 Okay, so good morning. This is the convening of the Massachusetts Gaining Commission. We are holding this meeting virtually, so I'll do our roll call this early morning at 9am. Oh my goodness, did I get ahead of Commissioner Barney? Oh, there she is. No, I'm here. There you are. Good morning, Commissioner Barney. Hi, how are you? Hi Mel, how are you? And you are here. There. Good morning, Commissioner Hill. Good morning, I'm here. All right. Good morning, Commissioner Skinner. Good morning. And good morning, Commissioner Maynard. Good morning, I'm here. Yes, thank you. And today is October 19th, it's public meeting number 482. Just a note on our agenda that we will not be addressing item number 11 with respect to a human resource's division and personnel matter that the Interim Executive Director wants to bring forward. They're going to plan on doing that perhaps on November 2nd instead. We'll turn right to you, Commissioner Maynard. I know we're going a little out of order today on your minutes. Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, we are going to discuss the August 30th, 23rd and the September 12th, 2022 executive session minutes, but those will have to be addressed in executive session. We have reviewed minutes from February 23rd and February 27th, but given given the timing, we will present those on November 2nd meeting. Okay. The 23rd and I'm sorry. The 27th. Thank you. And that's what. Okay, thank you so much. Thank you. All right. We're next going to turn to our screening committee for the firing of the executive director. Turn it right over to Commissioner O'Brien and Commissioner Maynard. Okay. Thank you. So the both postings are up internal and external. And we have gotten some resumes and as my understanding, we are going to have a first formal session, hopefully next week we'll get on that and get a first formal session in terms of starting to review. But the one outstanding matter is a couple of commissioners had expressed an interest in participating in the selection of the executive search firms are going to help push this out to a broader audience. So the staff has done the review and has some recommendations. And so that's what's on for today to make sure the other three of you have a chance to say whatever you want or ask questions about those search firms. Excellent. Thank you. Thank you so much. So I guess I'll get the party started and so it can drive us home. So I without further ado, I'll give us a little bit of background and a little bit of, you know, insight into the process and Beniso will give us like, you know, what we'll bring us home from there. So we'll get started in a public meeting on July 27 2023. The commission discussed the process and potential means for attracting candidates for the executive director vacancy. Part of the discussion was retaining the assistance of professional search firms to aid the MGC HR department and vetting committee as discussed in that meeting a successful search firm would likely exceed the incidental threshold, which would then necessitate the use of a statewide contract for a procurement exception. We asked the commission to allow us to do research to see if an intentional diverse spend would yield qualified firms. Okay. The Massachusetts gaming commission collaborated with the local enterprise assistance fund leaf using its grant and which leads helps to identify DEI vendors and adds them to a procurement database. This collaboration aimed to narrow down a broad list of supplier diversity certified recruit firms provided to them by the commission as well as firms identified by lease proprietary supplier network to a pool of five distinct search firms. In a public meeting on August 17 2023 staff presented at the commission and discussion of its findings that determined that there are diverse firms capable of assisting the commission and its search for the next executive director. In a public meeting on September 7 2023. We shared some high level documents as well as the questions that were asked of potential vendors. After reviewing the information provided the commission then requested that we proceed with the evaluation process and determine the final final recommendation. All right, so here's the evaluation process. The five executive search firm candidates for outreach were sent to search LLC gums partners. MH Group LLC Renaissance Network Incorporated and US Professional Services Incorporated. The team created a new set of questions specifically to gauge the level of interest and suitability of the five candidates search search firms prior to meeting with them. These questions can be found. Well, we basically created a matrix of the questions that we created and use those to compare and extract high level notes. The questions cover a deeper level of description of the recruitment and sourcing process. The willingness of search firms to not be sourced, the willingness to work on a contingency fee basis, their general recruitment reach, whether it's regional national and international, and their specific recruitment strategies for acquiring diverse candidates. The team next enlisted the help of Jacqueline connect to help with the logistics for outreach and coordinating the interview process in a tight time frame. All five candidates were successfully scheduled for interviews and provided the evaluation questions in advance of the meetings. The noted responses, the noted high level responses from these interviews, you know, will be discussed by Beniswa and I'm going to pass the mic to her right now. Yeah, so after we set up the Jacqueline set up the interviews we sent those questions in advance so it gave them an opportunity, so it gave us an opportunity to actually see the responses. We actually only received, I believe, one or two responses from that, but it was okay because we went through all the questions when we met with those individual search firms. The first search firm that we were recommended gums partners they actually self selected out so we didn't have to pursue them any further. We met with the first search group that we met with was the Renaissance group, and they are a traditional executive search firm they have a lot of experience with regards to source and talents for C level suite organizations. They were the highest priced out of the five or the four that was left. However, they would only do retainer they would not consider the contingency basis. And so we rejected them based on that. And then we we met with symptom search and symptom search is the newest of the five agencies. However, the person in charge of the search. She has more than nine, more than nine years of experience in the field so she's very qualified and she has helped companies higher for a sector level positions. We were concerned with the kind of the number of years she's she's been with that company. But because of her past experience, we felt that she was a their firm was a good candidate. And they had basically the best pricing out of the five. We met with us professionals and they, we, we kind of joked a little bit that they were super recruiters. They're a large firm. They have a very, very large database. Our only concern was, would they be able to bring diverse candidates they have a lot of, they have a very, very large following on their Instagram and some of the other social medias they really know how to, you know, utilize those social platforms to to gauge candidates, but with those candidates be the right for us. They are willing to work on a contingency basis. And then the last group that we met with was image group. And they are kind of, they kind of tell themselves as being the diversity