let me proceed. Anna Devlin. Oh, you're so close. You're so close. Hi, I'm Anna Devlin got there. I'm a resident of district five. I've spent some time recently trying to learn mass general law just, you know, some nice light reading, and I'm hoping it's helpful in my comment. So, as you all know it's not exactly a simple document and I apologize in advance if I'm incorrect in my interpretations, but I hope you'll consider the spirit of my comment if that's the case. I think the counselors who helped me figure out where to start looking. So as I understand it, you all as a council are not able to reallocate within a proposed budget unless it's within a department, but don't worry. There are still opportunities to show your constituents that you're hearing them tonight. I would like to ask the council today to reject the budget as proposed and ask the town manager to come back with one which fully funds the Cresc program or at a minimum provides a clearly outlined escalating budget plan to do so within three years, along with a full time professional diversity and equity position, not part time and absolutely not part of a role added to an existing position that is currently filled. That is a position requiring specialized knowledge and skill and should be a new hire. You have heard significantly from the public both tonight and at past meetings where they believe the money for Crest should come from. And while I understand that specific reallocation across departments is not within your purview as a council. I hope Paul considers it if and when he resubmits a budget. I also asked the council to take a vote to deem necessary as outlined in mgl part one title seven chapter 44 section 33. There we go. A full time DEI coordinator, along with components of the Crest program that were not included in the budget, making sure to specify that it wasn't that these specific components were less funded, but that they were not present at all. Paul would then submit that addendum to the budget and if he did not do so within seven days of that vote, the council would then vote on the appropriations themselves. Instead of dismissing comments asking for reallocation since that is not within your scope, I implore you to instead consider how you can meet the needs and asks of your community within the bounds placed on you by law. The conversation you have every vote you take is an opportunity to move the needle towards equity and liberation and meet the express needs of your community. If you cannot answer the question of how this is moving that needle and if it is moving it enough, that discussion should not be over until you can. Thank you. Have a great night. Thank you very much. Hello. Thank you counselors. My name is Artie McCollum. I am a resident of District two and Amherst and have been here for about seven or eight years. I would just also like to echo what a lot of people have said. I really encourage you the council to fully fund the the suggestions of the CSWG. I have listened to the people of color in our town who are who are often miss, you know, not listened to it. The work that those community members did that shared their stories with a lot of time and effort and it was also re traumatizing for many of them to share their stories that they were impacted by the Amherst police department. It's an opportunity for the council, you know, and for the town to step up and, you know, fulfill our desires to support people of color. The, the, from my opinion, the amount that is currently proposed in this sets the project up to fail and it'll be yet another example where it will just say see that project didn't work because, you know, it wasn't funded fully. So I suggest that as a parent of a student in elementary schools in Amherst, I would ask again that the funding be allocated to the schools, given the pandemic and the changes that occurred with virtual learning, the digital divide that is in our town and all the support that we need as we re re engage after this pandemic, the extra funding there would be much more useful. And again, reducing that budget of the police department as others have said, you know, it is not all needed. There are much better uses in the CSW programs as well as in the art school district. I would also know that I would just like to mention again raising up the voice of the Emma survival center leader. I'm a volunteer there and I see all the good work that is done there. And so the fact that they are do not call the police went for the majority of the issues to me holds a lot of weight. It is a, you know, an organization that as well respected in the town so I would hope that that would be useful so thank you all for your time. Thank you. Jennifer page. Hi, my name is Jennifer page and I live in Amherst. First, I want to thank all the members of the public who have spoken and will speak tonight for their dedication and service to the town and our community. I won't repeat any of the things that have already been said, as I agree with all of them 100%. I follow many of the town counselors on Facebook and have seen how you have touted the decisions that the council has made that support what the community wants. Councillor Ross in particular has reported on Facebook on how many comments you received in favor of the library project, and the percent of the total comments that were in favor of it. And as we all know, 10 of the 13 counselors voted in favor of the library project. I wonder how Councillor Ross and the rest of you will vote and act now given how many comments you have received in favor of fully funding, the recommendations of the community safety working group, moving money into the Amherst public schools and arts budgets, and reducing funding for the police. I want to ask if you do truly listen to what your constituents want and asked for and in many cases are begging you for. But you will apply the same standard to this decision as you have applied to other decisions when it comes to listening to the public comments of your constituents. Thank you. Thank you very much. I want to just remind people that I had asked about 15 minutes ago that we not have additional people raise their hands and I will ask Ms. Griezner about how to proceed. I need to but in any event I want to now ask Maratheia Wallace to join us. Hello. My name is Maratheia Wallace and I have been a lifelong resident in Amherst. I graduated in 1991. And I have raised my four children here. My father taught at Fort River Elementary School for 39 years. So I remember when Amherst was a town where the cops weren't involved in every aspect of everything going on. We had affordable housing. And our educational system was bar none. Now we've had, I've had four kids go through the Amherst Regional High School. My son missed his graduation because of COVID. But he's, when after dealing with the cuts that have happened, the cuts to the music and arts program, which helps kids develop all around. It's called teaching the whole child. Those things need to stay. They must stay. Otherwise we are not, we are creating automatons. We are not creating people who know what's going on in the world. The next thing is the AP, the Amherst Police Department does need to be defunded. And I'm saying this very well because even though we are well known, people in my family walking their kids down the street have been stopped by the Amherst Police Department and asked what they are doing. I don't think that's necessary because they were walking down the street. So when I hear something like that, it concerns me when, and I don't think that it is okay for that ever to happen. And the only way to say not in this town is literally to stand up and say, not in this town, we have other options. And I think it's so important right now that we start making that change, because it is hard for people who look like me to sit and face a lot of people who look like you, and speak their truth. Thank you. Thank you very much. Dmitry Shabazz. Hello. Yes. I'm Dmitry Shabazz. I'm in district five. And I believe Anna Devlin, Gautier stated everything so well, but I just want to highlight some really, really important points that have transpired. You have many young people who have spoken out tonight. You have many people of color who have spoken out and spoken up tonight. This is the future of this town. I think as a town council that is majority white. You should take heed. Because we want to be a part of this community. We are taxpayers. We want our voices heard, and we want to shape policy. The community safety working group has since November of 2020 fulfilled a very important role within our community. We have led us in terms of people of color, and those who have felt marginalized in Amherst and engaging conversation about race in this community about public safety. We have done their research. Of course, my group as represented by Katie Lesdowski earlier with seven Jen, we help them with research. Here we have a town council and a town manager that has basically thrown them a bone with a paltry sum of 130 some odd thousand to fulfill all of the different, you know, ideas and structural changes that they feel will be inclusive, particularly crests, but a multicultural center and most importantly here, a diversity, equity and inclusion office, not an event coordinator. We need someone who is a hired professional to become part of the structure within the town of Amherst to lead us for the next five to 10 years and how to make this place, not only more inclusive economically and robust, but for people of color and API and indigenous folks to feel like they are a part of this community and to feel safe. What our group found is that the police do most of their work in marginalized communities and people of color, basically rolling around in their vehicles. What a waste. For those who are interested in climate change. This of course runs counter to what we're about. I ask you, as everyone else has asked to cut the APD budget by 45%. To cover community resources needed public safety, and to fund our schools redirect the budget, redo the budget and have it speak to our values in this community, which are about youth, keeping them safe, and making sure we have a planet to inherit. Thank you. Thank you. Lauren Mills. Yeah, good evening. I wanted to speak briefly and think first, they have sunrise movement and the defense for when three all of the people who worked on the community working safety group, and brought home the points of transferring funds from the Amherst police department to where they should be, which is reporting our youth being redirecting funds and not cutting the budget for arts and ELL services. And I also wanted to reiterate that mental health mental health issues that not only communities of color but all communities and all people of Amherst deal with that the Amherst police department is not the best place to call when those issues come up. I'm speaking from my heart and so I don't have a prepared notes, but I just think that from the last year that we've all been through that communities of color are very exhausted. Our families are exhausted. We want to have safe communities we want to not feel like our the color of our skin is like a target for us and we don't want to walk around feeling anxious or feeling that, you know, because we are people of color that that is something that we do to make us feel like we will we harm or treated differently. And we know that this work is ongoing work. We know that we may not fully know what the community working safety group, their, their options, you know, are or their, their, their projects for transferring the funds from the police to their their project will we fully be, but we know that we need an alternative solution and we hope that we will I hope that you have listened to all the people who have shared their experiences who have shared their work and there is no reason for any school budget that deals with art deals with marginalized communities deal with students in need should have to suffer the consequences because of the pandemic and if the money has to come from the police then that's where it has to come from but there is no excuse there's no reason for any school funds to be cut. Thank you. Thank you, Tony. Hi, I'm Tony Cunningham and I live in district one. I want to echo the comments made by many speakers this evening about reallocating funding from the police department to community services, in order to fund the proposed Cres program, as well as a youth and multicultural center, and the other recommendations of the community safety working group regarding the school budgets, I understand the council prefers to defer to the school committee when deciding how to allocate their funding. I believe the decision by district leadership to reduce art and technology education at the elementary schools, and to cut our teachers at the regional schools is short sighted and misguided and will be harmful to students. You could as a council direct the town manager to restore that funding to the schools with the request that it be used specifically for arts education. It was last week that each school district is expecting to receive somewhere in the region of $2 million of elementary and secondary school emergency relief funds through the American Rescue Plan Act. Knowing these funds are flowing in soon I believe it is a mistake to approve the cuts to arts at the schools. Please take the steps available to you to make the changes to the police department community services and school budgets that have been asked of you by many many residents. Thank you. Thank you very much. Jonathan, civilism. Hi evening folks. Can you hear me. Yes, you can. Okay. I'm calling tonight to echo what's, what's been said, much more eloquently by many of my neighbors and community members, asking you all to reject the current budget as written. To ask the town manager to come back to you all with a proposal that fully funds the Crest Program, as outlined by the community safety working group that reduces the APD budget and reallocates those funds to much needed services and the rest of our town. To reduce the size of the embers police department by 50% over the next two years, and to freeze all APD hiring. I'm going to keep it simple there. I could talk about my own experiences and educator and how in prior work experiences in specialized programs has as a as a special educator, not here in Amherst. I had to use my deescalation skills. And my own life was at risk. I could talk about that. I could talk about how I never felt the need to be armed with anything besides my training and and my patience and compassion, but I won't spend a lot of time talking about that. I could talk about the dedication and the care that I see among my embers high school colleagues in that the care that they bring to children in our community, especially those from marginalized communities. Children who are experiencing houselessness, whose families are undocumented, multilingual households, working class or struggling children here in our town. I do want to re-emphasize and echo Dr. Shabaz's comments around the changing face of Amherst and I can tell you from walking in the halls that I do see this future that she talked about in Amherst. And the future of Amherst doesn't look like this group of people sitting here. One of the things that's asked of us as white folks in doing the work of social justice and progress is to have the humility to listen and to understand that our experiences aren't at the center of the universe. And here in Amherst, your experiences are no longer at the center of Amherst. