 Hello, Martha. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. Good. Just making sure I can hear you all as well. All right. We still have some people coming. Let's see. So if people can keep your microphones muted at least until you're speaking, that would be great. But for those of you who are here, if you could please also turn your video on so that we could at least introduce ourselves at the beginning of the meeting if you have connectivity issues and there's a reason why you might need to have your video off at some point. Totally understand. So we're just going to give people a few more minutes to enter the room. This meeting is being recorded and the recording has already started. So I just want to let you know that as you enter the room. Hello, everybody. I feel odd being here without saying hi. Now mute yourself. Great. We have Jack and I think we're waiting on Dwayne. Oh, great. There's Dwayne. Making sure that I have everyone. Let's see. Are we missing Jack, Dan, Martha, Dwayne. Oh, Laura. Just make sure Laura is not waiting in the. Athena is there. I'm going to put Athena, Athena, I'm promoting you to panel. So Laura is there now too. There we go. Great. Okay, great. So I think we'll let everyone just have a minute to get settled in. And again, I just want to announce that this meeting is being recorded and the recording has started. Okay, so I think we have everybody. So as I said a moment ago, and for those of you who weren't here quite yet during this meeting, if you can keep your microphone muted unless you're going to speak. That would be helpful so we don't have people talking over each other. And also, if you could keep your video on as much as possible, that would also be great, especially during this first meeting. So we're going to start with just general introductions and a little bit of an icebreaker. So I will be happy to give you the example. So my name is Stephanie Chigarello. I'm the sustainability coordinator for the town of Amherst, and one of the two staff liaisons to this committee. And why I'm here is because I'm a staff member, but my fun fact about myself that I would like to share with you all is that I sing in a band. So if you have one fun fact you want to share about yourself as well that would be great. So we're going to do this popcorn style, and I will call on someone else so I'm going to call on Janet. I'm Janet McGowan. I live in Amherst. I'm on the planning board. My fun fact is that I once arrested a ship. And Janet if you want to choose the person to go next. Let's see. I choose Jack. Hello, I guess I'm still on the planning board but I will be retiring as of this month. So I've been on the planning board for six years. I was a chair for for one year. And a fun fact is I won my first golf tournament in my life. That I recall with a net score not a gross but net score, but that just happened a couple weeks ago. Congratulations. I'm on the water supply protection committee to it so that's who I'm representing here. And if you could choose someone to go next. About Dan. Everybody I'm Dan Corcoran I'm a researcher at UMass Amherst and PhD Canada. I previously worked in environmental consulting. And my fun practice that I play the guitar. And Dan if you could choose someone to go next. Sorry. How about Martha. I'm a planner I'm a planetary scientist so I worked at Caltech JPL for a number of years of working on NASA missions to the planets and Jupiter and so on and chased comets and so on. So I've been following climate research over the years. And it's been interesting to me to see how the models for other climate atmospheres, which have, you know, vastly different initial conditions and so on have really helped to improve the climate models for our own atmosphere and that leads of course to the better predictions for the climate change and so on. Let's see fun fact that I was in the control center when the European space mission went by Comet Halley and so I was one of the first humans to ever see the nucleus of Comet Halley 1986. Okay, and let's see. How about Dwayne. Yeah, hi everybody, Dwayne Breger here. I'm the director of the Clean Energy Extension at UMass Amherst, and I serve on the town of Amherst Energy and Climate Action Committee and here representing that committee. And really look forward to being part of this working group. Fun fact, I guess, back in my 20s I guess I ran a marathon in Montreal. And across the finish line I swore I'd never run another marathon and I've held that promise. And I will go with Robert. I'm a big user of Zoom. Bob Brooks, I live in South Amherst. I'm a retired scientist for the US Forest Service. Fun. I can't think of many fun. I guess my, to me, my fun is fact is that I have two adult daughters from India who are both school teachers, which makes me immensely proud. And I guess we'll go to Laura. Yeah. Good morning, everyone. I'm Laura Paglia Rulo. Nice to meet you all. I've been in the renewable energy industry for about 17 years. I have the efficiency that wind power and now solar. I run a company that's focused on the real estate under solar. I live here in South Amherst. I grew up in Berkshire County. So a long time Massachusetts resident come from a family of farmers and teachers. Fun fact about me is that I'm a big birder. I'm going to choose Athena, please. I was going to be able to participate in this part. So I'm so excited because I have a great one. I'm the, I'm the clerk for the town council. I'm pinch heading for our town clerk today. Stephanie asked me to come and speak about the open meeting law and conflict of interest law with you folks. So I'm not normally going to be part of your meetings, but I'm happy to be here. Thank you for having me. And my fun fact is that my very first job was dipping hot dogs on a stick. And who hasn't gone yet. Chris and then Paul probably will say. Hi, I'm Chris Brestrup. I'm the planning director for the town of Amherst. And I've been here for about 19 years now and I worked for the town of Amherst. When I was in graduate school so all together I've been working for the planning department for over 20 years. And I guess my fun fact is similar to Robert's I have two grown, adopted children from India. And minor grown, and they still live with us but that's fun because they have animals they have a dog and a cat and yeah we really enjoy having them. So Robert and I will have to compare notes sometime. Great. And Paul, I'm going to, I'm going to turn your welcome. Turn it over to you so you can introduce yourself and then give your welcome to the group. Sounds good. Thank you everybody. So I'm Paul Backelman. I am the town manager. So let's see fun fact. We are played in the first, went to Hampshire College and played in the first ultimate Frisbee championship game against Rutgers back a long time ago. And so my role here is just to welcome you and thank you all for dedicating your time to this. This is a time limited committee. You've got a year to come up with a new solar bylaw and regulations that go along with it. It's a giant task. And so I really appreciate you all stepping forward and taking on this important role. This, you know, this, the committee has come out of some clear lack of regulations that the town has. And so we all recognize that pretty quickly that this was important. And putting together this working group that's going to be very directed and with under the guidance of our planning director and sustainability coordinator should be efficient. It's important. So we're going to talk today about the open meeting on the public records loss. Some of you have many of you have served on committee so you're probably aware of it. Because we think it's really important for us to refresh this all the time. Some people haven't served on committees before we want to re, we want to make sure that everybody is aware of what this means, what you're allowed to do how how email works, things like that. And so that's why I think it is here. And just in terms of the, the, the goal is to come up with legislation that the planning board can review, and that ultimately would be adopted by the town council. So that's what our direction is, and there's going to be a million other topics and things that you're going to want to pay attention to. And I ask you to sort of focus on what the end product is, because the time is going to be very limited. And especially when we get through the summer and holidays, you're going to find, wow, we only have X number of meetings to do the work. And so, encourage you to listen to as many people and as you and educate yourself as much as you can. So that's all I have to say. But again, thank you for your time. Thank you, Paul. So I'm going to turn this over to Athena now. One thing I do want to very quickly say is that we do have a web page for this committee. So it's under the town committee's dropdown menu. If you go to the main page under local government committees, dropdown menu itself a medical. And the communications director was way last week. So the packet items are available now for those of you who are in attendee mode. You can actually access that page and the meeting packet items from that link. So I will now turn it over to Athena. Right. Again, thank you for having me. I'm really excited to talk about this stuff. I want to talk a little bit about the open meeting law. Paul mentioned the public records law, which isn't on the agenda, but I do want to touch on that very briefly. And then the conflict of interest law. More, more a brief overview because there is just so much to the conflict of interest law and a lot of it depends on your specific situation. So I don't want to get too into the details on that. I'm going to answer the questions about anything after the meeting you can reach out. And I can try and answer those questions and I'll leave some time for questions at the end. So, for the public records law generally records created in your official capacity, including emails are a public record. So it's just good to be aware that when you send emails to each other when you send emails to members of the public. Your emails can be requested and can be requested. There's an official process for submitting our records request and we have a records access officer who's the town clerk. But I just want to make you aware that your personal emails if you're using that for town business as in your function in this committee then those would be a public record. If there are questions about that. Let's move on to the open meeting law. So the purpose of the open meeting law is to make what we do in municipal government public and make the public aware of what's going on and what the public body you this group is doing and how it's making decisions. So that should all be a public process and so the open meeting law aims to make all of the actions of the public body, a public process and there's a very small limitation on what can be done outside of this public process. And that's usually housekeeping items, like scheduling a meeting, sharing an agenda or making aware that materials are available in the packet. So that discussion is going to happen during the public meeting and deliberation is going to happen during the public meeting. So I want to talk a little bit about communications between members of the public body. And when I say public body, I'm talking about this working group. So your communications. Most of your communications are going to come from Stephanie letting you know that a meeting is posted here's the agenda here are the materials. Here's your link to get in and so forth, and communication between all of you. If it is about what's what you're doing in your official capacity, and if it's among a quorum then that's prohibited. So that's considered a deliberation of the public body so that deliberation needs to be held during the open meeting. So, I don't need to go too much into the definition of a public body because it's very clear that this group is a public body but I also want to talk quickly about some committees. So if this group gets together and you're having a meeting and you decide that more work needs to be done on a specific item. The group decides that more than one person is going to work on that together, and that is creating a subcommittee. So, I just want you to be aware of that subcommittees are also required to follow all the open meeting law procedures so subcommittee designated by this group would need to post their meetings and take minutes, and so forth. So deliberation is communication between the members of this public body about business within the jurisdiction of the body and jurisdiction is defined a little bit generally. So anything that could come up between them. It could come up as a as a topic for discussion at this public body is considered within the jurisdiction. The housekeeping is okay, as long as people aren't commenting back and forth about it so, for example, if somebody were to ask Stephanie to include or ask the chair to include a specific item on the next meeting's agenda that would be okay as long as it doesn't, you don't also say I'd like this to be on the next agenda, because it's really important and etc etc. The Attorney General considers deliberation considers communication deliberation, even if no other