executive search firm. In fact, they said on average they usually give their clients at least 70% diverse candidates late. When we were reviewing and going over all of the five, well, the first, the first one self selected Renaissance group kind of really self selected themselves out to because they, they would not consider the contingency basis. So we were left with three and from the three we were trying to decide which would be the best. And we came to the consensus that all three had different things to bring. And because in the fact that they're all willing to work on a contingency basis. Our recommendation is to use all three. And because in the end, only one is going to get paid anyway. And each one has a really, we feel we'll have a really bring a good benefit to the agency with regards to this executive search. And I think we, we do need to give some kudos to leave to or provide in these search firms, because they, they provided us with some really strong candidates and Hopefully we can utilize all three of these and move them forward with regards to the second of search. Thank you. So just to reiterate the three that were selected were MH group LLC us professional services incorporated and sent him search LLC, and this was in an effort to cast the widest net. So the question that I have I know I, Dave Meldrew and I had this conversation earlier it's unusual to use more than one simultaneously. So if you could just talk about that fact, but you're still recommending the three and then the circumstances if what if more than one of them brings a candidate and that ultimately is hired, whether that how that really works, whether it's just the one continuity that is that split amongst multiple firms or what that would be financially for MGC potentially. Yeah, so that's how it would be the candidate that we select the firm would get good. The payment. I'm just curious if that same candidate came in from two of them. So we asked we asked the can't this is actually one of the questions that we asked that we created for them is how do you have ownership of the candidate. And the answer to that is, you know, and it could be a variety of ways it could be through a checkbox and to layout it could be in the cover letter. Certainly, or they could just let us know in advance this is our candidate. Those might not be the only options if there's if there's a better solution in the future, we could use that as well. Yes, that would be the first one that brought it forward because we just okay. There's got to be there in the contracts in terms of how we interpret. We discussed this we discussed this with them and they said this is a typical issue, especially when you're using multiple search firms. So these three are not their preference to be included in multiple but they've done them before and they said, you know, we're not going to be dumping hundreds of candidates on you. We're really going to limit ours because that's how we keep a good database. If we just send everyone your way and there's no traction that doesn't help us. So, and that was actually all four that we interviewed said that. So that was one of the other reasons we chose to go with three, because they're not just treating it like a huge funnel to send to us. I think they were saying most of them actually all four of them said the most they would probably bring is 5 or 6. To us because at that point they lose the interest of their clients as well. And just to add on to that too. They would communicate regularly with regards to the candidates each one of them said that they would give us a candidate profile so we would know. And we can mitigate any of those risk right up front by saying, hey, this person is also with this one. And then we could decide at that point who would get the credit for that candidate. I know when we had our discussion. I thought this was the best approach having these three to cover as as cover as create a wider net recruitment that is possible. Because they're going to be referring a small number of qualified candidates to us as they instructed, we will be conducting on the recruitment side, a time stamp. So if there are any issues, I will specifically be speaking to the agencies to clarify it up front. So we don't run into any type of conflict if you will. And then just also to clarify it's it's my understanding and I think everyone else on the search committee and particularly Commissioner Hill for you that we we're going to see all the resumes that come in that not they're not going to be screening things out, you know, so I want to make sure that. Thank you. I don't know if anyone else has any questions for the, for the group. So we only had a vote on here if you wanted to go against our recommendation but since we're the procurement group, we don't need a vote. We basically made our decision here, but we did put that vote on there out of an abundance of caution in case you wanted to only use to or not use any. Looks like we have consensus to go with what staff is choosing to do, which I think is a good idea. I want to thank john and the new stuff with the really thorough presentations very helpful today. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks guys. Thank you. You. I'll set them john. I'll set. Thank you. It was excellent work by john and beneath what made it very easy for me and Dave to come in and just kind of well Jacqueline also made it easy for us to come in listen to the discussions and make selections. So, they were all that it goes there. Yeah. Absolutely. They were outstanding. I bet it was interesting too. Was not not a bad assignment very very helpful and really that's an intentional diverse spend. We only selecting minority and women owned businesses so that's consistent with our commitment and thank you and thanks for for really being a guiding light on that effort. All right, and I know john you're bringing all that every day to your work so thank you. So then we are turning to item number four. And this is with respect to our screening committee for the IED director position. And that I'll turn to Commissioner Skinner and Commissioner Hill. Good morning again madam chair. So, I have to say from the outset, this is not on it should not be on for a vote today. You have in your packet, the job description as it currently is with the human resources department. The goal is to work to revise that and update it. I got a little tripped up in this process because I had in mind the process that Eileen and I Commissioner Brian and I undertook in connection with the executive director job description review but that was under a different posture. It was not a subcommittee setup to review to review that or in it was before we had established the subcommittee for the interim executive director. So, in order to not run a file of the open meeting law. I did not circulate or include in this packet, the beginnings of a marked up version of this job description. So, it is my intention today to circulate what I have begun to mark up to the rest of you for feedback and some additional edits, not necessarily today. I'm hoping madam chair that we could have this put on again for a more fulsome discussion of the edits that need to be made to this job description at a later meeting. In particular the November 2 meeting. I truly does have a version. My fellow subcommittee members have not seen this. Just, we could we go we met, we didn't get it on the agenda for their review. So, this is really just my proposed edits, and I welcome further edits and comments from my fellow commissioners and chief module as part of the screening committee. In the next couple of weeks. And pause for