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. Kevin Noonan. Hi, my name is Kevin Noonan. I live in district four and I've lived in Amherst for 29 years long enough to realize that the remnants of racism are still being passed among us. Like the remnants of the smallpox-tainted blankets that the founder of Amherst gave to the native people who once owned this land. This said, I am also the director of Craig's Doors. I'm not speaking on behalf of Craig's Doors, but of him, the director of Craig's Doors. I guess it's hard to escape that. We have a need to call the Amherst police on occasion because people sometimes are intoxicated or have mental health issues that make it impossible for them to be responsive to us. And I can say without any embarrassment that the Amherst police have come and been extremely professional. They have no complaints. This said, we do work with the liaison team that has been assigned by Chief Livingstone, and we specifically reach out to them. We will call the non-emergency number. We will ask for those liaison officers because we want to make sure that the response is measured and not one that would lead to unnecessary violence. We need to have a program like Craig's because the mental health programs aren't adequate. The substance abuse treatment programs often don't exist or hardly exist. There's no affordable housing in the last seven projects that Amherst has developed. There's no permanent site for the shelter that we're on. We don't even have showers. So I'm here to tell you tonight that this discussion, it does feel like the BIPOC community, which was asked to go out of its way to get the information is being shoved aside. And I think it doesn't have to be a binary choice. The town manager spoke about the health of the fiscally, the health of this community and money in reserves. So take a million dollars from the reserves. Fund this program as a pilot, as Mr. Backelman said in the Amherst bulletin, he wants to see how to build this program. Well, money talks and you know it walks. It needs money and restore the 325,000 to the schools. I don't care whether you take it from the Amherst police department or not. I think a dialogue between the Amherst police and the town manager and the town council could lead to some cost saving measures. But there's money available and there's a crisis. There's a disease of racism and it is not stopping. Just ask the family of Andrew Brown Jr. in North Carolina, the latest one that I know of who has been killed by the police. Again, Amherst police have not had this experience with them here, but I'm a white person. When we do call people to the shelter, we do stand in solidarity with the people that we serve, but we also stand aside and let the Amherst police do their job. And so far we have not had problems. On the one hand, I want to be supportive of the people that come to assist us when we need it. On the other hand, I want to urge this council in the words of Anna, I believe it was Devlin go to a just reject the budget and do it over. There's money to cover this, maybe not fully in the first year but you can get there within three or four years. Thank you. Thank you very much. Zoe Abram. Why, this is my first time speaking and I wasn't actually expecting to get to the top of the list. I'm just trying, trying this out. I think of what I've heard here and the demands especially to fully fund the CSWG programs at the 2.4 million level and to redirect money from the police department back into the schools. Well, thank you very much. I'm going to recognize two people who have been had their hands up for a long time and then ask the council president what she, how she wants me to proceed, but Kathleen Grau has been had her hand up for quite a while. Did I get that name correctly? Please join us Ms. Grau. Thank you. Hi, my name is Kathleen Grau. I live in district two. I also want to voice my support for the Crest program. I think that it is pretty obvious from being on this call that it is a really necessary program and one that your constituents are asking for. I was really disappointed, especially when so much of our town budget is dedicated to public health and safety. As was stated in the budget, we are the only town in Massachusetts to be funding such a program. I think that rather than putting ourselves on the back for giving this program 6% of the necessary funding. The fact that we are the only town in Massachusetts funding a program like this really underscores for me the importance of fully funding the Crest program. So, I think that we have recommended programs put together by the CSWG. By underfunding Crest, we are setting up to fail. And I think that towns around us in Massachusetts will look to that as confirmation that a program like Crest wouldn't work in their communities. So not only is underfunding Crest a detriment to our community, but to other communities as well. Okay. The last person who had been had their hand up for a long time and then I need to know how to proceed because we are well over the time we had a lot of NASA that no new names go up that Julian Hines has had his hand up for quite a while. Julian. You have to unmute Julian. Hi there. My name is Julian Hines. I'm a resident of Amherst and I have lived in Amherst for 15 years now. And I've been at the schools for most of that time. I would like to speak on behalf of the fact that we are deciding actively to defund our educational systems and instead fund our police that was the decision made in the regional schools meeting last night or a couple of nights ago. And I personally would say as someone who attends the schools and also isn't involved in town politics. I'm very saddened to see Julian. It looks like your videos frozen. I'm going to turn it off. Sometimes that helps. And other town employees. I would say that the fact that we have police officers who are paid who are paid over $170,000 a year when most teachers are not paid nearly half that is quite honestly appalling given that they provide such a service to myself and other students. I would also add that that there have been many instances as the community safety and working group highlighted that that show police misconduct and police mistrust in our community and show some pretty Jari and examples of the police rather being the public safety threat rather than the public safety officer or assistant. So I would leave you to say that I encourage you to fund the elementary schools and fund schools in general rather than funding the police. Thank you. Okay. If you have no objection, I would just recognize Kathleen Anderson as the final speaker for this hearing. That's fine. Thank you. Kathleen, then please join us. You need to unmute yourself. Okay, so I have two devices I didn't know which one was going to work. So I'm Kathleen Anderson. I'm from district seven. I have been in Amherst since 1974 for about 50 years almost. I'm a 50th generation USR and have been experiencing a number of threats from police personally as well as having a history of the injustices that police officers can often cause to people of color people who look like me. So I don't want to. So what I want to do is support the comments that almost every single person has made that it's time to really look out for the residents of the town and not the police of the town. And that the school district needs to have funds so that subjects that are important to people's lives, like art, for example, are able to be funded and allow many students to experience themselves as whole people. I also would like this committee to start thinking about reparations and how the town will support the next speakers about the reparations proposals for our town. Thank you. Thank you very much Kathleen and at this point I am going to call the hearing on the budget to a close and thank all of the speakers who joined us this evening. We have heard you there was a lot of comments, most of which were about the community service working group and at the beginning of the meeting. We did announce the date in which the working group will present its report formally to the council. It has not been presented yet. And the date of the next finance committee meeting in time, in which the finance committee is going to meet with members of the working group and then move forward with the process. So with that, I've adjourned the hearing I'm going to adjourn the finance committee meeting and turn this over to Chris and please mark. Thank you very much. Thanks Andy for taking for managing that hearing and thanks to all of you who have spent the evening with us, making comment and listening to the comments that have been made. Before we break and we are going to take a break. I want to do a little budget, I want to do a little agenda check with a few people okay. I'm going to be meeting next Monday, the 24th. And I'd like to know from a standpoint of urgency, whether we can move water and sewer rates, and comroy village intersection to next Monday night. And I'm going to look to Paul on that one I don't believe there's a problem but I want to make sure there's not. I'm going to move to Mandy Joe Hanneke and CRC and a planning board and see whether or not the proposed amendment to zoning bylaw section 5.001. And the proposed changes to let me deal with that one separately, whether or not the first one, 8D could be moved to next Monday. Paul. I don't know if CRC are fine to move if that's the council's choice. Okay, and then 8D Mandy Joe. 8D would be fine to move till next Monday and I would defer to Councilor Schreiber. Sponsor on 8E. Right. So Councilor Schreiber if we moved 8E to next Monday night does that work. That's fine. Now I'm going to ask the council, are there any objections and if there are, please raise your electronic hand. Okay, we will return 10 minutes and I'm going to be generous here again and give you a 10 minute break and we will be back. Please turn off your videos, turn them back on when you return. Okay, I think all of my things were just moved to next Monday. I'm going to turn, please put your video back on so that I know that you're back. Thank you. As you come back, please turn your video on so that I know you're back. I'm waiting for three counselors to turn their videos back on. Thank you, George. Channel any waiting for Dorothy. If you're back Dorothy please turn your video on. Dorothy are you back. Dorothy are you back. I'm going to, I'm going to flip one other item, not eliminate but just flip. We're going to move to the consent agenda. So, and then back to the general public comment. So the consent agenda is as follows. The following items were selected because they were considered to be non controversial. The next item from the consent agenda. Please let me know that that does not require a second. I'm going to be looking for a second for the following motion to move the following items and and the printed motions there under and approve those items as a single unit. Adoption of resolution opposing the closure of the course. Children's Center at Mount Holyoke College. 6b adoption of race amity day annual proclamation. Suspension of town council rules and procedure rule 8.4 for agenda item a state reclamation and mosquito control board spray. The next item is to act tonight, but does not adopt our plan. 8f adoption of audit requests for proposals are a fee committee charge and 11 approval of minutes February 16, 2021 special time Council meeting minutes joint meeting with finance committee. May 3, 2021. Regular town council meeting minutes. Is there a second. We have. Alyssa. I'm sorry, my hand was to remove something. Okay. I'll second it. Okay. You'd like to remove. The adoption of the resolution on the course Children's Center. Okay. And Mandy Joe. Mine was for the same. Okay. And Evan. Yours. Okay. The motion stands as shown, except we are removing. The adoption of red. Of resolution opposing the closure of the. Of resolution opposing the closure of the course Children's center at Mount Holyoke college. Okay. And if the motion has been made in second. Are there any other discussions or requests. I've seen none. Then I'm going to move to a vote. Alyssa Brewer. Alright. At the end of this. All right. Darcy is absent. Lynn Griesper is in aye. Mandy Johanicki? Aye. Dorothy Pam? Aye. Evan Ross? Aye. George Ryan? Yes. Kathy Shane? Yes. Steve Schraber? Yes. Andy Steinberg? Aye. Sarah Schwartz? Aye. Chalene Ball-Mill? Yes. Passes 12-0-0 with one absent. And when we get to the proclamations, we'll take up that item as well. We are now going to move to general public comment. And let me just point out, we still have another specific public comment later. And that is on the mosquito spray. This is general public comment. And people have already spoken about the budget. And so this is not the time to speak about the budget, OK? I'm looking for hands for people who would like to make general public comment. I see one Connecticut River Conservancy. Hi. This is actually Corey Kurtz. I don't know how to change that from my work message. My name is Corey Kurtz. I live in District 5. I'm one of several parents who are here tonight to ask you to please support the resolution opposing the closure of Gorse Children's Center at Mount Holyoke College. I grew up in Amherst and graduated from ARHS. I don't know if you can hear my daughter in the background, but we're still doing bedtime. Apologies. I am the parent of two young kids, a three-year-old who is currently at Gorse Children's Center and a five-year-old who attended Gorse Children's Center and is now a kindergarten or a crocker farm. When I became pregnant with my first child, my partner and I immediately started looking for childcare. And I was luckier than many because I had a 12-week unpaid maternity leave. But we both work full-time, and we knew we needed full-time, full-year infant care. Gorse was one of the only daycares in the area that provided that kind of care and was open year-round from 7.30 to 5.30 PM, 7.30 AM to 5.30 PM. We were able to get a spot, and we've been very impressed with the quality of care. We ended up sending our second child there, too, also from infancy. During the pandemic, when Gorse closed, along with all the other childcare providers in the area, like many families, we had a hard time. With the lack of childcare, and we were very glad when Gorse finally reopened last fall. However, in February, Mount Holyoke announced that they would not be renewing the Children's Center contract, and it would be closing in June. That closure impacts 80 families and two dozen skilled childcare providers who work there. We looked everywhere, including contacting every child care center in Amherst. And we're unable to find any slots available for my daughter on such short notice. And most programs were full through 2021. The lack of childcare was already a problem pre-pandemic for many Amherst families, particularly those who need infant care. And it's made things so much worse during the pandemic, as centers have closed and the guidelines from the CDC have reduced capacity. Every week, someone posts the Amherst Parents list serve in search of childcare. As you know, this lack of care disproportionately impacts women and essential workers. Families impacted at Gorse include health care workers, teachers, firefighters, and EMTs, who were on the front lines during the pandemic and needed that kind of full-time care. The Hadley Select Board, at the recommendation of its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee, has already voted on a similar measure to send a letter calling on Mount Holyoke College to keep Gorse open. We, the families who are impacted here in Amherst are asking the town council here just to do the same and to ask Mount Holyoke College to continue its commitment to Amherst and to surrounding families to provide on-campus care beyond next June, just like the other four colleges in the area. Thank you. Thank you, Corey. Irv Rhodes. Good evening, Madam President, Madam Vice President, Town Manager, and Councilors. My name is Irv Rhodes, and I am a resident of District 5. First, I want to thank all of the Councilors for their service to the community. I have watched in awe the working of the Charter through your hard work done over the past years under very difficult circumstances. Given that your first terms are the first terms under the Charter and giving my hand in helping to create the Charter, I am humbled by being able to appear before you at this time. It seems that the working of the Charter is unfolding as planned. I am a part of a group of present and former Black elected officials who have come together to put in place a census of Black Amherst residents. We do this with a sense of urgency, given the policy decisions that are before the Council or soon will be before the Council. Specifically, the reparations proposal and others that have specific impacts on Amherst community in general and the Black citizens of Amherst in particular. At present, there is no group or individual who can say that they speak for the Black community. This has been so for a long time and it need not continue to be so. We have no idea as to the Black community attitude or stance as regard reparations or any other social or political issue in Amherst, this must not continue. Thus, the