member response so if one of you emails a quorum saying here are my thoughts opinions ideas about a specific topic. And that would be deliberation, even if no other member response. So it's good to remember that and to keep your thoughts, opinions ideas and feelings about a topic for discussion during the public meeting. There are several exceptions to the open meeting law. I think the only one that might apply to this group. I mean, there's briefly town meetings and meetings of other public bodies there's different situations they might get into. The only one that that might apply here is an onsite inspection of a project or a program so if you ever did an onsite inspection, as long as you're not deliberating at the onsite inspection or, you know, doing a tour of the facility or something like that as long as you're not deliberating there that will be considered public meeting. There are several requirements that need to be included in the meeting notice and normally, I think Stephanie would handle that for you, but just so that you're aware, the date time location needs to be included in the meeting notice. If you're meeting with another public body so if you're having a joint meeting then both of the names of the committees would need to be included. The topics that the chair anticipates will be discussed. And the topics need to be sufficiently specific so that members of the public have an idea of what the committee is going to be speaking about. It needs to be in an easy, easily understandable format so we can't be using too much jargon abbreviations also need to be spelled out that aren't commonly known. The date and time needs to be included in the, the date and time the notices posted needs to be included notices need to be posted at least 48 hours in advance of the meeting and Saturday Sundays and holidays are not included. If there are changes to the meeting notice then the date and time of the change needs to be included. Whenever a request for accessibility. Anyone needs help with accessing the meeting, then that's something that you should bring to Stephanie's attention so that we can make accommodations for meetings like this that are everyone is participating remotely all the votes need to be taken by roll call. And that's me to include who participated remotely if anyone disconnects or reconnects during the meeting, then the time of the disconnection and reconnection needs to be noted. And the chair will determine how to handle connectivity issues so if something happens and someone is disconnected and you're about to take a vote or something like that, then the chair can decide to pause the discussion or to pause the meeting or to call the member reconnects. And usually that's. There's some arrangement beforehand about you know contact Stephanie if you're having connectivity issues so we can figure out how to deal with it. The order requires public participation at all regular meetings and when we say regular meetings that means that typically a committee would establish a meeting calendar and meetings listed in the meeting calendar considered regular. If the committee decided to hold a retreat or a special meeting that was not included in that meeting calendar then a special meeting doesn't need to include public comment. The chair would determine at one point in the meeting to allow public comment that can be at one point in the meeting or at multiple points in the meeting depending on how the chair wants to handle that. And the chair can also determine how long a public comment period can be held. You could say, you know, we're going to accept public comment and you'd like you to keep your comments to three minutes. It's important that if you do ask for a limit on the period of public comment for people that you apply that consistently to everyone so you couldn't allow someone to talk for five minutes and then cut the next person off for three minutes. This applies more to in-person meetings which I'll get to in a minute because we are in a little bit of a period where in-person meetings might be held again in the next month or so. But members of the public who'd like to record the meeting or take photo or video need to make that known to the chair so the chair can make an announcement that the meeting is being recorded. I don't know if you noticed but Stephanie announced at the beginning of the meeting that the meeting is now being recorded and there was a little pop-up saying that the meeting's being recorded. So for in-person meetings the chair would announce that the meeting's being recorded and anyone who was physically in the room who wanted to take recordings or take pictures would need to let the chair know so that the chair could make an announcement that there was other recordings and pictures being taken. There are several things to be aware of that need to be included in the minutes so when you're reviewing, creating and reviewing minutes, the date, time and place of the meeting needs to be recorded. We usually just put virtual meeting if the meeting is fully virtual and we would include the physical location if the meeting is in a physical location even if it includes remote participation. The members present and absent so a list of the members participating and a list of members who were not participating in that meeting needs to be included. The record of all the votes taken or actions taken, a summary of the discussions on each agenda item, a list of all the documents and exhibits used at the meeting, the name of anyone who participated in the meeting remotely. And the summary of the discussion. The open meeting a lot doesn't very clearly define how detailed a summary needs to be it does not need to be a transcript, but the minutes should provide a person who's reading the minutes with an understanding of what took place. So you want to include as much detail as it would take to give someone an understanding of what was discussed in the actions taken at the meeting. Minutes are a public record at the time of their creation so even before the committee approves the minutes there are public record and a member of the public anyone can ask for a draft copy of the minutes so if any of you are involved in creating the notes it's important to keep your personal notes or opinions in a separate document if you're taking that your own personal notes at the same time you're taking minutes. And the body must approve minutes in a timely manner so generally that's within the next three minute meetings or within 30 days, whichever is later. Are there any questions about open meeting law before we move on. One question I just want to emphasize the serial deliberation which I think is the thing that may trip up committees most frequently. And that means you send an email, one person, you know person a sense of email a person be, then that person sends it to two other people individually they haven't contacted a quorum, but that serial communication does constitute a quorum. The best rule is to don't don't write and if you're going to write something right it to the staff to Chris and to Stephanie. You have to let them distribute it, as opposed to you just contacting each other. And the question I had Stephanie is. And also that the publicness of this body in particular, we have nine people I believe in the audience. A lot of people are interested in this topic so I think we want to make sure that we were always above board with all the conversations and the deliberation so it's always done in the public that's a high value for the town. Just a question to you Athena's. Does the committee have to a vote to accept minutes and be vote to adjourn or can they be handled in a different way. So our practice it's, it's up to the chair, essentially, to determine how they'd like to adjourn the meeting our practice at Council and Council committee meetings has been for the chair to announce that the meeting is adjourned. The committee, if it chooses can take a vote, we just find that that's it's a little clunky and takes more time so we usually just declare that the meeting is adjourned. If the chair wants to do that a different way than you can do that a different way. In terms of approving minutes. Again, it's up to the public body to determine the method that they approved the meeting minutes. The public body can decide if they want to designate one member to approve the meeting minutes on their own, or the meeting minutes can be approved at meetings of the public body. Typically, we go over and above the requirements of the open meeting lot in terms of materials at meetings and meeting minutes. For Amherst, our standard is to post meeting materials in advance of the meeting, which isn't required by the open meeting law. We really do our best to make sure that meeting materials are available not just to members but to members of the public on our website and advance of the meeting. Again, that's not required so if something were to come up at a meeting and somebody wanted to share something that they've worked on independently, or like Paul said there was an agreement that a member wanted to share through staff members that could be added to the packet during the meeting or after the fact. So a complete list of the meeting materials used doesn't need to be posted at all but our standard is to post them during or after the meeting if they're not available in advance of the meeting. We also post approved meeting minutes for our boards and committees which is again isn't required by the open meeting law, but it's our standard here in Amherst to make those things publicly available so that public records requests are, are ease people can find that on the committee's webpage, and they don't have to go making public records requests for meeting minutes. I think I covered Paul did I miss anything. Okay. Chris. So, I'm sorry Martha had her hand up and then put it down so Martha did you have a question. I just didn't want you to lose your opportunity. Yeah, Paul answered my question so okay great. So go ahead Chris. And then Janet. I wanted to mention one other thing and I don't think Athena touched on this maybe she didn't I lost it but anyway. Not only is it not appropriate for you to talk to each other or email each other about substantive issues but if you're out in the public if you're at the post office or the grocery store or, you know the transfer station and someone comes up to you and wants to talk to you about a matter that's going to come before your working group. I can't tell them, you know I can't talk to you now, but if you come to the next meeting, you can express your opinion, or if you want to express it in writing. You're welcome to submit it to either Stephanie or me, and then we will disseminate it to members of the group but you're not permitted to talk to others outside of the meeting, unless you're doing research. If someone comes up to you and expresses an opinion you really need to tell them, come to a meeting or send me something in writing. Chris, do you mean acting on behalf of the committee with a member of the public because committee members, to my knowledge can hear what members of the public have to say, but they couldn't, they couldn't present themselves to acting on behalf of the committee. I think, in the case of the town council. The situation is a little bit different from the way it is with other boards and committees and the town council is an elected body. So they're able to hear from their constituents but the normal boards and committees like the conservation commission and the planning board and this group really need to avoid taking input outside of public meetings from members of the public. So I wanted to just say one of the things that the planning board does and, you know, which is not an open meeting law violation is that we often share articles and information. And so our usual way of doing that is if someone finds an article or some information of interest, they'll send it to Chris and ask to have it sent out to other board members. You know, I hope we do that because there's a ton of information and we have a huge range of expertise on this committee so there's things that you all know that I don't know and hopefully I can add some information to. And I hope that information gets posted it might be huge volume but it'd be great to, you know, whatever we're looking at or some particularly good articles had the post on the website. I didn't plan to say anything but I would respectfully disagree with Chris about open meeting law. Being a violation to talk to different people in town about their opinions or your opinions about something it's the open meeting laws talking about communications amongst the decision makers. And so, if somebody from, you know, comes up to me and says oh I really feel strongly about, you know, solar and it should be x, y, and z. I'm free to say what I think it's just the communications and the distance we're going to be deciding that we can't communicate that amongst ourselves outside of open meeting law so they're really, as far as I see no restraints on our ability to talk to our friends and neighbors about the issues that we're working on. It's just the communications amongst the decision makers so some clarity on that I think would be helpful for all of us because