a minute, please. I just need a two minute break. If you wouldn't mind. Sure. Okay, thanks so much. Thank you. Thanks so much. Commissioner Skinner, I just wanted to make sure I was clear on something we do have in our packet a document, but it is not your does not contain your red lines and that's the distinction. Correct. I did look at the one that's in the packet. And it is not the one that we use to hire. The last, you know, we've got a little else. And I wasn't sure it, you know, if you had the most recent version and this was your markup, but it sounds like you want to work from this document that we do have in market up. Commissioner O'Brien, I think we probably decided the job description in a commission meeting as well. Commissioner Cameron and then executive director Wells worked on the version I had. I guess I'm just wondering, I believe I have them that version. And I don't know, Commissioner Skinner, if you would like me to, I don't know if I'm, if I'm allowed to even share with you. We did get from the version that I am working that I worked from. I did get from human resources. So there's obviously a disconnect. And I understood in that I understood that I was working off of the most recent version. I think I think the whole committee thought that. So definitely, I mean, the, the posting that went out when Loretta Lillios was hired obviously be a public document. So I don't see why that couldn't be shared with. Right. Yeah, I am concerned I could be wrong. Right. Commissioner Skinner, but I looked in to my files because to see the final for the, the director of the investigations and personal bureau and what I printed out. So then I looked at yours, I said, oh yeah, there's been some edits and I'll just think about it. But then it occurred to me maybe we had two different versions. So how can I just go ahead and send that to Commissioner Skinner is that permissible I'm going to turn. I wonder if all of us should get it. It's a public document. So, you know, if you guys disseminate to all of us because then that could be the jump and off point right and then to keep the red lines from there. I, I presume it's a public document. If it was never distributed, then it wouldn't be. But I posted for the job. Well, I'm, I guess I'm hoping I think that is that version. You know, I got my records could possibly be wrong. I don't think so, because it really brings true to me from, you know, but was that not that long ago. Right. And I know Commissioner Cameron was very, you know, she was a tune to it. So, and I'm willing for it to be. I don't I don't claim any ownership over it. So I'm happy to have Judy circulate and it to the extent that's helpful to you. Absolutely. And that, you know, the fact that I wasn't working or we weren't working off of the most recent version. Because you could be you could be I want to make sure I could be wrong. Yeah, but I wouldn't be surprised if we were not because it struck me that there were some significant items missing from this particular job description that it just it wasn't certainly wasn't ready, in my opinion, so it would be good. But then Trudy. I need to send it to her. Yeah. And just Trudy there's no need to circulate now the marked up version of the old job description that I sent me this morning. Okay. Or would it be a oh you don't want it you want to take a look first. If it's not so if I didn't work from the most recent version, it doesn't make sense to circulate. Again, I, I want to be really clear just because it says final and my records I could be wrong but it, I think you'll see it looks a little bit more fleshed out in certain areas so perhaps it is a later version. Yeah, right. And that could be on us are on me for not sharing with HR I just feel. I'll tend to that. Thank you. And again, thank you for the quick pause I just wanted to see where I was, make sure I had a little bit of understanding. Thank you. Chair, could I, could I ask Commissioner Hill and Chief Muldrew if they have anything to add to this item. Not at this time. I look forward to seeing what gets sent around. I do have a copy of this so if there is, if it's possible, if you could please distribute that to me also, because I have copies of the of the job description I believe I want to make sure that we are consistent with our information leaving HR. Thank you. Commissioner Hill, are you all set now at this juncture, and we'll get our marching orders next time around. Is that the plan for November 2nd. So process wise, Madam Chair and and Commissioner Skinner I just want to make sure that I'm understanding what is going to happen in the next couple of weeks so we're going to have truly send this around the newest. I think is the newest version. And will we take comments within that two weeks and then discuss on the second and vote on the job description because the hope is, at least, it was the hope of the committee that we would be able to start posting this job on the third. So I just want to make sure with what we're doing that we're meeting that goal, or will we have to meet again after the second to ensure that we have the product that we want. The latter, if I may, Commissioner Hill, because the commissioners aren't allowed to share their opinions on this outside of the public meeting so you'd have to discuss that at a future meeting. 25th we have agenda setting could we add a very discreet. You know, I be job description as sort of a solo topic on that in the end of the 25th to keep you guys on your cadence. I would just remind everybody I think we have a very busy meeting on the second and this would this will take some, this will take some time. So just putting that out there. I do like if available on the 25th that would probably be the best scenario. We would have, it would be marked up as a separate public meeting. I just take an assessment about how busy November 2nd is. You're also going to probably get a request from Judy. I do have a medical appointment at nine on the 25th. So if it's going to include, you know, a substantive discussion like that. It's at the end. I'll make it to that. No problem. But if you have an alarm clock starts going to be easy, but I don't know what everybody's schedules look like so. But let me take a look. It is an important, very important item and I don't want to get lost in the shuffle of an agenda setting meeting. But I'm hearing you commissioner tell as we look right now at a busy day. So I did find in looking at the files that Director Wells, Secretary Wells made all the red lines to they might be the earlier version. I can't tell. May I send the red line version with that be helpful as well. So you see Karen thinking. Is that okay? Can we send Karen's thinking and then the clean version. Yes, certainly. And because you're talking about it here at a public meeting, you can absolutely do that. Okay, so when I get a chance, because I don't want to make a mistake on the email, truly, I'll send both the red line and then what I noted, not as final as clean. So, and that was done September of 2020. So it was, there could be a good reason, given it was smack in the middle of the pandemic that somehow the files just weren't perfectly updated. Okay, so I'll send them along. Thanks. Yeah. Yes. Can I just get clarification on the November 2nd meeting. Are we confirmed for Springfield on that day. Yes. Okay. And were you suggesting when I thought you mentioned a nine o'clock appointment that you had. That was on the 25th and the agenda setting. So if we were going to make it into a public meeting, as long as that we're at the end, I want to be part of that discussion. I think I can just fine. I think we're just