Black census, the objective of the Black census is at a minimum to register up to 20% of the Black residents, 18 or older, based upon the census of 2000 Black residents. As we continue to register Black citizens of Amherst, we are looking at organizational models that will enable the registered Black citizens to become a former group, so that they would be able to speak with one voice to an Amherst community on a variety of issues. We will be asking the town through some, for some means you have to be determined to help us in this endeavor. In the meantime, the registering continues. We are asking all African-American heritage residents to help create a Black census by emailing blackammers at gmail.com. Again, blackammers at gmail.com. The, appearing before the council this evening will be an African Heritage Reparation Coalition, which I am a member, and they will be bringing a proposal before the council that I really support. Given that the results of our efforts will be advisory of this committee will be advisory subject to review by the council and a resultant group that's in formation from the black census indicated above, I will be providing, I will want to make it clear that I support this group and I support this work and we'll look forward to it being implemented and subject to the review of the black group that is in formation. Thank you very much. Thank you for your comments, Robina, Rabia. I'm so, I'm so sorry about pronouncing your name. No problem. Thank you so much for your time. Hi everyone, thank you so much for your time. Today's been heavy on many fronts and I really appreciate you taking time to hear from us. My name is Rabia Ahmed and I am in district two. I moved to Amherst. We moved to Amherst about two years ago and I wanted to comment to urge you all to support the resolution to ask Mount Holyoke College to continue on campus care. We moved my family and I moved to the Pioneer Valley about five years ago and we moved specifically for my partner's job at Mount Holyoke College. When we moved here, we knew we wanted to settle into living in Amherst but at the time we were living in faculty housing and our child and our child and since then children have gone to the daycare at Mount Holyoke College. It was one of the main reasons why we chose to relocate to this area as a family. It is a center that is very, very, very warm and kind to families of diverse backgrounds and people of color. It is one of the only childcare centers that offers infant care, aftercare, spring break care, summer care camps, which is essential to working parents such as myself and my partner. It may seem that this is something that is limited to South Hadley but I urge you to consider that we are so interconnected as a community here. Childcare in the Valley is very, very limited and high quality childcare is really hard to find and the Gorse Children's Center provides extremely high quality childcare for working families that have been so deeply affected by the pandemic and as Cori said, women especially are so deeply affected by this and the closure of Gorse would impact about 80 families in this area, many of whom live and work in Amherst. So I really urge you to consider the resolution to ask Mount Holyoke College to continue their on-campus daycare program similar to the resolution that was adopted by the Hadley town. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you for joining us. Sametri, please re-pronounce your name and tell us where you live. It's Robert Samet and forgive me, I am an ex-Amherst resident but one of the members of the Gorse Action Group, a number of us had to get off of the call, get off of the meeting this evening and I felt like it was important for one of us, another one of us to speak up. I'm also urging you to ask Mount Holyoke College to preserve on-campus childcare. The Gorse Children's Center has been in South Hadley for generations now. It's an incredibly important resource, not just for South Hadley, but for the larger Valley community. There are dozens, if not hundreds of families in Amherst whose children have gone to Gorse. I'd also point out, and I think if there's any hesitance on this, there is a difference between, say, a private childcare center and one that is funded by a not-for-profit, a not-for-profit that like many of our other colleges and universities in the area have tax exempt status, largely for the provisioning of public goods. And this is probably the single most important public good that Mount Holyoke College provides for this community. The uproar by camp, by faculty, and within the community, within the larger Valley community has had a lot to do with the unnecessariness of these cuts and this closure. If you have reservations about voting for this, for this resolution, I would urge you maybe to look at the articles in the Boston Globe or Inside Higher Education, both of which show that there's not a whole lot. There weren't a whole lot of good reasons for this cut. It's a center that's a vital resource for so many of us in the Valley, and I'd urge you to keep it. Thank you so much for hearing me. Thank you for your comment. Katia Vavova, again, please re-pronounce your name when you come on and tell us where you live. Thank you so much. My name is Katia Vavova and I live in District 2 and my son went to course from when he was an infant because it was one of the only places I could find that had infant care. And I have to say, I'm not sure how I would have survived his first year if I hadn't had that resource. There's a real dearth of infant care in the Valley and significant wait lists everywhere else. I used to live elsewhere, I moved to Amherst and I still wanted my child to go there. I consider the Valley a really interconnected place and I think this is a really important resource both in terms of the extended hours for essential care workers and for just working families in general. So I just wanted to urge you to consider the resolution. Thank you. Thank you, Katia. Kathleen Anderson, please. Do you hear me? We can. Yes, yes, so I'm from District 7. I'm a former elected official served on the school committee. I have served also on several other town committees, Planning Board, the Human Rights Commission and the former president of the Amherst NAACP. Currently, I serve as the New England, the female co-chair of the New England chapter of the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America. And I am one of the elected officials serving on the committee that Irv Rhodes mentioned. And we're working to organize our black community members. It's important that after the 400 years of which many white people have been enriched by the condition of the enslavement of African people and that the town of Amherst has also benefited by the discrimination against the African population here. I want us to have you thinking about and be concerned about the topic of reparations. I want you to investigate. In fact, I will send materials for your learning that you can review so that you get a sense and an understanding for the context of reparations and how Amherst can support that. I know that the town council has already approved a resolution brought forward by two members of our community. And as Irv mentioned, the black community of Amherst is organizing itself so that we can speak with one voice about the ways in which reparations needs to take place in our town. Thank you and I yield my time back. Thank you, Kathleen, for joining us. Nadine, please enter the room and state your full name and where you live. Yes, hello, Nadine Mazzard. And I live in Amherst in Village Park. I'm calling on behalf of the Reparations Committee. I basically, as a resident of Amherst as a person of color, BIPOC, I am here in solidarity, definitely trying to promote and to have this organization move forward. Whatever the Reparations Committee would like to do, I stand behind them. And then second, I'd also like to say that I do believe Amherst, given the five colleges, we should also be supportive of Mount Holyoke and rethinking the course shutdown of the course program. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Jessica Mayer, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Thank you. My name is Jessica Mayer. I am an Amherst resident of District Five. And I would like to urge you to support the resolution against the closure of Gorse Children's Center by Mount Holyoke College. I am a faculty at Mount Holyoke College and I have three children who are currently or have attended Gorse. The oldest is now a second grader. I crocker farm elementary. All three have enjoyed the wonderful care of the infant room, toddler rooms, preschool room, currently kindergarten prep room. I consider the Gorse Children's Center the perfect prelude to entering the Amherst school system. My seven year old was wonderfully prepared for socially and academically entering kindergarten The Gorse Children's Center has made it possible for me to be a productive academic scholar, professional at Mount Holyoke, while also being a parent and a resident of Amherst. I believe it is a critical resource, not only for South Hadley, of course, but for the entire area. And I have spent many, many hours of my life driving between South Hadley and Amherst when I didn't even necessarily need to go to my office in order to ensure that my children could continue to receive the care there. Like others, looking tonight, it was quite a shock to the system when we learned very abruptly that would be closing. And it has been a relief to have a brief reprieve from that, but we still, our eyes still, I can't speak for everyone, but I believe that we all have deep concerns that Mount Holyoke continue its resolution or may be resolved and reminded about the importance of this resource for Amherst residents and for residents of this entire extended community in the five colleges area. Thank you very much. Thank you for your comments. Zoe Crabtree, this is the last hand I see up. And so I'm going to hopefully end public comment with it. Zoe? Hi, thanks for listening to me briefly again this evening. I wanted to speak in the general public comment section in support of the reparations for Amherst Group and the work that they are doing in our town. I think it's really important and work that needs to happen alongside all of the other things we talked about at the beginning of this meeting. So I know we're gonna hear a full presentation from them later and I just really, really urge you to listen and take heart to it. Thank you so much. Thank you for your comments. Are there any other public comments at this time? All right, thank you. We are going to now go on to the resolutions and we already automatically passed Race Amity Day annual proclamation and we're going to have some words spoken about that next week. So I'm not gonna ask for any additional comments, but on the resolution opposing closure of the Forest Children's Center at Mount Holyoke College, there were two counselors that opposed this, or that asked that this be pulled from the consent agenda. I'd like them to speak. Alyssa? I'm still moving off, not talking about Race Amity Day. In terms, and thank you and I appreciate that Ash Hartwell will be able to speak to it next week during public comment. I just wanna make sure it gets out in the news items tomorrow. So thank you for that. In terms of pulling the other item from the, I'm reflecting actually just basically what was in the GOL report that was issued to us, which was the concern that of course it's critically important to have infant care slots. Of course it's critically important to continue really valuable programs like this. I just don't see that it's the role of the Amherstown Council to do that. And I would say that if it was a program at Amherst College or a program at UMass as well. It isn't simply the fact that it's in South Hadley. It is literally not something I feel like we should be weighing in on. Thank you. Mandy Jo? Alyssa pretty much said it. I just don't think it's appropriate for the council to be weighing in on a private business decision like this. Okay. So I'm going to ask. Then you have a hand up. I'm sorry. Shalini, please speak. Yeah, I wanted to speak on behalf of why this is important for us as a council to support our residents because many of the families who stayed up and thank you for all of you for staying up and coming here to speak to us and sharing your experience and the value of this program. I believe it is important for us as a council to weigh in for several reasons. One, these are residents of Amherst who are impacted. They choose to move here and live in Amherst knowing that there's this resource available. There are workers who are affected who work at Mount Holyoke and are going to be impacted by it. This is part of the five college consortium. And as we heard that it is one of the few paybacks that colleges provide as a nonprofit, one of the services they provide. And just given the way the world is moving, I don't think we can live in silos where, yes, of course, it's a decision that Mount Holyoke has to make based on whatever reasoning they have. But I think the only thing we can do in solidarity and is in inviting Mount Holyoke to consider the different towns, the surrounding towns that are inviting them to think about it and to be transparent in the process to provide the reasoning for the decisions. And I think it's really important that we are all working together, that the council and the UMass and the different universities and all of these surrounding five colleges that we're in dialogue and really looking at things in a collaborative manner. So that's one thing. And the last thing is that I do feel Mount Holyoke is it's a leader and it's shaping the minds of young leaders and the decisions they make and how they make these decisions really shaping the future of our country. Michelle and you're the council sponsor of this resolution. Dorothy, you have your hand up. I want to agree that I believe that we should make a statement on this issue. Infant Daycare is an absolutely essential service. It's a service that we do not provide. Yet it's essential for people who live and pay taxes in this town. And just as the families from North Village on UMass campus came to us with the problem that we could not solve but they came with their families to use us as a platform to present their case. This is what these parents are having to do. Sometimes you have to speak to somebody who might listen. And it certainly helped with the North Village. So I am saying I think that we should add our thoughts on this issue. Thank you. Andy, you have your hand up. Yeah, I mean, I was concerned about it when I saw the resolution too because I think that we as a council really need to start giving some thought through an appropriate committee process to what resolutions we deem to be appropriate for council consideration what are within the scope of interest and come up with a clear definition we've had a few and I'm not gonna name others that I think have really stretched what was intended in the charter for the council for our resolutions and what has been passed practice. And I think that we're really now just kind of swimming on the feel good question. And I say that being somebody who needed infant daycare from my kids and has a daughter who needed infant daycare for her kids. So I'm not neglecting the importance to the people who've spoken but I do think that the council really needs that discussion. Pat. Thank you. I'm not denying that the council needs the discussion but I wanna support our voting this positively on this resolution. We interfere with private business all the time in Amherst when we make decisions, we make bylaws that affect what kind of bags they can use and whether it costs them money to get rid of them and all kinds of things. This is not a feel good issue to me. It's an issue of an educational institution that for whatever reason is making a decision that impacts Amherst residents, impacts residents in Hadley and South Hadley. And I don't think it's frivolous. I think it's important that we hear these voices and there is as one of the speakers spokes said there's a disparate impact on women and essential workers with the closing of this daycare. And I think we need to address that as a council. Thank you. Thanks, Pat. Kathy? I'll add to what Pat just said that I think the point that these are nonprofits and don't pay taxes and this is part of what we can think of as a community benefit is a real one. If Amherst College was offering this, if UMass was offering it, I would cheer them and if they tried to close it down, I think we should be speaking on it because none of us, none of these communities gets enough back other than we know that they are a major stimulus for the whole area. But it's part of the partnership, I think, that allows them to succeed and dwell. And I think infant care, it's horrible that we just don't have it. I mean, I would like universal coverage on this. And for infant care, our kids, I would not have been able to be working when I had the first two kids if DC didn't have centers that had this. And when we got up here, there wasn't anything. So I think it's really important to be thinking of this as a resource that's a valley resource as we just heard described. George? Yeah, I think that it's important we're having this discussion. And that's what we should be doing. And perhaps in the past there have been resolutions where we should have had this discussion, but we didn't. It was discussed at GOL, I think it was appropriate. I'm happy to see it being discussed here. I was convinced at GOL, and I'm even more convinced this evening that this is relevant and that we should weigh in. So I'm going to vote in support of it. I am going to suggest that GOL take this up at the time convenient to them, knowing the many, many other things on their agenda. But with regard to this particular resolution, Shalini, I'm going to look for a second from you. The motion is to adopt the resolution opposing the closure of the Gorse Children's Center at Mount Holywell as presented. Is there a second? I second that, Shalini. Okay, is there any other discussion? Okay, seeing none, I'm going to start the vote. Patty Angeles. Aye. Marcy Dumont's absent. Lynn Gries-Murdersen. Aye. Mandy Johannity. Abstain. Okay. Dorothy Pam. Aye. Evan Ross. Aye. George Ryan. George, you need done mute. I apologize. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Steve Schreiber. Aye. Andy Steinberg. Abstain. Sarah Schwartz. Aye. Shalini Balmellan. Yes. Annalisa Burr. Abstain. Okay, so there are nine in favor, none opposed, three abstentions and one absent. Thank you. We're going to move on to our next agenda item, which is in fact, the presentation on reparations for Amherst. And with much delay, I would like to welcome Michelle Miller, Matthew Andrews, Dr. Barbara Love, and Dr. Amakar Shabazz. And they are going to be brought into the room. They're making a presentation, there have been items in your packet, and those items also were sent with additional, with links again today, but the items have been in your packet since late last week. So, Michelle, are we starting with you? I think we're starting with me. Oh. Thank you. Good evening, councilors, town manager. I am Barbara Love. I reside in district two in Amherst. I've been a resident of Amherst since 1970, well over half a century. I am here with my colleagues to ask the town council to support two policy actions. My colleagues are African-Americans in Amherst who hold or previously held elected public office in the town of Amherst. In addition to myself, we include Kathleen Anderson, Ben Harrington, Paula Lord, Irv Rhodes, and Professor Amal Karshavas. We are meeting with a growing group of Amherst African heritage residents who share our concern on these matters. The first policy action that we ask of you is this, that you read a resolution that is currently in Congress expressing approval of reparations at the national level, HR 40 and S 40, and that you endorse this resolution. We leave this resolution in your hands for you to read and we encourage you to endorse this very important federal legislation. The second action, we request that you undertake reparative justice for the harm of anti-black racism in the town of Amherst. From the beginning of the town, when people of African descent were enslaved in Amherst, down to and including the present moment when racial disparities and injustices continue to exist. Research has been presented to you on this. You passed a statement acknowledging these injustices and crimes against humanity in 2020. The remaining step is for this body to commit itself to cease harm, to redress and to work for justice and healing. The policy idea has been presented to you to direct tax revenues in Amherst into a fund that the Amherst American community would direct to the needs and priority areas that it determines would best promote equity and justice. We endorse that policy idea and call upon you to make this happen as soon as possible in the coming months and before the end of this year, 2021. We know that this can be done and we encourage you to act on this immediately and let us begin to heal as a town. I yield the balance of our time to my colleague, Dr. Chavaz, who will inform you about how we are prepared for all of the things we have to do to initiate this. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Dr. Love. Oh, yes, thank you, Dr. Love. I am a Bill Koshibaz. I live in District 5. I'm waiting a plane to take me back to our beloved District 5. I have been a resident of the town since 2007. I concur with all that my colleague has presented and I wish to briefly inform you of how we wish to partner with you in promoting justice and making this town a leader in the fight for reparations and the justice and healing it will bring. The black elected officials have studied reparations and are organizing the African descent community and Amherst to the movement for reparations on a national, state, and local level. We are engaged in an organizing process of identifying who identifies as black African-American through what we call the black census. Of course, the Census Bureau puts us at a certain figure, but we're all anxiously awaiting the 2020 census figures to be released so that we can know exactly what the size is. We are asking all African heritage residents to help create a black census by emailing blackamherst at gmail.com with the following information, your first and last name, an email address, phone number, residential address, and how long you've been a resident in Amherst. To date, we have approximately 100 residents on our census and we input more every day. With the black census, our community will be in a position to come together to deliberate and assemble people similar to how town meeting would discuss and vote on warrant articles. This is the process by which we are organizing from a black census to achieve a black consensus that will direct reparative justice funds toward the greatest needs we identify for our local community. When you act to create a reparative justice fund, our community will be ready to move toward transformative justice. Be a leader now, act to endure as we have asked three times now and this being our final time, HR 40 and S 40, as well as to create a reparative justice fund. Thank you, some blessings. Thank you, Michelle. Thank you, Dr. Love and Dr. Shabazz. So we also had Mr. Cam Howard. He was on the call for a while. He is the national co-chair of ANCOBRA, the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America. Unfortunately, he had to leave, but he does have a statement that he'd like me to share. But I'll start by saying my name is Michelle Miller. I'm the co-founder of Reparations for Amherst and a District One resident. On December 7th, 2020, this body voted unanimously to approve a resolution to end structural racism and achieve racial equity in Amherst. Counselors, we appreciate the commitment you made to engage in a path of remedy for Black residents, especially without knowing exactly what that may look like. Since the resolution was passed, Reparations for Amherst has been engaged in significant work to lay the foundation for our presentation this evening. Specifically, we have been developing the report in your packet, Anti-Black Racism and Black-White Disparities in Amherst, which was the basis for the educational symposium we hosted on April 27th. Please note, the draft report is in the process of being reviewed and will remain open to be developed over time. Earlier in the year, we made a $5,000 request to Mr. Backelman to enable us to expand our research to include qualitative data, specifically to engage Black folks in the process. We are pleased to share that Mr. Backelman has made a verbal commitment to allocate those funds to our for A, and we're working together to determine a path that meets the legal requirements of the town. This is a tiny seed of hope and accomplishment and something that we can and should tend to and develop together. We have also spent a significant amount of time hearing the unique perspectives and experiences of residents of Black heritage in Amherst, in extraordinary honor. Through these conversations and our work together, we have been brought closer to the lived reality of our African-American neighbors, an experience that most White people in Amherst do not have. This is what we must presence and hold on to as we continue on the path of remedy together. In that spirit, I'm going to make an ask. In solidarity with the Amherst African heritage residents for reparations, we are asking the town council to create a committee to study and develop preparation proposals for African-Americans. We've drafted a proposed committee charge which is available in the meeting packet for tonight. This request, if approved, will be a significant step in advancing reparative justice in Amherst. And I'll pass it to Matthew now. Thanks, Michelle. My name is Matthew Andrews. I'm the co-founder of Reparations for Amherst and the resident of District 2. Our research has shown that specific harms have been committed against Black people in Amherst. But what the research cannot do for a White person like myself is connect me to the multifaceted lived experience of a Black person living in a community that demonstrates it values them less than it values others. The Wall Street Journal reported that it would take 228 years for Black families to amass the wealth of White families. But what's it like to live inside that statistic? We White people are blinded to that reality about our cultural conditioning. We're inhibited from actually seeing reality as it is. The trauma of anti-Black racism did not end with slavery. The persistent dismissal of Black experience is psychologically traumatizing. And you, members of the Amherst Town Council, have an opportunity today to stand for something different and prioritize reparations now. You're representatives of a structure that is culpable. We've shown that through our research that the town of Amherst was responsible for causing material harm to Black people. Now's your chance to move toward repair and make your priorities clear by making specific budget allocations. If you try to skip over a process of reparations for past harms, racial equity efforts will continue to be hamstrung. With your commitment, reparations will open the door to more clear and effective collaborations to create a town that welcomes and values all. Last year you allocated $80,000 to combat structural racism. Over the past year, the true scope of the problem has begun to be revealed. And we can see that much more investment is needed. Structural racism and the harm it caused is a long-term problem that will need a long-term solution with short, medium, and long-term goals. In addition to our short-term recommendation to create a committee of the town to research and recommend a path for reparations, we also recommend that you ensure the community safety working group has the funding they need in the coming year to fulfill their charge, which would mean a substantial increase over their current allocation. Material reparations is going to require prioritization in the budget. Your immediate action in this coming budget cycle will set a precedent and demonstrate the seriousness of your commitment. We realize, and in the context of all the talk there's been about the budget tonight, we especially realize that this will create, require creativity and courage. This town has played a part in the national structure that have prevented black families from accumulating intergenerational wealth. Our town's reserves, our own accumulated wealth, should not be considered off limits as a source for writing this wrong. A recent Time Magazine article notes that Americans are repeating an old pattern, talking about racial inequity, but doing little to solve it. Are you ready to stand up as a leader and change this pattern? We're standing right now on the brink of possibility and you have the opportunity to influence the course of history. Thank you. Thanks to each of you. So first of all, before I ask for questions and comments, Dr. Barbara Love, if you would, if you have a specific resolution or proclamation that you would like us to see, please advance that to me and assume that it is already referred to GOL, which is one of my responsibilities. And if not, we will work with you to develop that resolution and bring it back to the council for adoption. Okay. And then I'm looking for other questions and comments from the council. Yes, there is a resolution and I will figure out how to advance it to you, as you say. Thank you. I'll make sure that I have your email and I'll make sure we're in touch. Thank you. Alyssa. I'm assuming that resolution we're speaking of is in favor of HR 40, so that we have a way of saying not just we like it, but the official resolution type language. So that's great. The other thing I just wanted to ask about is I know that Mr. Kim Howard was on the call for a long time and then had to leave. And I wondered if we could still have his statement read. I'm happy to read it if time allows for that. It's a pretty short statement. Please go ahead. Sure. And also the resolution that Dr. Love is speaking of is in the packet. So it is available in the packet. Yeah. Thank you, Michelle. Absolutely. So this comes from Mr. Kim Howard and Cobra holds that local reparations allow for communities to intentionally address the continued injuries of enslavement, Jim Crow and ongoing systemic harms to the black community. In accessing the injuries, the community can prioritize the areas most needed resources and begin to pinpoint those resources in a way that aids in the healing of the historic ills. As such, every local community in America should be localizing reparations. And Cobra has worked with the organizers and stakeholders there in Amherst and are in total support of these efforts and the legislation put forth. And Michelle, I don't think we have a copy of that, but if you would send it to us, we will put it in the packet for the safety. Absolutely, yes. All right. Alyssa, your hand up. Okay. Mandy, Joe. Yeah. I don't know whether this is the right time. We've gone with motions to refer in the past under presentation. So I'd like to make a motion whenever you believe is the right time. Please go right ahead. I move to refer the African Heritage Reparation Coalition charge to GOL for report and recommendation by June 21st, 2021. Okay. It was seconded by Patty Angelis. Anything else you'd like to say to that, Mandy, Joe, at this time? I think it's pretty self-explanatory. Great. Thank you. Shalini. Is this the right time to then have a discussion about, as a council about the formation of the committee and their ask for. Yes. Okay. So I definitely want to support. The formation of a committee and. You know, I know that we also get emails from residents who are. Confused or they feel why now there's so much going on. Why should this be put right in front of, you know, why is this a priority when we have schools and we have policing and we have BIPOC community and there's so many issues. And I just want to say that. You know, this is the right thing to do. It's overdue. We have not. Done the work of reparations towards black people and. And it really, you know, even if you just look at it from, I personally believe it's the right thing to do that as a community, we cannot heal. We cannot thrive. If there are people who are still suffering the trauma of. You know, historically what's happened and we've not worked together to heal. And it's the right thing to do, but there's also research to show that it also entails costs for white people, whether it's psychological and. Spiritual material, physical costs. And it's really important that. You