I don't think we've had that kind of constraint. I think Chris wants to respond to that but then I'll go to Jack so Jack if you could just let Chris respond and then I'll go to you. Chris go ahead. I think that is a restriction and we can get a reading on that from Lauren Goldberg from KP law but that is a restriction that I've been told about ever since I came here. You know almost 20 years ago, and it's been reinforced over and over so I will get clarity on that. Thank you. Are you speaking about a restriction in the open meeting law, or somewhere else. I'm told by KP law over and over again that if you're out and about, and you're not an elected official that you really need to avoid talking to people about topics that are coming before your body substantive topics that are going to be deliberated before your body so I don't know if it's written in the open meeting law but that's that's what I've been told again and again by town attorneys. So we'll follow up with legal console to find out the answer to this rather than going back and forth and get a definitive opinion on that and then Jack you're next. Yeah so sounds like we can take in information but we can't really give, give it out or lend opinions that sort of thing but also with hitting on what Janet was saying in terms of the information. We have an online supply protection committee we have an online directory that I personally dumped like 40 documents there for the committee committee to review what they so choose. And for something like this I'm wondering, you know that could be an option. I'm not a working group. Because I know we're going to have tons of information coming through across our, our zoom here. Chris and Stephanie will distribute. So one that one question I had was and I didn't know if I missed this is how in the minutes going to be taken is that going to be the town's responsibility. We'll get to the election of chair and meeting scheduling will, we'll talk about minutes I'm taking them today, just to make it easier but we'll we'll talk about that that'll be further on in the agenda. Yeah, because that's a big, that's a big left. Yeah, we'll talk about that. It's a great point. I'm sorry, it's a great point Janet and Jack that you can distribute, you know articles that might be pertinent to the conversation. It's just important that when you distribute those you don't include your opinions about them when you share them if you're if you're not sharing them through staff and I think that Janet what you mentioned setting them to staff to share in the packet is, is great because then your, your opinions are, are tacked on to them so. Yeah, I will say that typically my request would be that you all send them to me and or Chris or actually, if you're going to send them to one of us send them to both of us, but I will be the one who will be maintaining the website and the resources so anything that you plan to share with the group should come through us so that we can also then make sure that gets into the packet and onto the website. Yeah, I just wanted to clarify that in terms of sharing information about the conversations of this working group with the public. We're also here. Some of us at least are representing other committees that were on somewhat with the purpose of relating the deliberations of the working group to our committees. And I wanted to clarify the clarification that we are able to discuss, maybe with some commentary I'm not sure the deliberations and progress and discussions of this working group with their town committees. So my understanding and I'll ask you to clarify, because we have, and this was something I was going to review when we reviewed the charge but we do have four committee members who are representing other bodies. So the reason they were chosen to risk to represent those committees was to be able to bring information back share that and get the collective knowledge of that committee. So my understanding that that would happen during open session. So when they're in the meeting that is when you would have that discussion with the committee and anything that you would get from and a response that you could bring back to then this deliberation would be used and would be actually helpful. We don't expect you to go back and then speak with your committee members separately independently outside of public session. And so Athena, you can correct me or tell me if that's accurate. Yeah, I think having those conversations with your committee during an open meeting law during during open an open meeting would be appropriate. If the chair of the committee that you're representing here anticipates that there will be some discussion about your report back to the committee, then it would be helpful to list in your, in your committee agenda that, you can report from member on the solar by law working group progress or something so that more of a discussion can be had so our practice is to include committee report period during council meetings so that the representative or the chair from various committees can report on what the committee has been doing. So, Janet, if you wanted to go back to the planning board and talk about what the solar by law working group is discussing then the planning board would want to include an item on their agenda saying report from Jenna McGowan on solar by law working groups so that they could discuss that have a conversation. I have a question, a scenario, if you will, if you have a committee member who is represented on this committee and his liaison to another from another board or committee. If they want to get feedback from a member of their other committee so not this one, but their other committee, are they allowed to do that does that by a load violate open meeting law. So there's so they weren't, they weren't identified as a subcommittee, so I'll just use easy AC just because it's an easy example for me. So if Dwayne leaves this deliberation this meeting goes back and there's something that he wants to review with another member of the ECAC. And they're not an official subcommittee. Are they allowed to do that, because my understanding is that they are but I would love clarification on that. So two members of the ECAC because ECAC is nine. Right. Correct. So two members wouldn't constitute warm. So, Dwayne could go and speak to one ECAC member about something that's coming up for this committee, if that member then goes to talk to another member and another member and another member or emails are going back and forth and you can get into what Paul mentioned called serial deliberation. And then that would be a violation so it's a good idea to pick your person just have one person that you look to for feedback or to bounce ideas off, as long as that other person isn't doesn't constitute a quorum of your committee or a subcommittee. So if you're on a subcommittee with three people and two people as a quorum. Does that make sense. It's, I think it's just sometimes gets confusing and the clarification here is that the, the committee itself did not designate them as a subcommittee. That's the clarification and I think the piece that sometimes gets gets confusing for people. So, Dwayne was specifically identified as representing the ECAC in this committee. And then another member who isn't can still be looked to for guidance, but as long as the ECAC did not identify that other member as working on this specific issue as well. As a subcommittee, or as a subcommittee on it on a different topic, right. Okay, yep. Right. Are there any other questions about opening law. So, like I said, I'm going to just briefly go over the conflict of interest conflict of interest slot, it can, it can get very nuanced and it really depends on your individual situation, and what connections you have to businesses and what family and diverse connections have to businesses and other dealing so if you have questions about conflict of interest if you feel like you might need to file a disclosure or you're unsure. It's really helpful to contact the ethics division at the state. And if Stephanie hasn't already shared that contact info or the website then I can pass that along so she can share it with all of you. It's helpful on the phone. And it's helpful to share all the information that's pertinent to the situation with them so that they can give you good advice and that's their job at the ethics division is to give you good advice before something happens. Where you know you can't go backwards and undo a vote because you should have recused yourself or whatever. So the ethics division is a great resource if you if you need advice about your specific situation. But in general, you are all considered municipal employees. You've been designated as special municipal employees and I'll get into that those differences in a minute. But there are various restrictions on what you can and can't do so you can't ask for and accept bribes. You can't accept gifts because of your official position or because you've taken a specific action, you can't accept gifts for more than $50 and that includes gifts that total $50 multiple gifts that total over $50. You can't use your position as a member of this committee or another committee to get something you wouldn't otherwise be entitled to for yourself or someone else a family member. You can't act in your official capacity when you or your immediate family business or future employer has a financial interest. False claims apply more to staff but that would be, you know, like falsifying time sheets to indicate that you were working when you weren't. There are also restrictions on appearance of conflict. So if a reasonable person would think that you could be improperly influenced by your connections. Then it's important to file a disclosure of that appearance of a conflict of interest. Those disclosure forms are available in the town clerk's office and they need to be filed with the town clerk in a timely manner there's a discussion at a council meeting about how often and the degree to specificity about filing a disclosure of a conflict of interest. And the advice that I understood at that point was that it really depends on the specific situation so you couldn't file a blanket disco disclosure for an appearance of a conflict of interest you really need to think about what the body is doing at this point and if there is an appearance and then file that disclosure and make that disclosure known during the public meeting. You couldn't disclose confidential information being discussed at the meeting that really rarely happens if you're not entering into executive session which I don't think would be an issue for this committee. There are restrictions after you leave your municipal position. There's a one year cooling off period and restrictions on partners. Some of those things are modified for you folks as special municipal employees. So, I can touch briefly on some of the changes for special municipal employees but I encourage you to go and read the info sheet and I can send that on to Stephanie so that she can distribute it to you about the changes to the conflict of interest for special municipal employees because you are allowed to do things that other board and committee members aren't who aren't designated as special municipal employees. So you could represent private parties before municipal boards other than this board provided you haven't officially participated in the matter and it's not before this board. You could act as an agent for private parties in connection with a matter of interest to Amherst provided you haven't participated in the matter as a municipal official, and it's not within your official responsibility. You can receive pay in connection with matters involving your city or town so a lot of these get into the sort of very specific situations that people get into when they have a business connection and also are acting in an official capacity in this body. So I'm not sure how helpful it is to get into all of these very nuanced situations. So maybe it's better to just ask if there are questions about this and I can try and answer questions. Chris. I think people are appointed, and they go to the town clerk to, you know swear themselves in that the town clerk then gives them a link or information about being trained in conflict of interest law. I think that they, and then they have to go through this every every two years or something and every year they have to swear that they did something I don't remember exactly what they have to do but all I'm saying is that I think that each member of this group gets an opportunity to go through that process and that training. So I don't think we need to go into a lot of detail about it here. Yes, that's correct you should have received a receipt of the open meeting law guide, and that needs to be kept by the town clerk's office. You should have also received receipt to fill out for the conflict of interest law. There's also an online trading that like Chris said needs to be completed every two years. So if you haven't already done that, then it's important to do that. I don't believe the conflict of interest law training covers special municipal employees in very much detail. So, again, I think it's helpful to go and read about special municipal