going to take a look, assess how busy the second is and would be, I'm hearing two different things from the two of you. And I think you're leaning a little bit toward November 2nd. Michelle Hill, are you leaning towards the 25th. So I leave it to you. I can work out my schedule. I'm just hoping that we can have it all finalized by the second, if it's done on the second, great. If it's done on the 25th, great. As long as it's done, because I would hate to put it off again because we, we have a pretty good goal in mind and I'd like to keep that if possible. So my my request, even if all we do is distribution of the red line version on the 25th, so that the other three of us get a look at it that would speed up the second even if it's just a really short meeting for distribution of the red line. So that we can see what was the last actual posting when we hired the red lilios and then what are the red lines that coming out of the committee with a vote on November 2nd potential. Right. So even if there's no substantive discussion on the 25th, at least we can mark it up for distribution of the red line and the original. I like that a lot. Thank you, Commissioner Brian. That's the goal that makes great sense. So Trudy will just make a note that we're will have a second public meeting to follow on the 20th that we'll have a single item basically what was on today's without a vote noted. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. And you know what, these processes for the screening committees are just new challenges for us. So this, there was, it was perfectly managed today. From my perspective. So thank you very, very much. Okay. Let's see. Madam chair just so you know I'm going off camera now for a period of time I'm here, but my camera won't be gone for a while. Well, thank you and God it worked out for you. Commissioner Brian know you'll be interested in listening to Denise with some presentation. Yes, thank you for taking out of order for me. No problem. I'm thrilled that we got that accomplished. Thank you so much. All right. So now we're going to item number four by. And we will turn right to our interim executive director. And I know you've got a presentation today. We do thank you, madam chair. Good morning commissioners and to all the members of our team and all who are joining us here today. We actually have three pieces of information we'd like to share with the commissioners all by members of our team. The first as you've noted is from Mr. Muldrew and Beniso sundae, who will talk about the commission's own diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. Also like to update you as to the goings on relative to responsible gaming conference that's in the planning stages and director Vanderlinden will discuss that with you. We'd like to offer an update as to the east of Broadway development and chief Delaney will be here to talk a little bit about that for you. But without further ado, if I may, I'd like to turn things over to Mr. Muldrew miss sundae to talk about the commission's DEI effort. So good morning to you both. Good morning. Good morning, Madam chair, morning commissioners. Good morning. Interim project. Executive director. Thank you for inviting myself and my colleague, Baniswa Sundai, senior DEI program manager to present the MGC Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Report. As we begin, I want to give full recognition to Baniswa who has been an incredible addition to the team and was the lead in collaborating and the gathering of the data and presenting it as such. I want to make sure that's it's evident. I think you'll agree. In 2020, Madam Chair, Cathy Judd-Thud created the MGC Equity and Inclusion Working Group. The creation was in response to societal, racially intolerant issues that were prevalent at the current time and are prevalent today. Statement of purpose. MGC is a committed and racially equity in justice, diversity and inclusion that expects the same of its employees, licensees and stakeholders. We realize that in our society at large, there are systems, policies and practices and the continuing yield inequitable incomes. We recognize that in addressing systematic issues, everyone who's in part of any system that has an opportunity and responsibility to examine how systems work and to the semental barriers of struck racially equity is responsible. We embrace the anti-racism as a guiding principle. Anti-racism in contrast to absence of racism calls for a proactiveness. On the topic of racial equity, neutrality is insufficient, preserves the status quo as equivalent to an abdication of moral obligation. Here at Mass Gaming Commission, we hold ourselves, our licensees, our vendors to this cornerstone of our culture and we continue to approve upon it. Venisha, next slide please. Our core values, commitment to transparent gaming licensing processes, encouragement of open exchange of ideas and participation among our staff management with our licensees, strict adherence to ethical standards in licensing and regulation. We embrace diversity in workforce as well as we embrace diversity in our vendors and working closely with our communities to meet the commitments and to have representation. So I'm gonna jump in for the rest of the presentation. So it was really good for us to not, we're a madam chair, not to only establish the equity and inclusion committee, the group and to have our statement of purpose to have our core values, but then we need an inaction plan. We needed goals to shoot for. And this slide really speaks to those goals. First, it's all based on our cultural transformation, fostering an inclusive agency, having training internally. We can't grow as an agency if we don't know or are educated on processes and things that affect our society and our agency as a group too. So we have our internal culture that we're building and that is kind of driven by societal culture as well. So we will be established in a culture committee we're working through that now. We have to put some systems in place in order to get that set up. Regulatory review, we want to make sure that we integrate an anti-racist perspective and we wanna review it every three years. So it's about time now that we're coming up on reviewing the processes that we talked about a couple of years ago and we'll move forward and possibly alter these goals, add to new goals and really take a look at how we have progressed through this action plan and ensure regulations don't disproportionately harm or hinder community visa color. We want enhanced customer service. So we have to review our policies and procedures to make sure that we're being fair, that we're accessible, that we have economic opportunities for our communities of color. That also means our hiring and retention. We have to look at that internally as an agency. So we are trying to improve those processes. We just talked about looking at those job descriptions and that's what we're doing and also thinking about how can we do more outreach and mentor and monitor our licensees diversity efforts as well and procurement enhancements. So we wanna continue to broaden procurement policies to increase spending with minority businesses. Again, we talked about that through the Executive Search Committee. So those are just some of the things that we're doing and making sure that we have intentional spend within our organization that we're expecting of our licensees. This is our team. So we have our HR team. I'm on that team. We have Annie Misery, Trutibanda, Dean Ventola and Natasha. And each of them play a vital role in ensuring that our diversity goals are met, not just through the DEI portion of it. And