know, it's important for us to be able to be working together in this community to be able to speak openly and support each other and ask questions and have trusting relationships that we really start with the work of healing and. And so I would really encourage that having a committee to spearhead that process and do that work is really essential. And I think that if there was anything else, it's. I think I'll stop here for now. There's a motion that's been made and seconded. With regard to the committee charge. And the motion is to refer to GOL to come back to the council by June 21st, I believe was the date. Okay. Alyssa. So I know we're short on time. And I know the presenters have been really patient with us. So I just want to make sure I'm in the right headspace here. So I believe Lynn, that you already informally referred the actual resolution that was already provided to us in our packet to GOL. So we gave GOL that task without voting. Mandy Joe has made a motion that's been seconded to refer the charge to GOL to review. So two things have gone to GOL. I think that's a great question is when is it that we discuss the idea of the funding stream associated with the marijuana slash cannabis taxes that has been referenced elsewhere in that, if we're going to be having that conversation for the FY 22 budget, then we need to be having it now or like, how do we have that conversation in terms of a funding stream? Or is that something we're just putting off until next year? So I just want to be clear on where we're at with that since we've done the other two pieces. And then we step back and say, I've formally referred that resolution because the president of the council gets to do that every once in a while. I get to do something by myself. Second of all, there is a motion on the floor. It's been made in second. Let's deal with that motion. And then if there's other discussion or questions that we are, we'd like to have with the presenters. We'll go ahead and do that. Okay. So the motion's been made in seconded. Are there other comments on the motion? Evan. Yeah. Is the. Sorry, it's late. Is the intent of the motion. For it to be reviewed by GOL for clarity, consistency and action ability as per GOL, or are we asking GOL to. We're asking GOL to do that. And we're asking GOL to do that. We're asking GOL to edit and refine this charge. Because I'm looking at this charge and there's aspects of it that. I have some concerns for instance, about the composition, but that would be the substance of. Right. We asked to deal with. What we often ask them to do is just clear, consistent. Or are we actually. To deal with the substance of this charge. I'm confused by that. That's a very good point. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I worded it the way I did. To encompass both. I was trying to make it as simple as possible. So for report and recommendation, I specifically left out clarity, consistency and action ability, so that it would encompass both because I am aware that. Through my conversations with. Michelle. Yeah. I'm just going to draft this initially that it is not quite ready yet. So she is hoping. That there'll be some ability to do some modification. And I told her that would be possible within the referral to GOL. Are there other questions about that particular issue? Okay. So in other words, in this case. And GOL has looked at. Charges before. So in this case, they will be looking at it. Both for clarity consistent and action ability, as well as helping to shape it from a content standpoint. Any other comments on that from any member of the council. Are there any other comments about the creation of this committee before we send it off to the council. Dorothy. I mean, off to GOL, Dorothy. I guess I'm a little confused as to when you won't send contents. And we haven't discussed it. So we ask GOL to make it a really good motion. And then we discuss it. Or do we discuss it before we send it to GOL. If you have things you'd like to say about it now that they would be, they should be thinking about. That's fine. But you also have an opportunity to join GOL. And then you also have an opportunity. To talk about it when it comes back to the council. So if there are other things you want to say. About it input regarding this particular issue. Not any other. So I have a few thoughts, but part of me is reluctant to say them because I think part of the motion is that this committee. We'll make the suggestions, not us. So that's why I'm a little confused, but I will just say that whenever anyone talks about intergenerational intergenerational wealth, I think of property ownership and the harping on something I've talked about before in terms of what we're having built, what kind of buildings are being built in this town, which are all rentals. And that does not allow building up of wealth and benefiting from the growth of the capitalist system. So I know in some towns. There's a lot of, there's a lot of, there's a lot of, there's a lot of, there's a lot of. Reparations, the few places that have done it with maybe there's only one. One of the programs was helping people buy homes, helping people of African-American heritage by homes. And so of course we would then have to say. We're not building any new homes. So I just, if this is tied up with the whole thing we're talking about, are we including home ownership opportunities? Are we including affordable housing? And then that of course tie in with. One very. Reparations, which has been discussed, which is helping ownership as way of. Thank you. Kathy. I have a question, which is probably clear to everyone, but by. Referring this, we, I see it as that we're endorsing the concept of having such a committee. So what we're asking for is further work on the charge. At least in the past, we haven't worked on a charge of setting up something that we weren't intending up setting up. So it is, it's a vote for both. Yeah. I mean, yes, it's a vote for the next step on it. Am I correct in that? I think that would be a correct assumption. Thank you. Shalini. Yeah, I had a question for this. Whoa. Sorry. Just one second. Hello. Okay. Sorry about that. Okay. So the question to the reparations for Emma's group is. Yeah. I think that I want to acknowledge all the hard work that is gone. And I also feel that it's. It's really helpful to the town council to end to all of us to have a way to engage the black community, which we have not been able to do successfully and to have a process in place where you're, you know, have a way to engage the black community. So I think that's really important. What that healing is going to look like is really important. I also want to just acknowledge, and then I have a question. The acknowledges that you are speaking with other existing. Structures like the library trustees or the bed and the chambers and, and, you know, you know, you know, I think that using the existing resources that we have already in town and how can those, how can, and even LSE or, you know, like what are the existing resources we have and how can you all partner in service of creating programming or. Offering resources to the needs that then emerge from the black community. And that's also a recommendation for youth programming and multicultural center for the BIPOC community in the community safety working group. And so how, and I can sense that also that might be something that comes up as a, as a need from the black community. So I think that's a good question. I think that's a good question. So overlap or. I'm sorry. What might be the overlap or. Collaboration between the community safety working group and your group. Is there anybody from Michelle? Yeah, sure. I mean, we, so we attended the community safety working group meeting last week and had a similar conversation. We had a meeting, a liaison that can work on each committee to communicate. Because absolutely it's very possible that a community center would come up as a reparative measure in our group. So if we can work, especially, I mean. Work with the entire town council, but within our groups to really see whatever funding streams that we have, that we can be able to efficiently and effectively utilize those to meet our shared goals. And if anyone else wants to add to that. I'll just add what I said as a community safety working group meeting, which is that if I. Or the town council for that matter, we're to decide to allocate funding for a community center. Kind of on our own on my own. You know, that's not reparations. But it's not. It's not. It's not about empowerment upliftment. It's begins with the acknowledgement of what harms have been done in the past and the sincere desire to atone and bring healing for those harms. And that's the central principle. So as far as what happens, that's all secondary to the healing process. And it's going to require. I mean, I mean, I mean, I think the consensus that Dr. Shaba spoke about in order to direct the allocation. So the funding in a way that uplifts and empowers the voices of black people. And so if there's an overlap with community safety working group, that's great. But, you know, that's what's fundamental. Yeah. If I may just respond. And I think it's really important, the spiritual healing and as a community. Coming together and acknowledging and doing that healing. And I think it's really important that we have the support that we need to be supported with financial. Funding and support as well. So just to have a little clarity around that. So that. Okay. So. And okay. And the other thing that I'm struggling with right now is, which I think it's good to have these conversations upfront before all the work begins, because you can see that I'm completely on board and I completely understand what you're talking about. And I think it's really important that we have the support that we have. And I think it's really important that we have the support that we can have about it. I feel we can. Work in a way to ensure the success of the. Programs and the steps that we're taking. So with that in that, with that spirit in mind. And heart. My question would be that. In terms of the recommendations that we collect. And I feel that since you're. You know, I think it would be really helpful to when we get the recommendations that they're very specific in terms of. You know, because. My brain is a little exhausted. Forgive me, but. Many of the social programs that fail are because people with good health. So the hope is that you will get us. An understanding of what are the challenges of Amherst residents of black Amherst residents. So we can really look at solutions that are. Really supporting those. Specific problems that they're not general. General ass. Because we may then we have limited resources and we direct them, but then we find that no one's using those programs or those resources. So it would be really helpful to get. You know, using approaches like human centered approach or just your dialogue sessions or whatever processes you're using. To engage the black residents across the town. And we can really look at that. What are the specific problems? Sorry. I'm rounding. Okay. Then. I'd like to do. And I say Andy and Pat, want to speak specifically to the motion that's on the floor. And if you do leave your hands up. And because I wanted to bring it to a vote. If possible. Andy, you have your hand up. No, you don't. Alyssa, you have your hand up. This is the motion on the floor. We said we needed to give some direction to GOL about, because this is beyond their usual. Yes, they have looked at charges before, not like a million of them, like a couple. And so when it says here, a plan for developing ongoing funding streams to repair past harms, what's GOL going to do with that? Are they going to say, cool, that sounds fine, but we're going to complain about what's in the section on reports or are they going to try and refine that? Because again, I emphasize. We're not trying to exactly what was said to us for several hours earlier this evening about the community safety working group process. We're not trying to set people up to fail. And so if there's no money set aside for this and FY 22, then it has to be perfectly clear in the charge that it's going to be a plan for FY 23. If there is going to be money for FY 22, then that needs to be addressed here somehow. Motion is, is on the table to refer this to GOL, to come back to us by the 21st of June. It's a charge for a committee. It's, we're not going to solve everything. Before the charge, the committee is formed. We're not going to solve everything. Tonight. So I'm trying to figure out what else, how much further you want to go on this now? I mean, are you looking for a vote about a stream of revenue? I'm looking for not just paying lip service to a charge, because if the charge stays what it says right now, it comes back to the town council after we've voted the FY 22 budget or the same night as the FY 22 budget. And there's no money for this, anything that's in this charge in the FY 22 budget, then we've not done ourselves or anyone else a good service. So I appreciate that. We're in this awkward crazy place where we're trying to get the charge done and we're trying to figure things out. But there's a chicken egg problem here. And so we need to figure out if we're going to say, yes, there's a funding stream and it has to be identified in the FY 22 budget, which means we, I guess the finance committee needs to look at that since obviously it's not in the FY 22 budget. Or we need to just send it to GOL and say, we're not, we specifically know we're not putting any money in this into FY 23. I mean, we have to make that decision. We have so we can send it to GOL, but at the same time tonight, we have to decide if we're going to ask for some money and ask finance committee to look at that. Because they are inextricably intertwined. And so we're going to have to figure out if we're going to ask the finance committee to look at that. Because they are inextricably intertwined. It's if you can't just have a charge and say the money doesn't matter. Benji, would you like to speak to this? I guess I would respond with the. Charge is asked if as written, and that doesn't mean GOL won't change it or the reparations for Amherst after conversation and hearing this. Might modify it, but as written, it's asking. It's charging a committee with coming up with a plan. I guess I look at that and say a plan is more than one year long. You know, a funding stream is more than one year long. And so I, I guess that's my response is. I don't think I don't see why we'd have to decide a funding stream. I think that's a good point. I think that's a good point as well. When the charge, if we pass the charge and create a committee, the committee's charge would be to come up with a plan that includes a funding stream. Right. Which basically says to me. Then that funding stream would not happen. At least in this FY 22 budget. Because of other funds being available. Through some time during the year. I mean, I, I, I shall, and I want to give Dr. Love a chance to speak. Thank you. I simply want to point out that our request of you. Was specifically that a funding stream be identified. Thank you. And that if it isn't, we're essentially delaying this for another year. As Alisa has said. Okay. Shalini. Yeah, I think there are two questions of comments that I have. One is that as a council, I think before we send it to Jewel that there should be a discussion about it. I think people. There should be a space for people to ask questions, address their concerns and. And so we kind of are all on this similar same mesh page about this. And the second thing is that even if we don't identify the stream for the full plan, the recommendations that will follow. I do believe that there should be some funding to carry forward the research they will do or some kind of work that will need to happen to identify, you know, in the process. Dorothy. As you know, I am not the expert on the charter on rules or procedure or any of these things. So I'm just coming at you with plate common sense. So I'm just going to give you a little bit of an example. Let's see how a committee charge is the same as a plan. So our response to this request to send it to GOL as a committee charge just doesn't make any sense to me. We're trying to do something that that's not what they do when they do committee charges. They don't decide what the committee is doing, how it's doing, how it's funding. That's not what they've done, at least in the ones I've listened to in the last two and a half years. So I'm just going to give you a little bit of an example. With an instrument that's not set up for it. So we have to do something else. And I leave that to you to figure out what that something else is. Matthew. I just want to. First of all, thank you. Thank Alyssa for presencing the. The. The tangle here. And also reiterate what Dr. Love said in the sense that we did make several requests. And the charge has been a charge for the committee have been addressed specifically. What hasn't been what is, you know, the, the request that's hanging out there is for an allocation. And it sounds like the bold and courageous move would be to refer it to the finance community for the town council. To recommend that the finance committee figure something out. And I know that's not easy, but it seems like if you were to respond to that request, that would be the means of doing it. And so it's a matter of whether anybody has the will to do it right now. I agree. So. I'm going to take this in. And I'm going to split it. One is there's a charge to a committee. There's a chart. One is there is a committee charge. And that committee charge needs to be reviewed. And brought back to the council. The second is the request that some funding stream be identified. In this coming years. Financial plan. Not even going to say budget. Just financial plan. Okay. That is in fact the finance committee issue. Unless. And that's not saying that the council doesn't weigh in. That's not saying that. That's not saying that. That's not saying that. That's not saying that. And want them to think about something. So perhaps. The. Motion would be amended. To refer it. Or. Or make a separate motion to. On the finance committee side. All right. Let's deal with the motion that's on the floor. Okay. Okay. So I'm going to start with. To look at the committee charge and come back to the council. For FY. For June 21st. Is there any further discussion about the committee charge? Okay. Then I'm going to start with. I think. In Greece. And. I. Mandy Johanna key. Hi. Dorothy Pan. Hi. Hi. Hi. Evan Ross. Hi. George Ryan. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Steve Schreiber. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Hi. Sarah Schwartz. Hi. Shalini Balmill. Yes. Alyssa Brewer. Hi. Pat DeAngeles. Hi. Darcy Dumont is absent and so it is 12. 0, 0, and one absence. Now. Is there a separate motion? Alyssa. I am more than open to having the finance committee chair. Another finance committee person rephrase this in a way that makes more sense to them. But. My intention is to move. To refer. The charge document we have here. We have the finance committee. We have the finance committee. We have the finance committee. Even though it's weird to think of referring a charge to the finance committee. Referring the charge. Just because it has all the information on it. To the finance committee. For recommendation to the town council. On. A revenue stream. For this committee's work. In the FY 22 budget. There a second. We have the finance committee. We have the finance committee. We have the finance committee. Is there further discussion on this? Alyssa, you have your hand up. You need to unmute. Again, if the finance committee wants to word it slightly differently, but I'm just trying to get at giving them the same information. We're giving GOL having them look at that. And then I would also. Add, but not include in the motion. That I'm assuming that one of the things they'll look at is the finance committee. I'm assuming that's never been budgeted in the town budget before. Andy, I'm going to just skip. Evan for a moment and say, Andy, is there anything. Do you have. Are you comfortable with the motion. In that you understand what they're asking the finance committee to do. Is I, if I have the motion correctly. And I didn't. Couldn't write it down, but it is to. Identify. A revenue stream or identify what is the exact. Could I please have the. Read the motion. Sure. To refer the draft African heritage, reparation coalition charge to the finance committee for recommendation to the town council on a revenue stream for the committee's work in the FY 22 budget. Andy. I mean, I think that the more honest. Statement. It would be. Whether. There is a potential revenue stream. Because I'm not sure that we will conclude that there is one, but I think that the idea. Of getting the report back to the council. On whether there is such a stream and what it might be. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if it does inform the council, but I can't guarantee the result is that we will identify something we may not. I can't prejudge that. You understand what the finance committee is being asked. To look at. Yes. And it's only the end product. Because the end product. Is that there is one. And. By saying whether there is a revenue stream. Is a. More honest. Rendition because there is the possibility that. We'll come back and say. There is no easy revenue stream. Right. Yeah. I'm glad Andy. Finance chair understands what this motion is asking. Because I still am a little bit confused. So we're asking the finance committee to identify. A source of revenue to fund the work of this committee. That we are deciding we are likely. To. Create, but we don't know what the committee will need for funding. We don't know exactly what they're going to be doing, but we want to identify. A hypothetical source of revenue should they need money. Is that what we're asking. Which is something that we've never done for any other. Committee that a community safety working group. Had funds available to them. Right. That came from that $80,000 budget allocation, but that budget allocation was never, this is $80,000 to support the work of the community safety working group. That was just there. Access to tap into. So I'm a little bit confused about we're going to create a committee. And we're also going to identify. A funding stream. For this committee, I'm going to go on to George. Thank you. I also share some concerns. We're basically sending to finance a committee charge that really isn't final. And the council hasn't actually voted on. The natural process would be for us to. Establish the charge and vote on the charge and then. Send it to finance. If that was. We thought that were appropriate, but here we're. Still trying to figure out and finalize the charge. Same time we're sending it to finance. But the charge really hasn't been determined. So I think there's an order of process here that we should follow. We have not done this before. I understand this summer on feel that there's a need to act right away. But I think that. Is dangerous and such a dangerous precedent. Michelle. Yeah, I think it's important to make the distinction between. The committee itself needing money to do their work. Versus a stream of revenue to make reparations. Happen. And so I think. And I don't. Want to speak for the full group, but I think I'm confident in saying that even the $6,000. That reparations for Amherst has been, or the five or 6,000. The town. Town manager, Bachman is working with us on. Can be part of the funding that will help us with our work. For example. And building that census that we talked about. But the revenue stream to actually make reparations. Happen in accordance with the black community's wishes is a totally separate thing that we need to keep. You know, and have that distinction known. So if that helps at all. I wanted to throw that out there. That was my assumption. Of the. Of the difference at this point, but I thank you for that clarity. George, you still have your hand up. You have additional things you'd like to have. Thank you. I was. Going to say basically what Michelle said. But I don't have to say that. But I also want to say that I think that we can send. The committee. Charge simultaneously. To GOL. And to finance because it's clear. I don't want to say that. I don't want to say that. I don't want to say that. I don't want to say that. I don't want to say that. And. To GOL and to finance because it's clear we're looking to. Discover creatively. Look at our finances and begin to understand how we can have an ongoing fund for reparations. And those things can happen simultaneously. They do not have to be split. And I think Michelle for saying that so coherently. So I think that then it comes down to the finance committee. I appreciate the, well, there might not be a funding stream. Well, a funding stream in terms of ongoing. There obviously could be, it's a matter of choices. And so if we're not ready to make that commitment. So I think that in terms of an ongoing funding stream, because obviously the committee would just be getting started in terms of the funding for the committee's work, as Michelle referred to as Lynn referred to, then there should be. So you may want to reword what I said in terms of the original motion, maybe it just needs to be added to for the committee's work. And so it's potentially possible. The finance committee would come back to the town council and say, look, I think that's a good idea. And I think that's a good idea. And so I think that the, the 80,000 that Paul set aside again this year for no specific purpose within this umbrella of. Racial and social equity could potentially be accessed for that, for some committee work. And then in terms of revenue stream, we have no idea what to tell you about revenue stream. And we'll have to work that out over the course of the following year. I think that helps inform whether or not the town council is doing that. And it's a good idea to take the, I'll say this is the bottom line because I don't think it's a good idea to take those two things out, but finance committee addresses both of them. I will say again that this is not like some bizarre unheard of thing. The $80,000 that Paul did last year was a bizarre unheard of thing. That didn't turn, that was never community safety working groups money. And so from that standpoint, you're absolutely correct. It was never money for just that purpose. I don't know when we voted the 80,000 that we were going to find such a useful purpose for it. Similarly, if we have this kind of soft amount of money that's in the budget could that could potentially be accessed, just like this year for reparations but this following year for this committee for their work. Okay, and then the revenue stream is a separate discussion, and I will keep harping about the revenue stream associated with cannabis tax that without any town council discussion whatsoever. Town staff decided they were just going to include it in general operating funds and not dedicated to anything, even though we've talked for many years before, at least two of those staff members were in place about using it for housing or using it for social justice and that simply never happened. And the money's just been taken and used for something else, which is going to make it difficult to have it be an ongoing revenue stream. Evan. Okay, so I just want to make sure I'm clear. Michelle said Pat said the conversation about identifying a revenue stream for reparations is not part of this motion that is not what we are about, we are not asking finance committee to identify a revenue stream for reparations and in fact we shouldn't be doing that because that is literally part of the charge of this committee that we're creating is for them to a revenue stream I assume working with finance committee but that's not part of this motion this motion is strictly asking finance to apply potential funding to support the work of a committee charge we haven't even adopted and that's where I'm getting really caught up on this and that's where I'm feeling uncomfortable. So we created environment, energy and climate action we knew that it would take money for them to do what they were going to do we never said figure out where the money's coming from they found ways to get money right for community safety working group we created it, not knowing what they would so I'm struggling I'm likely going to vote against this, not because I don't support the work of this committee but because we haven't adopted. We don't know what they're going to do yet we don't know how much money they need and so we're coming up with a hypothetical. We're asking finance committee over the hypothetical revenue source to support an operation committee that doesn't even exist yet. And that I am comfortable with I'm perfectly comfortable with the committee when it does exist. And so we're asking the finance committee to identify a revenue stream to support a path of reparations and I think cannabis funds are a very logical one and I agree with elicit it is frustrating that we've never actually had a conversation with the council about whether or not to use this but that's not part of current conversation and that's where I'm getting frustrated. Dr love. Please. Yes, thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to speak three separate ideas. My presentation to you specifically asked you to direct revenues into a fund that the African American community would direct to the needs and priorities etc. It's about reparations. We, my group did not ask you to fund the work of the committee. So I wanted to make that clear. And second, I want to also say, yes, there are revenue streams, but there are choices. There are choices. So it's a matter of deciding on priorities and choices. So to say that there is no rev that you might find that there is no revenue stream is not correct. I decided that the revenue streams that are there would not be directed toward these purposes that would be direct to state. Third, I want to say yes this is new and different because reparations has never happened before ever, ever. So yes, this will be something new and different and probably bizarre and not unheard of since it has been talked about for a very long time. And it might feel odd. It might feel awful. And it is a possibility. Those are the three things I wanted to say. Thank you. I wanted to say my understanding of the motion is that the finance committee was to in fact, I think maybe the word identify is what is throwing people off was to explore and see where there might be a revenue stream to support reparations, not the committee's work. So that's what I understood the motion to be. So Evan, I, I, I disagree with where you are and that may make you uncomfortable, but that is what I understood the motion to be Sarah. So I just wanted to be clear since we're trying to be clear on this. What we're trying is that this entire charges about reparations. So if we're talking about reparations the first step is that we all said as a council. The town of air must we recognize that there were significant wrongs done harm to African American people in our town. What this is now asking us to do the second step is reparations. And so it's not up to this committee to start finding their own money or their own revenue stream within our government. It's our part of our reparations to them to find a revenue stream and that's where the choice comes. And that's how I'm understanding it. And I, I, if some if that's wrong, somebody please let me know. Thank you. That's how I understand to Evan. Maybe I just need to hear the motion again, because I have a different understanding of what this motion is. Can you please read the motion again. Sure, it's to refer the draft African heritage, reparation coalition charge to the finance committee for recommendation to the town council on a revenue stream for the committee's work in the FY 22 budget. That is not what we want. It may be that we need to identify we need to modify the motion. That motion is asking for money for the work of the committee reparations. Right, Mandy Joe. I think we need to change the words committees work to. Is it just reparations or a means of repair or I think we just need to replace those two words with something like reparations. Yes. I like that doctor love a reparation. Reparations fun. Okay. Who made the original motion. I've lost track. Mandy Joe, Alyssa did with Pat seconding it. Okay, Alyssa, do you accept that change. Tell it to me again, please. Replacing the words committees work with reparations. Replacing the words love committees work with the words a reparations fund. So, so, Athena would you now read the motion. Sure to if Mandy's amendment