employees and contact the ethics division if you have questions about your specific situation. Are there any other questions. And if anyone has any questions that you think of later, please feel free to send them to me and I'll get responses from a theta and share them with the group because it's likely that if you had a question somebody else might have had a similar question. So, I can definitely get responses. Okay. Thank you so much Athena really really appreciate your pinch hitting at the very last minute. Okay. So, we will move on our next agenda item is to review the charge so I'm going to share my screen. And we will just go over this fairly quickly because we have other items to discuss. So just give me a moment. So, this is our official charge. The board of health that was voted on by the town council, and as you know, you are a seven member body. I did want to point this out because in the charge it identifies the board of health as having a representative, but the board of health was unable to find someone from that committee who was willing and able to serve at this time. So, instead of having a representative from the board of health we have an additional resident member who is not a committee member and as it has been pointed out to me that all of you are residents of the town of Amherst and that is true. But the specific difference here is that the resident members don't currently serve on other committees and are not representing other committees committees. So they are basically representing their interests in this issue in this topic. So as you know, the goal is to draft a solar zoning bylaw that includes standards and guidelines that will help us for looking at the development of solar within the community and specifically to large ground month solar. We sort of have rooftop somewhat covered but we really don't have large ground month solar installations specifically identified so that is going to be what your charges and as Paul noted, it will be very easy for us at some points to run off the rails if you will, because, you know, we may find that like anything else. You know these things will lead to conversations that can lead to other interests and other concerns and so we have to always come back to why we're focused on creating this solar zoning bylaw. We have a year to work on this and Chris will talk a little bit more about engaging a consultant will be looking at resources. Some of the resources Chris and I will provide as already noted by Janet and Jack and I'm sure Laura, I'm sure all of you will have some materials and resources that you'd like to share with the group. And then, when we have those resources just make sure that they come through Chris and I and we will share them with the group and we will make sure that they get into the meeting packets. So those will be available on the town website. We will always do our best to get them ahead of the meeting we can't absolutely 100% guarantee they will because sometimes we literally get things during the meeting or just before the meeting, or after the meeting because they're referenced in the meeting but then we get them afterwards so we will do our best to get the materials together in a timely fashion as we can. So our goal is to be done on or before May 31. I'm assuming giving timing we're going to be certainly shooting for on May 31 at the very least. So, I think, you know, we do have a set time frame to work within so it'll be important that we work as efficiently as we can within the time that we have. So are there any questions on the charge. I'm not totally able to see you so if you are all okay I'm going to actually close it out, but you do have it in your packets. And there is access on the town's website on your solar bylaw working group page so you can see the charge. Now I can see you all. Jack. Yes, I'm wondering if we're including energy battery storage energy storage systems, but would this bylaw cover independent battery storage facilities that are not, you know, ancillary to a solar ground mount. This is probably a discussion that we're going to have in developing this bylaw. I think because it is related but not directly because they would be sort of standalone. So, I think that's something that we'll have to determine as we discuss this battery storage is referenced. But what you're citing is something's not that's something not directly related to the solar installation so we'll have to determine that as we have this discussion. Probably in my mind, I, you know, my first reaction is to say probably not because it should be specifically addressed with solar. This is a solar development bylaw so battery storage paired with solar makes sense to discuss battery storage on its own I would defer to Chris on something like that that would be probably a separate issue. Other questions. Okay. And moving along to our next fun topic meeting scheduling. This is always fun. We have to find a day in a time that works for us to meet. So, I know that I was sort of surprised that, you know, an early or morning timeframe actually worked for everybody for this meeting so that's great but I think there's two ways we can handle this. We can sort of have a discussion about about when is the best time for folks to meet or I can send out a doodle poll. Gather all those responses and then at the next meeting. We'll have to schedule the next meeting but then I can sort of give the options that were the most had the most hits. Laura, you have a question. Stephanie, are you looking to establish like, you know, like the conservation committee has like one certain day of the month like the second Tuesday or something like that. And the reason why I'm asking is because I certainly for myself and I expect for others that summer is busy. And I wonder if it might be sort of customized at least until we get through these busy months. So we want to make sure that I would think at the very least during the meeting we would have to come up with our next time frame for our next meeting so that's announced publicly and that we can post it publicly so the next meeting would be issued as a date and time certain. So just to do that at every meeting. If we establish a date and time, we're required to have a quorum. I think, you know, it sort of gives more reliability of frequency and understanding of when we're going to meet. It makes it easier for people to plan around. I mean, it is summer you're correct. I don't anticipate that everybody is going to be able to make every single meeting. That's why we need to have a quorum. So a quorum can make a decision, you don't have to be here at every meeting, although we should do our best, because this is such a tight time frame in which you're convening your only together for, you know, less than a year really so. And that's why I think what we need to determine is the frequency of our meetings do we want to meet. I think once a month won't be enough. There may be a time in which we, if right now we may say that we meet more frequently in the beginning. And then there will maybe a period of time if we're working with consultants where the consultant might be doing some work that we might meet less frequently but those are certainly. If we have a set schedule we can certainly post and announce that that meeting won't happen or will postpone that meeting. So those are sort of the various scenarios I would recommend because of the time frame, I would really recommend at least. If not every other week then at least twice, twice a month to have like a date like the second and fourth, or first or third day of the week per month that would that's what I would recommend. And just know that when you do that sometimes the second and third or the second and fourth are not every other week. There may be gaps of time in between those dates so. So I guess I would first see what you know if people have some thoughts on what might be possible. And then I can, we can always do the doodle poll after but just some initial conversation. Well actually I was just going to suggest we go to the doodle poll. I found those things pretty useful we're just going to get really lost here with seven people trying to come up with something right now. So just some general, I'm thinking, looking first maybe just some general like it's good to even know if people if mornings afternoons or evenings are better for people like just getting that much of an understanding would be helpful. Chris. So you were able to get everyone together this morning, which is a Wednesday morning. So I guess I would ask the question is Wednesday morning a good time for people to meet. Yeah, but when we let me get to other questions and then we'll get back to that question Chris. Jack. Yeah I just. I think the summer is really busy I'm just wondering if you kind of like have a soft opening for July, August, maybe meet, you know, once a month, and then get into the, you know, bi weekly, you know in September. That's my basic suggestion and I was able to make this mean by sort of like Laura. I would think we'd be less restricted for like a late afternoon like a five o'clock or, or evening meeting. But I mean, I'm, we'll see what other people think. And Dwayne. Yep, I was just going to add that I understand what Jack just put forward with regard to maybe a soft start in the summer but I was going to suggest every other week or twice a month or roughly twice a month to get us going well here. I was also for those of us with adult children early late late late afternoon early evening makes is really much better. That being said, for those with children that may not be the case I'm very open open to that discussion. I will say just for myself. I was able to make room in my schedule for this meeting Wednesday morning but generally that's the, that's the worst day of morning of the week for me with some other standing meetings that are out of my control. So, that's just what I had to add. Okay, thanks, Janet. One of one concern I have is, you know, being available like having a time that members of the public can attend. And I don't know if that means varying it to evening meetings and morning meetings maybe around five. You know, so people are 530 or something like that but I also totally empathize with anyone with young children, like five to seven would be like the witching hour. Okay, I will note that we have 10 attendees here. Members of the public. Okay, so any other comments. Chris, I think in response to your question about our Wednesdays at this time good Dwayne's responses no. So, and that's a pretty solid no. So I think what I will do is having taken some of this information from you all about evenings, every other or twice a month I'll just put together a doodle poll and send that out. The next meeting, we'll have to decide what works best for everyone. Chris. So I just wanted to note that we should avoid meeting on nights when the town council meets, or when the planning board meets or when the Conservation Commission needs. Well, any of these bodies, I mean we have four committees represented here so we'll have to schedule them, you know, obviously we're not going to conflict with your current meeting so actually what I would request is if you could all let me know what dates that your committees typically meet for those of you that are on other committees please send that to me. And I'll take that into consideration when putting together the doodle poll. I know I can find it online but it's just easier if you just send it to me so I don't have to go digging. Thank you. Okay, so meeting scheduling will be a topic for the next agenda as well. Moving on so the next item on our agenda is engaging consultants. And there are two consultants that will be engaged for this process. One for a solar assessment and one for the solar bylaw I will speak to the solar assessment and Chris will speak to the solar bylaw. The solar assessment is not something that you all are going to be specifically overseeing but it will impact the work that you're doing. There is an RFP that's being developed and Dwayne, as a member of the ECAC is working closely with me on developing that assessment this is for solar siting community wide solar siting. Dwayne has very specific expertise in that arena and so he's working with us as a representative of the ECAC. And also because of his background on helping us develop that RFP so that isn't the works. We are hoping to my hope, if at all possible, is that that will be going out soon. We're deciding whether we're going to go through the state process which is actually a faster process than actually putting out an RFP so I'm calling it an RFP but one is, one is I think an RFQ. Paul correct me or not if that's correct for going through the state process. It's an RFQ and we, the state has a list of consultants that are already pre approved and vetted that we can use that's a faster process but it does limit us. So if we go with an RFP, we can put it out to anyone beyond that list, but it does take longer. We have a little more control in our request, but then, you know, the process as I said just takes a bit longer. So it's likely that we're going through the state process just because it's faster and they have already approved consultants and you know we haven't gone through the list we