just wanna go over a few of our diversity stats. Now our goal with regards to our agency is to be 25% diverse. Right now we are at 31% diverse as an agency. So that is looking at what we talked about that diversity hiring to be intentional about providing opportunities for people looking at the job descriptions to make sure that we're getting diverse candidates who qualify diverse candidates who are applying and who can be hired. And this is the result of that. With regards to our spend in year 2022, we had $3.6 million in diversity spend. And with regards to hiring, being gender diverse, 40% of our agency staff are women. And just to look at some of the outreach that we have in 2023, we're looking at an MGC internship. I recently participated in DI training with pay setters. We're really trying to be intentional with regards to expanding diversity recruitment reaches. And for example, we participated in our recruit military event in which we had a good turnout for that event. And we followed up with several of the candidates that we met at that event as well. And that kind of ends the presentation. Do you guys have any questions? Right, if you could bring down the deck, we'll be able to have a conversation more easily. Wonderful presentation. Commissioners, questions do you have for this team? Madam chair. Yes, commissioner. I actually don't have any questions. That was a great presentation and I appreciate you bringing it forward. I most noticed that we're at 31% of our DEI goals. And that is a big number. It looks like it's a low number, but believe it or not, that's a big number. And so very proud to stand with you and all that your division does to get that number where it is. And with the goals that you've said, I know that number is gonna get even higher. So congratulations on a job well done, but more importantly, I just wanted people to know that 31%, that's a highlight for sure. I have a question for Denise or Dave. On the spend, I think that's a very good number too. I don't know if there's any way, commissioner, I'm turning to you because you usually have some perspective on how we think about it. Should we be thinking about it in terms of our overall spend or how do we think about it with respect to the diverse? So here's Derek too, because I know we've been, as we mentioned earlier, of an eastbound, very intentional around this. So Derek, do you want to get some perspective on that number for us? I can fill in around commissioner Maynard after he gives his perspective, but. I mean, I think, listen, first of all, like commissioner Hill said, these numbers are very commendable. It's easy to look at it and say, there's more work to do, there's always more work to do. But, and Benissewa and I had a long conversation outside of my office, probably a week or so ago about a lot of these topics that are coming up. Intentionality though is the first piece of this, right? And so knowing that you have to do it, understanding that you've got to pick in, I don't know if Derek's going to go into this and he's much more of an expert on this than I am, but you've got to pick vendors that are in spaces where we need spend, right? Which is part of the equation. But I think it's important. And really my question was, Madam Chair, if I may go off of your question, is what can we do as a commission to continue to put gas on the fire? What can we do to make sure that people know that A, we're looking for suppliers, we're looking for vendors, anyone who wants to join the MGC, we take it very seriously to have the best, but also to make sure that the people here reflect the Commonwealth, the Commonwealth. And so what can we do, Dave and Viniso, what can we do to help? Well, thank you, Commissioner Maynard and your comments. It's a lot of this initiative began both honestly before myself and Viniso arrived. So we're continuing an ongoing effort, but to answer your question, what can MGC do and what can we have? As we present ideas, and with my background for what I've seen, it is extremely, it is only successful if it starts from the top down. It can't go from the middle, can't come from the bottom, it has to come from the top down. So as we present thoughts, and we collaborate among everyone, staff and employees, I mean, staff and executive management, and we present ideas, your open minds, your ability to figure out and help us assist in how to execute and just be willing to implement or provide recommendations for us to implement, that goes a very long way. Because once that happens, we have a culture and everything cascades down. So that would be my thought. And just to add to that, I mean, it's about educating. And if we have to do a lot of educating internally, that DEI is part of everything that we do. And people tend to separate it and they only tend to think about gender or ethnic diversity, but it is part of everything we do. And once people start understanding that, when I'm in finance, how did that affect me? Or if I'm in HR, how does that affect me? And when we start thinking about those things and how all those things are interconnected and interrelated, people still have a fear of DEI and that fear will go away. And we can only do that by continuing to be intentional by educating people and to continue to build culture with them, but agency. Beautiful. Patricia Skinner. Do I echo Commissioner Hill's sentiments, but I'm gonna go against a grain just a little bit. I think overall those numbers are fantastic, but the devil is in the details. What, how can we drill down on the categories of diversity, race, ethnic, in both that 31% number and the 48% number disability or veterans, it'd be helpful to see where we are internally with respect to our management numbers and diversity. So I think we are absolutely on the right track. It's something for sure to smile about in what you're presenting today, particularly the establishment or the goal of establishing the culture committee. I'm really looking forward to that and to see what work comes out of that committee. So keep up the good work for sure. Thank you. And we actually are putting more systems into place. We're finding that some of the systems that we had in place weren't necessarily reliable. And we do have limitations like our applicant tracking system. We have the ability to do the tracking, but we don't have access to it. So some of those things that we're trying to work through to figure out what is the best way to keep those, to provide accurate numbers internally, we're working through those. So we, they are on our mind. Sounds like it could be the first task of the culture committee. Yes. I think you made it correct. I'm sorry. Commissioner Skinny, you bring up a great point. The 3.6 million number that we reported for FY22, there are targets within those numbers for both diversity, small business, so diverse vendors, women-owned vendors, minority-owned businesses, veteran-owned businesses. And we missed the veterans target in 22. And I think we just barely made the other two targets, FY23, we were much more intentional in these. So the more reporting we do on this, and I think Bernice was holding our feet to the fire, right? The more reporting we do on this, the more digging into the numbers is how we get to more of these intentional procurements. Our veterans' numbers are still lagging. That's a hard spend for just about every state agency. We were able to exceed our benchmarks in both minority and women-owned businesses for FY23. So that was great. And we're way over on the small business, Massachusetts small business side, which we have been year over year over year. So you're right, it's digging into those numbers