to refer the draft African heritage reparation coalition charge to the finance committee for recommendation to the town council on a revenue stream for reparations fund in the FY 22 budget. Mandy Joe. You further repair you want to do to that. No. Do you accept that change. So, obviously we're doing all this on the fly and so we're trying to figure this out so I think that does accomplish it when I said committees work that we later realized that was a poor choice of words because I was referring to their work in that not necessarily their work, but the work of the actual charge, which includes an ongoing ongoing funding streams I might point out, not necessarily just linking it town funds but town funds is definitely a part of that. And so I think that assuming that if the committee needs any money to do its actual work. That's something that could theoretically be done through that 80,000 or another source. That's one part for the FY 22 budget. I agree. I've gotten to some thinking was thrilled out the revenue stream part associated with a reparations fund is what works because we need to know that. So the committee knows what they're working with assuming we approve the committee, going into the FY 22 budget. So, thank you. Pat, you were the second. Are you accepting the change. Yes, I am. Thank you. Dr. Love, did you have a comment at this point. Thank you. Andy. I guess I'm still still concerned about whether you've given something to the committee that's even feasible for it to come up with the answer on because I can't guarantee that the committee will come up with a revenue stream. So it really gets to whether there is a revenue stream would be the more appropriate wording. Then at least we have a realistic base to work from. But I don't think that there to say that there's going to be a referral and there's going to be an easy resolution. We're coming back. Oh, here's a possible right here. Here's a revenue stream. We can't guarantee that. If I'm good if we're going to go on much longer on that subject. I probably would exercise the right to postpone. Are you exercising the rate to postpone or are you going to go on? Let me try one more time. Please read the motion to refer the draft African heritage reparation coalition charge to the finance committee for recommendation to the town council on a revenue stream for reparations fund in the FY 22 budget. We insert the word possible. So I think it would be a real disservice to all the people who have been waiting with us all night to work on this to postpone. So I really hope nobody pulls that lever. If it makes Andy feel better to say that possible word, I can live with that because I can tell you right now that if you come back and say there isn't one I'm going to say, well, I wouldn't say on camera. And so it's about choices. But if you as a finance committee say there really isn't one, that's something we need to hear as a town council. So if adding the word possible in there makes it possible for you to move forward, then I can certainly live with that. Pat, do you accept that change? I don't want to but I will. Okay. Andy, further conversation. I just can't speak to the committee to say what the committee, a result of the committee discussion would be and adding the word that's been proposed possible gives the full range of options to committee that will have to meet and then make its own determination. Matthew. And use the word easy several times. And I don't think any of us are under the illusion that this is going to be easy. Michelle and I didn't start this work a year ago because we thought it was going to be easy. We don't have any assumption that it's going to be easy for the town. But this is a possible historic moment that we have the opportunity to step into. And easy is really not part of it. And what I wonder is whether, and I don't know about the, the charter enough to know this, but if the, can the town council say that you have to find a stream. I mean, is that an option that that the town, I don't want to hang things up anymore than they need to be. I know it's very late and I appreciate all of your attention and time to this but I'm just curious if that's a possibility for the town council to say that there has to be a stream. It's, it might be possible but it's not good form. And I think the best thing at this point is to go with the motion, the way it's now been changed twice, and see if we can move it for, move it along Dorothy. I think the finance committee is not all powerful, but I think the finance committee with town manager Bachleman and our financial wizard, Sean mangano that we can at least have a strong discussion on this. Thank you, Alyssa, any other comments. George. I think form does matter I think procedure does matter. I think this is important to agree with much has been said, but we need to take our time and I'm extremely reluctant as a matter of fact going to vote against this because I think we first need to vote on the committee charge and then send it to to finance. So, I think it's important that we do follow process I think it matters. Okay. Are there any other comments. Sarah. This is about reparations and I don't think that you can separate in a lot of ways the, the earnest trying identifying funds. I mean, if Andy saying look we're at the end of a, you know, towards the end of a figuring out what our budget is going to be and this is going to be darn near impossible. I understand that but I think that it is a choice. I think that having a robust discussion about where this money is going to come from has to happen because you can't talk about reparations at this in this point of repair, and not be talking about money. I mean, it goes, I mean it's hand and glove you can't. And I think it's insulting to people who are asking for reparations to then say well we can talk about your committee and I know it's about, you know, monetary reparations, but we can't give you the money, I just think it's insulting so I understand even if it couldn't be found right away which really makes me feel horrible and I do think it's a choice I think we can find it. There has to be real discussion about how we're going to do this and how it is feasible you can't, you can't pull one away from the other. Are there any other comments. I'm going to ask that the motion be read the way it has most recently been worded, and then we're going to bring it to a vote. I prefer the draft African heritage reparation coalition charge to the finance committee for recommendation to the town council on a revenue stream for a possible reparations fund in the FY 22 budget. Okay. I'm going to begin the vote with Mandy Johanna. The isn't the possible in the wrong place. Yes. Oh, I'm sorry, I guess I wasn't here. The possible is in the wrong spot. It's a possible revenue source it's not it's a possible revenue it's not a possible reparations. Got it. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. And I'm so sorry I wasn't. Thank you for having your ear tuned. Any further questions. Okay, Mandy Joe. Yes. Dorothy Pam. Yes. Evan Ross. Yes. No. Kathy Shane. Yes. Steve Schreiber. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Same. Sarah Schwartz. Hi. Shalini Balmille. Yes. Alyssa Brewer. Hi. Pat D'Angelo. Hi. Marcy Dumont is absent and Lynn Breesma is I. And so it is 10 in favor. No opposition to abstain and one absent. No, there was a no. Did I got. I'm sorry. There was a no. I'm sorry. It is. And in favor. One opposed. It must be nine in favor. One opposed. One. Two. Obscene and one absent. There was only one abstain. It was 1011 with one absent. We're very tired right now. Excuse me. It was nine. 1011. 10 in favor. Right. 1011. One abstain one absent. Thank you. 1011. Thank you. I am tired. I want to thank all of you for your efforts leading up to tonight. And your efforts to be here tonight. And for the materials that you've provided us and for the research. That you've put forward and for sparking. This very. Interesting and long overdue conversation. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to move on. To. Presentation very briefly or discussion very briefly. About the governor's orders. And then we're going to do the mosquitoes. Board spray thing. And then we're going to start wrapping up the meeting. So. Paul. You and every other. Municipal leader in Massachusetts. I'm going to start with a new message today. Would you like to talk about it? Yes. Thank you. And we will be brief because I know we meet a week from today that will have more clarity. The governor announced today. That. They were lifting the. Mask mandates across the board on May 29th. And that the state of emergency was going to be. Going to be listed by June 15th. Previously he had said August one is being the date when they were going to be listed. And that is the state of emergency. State of emergency is important to us because that is how we're able to meet via zoom. And there's no substitute legislation that allows us to do anything else. Also it impacts our restaurants because that's how they are allowing take out drinks, alcoholic beverages and a lot of other processes that they're able to utilize. Also. So there's a number of things tied to the state of emergency. He has acknowledged that this is an issue that he plans to address. So we don't know where this is going. But I think every. And I know many of my colleagues were. There was no previewing this for anybody. And so it's good news. And the fact that we have more than 50% of vaccination rates. And this is all good news. But we're managing out of the pan pandemic is as hard as managing into the pandemic. So we, you know, we are, we'll be prepared whatever happens on June 15th. And so that's all I can have now, but we'll have more information. I'm sure in a week. Okay. And Emma, I believe you. Remove the mask mandate today. Correct. Can everybody hear me? So hi everybody. Yes. So as of noon today, the local mass mandate for downtown was lifted. We communicated with the area institutions as well as the local mass mandate. And we're all just doing the good work that we're trying to do to get us all healthy. And back to. Before all this stuff started. So. Well, and Emma, we want to thank you and all the people that have worked with you for your vaccination efforts, particularly for the COVID-19 pandemic. And I think we're going to be able to do that. I think we're going to be able to do that. I think we're going to be able to do that. I think we're going to be able to do that. And I think we're going to be able to do that. And I think we're going to be able to do that. And I think we're going to be able to do that. And I think we're going to be able to do that. I think we're going to be able to do that for your vaccination efforts, particularly in the last couple of days as we've begun to vaccinate younger children. I understand there's a tent. On the lawn in the middle school and that you have been very, very busy. So thank you so much for that. Thank you. And it's, it's good work though. And we're all doing it together. Right. Andy Joe. I just wanted to say, and I was hoping to be able to say this earlier with more attendees, but it's late. But the first thing is. To Emma, the entire department, you know, your public health department, all the volunteers. As a parent, turning around the vaccines, 12 to 15 year olds to get some school. I know my family was not able to get into that because it went on for a long time. I mean, it took me about seven or eight minutes. But to turn that around in under a week. On top of the high school one that you turned around the week before. And then open up walk-in clinics on Friday and also dates on Friday. We were there on Friday. It was filled. At 440 when we had our appointment. We had to have a meeting with all the volunteers to get a chance to do that. So it was a pretty organized. Everyone was excited. Everyone's questions could get answered. You guys did a great job. And I just wanted to say thank you too. On behalf of all the kids that have been waiting so long. To get a shot that they might not actually want, but that their parents want them to have to make that as available as possible as quickly as possible. that was extremely thankful for all you did to make that happen. On a similar note, well a question I have, Paul, now that I've said that, you also have a state of emergency for the town that you issued way back a year ago. Is the plan to rescind that on the same date at this point? Correct, that would be coterminous with the governor's state of emergency. Are there any other questions with regard to the present changes from the governor's office or can we all just be patient and know that we'll hear more from Paul next week? I think we have patience, Paul. At this hour, yes. Yeah. Emma, we're going to move rapidly on to the mosquito spray. Okay, and let me just tell you that I've learned more about mosquito spraying in the last two weeks than I ever wanted to learn. But Emma has identified a path forward and has taken that to the Board of Health and the path forward is to join a pre-existing group that has a pre-existing, pre-approved plan that is in your packet and it is with a pioneer, whatever the name is, okay? And if we have questions about that of Emma, I think that's where we should start tonight. But the motion before us is that we will join this group which will cost the town $5,000 and then I guess there are some costs for some individual things as well. But it's a growing collaborative of local municipalities that do minimal spraying except when necessary is what I guess I've learned in all of that. Emma, Paul, us would you want to clarify? Yeah, so I'm coming forward because in July of 2020 Governor Baker signed a law into legislation entitled an act to mitigate arbor virus which requires the EEA to develop a process with the state reclamation and mosquito board to permit municipalities to opt out of mosquito control spraying either aerial or otherwise conducted by the state mosquito control board. All plans are subject to approval through the EEA and the approval of the plan that we would adopt through the Piner Valley mosquito control district would allow the town of Amherst and the town council to then opt out of spraying conducted by the state mosquito control board. This Piner Valley mosquito control district is a fairly new district. It started in 2017. It is funded. Their goal I apologize is to create an ecologically conscious integrated mosquito management program with a focus on preventative control measures. The district is funded through the voluntary contribution model as dictated by the Massachusetts general law, meaning that the members pay a la carte so they can choose which services they would like to pay and use. As of right now the Piner Valley mosquito control district would perform surveillance for the town of Amherst for a program cost of $5,000 a year. That cost would include the community to get two mosquito control traps each week from June to October and then also be collected the next day in the mosquito breeding habitat and then enable those samples to be tested for triply in West Nile virus. As of right now the district does not have any services of adult spraying or larval control or water maintenance. Those services will always be optional in the future once they occur but this is a plan that is already established and operating. I think that it would go beyond the minimum requirements of a plan which is education. I think all of us in this room are very well educated and education is wonderful. It's not working on those surveillance and preventative measures and really allowing the town to have a full awareness in terms of what's going on in terms of triply in West Nile virus. Triply in West Nile virus are chronic conditions. Triply is fatal in 66% of those that obtain it. Of the ones that survive they have neurological deficits the rest of their lives and West Nile virus about 10% of individuals become critical and those individuals also have sustained symptoms as well. I think the consensus from the board of health meeting was a great discussion. We had wonderful public comment that was very helpful is that the board of health certainly does not support aerial spraying. That's a position I think that Amherst as a whole has been very vocal about but in order to be able to opt out of that spraying if we're able to join this district to have that substance of the plan then I think that