didn't see any reason to believe that we wouldn't have capable of providing consultant consultants to choose from. So just that's an update that that's happening. The result of that will be a map layer that will identify different zones if you will and we don't know exactly what that will look like so I'm sort of giving you a clue of what we're looking for. I can't say exactly how that will flush out during that process, but there will be a GIS map layer that will be available to sort of pair with the solar zoning bylaw. And our timeframe is hopefully to have this completed within six months of engaging the consultant. So, that will be a process that will include we will certainly include you as they develop the mapping we will certainly, you know, bring it to you for your input. We will also be engaging the community where we're asking for at least two community wide forums for people to weigh in on priorities and prioritization of solar siting within the community. And also we're asking the consultant to reach out to staff, so that when they come up with this map layer it will be something that fully integrates the, you know, the priorities and concerns of the entire community as a whole. So, it's, it's a big task but it will, it will be moving along soon and it will be, it will be presented to you so that you can use that information as you're developing the solar bylaw. Janet you have a question. Is the assessment just going to be like here places that we could put solar and this is how much solar we can get from it, and some sort of economic analysis or costs, or is it actually saying, here's where the community doesn't want solar here's we want it because I thought that would be the worker of our committee, working with the community. So, based on the charge and the description. The assessment will be for identifying locations suitable for solar, and some of that will be based on community priorities. The economic piece will not be part of that. The whole other layer of analysis and assessment that we quite frankly we don't have the budget for, you know, a community wide analysis of just citing itself is going to be pretty intensive, and also creating the GIS mapping layer so what we have, there will just tell you that there was a solar study just recently completed and it was only recently just done and only shared with Paul Backelman recently that looked at 10 locations within town and we can share that with you although that's very specific to specific development in locations. And it sort of gets us to a next level of prioritization for for municipally owned locations. So it's not like, it's not looking at townwide this is townwide this is like, where are their areas where solar makes sense, where are their areas solar doesn't make sense. So, I'm sorry stepping so who makes that decision about what the community priorities are and what's what land or areas are acceptable not who's the decision maker. Is it the consultant, is it somebody from the town staff, is it you. Is it not it's not me that the assessment will be ultimately the town will take all of the input from the forums from staff from committees, and we'll look and the deciding factor will be the town. And it'll, it'll be the town manager and I'm not sure, Paul you'll have to correct me on this because I'm not clear procedure wise if that's like a town council finalize or if that's you that will finalize the final map prioritizations. I think if we're talking about, I mean, I think this is going to be, I think you're right, it's going to be a public discussion the town council is clearly going to have a role in this. And I would think the planning board in terms of the zoning would have a key function is that as well. I don't think there's like one sort of like, okay, it's going to go here type thing unless it's public land. Chris has her hand up as well. So I was going to say that if this is a zoning layer, similar to what we're developing for the flood mapping. Then it would be going through the planning board and the CRC and town council would need to vote on it as a zoning layer so it depends on how we categorize this but my assumption is that it will be the zoning layer. Yeah, the question about the study. I mean, who is defining the charge to this study. I mean, is that something our committee is going to be involved in at all I'd had the original impression that we would be. So what the just engaging a consultant to do the study right now is a fairly broad topic of you are going to do a study. When it comes to the prioritization that will that's when the, when the consultant is chosen, the more specific details will then be ironed out with the consultant and that will where that will be where we will get other people's input on the prioritizations of, you know, where that will be provided within the community. So the general RFP is is, you know, to do an assessment and create a map layer. The details of it will get ironed out with the town and the committees as we as we work on that. Does that make sense. No. Well, tell me so what what is it that you're hoping. I guess the role of our committee or also the question for the, for this study that the consultants are doing. Is it studying where solar can go on any scale, ie, you know, on developed land or parking lots. Right. Well as the larger scale on open lands or what so range. So the solar assessment will be something a tool that you can help use in its completed form, and you will have an opportunity to weigh in but this committee is not overseeing development of the assessment. That's something that's happening at the staff level. But it's going to include input and outreach from other committees. Your group, your specific function for this group is to develop the bylaw the zoning bylaw. So that assessment will be a tool you can use but you're not specifically developing the assessment, you'll use it as a tool but you will have an opportunity to weigh in on what that assessment will include, just like everybody else. The EC AC wants to weigh in. Everybody wants to weigh in on what that will prioritize so that's why there's going to be, you know, community engagement around around that. But you're not overseeing the consultant the consultant and Chris will get to this in a minute and again these are going to be two separate consultants that we're working with. Staff will be working on the assessment, but you all will probably be working more closely with the solar bylaw and Chris can speak to that in a moment. So I'm going to go to Laura. Yeah, thanks. So in my first one I think it's great you guys are developing a GIS mapping tool. Many years ago when I was working in Virginia, we developed a similar GIS based tool that essentially incorporated things like, you know, historical sites, wetlands. So this is for wind and solar but sensitive bird habitats, bad habitats, which is a good reference point but separate from the bylaw to say anyone can use this tool just to get a sense of, you know, is this a good place to develop solar or not, you know, a sensitive species just have endangered species. So, I think it's great that we're doing it. And, you know, to the extent possible I would just say, if there's, you know, things we can add, you know, to develop the tool that'd be great. Great. Thank you Laura. Yeah, I was just going to add my sort of perspective and sense of the of this assessment, which to some extent I think is is really a tool as Stephanie I think articulated after I put up my hand but that it's really a tool for the town, the town as well as our constituents as well as our committee our working group to make use of as we deliberate on on potential zoning bylaws that it is to some extent, value less in terms of identifying using GIS over a number of criteria of layers, what what the town looks like with regard to solar potential solar sighting under different criteria that this group or others might want to be able to put into this GIS mapping software to get a sense of not specific locations necessarily but but more so the extent to which are the capacity available to the to the town with regard to solar development both in the on the built environment as well as on the unbuilt environment. In order to help the town to and our committee working group to come up with to use as a tool to come up with with bylaws that make make sense. Janet. I think it's important to have clarity about who's deciding what, and I'm not sure I'm clear on that. I thought that this this committee would be making recommendations about where the solar is appropriate large scale is appropriate or not and making those recommendations to town council, based on the language and my understanding, I do think that a lot of members of the public are super interested in where it's going to go, I mean, I mean that's obvious from what happened, you know a while ago. And so I would love to see some clarity, hopefully in writing about when who's deciding what like when you say staff. I think that you is that, you know, Christine is that the planning department like who's deciding this is that the town manager. You know if the town council when you say the word town, you know we all know that is just a very diffuse. It could be the town council it could be the boards it could be different departments and so I think clarity on this question is going to be really useful to the public. It's going to be really useful to me and I think the committee about what we're deciding if we're just going to collect get the information from the assessment, and then write up a bylaw that looks like a, you know, to me as an attorney that's like kind of cut and issue, you know, you know, other than the blizzard of options we have in different bylaws but I do think we need a lot of clarity about what decisions need to be made and who's making them and I would love to have that at the outset and clear so we don't have conflicts later confusion later. Thank you Janet. Well, so I think, you know, Chris go ahead. I've been thinking about it while we've been talking and thinking that maybe it makes sense that there are two separate maps that there's a map that can be used as a tool as Dwayne was describing. And there's a map that's part of the zoning bylaw that says where the town wants solar to be located so that maybe something that we consider, you know as we're moving forward that there's not one map but there's one that provides information. And that says what the town's desires are an intent is as far as where solar can can or can't be located. Okay, I was just going to ask Paul if he had any thoughts. Seeing that we have you here. But I think we've lost him. So. All right, I think, you know, I thank you all for your input. I think, you know, as far as, you know, right now, we didn't plan on having two maps but that might be the way we go. I think at the very least the assessment that's going to happen now. It's being, it's being led by staff and when I say staff I mean me and I work for the town manager and the town, which it is the town, and we did include you know we are including public engagement as part of that process we're including outreach to staff but I think I'm trying to I think it's somewhat like the, somewhat like the development of the climate action plan, and that we, you know we had public engagement we went to staff we went to various committees we you know we sort of put the, the pride, put things out there to sort of prioritize and then sort of took that information back and worked with what were the things that rose to the top. And that is how I would assume we will be working with this process as well. When things, you know, automatically come to the top, we will be identifying those things and then we will follow I'm glad you're back. I think that you know we'll be sort of summarizing that and bringing that to the town manager and as Paul said, he's going to, you know obviously the CRC is going to want to engage in this as well so Paul I just don't know. It sounds like they want to clear process but I'm not sure beyond the assessment and gathering that information, what the next steps would be. I think it's a good question. I think, looking back to the charge we can look at what the charge says and then provide better clarity. And maybe that could be a topic for the, you know, for the next meeting. Yeah, I think maybe the confusion is how the assessment is being used for this committee because, in my mind, the assessment was a little bit separate from the work of this committee other than it will be the completed project would be like we would. We would talk to you as it was being developed we would get community input, but the, but the, the assessment is kind of a tool you would use but not necessarily something that you would specifically be creating as a result of this process. It was something that would help you. Again the end product is supposed to be a solar bylaw. And that's, that's what we need to focus the energy. But so they are, but these things that are really like we get that. Yeah, they're interrelated but they are separate so. So sorry I'm going to, I'm going to move on then to Chris. So she can talk about the process of engaging a consultant for the solar bylaw. We as staff have done a lot of research already about you know