and continuing to drive. And I think part of what Dave and Bernice was said is this program started, but they're really digging their teeth into it and holding us all accountable at this point. Thank you for that response, Derek, but I wanna take this time and opportunity to remind everyone of the recognition our procurement team got from the SDO, the Supplier Diversity Office. So that is not to be taken lightly. I recognize and appreciate your identification of a couple of shortcomings there, but I think overall, we should be proud. We work hard at it. It's not an easy area to change what you've traditionally done. So it's hard. Well, I'm very, very pleased with where we are. And I think all of us recognize we've used the word intentionality. We do require reporting from our licensees on these issues. It's good for us to hold ourselves accountable. As you know, Derek, on reporting. And today is a great start. These, let me show you how it points out, 31% exceeded our goal of 25%. And I suspect with the team that we've gotten in place and everyone's commitment. And that is across the agency. We just have seen just a lot of good results and just looking forward to the future. So thank you. I want to mention, I mentioned at the agenda setting I had invited a Denise one and Dave to give their presentation today. We had this presentation and Commissioner Maynard join the GPAC meeting. And I said, it's not, you know, I want to make sure that our team has seen of the GPAC saw. So now we're all caught up. So thank you. Looking forward to continuing reporting. Thank you, Madam Chair and commissioners. Thank you. Thank you. Excellent, excellent, excellent. All right. Moving on to item number six, Commissioner Hill. Oh, close time. We do have a few more things. Yeah, there are a few things I didn't know about when I did my time frame. So I'm sorry, my apologies. Quite all right. We'd like to turn it over to Director Van Der Linden if we can. Mark, good morning. Good morning. Good morning, Madam Chair. Good morning, commissioners. I will be quick, but I do have just two very brief things here. First is an update on the research conference that is planned for the spring included in the FY24 gaming research agenda that the commission approved back in May is a section on knowledge translation and exchange. And short the goal of this section is to focus on activities that ensure that the findings of the MGC research program are accessible and usable by a broad range of stakeholders. The main activity in the FY24 research agenda is an inaugural research conference. The goal of this conference to dive a little bit deeper is to bring together a diverse network of stakeholders and researchers to discuss the findings of more than a decade of MGC research, to collaborate on knowledge mobilization strategies and to develop ideas to broaden and deepen our research. This will be tentatively held on May 14th in Worcester. We're working on some of the contract details of that right now. I would like to just give a shout out to the Mass Council on Gaming and Health for helping us coordinate what is a relatively complex task that I have very little experience in. But I also want to call out Griot, who has worked with us for a couple of years now on knowledge mobilization activities and the UMass Amherst. They will be showcasing some of the research that they've done over the past number of years at the conference. To extend it beyond the borders of Massachusetts, we've also been in discussions and received support from members of the New England Consortium on Problem Gambling, including those individuals from Connecticut, from Rhode Island, Maine. We've also had conversations with New Hampshire and Vermont about this as well. So it's moving along. It is admittedly more complex than I was anticipating, but we are working on it. Any questions about the conference? There's just one other 20-second thing I want to mention. Dr. Mandolin, is Ms. Mandolin involved? Because she came on with her video. Or is that somebody else? I'm sorry. Yolanda. Yolanda. I'm sorry. Oh, Yolanda is a member of our game since came in. I know. I just wondered if you were on to introduce her, because I see gallery. You are probably seeing speaker. So I just wondered if you wanted to introduce her. Hope. I think you're just excited to join for the next presentation. That's okay, but I wanted to note you. And she was listening with intentionality. So I like that. Good morning, Yolanda. Good morning, Madam Commissioner. Yeah, thank you. All right, next. And then just really briefly, I just mentioned a request for information that is currently posted on the Combine system. It's the gambling risk identification and response technology RFI. Purpose of this RFI is intended to give the commission information from knowledgeable parties so that it may advance our understanding of currently available technology capable of identifying or assisting in identifying risky gambling behavior and response options in the context of both casino and sports way drink. This RFI has been posted now for probably around a month or a month and a half, but it closes tomorrow. We're very excited to receive those responses, to review them and share them with the commission. But again, this RFI is posted on Combine's and we'll be closing tomorrow. Thank you. Thank you. And you have Chief Delaney? Yes, thank you and thanks, Mark. Appreciate it. And it's been a little while since we talked about the Easter Broadway development. So we want to just check in and give you a quick update. Nobody better to do that than our own Joe Delaney. So let's turn it over to Joe and the floor is yours. Good morning, Joe. Thanks, Todd. Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. Just as you probably recall, back in the spring and the early summer, we were working on this project, trying to figure out exactly what we wanted to see for an application and so on. And back in the middle of July, we sent a letter to Encore with that list of information that we were looking for. And of course, what we need to do on this is we will eventually need to amend the gaming license, amend the operation certificate and amend the section 61 findings. But of course, since that letter went out there, it's kind of gone a little bit quiet on the project, but there has been some recent activity that I wanted to give you an update on. So since the spring, this project has been in the MEPA process with the draft EIR or final EIR. And actually on this Monday, this Monday the 16th MEPA issued their decision on the final environmental impact report. And that decision is requiring Encore to do some additional work on a few areas. So they will have to do a supplemental final environmental impact report. And the key issues, as you might imagine, revolve around traffic. So it's really parking and traffic. Some of the agencies, MAPC and MassDOT have been pushing back a little bit on the amount of parking that's being provided. They like to see parking limited somewhat so that people use public transportation. So that's an issue that still remains. And there are some other issues around the general traffic mitigation, the mode shares. How are people gonna get to this facility on what platform? And then also some of the transportation demand management items are still questionable. There's a few others too, but those are the big ones. And you also might have seen that last week, the city of Everett approved the plan for this project, which is one of their many approvals that they need. You know, this is not uncommon in a project like this. There are multiple permitting paths that a project like this has