would be the best move forward for public health. And my understanding is that the board of health voted 5-0 to support this plan, this recommendation. Correct. Okay we're going to take a couple counselor comments and then we are going to have public comment as required by the state law. George. I think this is a very good solution to the problem that we faced and appreciate the work of Emma and her board. My question has to do with our ability to monitor and evaluate this program say after a year or whether she feels that's going to be a serious concern and I would think that it would be but maybe not but how we would do that does you feel confident that that after a year we would have a sense of whether we got what we paid for. Yes that's a great question George. So counselor so this contract with the Pine Valley Mosquito Control District it can be annually. Municipalities can withdraw after the annual contract has been expired. I think that hasn't happened with a lot with it being such a new district but we wouldn't be stuck per se if we weren't satisfied with the results. Yeah one thing for the motion and then one question for Emma the motion I think just has the name of the district wrong missed the word Valley both times in my copy so when you read it just make sure you say Pioneer Valley Mosquito Control District but the question is do we actually do any active surveillance for Tripoli and so this is actually gaining some knowledge that that we don't have right now that sounds actually very good to me if we don't do it right now. Yeah that's a great point Mandy so I forgot to say that the state as a whole of the Department of Public Health does have an Arborvirus surveillance team however it's extremely run thin the testing and surveillance is sporadic throughout the state it's not consistent so yes we do not have a surveillance plan right now that's being executed so this would give us a lot more data and information in terms of what's going on in the Valley and the way that we have more information is by having more regional partners the Pioneer Valley Mosquito Control District is the last area to have a Mosquito Control District in the entire state in the eastern part of the state they've had them for a very long time so the more of a more municipalities that join this the stronger information that we're going to get for western mass so that's a great point. Thank you Shalini. Yeah I had a couple of residents who are young kids who were concerned about not doing the spray and so I had I did dig up a lot of information I just want to share one statistic that I found was that data from 2019 applications gives scant reason for confidence in the spraying method because it said half the spray events had zero percent efficacy and it cost the taxpayers 2.2 million dollars and the fact that it also is bad for animals and birds and so the Department of Health admits it's impossible to measure the reduction and it's really we have to rely on people's individual behaviors and prevention methods so when I write so the parents are still concerned even though I shared this information with them and so would you say that the document that you provided with the alternative plan is some will have all the information that I can send to them to assure them about what our town is doing like what assurance can I give to people even though I've given them these numbers that that spraying is not going to really you know safeguard your kids you still have to wear the sprays and what not personally so um yeah let me expand on that request and that is that Emma as as appropriate uh as soon as we move forward with this I think we should create a place on the town website that provides all of this kind of information and not try to deal with the specifics tonight but we provide information about what this does and any other statistics as we go along the concept of course of being part of a region is that if it's detected in the next town over then you become a little more so it's a very I'm very pleased with the solution that you have found Emma I really am uh are there any other comments from counselors I'd like to go to see if there's oh Paul yes I just want to point out this is a surveillance system it's not a prevention system yeah so that's what we're buying into a surveillance right right and if we need to and we have to move to a prevention system um because we have more of a problem than we have had in the past are there people who have public comment on this issue yes Lenore Brick please enter the room and state your name and where you live hi everybody can't believe your stamina um thank you for hanging in with us oh god this was three meetings worth agenda guys so um I live in Amherst happily for the last 29 years in district four um I'm a healthcare professional I co-founded the regenerative farming forest and food systems alliance branch of climate action now and um and Lynn I've also learned more about mosquito spraying and control than I ever thought I wanted to um but I do there's a couple of things um one is we we are blessed with a local expert in our area he lives in south Adelaide he's south Adelaide he's a colleague of mine in in the group I co-founded he's a research pathobiologist with extensive experience in um disease systems and and this this whole area he has actually sent a report that has been commended by Joe Joe Comerford to the Pioneer Valley mosquito control district um telling them how they can up their game because we should be aware that the PVM CD has um a lot to learn yet their survey their surveillance program is not up to snuff um but it will get there if they take into account these recommendations from Dr. Franz and also Shalini he is someone that can help with the website with our town website putting in all that information he is a wealth of information there's more there's there's the beyond pesticides organization there's the mosquito uh mosquito coalition with NOFA masks there's lots of information at our disposal for educational purposes and for our website but I just want people to know that even though I agree Emma we should totally join this district they're they're not they don't have it like all together it's it's a work in progress and my question to you Emma is my understanding is that as a town Amherst we still have to opt out we still have to propose a plan whether or not we join the district is sort of right you're about to say something so this would be our plan this would be the approved plan to submit and is that enough we don't have to you know where we have to fill in all those checkboxes like modeling it's it's enough to say we're going to join the district as I can bypass to page seven of the nine path page four yeah and and I agree Leon or I am sorry to interrupt and and do your time but I I think this Pine Valley mosquito control district is is a great first step with the opt-out I'm not saying it's the end I'll be all I think there's a lot of great work that we can do together on this but I think this would be a great a great bridge to get us to where we want to go okay so as far as the the what the state requires what the ea requires it's enough on that proposal that we just say we're joining the district that's that's enough of our opt-out I just wanted to make sure because it when I was looking at the the plan when I was looking at the form it didn't seem like that would be enough yeah and and Shalini when you talk to your parents that are concerned um there's a couple of websites that that Emma that I sent to Emma that that she can forward to you because it's a it's a real sense of false security to think that aerial and truck spraying is going to somehow contact these flying adult mosquitoes it's ridiculous um and the the physical measures the surveillance data there's a lot that we can do that's much more effective than than that plan it's an outdated plan from the state it's actually not effective so it's not helping their families but there's there's lots we can do that can keep our ecosystem strong which is the reason that we have these outbreaks and so it's completely ironic to think we're going to spray which is going to further degrade the ecosystem which is the reason we have a problem in the first place it's very backwards archaic thinking so there are ways to reassure them I reassure you okay I won't I don't know so much thank you for joining us and for your comment and for your sharing of resources and knowing Amherst the district will be better off because we did join them because we'll make them do better are there additional public comments no okay so um I am also um so here's the motion in accordance with mass general law chapter 252 section 2a in friends b and friends 2 having held a public meeting on May 17th 2021 at 6 30 p.m. during which a period of public comment was held and as recommended by the board of health that the town of Amherst joined the pionter valley mosquito control district and use its alternative management plan to opt out of wide area pesticide application conducted by the state reclamation and mosquito control board with the understanding that the pionter valley mosquito control district's alternative you know management plan has been submitted and approved by the executive office of energy and environmental affairs is there a second second Ross thank you so manager i changed it slightly because they have an approved plan because manager was involved in writing the motion are there any other questions seeing none we're going to move to a vote Dorothy Pam yes Evan Ross hi George Ryan yes Kathy Shane yes Steve Schreiber yes Andy Steinberg all right Sarah Schwartz hi shall we go now yes Alyssa hi Patty Angelus hi Lynn Greasemer is an I Mandy Johannike hi passes 1200 and one absent the only other items we have on our agenda tonight are appointments there's none committee reports and I'll come back to that in a moment um any questions on the town managers report and any town council comments so I'm going to ask the question on the committee and liaison reports are there anything different committees need to say when I call on you that cannot wait until next week CRC Mandy Joe planning board hearings and CRC hearings are this Wednesday two days on IZ and moratorium starting at seven just a reminder great elementary school building Kathy it can wait till next week thank you finance committee andy everything's in the report VOL George yeah just briefly I really need your help with DIP my beautiful timeline is crumbling before my eyes we hope to meet on Wednesday and declare that body ready to move ahead and we can't so I really need help we've reached out to other people lead women voters reached out to Paul and how much of the cpo's or the anyway so we I'm asking you again to try and reach out to your constituents other point we have removed the interview process we're relying strictly on SOIs we can't go to SOIs till we have a sufficient pool and we don't have one yet George can I just ask are there specific districts that you're missing altogether because I've seen some of the names you've got some from district one so yeah but still even there I mean a sufficient pool should have more than than just a handful so pretty much across the board district one is leading the path but not by a lot Evan is as a vice chair of TSL yep okay any liaison reports Paul town manager any questions the town manager Pat yeah I don't want to take up a lot of time right now Paul but I'm very concerned that there's still no shower no functioning shower we purchased the shower but it wasn't ADA compliant why not and when's it gonna actually happen it's getting a little crazy since this started in December so the shower we purchased was the only one that was available so at that point back in March or whenever we just bought anything that was available because we thought that was more important at that moment in time we've offered funding to Craig's doors to install a shower and they can do it much quicker than we can but you're right it's a frustrating thing for everyone so and it seems ridiculous so we're gonna redouble our efforts on that but we have offered funds to Craig's doors to put one in their existing mobile home mobile unit there okay thank you thank you Mandy Joe a couple of quick things um grove park slash park I am highly encouraging that the splash park get opened as soon as possible and not wait till either Memorial Day or June 19th we thought the reason of a splash park was that it could be open before the pools could be open because it's on push things so we're getting into the mid 80s this week so please open the splash park early um dog park is it related to finish on time because I drive by it regularly and there doesn't seem to be a lot of work going on Kendrick Park with the granite delay is that going to affect any of the financing because I thought we had a hard completion deadline and then you were talking about creating a homelessness and rehousing working group does that need to do we need to vote SME status on that is that something you would want us to vote on um so dog park I need to check on that and get that back to grove park we are waiting for some chemicals to before we turn that on but that's they're on order they should be here soon we could we hope to have them in this week and we talked about this this morning actually about getting it started not waiting till late to Memorial Day depending on the weather the Kendrick park the granite delay is a problem but we've reached out to our funding to say if we don't meet the funding deadline due to the granite delay will you hold us you know and we're making other arguments to them as well that we've spent their money we just this is our money that we're spending on so we're um whether they'll accept that argument or not um SME status um I have not final I'm not sure I'm about that yet let me think about that okay Kathy I just wondered um are the contracts or the request for bids going to go out or have they gone out for the North Amherst Library or the construction day the permitting has been completed now the construction documents need to be prepared before we can go out to bid that was that is that imminent is that like I'll I'll check with Coonerola they're the ones preparing the the construction documents okay yeah the town manager okay um let me just mention uh on the next week in addition to the four items I delayed from this week we will start with the North Common Hearing and then and let and have a revote on that uh the community safety working groups will be giving their presentation and then that will be referred to the finance committee and the proposed mixed use building standards bylaw and the appointment that I make of the audit RFP review committee I will be polling counselors to see who is interested in that Alyssa you have your hand up I'm sorry no it was exactly the perfect segue so you mentioned obviously our agenda was already full for next week and we've made it fuller but you mentioned of course the community safety working groups going to get to give their presentation about the reports we got yesterday which is wonderful and then it gets referred to finance committee so is it that day that we as a town council can give our instruction to finance committee to say community safety working group proposals need more money or are you expecting us to do that through a different venue because that's where I would expect to do it is that night when we're referring it to finance committee does that make sense yeah yes um anything else Alyssa Kathy I just wanted to make a comment the on the North Commons the choices uh the town staff have put it up on engage Amherst so you can see exactly what the voices are and the pictures are there to the extent up here in North America people were asking for that a lot but it is it's there for people to see okay also mentioned that on June 7th uh we do have a hearing on the capital improvement program um is there anything else we are not going to try to do reflections on our training I had hoped to do that tonight as well but um just under councilor comments um but I want to just thank you all for a very long evening um of listening and um we'll see you back here next Monday actually we will not see you back here we will see you tomorrow at four o'clock for a council meeting that immediately will move into executive session okay are there any other comments questions Kathy we're adjourning goodbye