what various cities and towns around the state have put in their solar bylaws. Some of them are more up to date than others. I think we need help from a consultant who has written solar bylaws for other municipalities, and we have around 20 to $25,000 to hire someone or a company to do this with us. You know, while we feel like we know kind of the structure of what we may want to put in a solar bylaw, there are aspects of it that we are unfamiliar with such as battery storage and that's one that's really, you know, coming into the public eye and being talked about more and more lately so that's one area that we know of that we need outside expertise. And there may be other areas as well that we don't even know we don't know what we don't know so as we get into this more, you know, we will be needing advice so so we're going to put together a scope of work for a consultant. And as Stephanie was talking about there are different ways of hiring a consultant. One way is actually to hire somebody through plan, Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, and they have been helping cities and towns, particularly in western part of the country to develop solar bylaws so that may be a good route for us to go because then we wouldn't have to go through the RFP process. But then again we may choose to hire somebody from the state list as Stephanie was talking about. So I'm sure that we want to go with an RFP that does seem like a lengthy process, and that may be more than what we need at this point so. So we'll be putting together a scope of work and we can bring the scope of work to you to show it to you just like we've been doing with the planning board and show the planning board recently a scope of work that we had for a design consultant. So we'll be putting your input on that. Ultimately it will be the town manager's decision about exactly what kind of help will ask for. So, you know we're hoping to do that sometime very soon we just got the budget approved so we know we have the money now. And, and so we'll be putting together that scope of work very quickly and we're hoping to hire somebody sometime this summer. And that's really what I have to say and I think that you will be, you know, brought along made aware of what the consultant is doing and then, you know, probably meeting with the consultant at some point to talk about various issues but we don't know exactly what those details will be yet. Any other questions. Yes, I just want to say that I did approach that subject. No month or so ago with the Piner Valley Planning Commission because I don't think they had really looked at that so you know if you you are approaching them as well Chris maybe that can, you know, enable that to make that happen. So that's great. Yeah, just wanted to say I mean it sounds like making use of the Piner Valley Planning Commission sounds like a good idea because they are, you know, knowledgeable and thinking in terms of the needs of Western Massachusetts here and issues and, you know, on other subjects I've been impressed with their work. And I also then had a question of whether the solar bylaws from other communities are available for us to have a look at. Chris you want to respond to that. Yeah, we could probably post links to those. Yeah, I'd be interested in reading them and seeing. So just a comment is that some of them are very restrictive and some of them aren't restrictive at all so there's a full range of bylaws out there and it seems to depend on, you know, the situation of the city or town if it has already been hit with a lot of solar installations and it's really kind of what should I say disturbed by that they tend to put on very strong solar bylaws and other cities and towns that are more welcoming will put will have things that are less less restrictive and more flexible so there's you'll see a full range of these things so yes we can post a list. Okay, thank you. Any other questions for Chris. Okay, great. So that moves us on to the next agenda item which is just a quick review of packet materials. I'm just going to reference the, the materials that we gave you regarding developing model bylaws there's one from the Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, one from the Department of Energy Resources and one from the Cape Cod Commission for models for large scale solar. Another reason we didn't give you specific communities is because as Chris noted, some are more restrictive, some are less restrictive, and that has to do with the community themselves. So we didn't personally, we as staff were sort of talking this through and feeling like it doesn't necessarily make sense to give you a specific communities bylaws an example because they're not immersed. So, these references that we gave you are just more in how you develop a solar bylaw and more generalized and the things to look for that are specific to our community that we're working with. So that's why we gave you these materials to begin with. I think maybe as you get further on you might want to look at other communities but quite honestly, just, and this is my personal opinion. So it's sort of confused the issue to go to a specific community at this point in time down the road maybe but I would start with these. We recommend that you start reviewing these materials that we've supplied to you first in developing our towns bylaw. One thing I do want to share with you though that's in the packet is that I worked on a solar permitting pathway flow chart. But before I get into that, I'll, you had a question. More, more just a comment because you can just get lost in this labyrinth of pages and pages of different bylaws from communities and we do have 351 cities and towns and in Massachusetts. You know, I looked at Athol which is, you know, they had, they did, I think it was UMass or Tufts did a community planning process with Athol and they have sort of a model bylaw that sort of stops and asks questions. Athol itself was super concerned with economic development and scenic views they just felt like, you know, there were so many arrays going up it was just going to be, you know, you're going to drive through Athol which is a poor community and just see solar arrays and so they were concerned about where you could see all of this from and screening in the town of Palmer, they, you know, protected their watershed and also they protected their industrial zones because they thought that was, they wanted businesses to go into industrial zone that would be more employment than passive solar So it was interesting to me, you know, like, interesting to me like everything legal is interested to me in terms of bylaws but it was, it was interesting to me to think about what did the community care about and how that was reflected in bylaws and I almost think if a bunch of non legal people were, you know, less deeply interested it'd be interesting to see what different communities are making and the choices they've made I think the most notorious one was some, I don't know if it's Walton who basically said, Nan, and limited it to like rooftops of houses and stuff and that I think is the court case. But it is interesting. Like, it'd be good for the committee and the town to be able and members to be able to say hey, here's the choices people are making and it does come from a values perspective and so that's it. Well, and I will add that, you know, you, the town council adopted a goal of carbon neutrality by 2050. And it's absolutely something that in considering what the town prioritizes that's a priority the town council made that clear. So that is something you probably want to consider when you're when you're looking at developing this zoning bylaw, Laura. I know I just built upon that I think it's a great point. All the bylaws of different towns across Massachusetts and across the country are reflective of the town's priorities. And to the extent possible, you know, for us to be able to extract whether it's the climate, you know, climate goals carbon reduction goals, you know, boosting tax based goals whatever that is for Amherst. Sort of getting to the heart of that. So this committee can also, you know, look and see what priorities have been set by the town council. So we can uphold those. So I think that's a great idea. Because, you know, I think, after all Palmer, their priorities might not be our priorities. So it wouldn't be wise to create a bylaw that mirrors another town that has a different, you know, value set than Amherst does. Thank you, Laura. Anyone else before I move on. I'm just looking at the time so I'm trying to keep us on track as much as we can. So I wanted to share this. This flow chart on the on ground month solar permitting pathway. Bear with me one moment, and I will share my screen. So very quickly. I will note that this permitting pathway. You know, projects are very project specific, you know, so they don't come in as, you know, this is the one pathway that every project will take. It's a generalized reference point for what typically happens. So when an applicant comes to the town in says, you know, I want to put solar and Amherst. And we're specifically talking about large scale ground month solar here now. We're going to meet with the building commissioner, and there may be the building commissioner may then reach out to staff and say, well, there may be wetland issues. So we're going to bring in the wetland administrator. Oh, there's a historic build building on that site. So we're going to bring in someone specifically from planning who, you know, works with a historic commission. So depending on, you know, what the project is, they will bring staff in. So we're going to have a informal meeting and just sort of have a pre application meeting is typically what we call this, where they just have a general discussion of like this is what we're going to do. So who are we going to have to see which boards are we in committees are we going to have to speak to what permits do we need so there'll be a general discussion and then the application would then get submitted to the the ZBA the planning boards or the planning board in some of these very specific cases scenarios down here that are referenced. And if the, if the application is complete, then it will go to the town clerk, and the town clerk will then submit a legal ad and provide notification notification to a butters for the development of that project. So that application while those things are happening the application the planning staff is going to then submit, and this is just a general course when we get applications. They go out to different staff members and rep and liaisons to various boards and committees. So there's kind of like a, an email, you know, just sort of sent out along the network to various people that here's an application that's coming in, there's a lot of relevance for you, either a staff or as someone who has liaison to a committee that may want to look at it. So for instance, if it goes to the wetlands administrator, the first thing the wetland administrator is going to do is look at it and say are there wetlands on site and if there is, then that means that this is going to this project is also going to have to go before the conservation commission. So the wetlands administrator will probably call the, you know, the applicant in to have a meeting. They'll decide which form of permitting they should pursue if it's a request for determination, which is to determine whether it's okay as is or if it needs a more stringent review process which would then be a notice of intent. So that will be submitted and then there'll be a public hearing process. And the, the application will then be reviewed for comments from the public. And there may be other outstanding issues that other agencies review such as other endangered species habitat, or does this project exceed some kind of environmental threshold that's reviewed by the Mass Environmental Policy Act also known as MEPA. If that's the case, these two agencies will also have to review the application, and they would then submit their assessment and comments to the conservation commission. So when the conservation commission is making their decision they have to weigh in these bodies feedback as well in making their final decision. If they can't make a final decision if these two agencies which are state agencies are triggered, they can't make a decision before these two agencies have weighed in, and they have to include any of their recommendations, and their final order of conditions. So then, these two agencies which is why these arrows lead back to the conservation commission, they get weighed in, and then that determination is made or an order of conditions is issued which is the permit. And then gets shared with the planning board as EBA depending on who's reviewing the project at this point at this stage. Also, if there are other these are the other questions we may be asking and again this is not an exhaustive list. This is just sort of a typical typical questions that are asked when a project comes in. Is it a project on town land is it downtown or is it town sponsored project, then the design review board is going to take a look at it. If it requires removal of a building or structure that's historic, then the historic commission