to take from us, from the state, from MEPA, from the city planning board, zoning board, conservation commission, there's many, many approvals. So it's not uncommon for something to be working in parallel. But now we have not seen an application has not come to us directly yet to consider this. So we've been in contact with Encore. I've called over there a couple of times just to see what the status is. And at those points, they weren't ready to submit to us. So, you know, we'll keep in touch with them. And, you know, obviously we'll let you guys know as soon as we know when they'll be coming in with an application. And then, you know, once that comes in, there will be a little bit of a process that we need to do. We're gonna have to put together, you know, an internal team here to review those plans and so on and then ultimately bring them to commission, to the commission for your consideration. But that's essentially where we are now. So things are moving, although you haven't seen much lately, things are still progressing. Madam chair. Yes, Mr. Joe, can you just answer me this question in regards to the MGC's responsibilities in this particular subject matter, which is the traffic and parking. I know we have a little oversight when it comes to the parking and we can certainly advocate what will be there or what public structure. What you said though during your presentation, a red flag went up for me. And that was the fact that they've gone back. Thank you, you said MEPA has gone back and others to talk about, you know, the traffic and pushing people to public transportation. And what I've seen over the last couple of years since COVID locally in the city and other places across the nation is these good plans that wanna push people to public transportation are good in thought. But once the plans are laid out, they don't always get the results that they wanted because people don't trust public transportation. So when I see that people are trying to be pushed to public transportation and I see people not using public transportation, a red flag goes up in regards to a plan that people think might work, but then ultimately don't. And then we come back and we get criticized because the traffic is so bad and in this case around the casino, you could pick the casino, you could pick the Boston gardens, you could pick any place you want where there's a lot of traffic. Do we have any oversight when it comes to the planning or is that totally between on core MEPA and the city of Everett and the state in this case? Yeah, you know, it's really on core, it's MEPA, it's MassDOT and the city are the primary drivers of these things. You know, in the first, when we permitted the big facility, the original facility, we spent a lot of time ourselves through consultants primarily, and this was before I was here, looking at traffic and other things. We had kind of an army of consultants looking at a whole lot of different things, but we did have consultants that were looking at traffic and design and a whole lot of other things. We don't have that now. But I think the notion is really, it's the state agencies and the city that drive what this mitigation is. At no point during the original process, did we say, oh, we think that there needs to be more mitigation in this area. I mean, we required a couple of very minor things, like in our section 61 findings, there were a couple of communities that felt that they were gonna be more impacted by traffic than MEPA thought they were gonna be, and we required that when they do their monitoring that they do some traffic counts at these intersections. So, we tinkered around the edge, I guess, I would say in the original, but by and large, the mitigation was driven primarily by MassDOT. I know, Madam Chair, if I could continue. During the public hearings we had with the citizens of Everett, the traffic kept coming up as an issue to us, but I'm hearing we really don't have any oversight of that. It needs to go back locally in state, but it's a red flag, Joe. I don't know how or if we need to address it, but I just know from experience, as I know you have in your past career, it's a great thought, but then when it becomes realized, it didn't do what we hoped it would do, and then the traffic's still gonna be there anyways. So, it's just a concern, Madam Chair, and through you to the other commissioners that I have in regards to this project. Thank you for giving me a minute or two on this. Any other questions for either John or Mark on these matters? Okay. Thanks, Scott. Thank you, Commissioner Hill. All right, then let's turn to you, Commissioner Hill, on item number six. Well, a very quick report. I have nothing to report. Thank you. We'll be looking at legislative matters over the next couple of weeks, so convening that working group. Thank you, Commissioner Hill. All right, turning now to item number seven, Todd, in your capacity, I think it's General Counsel. Yes, good morning once again. We have our whole team assembled to walk through these regs. Caitlin Monaghan is on hand, Mina Macarius is on hand, and I will turn this right over to those guys. Good morning to you. Good morning, good morning, everyone. Today, we have five regs for you. I will just overview what they are very briefly and then turn it over to Mina and Annie, who are gonna help walk through them more specifically. So the first two regs, 205-CMR219 and 231, are up for a final vote today. 219 relates to temporary licensing procedures and 231 relates to the renewal of a sports wagering license. Then we'll move on to 205-CMR258, which relates to sports wage or operator secession, so that reg covers situations in which an operator is going to shut down in the Commonwealth. And there could be multiple reasons for the shutdown. It could be because of a bankruptcy, it could be because they just don't want to operate in the Commonwealth anymore, but that sets out the process that the operator would go through. And this is a brand new reg, and you'll be seeing this for the first time today. After that, we'll get to 205-CMR238.12, and that does relate to the secession. There's an amendment to that reg that we'll be proposing, so those two will be taken together. And then finally, last but not least, we'll get to 205-CMR2.0, which relates to racing meeting licensing. This reg, the commission has discussed the concept of this reg before, in particular with regard to amending the application for a new racetrack in the Commonwealth. And so this is the reg that goes along with that. And we're asking today for a conversation about this reg, but not for a vote so that we can get feedback, make any modifications that the commission would like, and then bring it back for a vote in very short order. So with that, I will turn this over to Mina. Thank you, Caitlin, and good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. So as Caitlin said, the very first reg we have up here is 205-CMR2.19. That clean copy is on page 20. That reg came before you last on October, excuse me, August 24, and then went back out for public comment in the normal process for adoption. It's back for final review. We did not receive any comments. The changes from the prior version of the reg to the one that's before you today show up starting at page 26, but these are changes you already discussed in August and approved in the emergency regulations. So this is just to remind you what the changes were. Largely, as you may recall, those changes had to do with the timing of temporary license renewals given that we are about a year in now, or approaching a year in on licenses. So that's really it for 2.19. I'm happy to go back over