is going to want to review and comment on it, and, and these bodies will also have a public meeting about this topic as well. So if there are stone walls that are along a scenic public roadway or their shade trees, then it could be reviewed by the shade tree committee, they're also going to weigh in. As well as the planning board will review that as well, and then all of these decisions all get fed into the planning board and ZBA process. These things can happen simultaneously, or they can happen consecutively. It all depends on how the applicant deals with it. It doesn't mean that the conservation commission will hear the project and, and the zoning board will make a decision about the conservation commission's input. They will review if they know that the conservation commission is reviewing a project they're going to want to know what the conservation commission's final determinations were. So the, the ZBA process is really where all of these, all of these decisions from all these other boards and committees and all these other considerations have been reviewed taken into account and it feeds into their final decision. And it helps guide their, their decision, their final decision that's issued. And the planning board assists with that process. The reason I am sharing this with you is that obviously what you are creating is something for a ground mounted solar so this bylaw will be something that I believe the planning board will review and the ZBA will be reviewing as well and making their final decisions. And that's why the planning will be assisting with development of this bylaw. Because they're the committee that works most closely with the ZBA on regulatory issues. So I hope this is helpful that was a very, I'm trying to do this as quickly as I can. I'll stop sharing so that I can see you all in case somebody has a question about that. Great. So as I said, it's, it's not a particularly straightforward linear process. It depends on the project. Some projects may only go to two or three committees. It depends on the project and where the siting is, is, is being proposed and which is why creating a solar zoning bylaw will be useful and that priorities, you know, if there are priorities areas that are identified. It will trigger other committees review and weighing in, if that makes sense. I hope that's clear. Okay, so moving on. Now we're moving to the fun stuff. We get to elect a chair and a vice chair. So I'm going to lead this process of electing the chair and the vice chair. So first the chair is elected the rest of the agenda. So identifying the agenda items for the next meeting and running the public comment will be on the elected chair. So my first question to you all would be, who is interested, you can self nominate yourself if you are interested in being chair, or you can nominate another member. I would like to ask if there are folks interested in sharing the committee or if someone wants to make a recommendation, please raise your hand virtually and I will call on you. Martha. I guess I would be willing to be a chair in the sense that I'm retired. I'm not on any other committee, at least any town committee and so on so that I feel at least I, I do have some time to devote to it. I'm a generalist, as you probably heard so I'm interested in, in sort of combining knowledge from all the different specialties and trying to give our committee a sort of a basis of knowledge that we might all share on the various topics, but but I'm just one person here. Okay. Is there anyone else interested in self nominating or nominating another member. Dwayne. I feel like I don't know the members very well. So I be hard pressed to nominate anybody. And that's, I feel badly about that I just don't. I don't know each other that well except for the short introductions. So I will self nominate myself to be chair or or vice chair I appreciate Martha's willingness for sure and retirement status which offers more time than I have I will say I would have some concerns about time availability, but, but I would say that solar and solar siting is something I do with my, my day job at the university and with the ECAC committee for the town. So, these are issues that I'm, I'm pretty quite familiar with and interested I did spend time as some of you know at the Department of the State Department of Energy resources on on leading the renewable energy group there as well so I'm familiar with sort of state context of all this is as well. I'm not a zoning expert, but, but I am very involved with solar and land use issues, as well as climate goals of the Commonwealth and of the town. And Laura. I'm obviously not knowing you all I did a bunch of research on everyone who's on the committee beforehand, and I was actually going to nominate Dwayne. I'm happy you nominated yourself because I didn't want to throw you under the bus there so that's my opinion. I appreciate the nomination just because I'm typically don't flaunt myself very much so I appreciate that. I think with your with the background that you have, especially because you worked at sort of, you know, sort of the institutional level as well would be valuable. So, Martha were you raising your hand again or putting your hand. I was putting it down or trying to. Okay. Janet. I think we would consider co chairs, given the interest and time and experience if that would be work, workable to people. You know, for me, the chair needs to be super organized, keep people on task, get meetings together, and have time to do all that is what you know but obviously having the background in the area is super important too so I wonder if we might consider that. Yeah, so having experienced co chairs and I would really encourage you not to do co chairs, it just creates a lot of communication issues and for staff but also between the co chairs so I think it's much better to have a chair and a vice chair. You can choose what you want as a committee obviously but in terms of a committee of this import I think you would be best served by having a chair and you can change that out someone can do it for a while and then change out if you choose. So that just my that's my advice. So, Paul just procedurally and I'm sorry because I'm not sure that the way we've been doing this is totally correct so I just want to double check and verify with you. Do we take these two candidates one at a time and ask for a second and then do a vote for each. The way you do it is, I think the way you would say if there are any other people who would like to nominate themselves or nominate someone else. And then you would declare the nominations closed, and then you would sort of go through procedurally through the membership list and they would say who they would like to have as the chair, and you'd do that alphabetically or however you want to organize it. Okay, and then and then the chair would take over the reins and then they would hold an election for a vice chair. Correct. Good. Okay. Great. Thank you for the reminder. So I guess the nominations unless I hear from anyone else. Of their interest or their interest in nominating someone else. Okay, then the nominations are closed. And I'm going to do it by the order that you pop up on my screen. It's not alphabetical I hope that's okay. But I will. I will ask you to unmute yourself, and I will ask you to identify who you are voting for so for chair we have Martha Hanner and Dwayne Breger. So, I will start with Hannah. And you just unmute yourself, Martha and let me know. And let us know who you're voting for. A little bit of a tough decision here. Okay. Well, I guess since I nominated myself, I guess I'll vote for myself. That doesn't mean I'm, you know, jumping up and down there. Corcoran. Dwayne Breger. Brooks. Martha based on availability and I have to go pretty soon Stephanie had childcare responsibilities. Okay. And Jim sec. Yeah, I would be comfortable with Dwayne as a chair and Martha's vice chair. We're going with chair for right now so we'll hold the nominations for vice chair later. Breger. Yeah, I'll vote for myself then. Taglia Rulo. Dwayne Breger. And McGowan. I feel like I don't really know who to vote for since I hardly know anybody. So I just meant sort of in a dilemma. I'm leading towards Martha for time and but also I have nothing against Dwayne so I think I might just abstain because I have really no idea or basis to make a decision on which is not my happy spot. So, Okay, so you're abstaining. Okay. So I have four votes for Breger and two votes for Hannah and one extension. So Breger gets the nomination and vote. So Dwayne, you are the new chair. Yeah, we are handing over the election for the vice chair to you so same process please ask people whether they want to self nominate or nominate another member. I can do the roll call vote for you. Great. Okay, thank you and first thing. Let me thank everybody for their vote and and ability to chair this group and work together and look forward to it and look to everybody to contribute actively to this to this to the work in front of us. My role will be to try to keep us organized. Okay, so the floor is open for nominations either self nominations or nominations of others for the role of vice chair. Jack. Yes, I'd nominate Martha for vice chair. I second that nomination. Any other nominations, including self nominations. All right. The nomination for vice chair is closed. Stephanie you want to lead a vote. Sure. So it's Martha and Martha you accept that nomination. Yeah. Okay, so Hannah. Yes. Corcoran. Yeah. Brooks. Yes. Gensik. Yes. Breger. Yes, Hannah. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. And Dwayne. I'm looking forward to, to working with you. We have different backgrounds, which I think will be fun actually. Yeah, I love planetary science. I look forward to it. And just to be clear. If Stephanie, if, and if Martha and I obviously speak offline, that's, we're not a quorum, right? That's the expectation is that we can organize ourselves offline. If it's housekeeping items, you can't be deliberating about anything. If it's just like, you know, who's going to cover what topic when we have the next agenda? Those types of things you can discuss offline. And if you want to include me and, and, or Chris. Just to sort of keep you straight about some of that. If we think you're crossing a line, we might say. You can't have this conversation. So. You know, that would be helpful to include us. And then I, so the next agenda item is the agenda items for the next meeting. Dwayne. So, okay. Well, I guess. Just another housekeeping. Stephanie, you, I believe we'll be sending out a doodle poll to schedule the next meeting. Correct. The next meeting we'll probably have to, we'll have to decide now. Okay. The doodle poll will be for the sort of ongoing regular meetings. Gotcha. Okay. Okay. So maybe we will first talk about agenda items, and then we will hone in on a time to meet for the next meeting. So. What's the process? Stephanie, am I opening up the floor for agenda items for next meeting? You, you may. Yep. Yep. I will say I just, you know, as you said, the scheduling next meetings will be sort of one of the priorities. Obviously you'll review minutes. But you may want to discuss sort of having a first crack at some of those. The documentation that was shared with you. On the model by law, by laws particularly. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I guess also in terms of housekeeping, we probably want to. Review how we're going to be taking minutes. For the meetings. And, and then yes, I, I also wonder if it would be appropriate. To spend a little bit more time, maybe. Three to four minutes each to just introduce ourselves. A little bit more. To each other. What are what we bring to what we feel like we bring to the. Working group. With regard to our, our perspectives and expertise in this area. I wouldn't mind an agenda item. And I, it may be something for Chris to, to, to talk about. But I think what I think is appropriate is. Just a. Or maybe somebody on the committee has this expertise, but sort of just a zoning one on one. What, what is, you know, what, what's the purpose of zoning? What's the legal ramifications around zoning? Who's the audience for zoning? How does owning fit into that? Solar. That you just shared Stephanie in terms of that. That chart that you just described of how solar. How's the solar bylaws will specifically fit into that. Process. I would suggest. Maybe having, having that as an agenda item. And then. I think we do have, I looked at them last night. I think we have, have three good. Model bylaws to look at. I, it certainly helped me to get a sense of the scope. Of what's in these bylaws in the. PVPC. The deal we are in the. Cape Cod commission. Model bylaws that Stephanie. Provided. So. Maybe there's not an agenda item to. Have somebody lead us through. So the main components of that and, and have a discussion about. Those components. And sort of where. Our group might. Particularly choose to focus. Obviously we need to cover the gamut of the bylaws. Of the bylaw, but maybe hone in on some of the key issues that we think are, are particularly important for. For this committee. So. Beyond that, I'd open it up to other thoughts for agenda items. And I see Martha and then Janet. Yes. Well, I really liked the idea of a zoning one on one. That I think that's, that's important for somebody like me. And I was thinking then maybe we could kind of. Spend a few minutes just making maybe a wish list of what each of us thinks would be. Something they wish all of our committee members were knowledgeable about, you know, like, like. Don, you know, would. He's a. Battery expert that knows all the ins and outs of lithium batteries. Maybe, you know, we. He'd like to suggest that we could plan. A session on that or, you know, we might want to just go around and, and, you know, fix some key topics for, you know, future one on one discussions. That's all. Great. Janet. In terms of, in terms of looking at bylaws, I would hope that we would look at the. Toughs UEP. Bylaw, it's, it's, it's really terrific because it explains the process that they went through to get where they were. And they actually have like a draft bylaw and saying you could decide this, you could decide that. And so I think that's like of all the bylaws, the most user friendly. But I just thought it was excellent because it's like a case study and it's sort of the process. I think we're going to go through. Sorry, can you just mention the name of that bylaw again? It's put out by toughs UEP, the environmental program. I think, and then it's from Athol. I can find the link. It's floating around somewhere in my mind. But it was super easy to understand and kind of a roadmap to decisions to make. But I actually really think we need to hone in on and, and talk at some length about what we're supposed to do, because my understanding of the charge seems to be a little different than Stephanie's or other people's. And I just think, you know, I thought that we would be doing, be much more involved in the solar assessment in terms of locations and priorities. And I think we need to, I think we need to, I think we need to be aware of where solar should be. And I'm getting all this basically from the charge itself. So I think it's worth the discussion to be like, what are we supposed to be doing and, and who does what? Cause I think that clarity will be good for the committee and keep us from this. And it'll be good for the public and everybody to kind of keep. Even the lanes clear and things like that. So I really do have a very different understanding based on the language of the charge. And then I see some language in the charge that could create some of that. So I think we need to start out on that. Great. Thank you, Janet. Yeah. I forget whether Laura or Jack was first. I think Laura had her hand up first. Nope, Jack. Okay. Sorry. Thank you, Laura. And Joanne, congratulations for taking on the, the, the chair role. And I just, I think we shouldn't lose sight of, you know, who has the most experience with writing bylaws and, and who's, who's team that is, and that's Chris's team. And I think we need to put a lot of trust in her and coming, you know, up with. You know, the drafts and she certainly will, you know, I've been with it on the planning board with her for six years and she takes in all our comments. And, you know, and it comes back at us, but I think I'm not sure that Chris's role. Has been highlighted to the extent that should be on this, or maybe I'm mistaken, but. You know, I wanted to say that much because not, you know, I'm looking at us and nobody has written a bylaw in this group. I think if anybody has a raise our hand. No, all right. So just want to make that clear. Okay. Quickly speak to that on behalf of Chris is that Chris is absolutely the expert here. And that's why Chris and I are your staff liaisons. And there's different pieces. I was just sort of helping today and facilitating to sort of get us going, but Chris is going to be very much key and instrumental in helping you through developing the zoning bylaw and her team. So I'm, I'm sort of a nuts and bolts. For the most part, you know, when the, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, I'll be helping sort of facilitate engagement with the community and other pieces. So Chris will be definitely your reference point for development of the bylaw language. Great. Thanks, Jack. Anything else? Great. I did see Janet 10 go up a little bit. I think she has some experience with writing things. At least similar to, to bylaws and maybe solar bylaws and. Appreciate her expertise to sort of work with work, provide that expertise to the group. And so let me go to Laura. Yeah, I wanted to just, I think Jack, you made a really great comment there with Chris's expertise, but I wanted to just raise a little bit of concern. And I think it's really good to look at. Just for reference, the bylaws of the other towns, but I think that, you know, again, reiterating the priorities of alcohol are quite different than the priorities of Amherst. So while they're made concerned by the band, you know, sort of the, the visual impact, you know, to my knowledge, alcohol doesn't have strong climate goals. So, you know, to the extent that we're looking at other communities, you know, you know, if Tufts worked with alcohol and developed this roadmap, it was based on Athol's priorities as a town. So I just want to make sure that we actually clearly know our town's priorities before we develop our own roadmap. So that's my comment. And I, I'm not sure if it's premature, but I do wonder whether there's a conversation to be had maybe at a very pretty general level at the next meeting or a meeting soon of what the priorities are. You know, I don't, and I, and how, how do we, how do we come up with priorities for the town? Obviously we're, we're a six constituents, member constituents within the town. I don't, we don't speak for the town priorities, but I think to some extent, if we at least maybe think about how to categorize the different, the priorities within the town, I think we can each, obviously we have some priorities from the committee. I represent ECAC planning, planning probably has some priorities with regard to their thinking about the town. And, and, and obviously the public as well. But I think maybe some conversation and agenda, I'd at least to get a conversation started and structured about, you know, how do we, how do we, when we start thinking about the silver bylaws, how do we, how do we think about the different priorities that the town has that need to be accommodated. Actually just one further follow up question. My understanding of this group and this would be good to clarify is bylaws aren't necessarily defining where we want solar to go. It's all the criteria to look at, you know, setbacks, things like that, you know, when you're developing a solar project, there are far more, you know, there's like base level considerations that, you know, if we said, okay, we want, we think solar should go here and Amherst, maybe a lens or whatever. If you are a solar developer, one of the first things you're going to look at is, what's the interconnection to the grid? How well does it, how much is that going to be? And even if the town of Amherst said this is a great location, it might not stand up economically. So I think some clarity there and I think this is to Janice point, Janice point two, you know, I didn't think we were going to be establishing where solar is going to go. Just sort of what we're looking at across the board and what we require, whether it's, you know, proximity to wetlands or, you know, obviously distance from my lens, different setbacks, you know, things like that. So that would be helpful for me. Great. Jack. Yeah, I know, I know we all want to move on. It's where we're two hours in, but I just want to mention that we'll probably be pointing back and Chris would guide us on this in terms of the master plan for the town, which is quite a good one. Vetted has everything soup to nuts. And there's, you know, conflicting objectives, I guess. In that, and that's for us to kind of sort out. But, you know, I think that that's a good starting place. I'm sure that Chris will, you know, be staring us toward that. For our initial sort of sites on the objectives. Great. Let me note noting the time that we're at time. Let me take the priority to move to the next topic that we need to resolve before we all leave, which is our next meeting. My suggestion is we, we meet again in about two weeks. To keep our momentum going and so forth. Obviously, it's summertime vacation time, but how do people feel about trying to meet and not in two, in two more weeks. That's the week of July 4th. Do you want to, you know, We will meet that week. The following week is the week of July 11th. Do you want to propose a time, you know, I know Wednesdays at this time, obviously don't work, but just for the next meeting. So this isn't ongoing. This is just for the next meeting. Yeah. Yeah. Martha, did you have. I'm afraid I'll be away until the fifth, the 15th. Which is the Friday, the 15th, but the on the West coast on an island. We just need to have a quorum. Yeah, anybody else not available the week of the, just categorically not available the week of the 11th. I do hate to schedule it then without the vice chair, but. Is Martha available that Friday. The 15th. Yeah. If the airlines cooperate, I'll be getting back home about probably 2 30 a.m. on the 15th. So I'd be available late in the day. 2 30 a.m. Yeah. So I probably wouldn't want a 7 a.m. meeting. Nor would I. You know, come to later in the day if you wanted. Okay. You know, I don't want to push it too late on a Friday afternoon, but would. Friday at noon. Yeah. Friday, the 15th at noon. Yeah. I could, I could do that. If United Airlines is willing. Yeah. Any objections to that or Stephanie and Chris, are you available then. I'm pretty sure I'm available. Great. Do we need to take a vote on that? I think you can just say that. Okay. Let's, let's then plan to meet again. And Stephanie, I'll work with you on the agenda and the, and then the public notice and so forth. But for Friday. July 15th. Noon to. One 30. Is that the normal? I think we give two hours. Okay. Noon to two. And then we have public comment. We have members of the public. I'll get to that in a moment. But that was my question. Nope. That's great. I just didn't want people to bail. Okay. Laura, did you have a comment? No, my question was just about the public who's been. Okay. Listening. Okay. With that. Let's turn to our last agenda item before adjourning, which is available for any of the, our public participants who wish to make, provide a comment. The floor is open. I think Stephanie or Chris, do you. If they raise their hand, I can allow them to speak. So if you could electronically raise your hand, if you would like to speak or make a comment. Or have a question. Okay. Laura McLeod. Laurie are on muted. Thank you. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Well. Congratulations again to the, this important working. Group. I think it's essential for the town. I think it's important for the town. I think it's important for the town. I think it's important for the town to be pressured by all fronts from climate situations. And our town is going green. Definitely. I'm very happy for that. I am one of the supporters. And I translated and interpreted the. The car project. Very happy with that. And I've seen Stephanie is sharing. We share so many other events. And with these and. Martha and Janet. So. And thank you, Paul too. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for doing this project and all my best. For you to look at the protection of forests. I am a strong, long time environment that is in the 80s, founded groups. I, every time I do my translation work, my education work in my different board groups. I connect. All possibilities to protect. And I think it's important for the town to be. And every community, every decision maker and policy maker can do a lot. There are bylaws. There are other towns doing a lot ahead of us. Locally, nationally and globally. So you should be able to look at all those and get the best out of it. That's why you are there for. That's why you are public servers. So thank you very much. I'm very happy that the town is going forward. Thank you, Paul. And all the best. The time is tickling. There is no time. There are check the United Nations goals for the, the sustainable development goals that were asserted and we are on a, on a climate crisis. I don't need to say more, but as an environmentalist for with more than four years. The, it's a, I'm bleeding. The planet is bleeding badly in every aspect. And you can do things, more things to save the forests. Solar should go on. We know where they should go. And I know this is a ground ground level solar, but you must be careful where you choose to go for solar. Thank you very much. All the best. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Laura. Good comment. Any other comments from the public? Now's the chance to raise your hand. Great. Seeing, seeing none, at least on my screen, Stephanie. Any, any final comments before we adjourn. Great. Thank you again. Thank you for your vote of confidence to chair and look forward to, to our year together. And, and our next meeting on July 15th. And I guess I officially declare this committee adjourned. Thank you. Thank you, Dwayne. Thanks everybody. Thank you. Thank you.