anything we talked about then, but there is no new changes proposed. Mr. Scherz, questions for Nina. We would move to move on this if somebody is prepared. I'm prepared, Madam Chair. Yes, Mr. Scherz. I move that the commission approve the amended small business impact statement and the draft of 205-CMR2.19 as included in the commissioners packet and discussed here today. And further that staff be authorized to take the steps necessary to follow the required documentation with the secretary of the Commonwealth to finalize the regulation propagation process. Second. Thank you. Any edits, concerns? Okay. I believe I've got Commissioner Bryan. Yeah, I'm here. Thank you, Commissioner Bryan. Did you hear me? I did, yep, and I'm I. All right, thank you, Commissioner Hill. Yep. Hi. Thank you, Commissioner Skinner. Hi, I'm Commissioner Maynard. And I felt yes. Excellent. Thank you for that, Nina. Thank you, Madam Chair. The next one is on page 234. Also came up on August 24th. This is a licensed renewal process, Reg. No comments received. We have one very small edit. This is an incorrect cross site in 231.013b. The subsection cross reference needs to be changed. So that is the only proposed change on 231. Everybody saw that, right? I don't look like three times because it was in green. Thanks. But that, commissioners, do you have any questions? Commissioner Maynard, are you prepared to move? I'm prepared to move. Okay, just make sure you have no questions then. All right. Madam Chair, I move that commission approved the admitted small business impact statement and the directive 205CMR231 as included in the commissioners packet and discussed here today. And further that the staff be authorized to take the steps necessary to file the required documentation with the Secretary of the Commonwealth to finalize the regulation, promulgation process. Back in. Thank you. Any questions, concerns? Okay, Commissioner Brown, did you hear that okay? I did, yep. And I'm aye. Excellent, thank you, Commissioner Hill. Aye. Mr. Skinner? Aye. And Commissioner Maynard? Aye. And I vote yes. Okay. All right, Madam Chair, we're onto page 41 and I apologize, I don't think the next three are going to be quite as quick as this, but we'll use the balance of my time and the balance of Commissioner Hill's time from the legislative update. I mean, and will you allow me just to make one note? We do have bookmarks and I want to credit Judy. She learned, Grace introduced bookmarks and Judy trained herself yesterday and she said not hard, just a little tedious. And so here we have multiple bookmarks for the organization. So thank you. Great idea. Yeah, that's fantastic. Thank you, that actually makes my job a lot easier. So this, as Caitlin alluded to, this is a regulation we've prepared to address and really this one and 238-12 go together and I'll explain why as we go along to address potential closure of operations. This is an issue that the commission first raised when we were discussing, when you were discussing temporary licensing back over a year ago at the outset of the passage of sports wagering, it was sort of put on the list of regulations to develop. Recently, I think there's been news around the country of various entities that have been reconsidering whether or not to stay at all of the jurisdictions that they were licensed in, which raised sort of raises to a little bit a higher priority to get this going. And then of course, as always, there's sort of just in the normal course of business, their businesses decide to make decisions to shift their resources elsewhere or to no longer operate a particular product line or lose funding and go into bankruptcy or sort of financial distress. And this regulation is intended to address that process and the disruption it would have for the commonwealth in terms of revenue and potential wagering losses. It would also attempt to address the impact so it would have on individual patrons, particularly earlier in an industry that has wagers that may not be paid out immediately is one of the features of sports wagering. So that kind of creates a different issue that isn't as true for brick and mortar casino gaming. And also to sort of just have a game plan. As we go through this reg, I want to emphasize, I guess a couple of sort of structural things. One is we have worked with a lot of people we have worked with bankruptcy council to get their feedback on this as well because bankruptcy presents particular circumstances. The long and short of it under the bankruptcy code, I am not a bankruptcy lawyer, so I won't go into the intricacies of it, but the federal bankruptcy code pre-empt state regulation almost entirely. So if an entity goes into bankruptcy, there is not going to be a whole lot that the commission can mandate. However, there are things that we have tried to do here to try to set up the commission and the commonwealth to be as protected as possible in the event of bankruptcy. That's sort of point number one. For everybody else, anybody else who sort of chooses to cease operations, the way this is set up relies in large part on the cooperation of entities who are closing in Massachusetts. And I think one sort of threshold question that might be in the back of everyone's mind is why would they cooperate if they're no longer licensed? And I think the short answer to that is we, first of all, some of these may have other businesses in Massachusetts, they may continue to be sports wagering licensees elsewhere. And so just like the commission and the IAB talk with other agents, other states and other jurisdictions, when you're doing your license name, the record of how an operation wrapped up and whether it was done appropriately and safely and with protection for patrons and the commonwealth could impact their licensing elsewhere. So we're sort of relying in part on that. And we also understand that's not going to be one size fits all. So with that, I can start going into the process. I'll stop at the end of each section and take questions. There may be, this is sort of a more or less chronological regulation. So the first piece 250801 is a notification. If an entity knows or intends to shut down operations in Massachusetts, whether they're brick or mortar or online, a category three, they're required to give the commission at least 90 days notice. And to sort of begin this process. This is intended whether it's either permanent or indefinite. So if they're saying we just need to take a break from this particular jurisdiction, et cetera. That's sort of the basic. Again, there is of course a risk that someone doesn't do this in the event of a current licensee or someone who's gonna continue operations that could, the remedy is really that the commission, it ruins a reputation elsewhere. In the case of bankruptcy, which it may be more likely that they do not provide notice or if it's sudden, we'll get to sort of one of the ways that's addressed later. It'll be harder at that point, legally to force notice or to force someone to stay open. Once you receive the notice, if I can go to 2502, the commission has options and the idea is again to keep discretion as broad as possible. One, it could decide, look, we actually want you to cease offering wagers or accept immediately. If you're going to be shutting down in 90 days, we really don't want you to accept that on the Superbowl or March Madness this early. That's an option, it's not a requirement. All of these are intended to allow you to survey the scene at the time. Borrowing from the process under the gaming regulations, you can appoint a conservator or receiver to manage and operate the business. So essentially, if they no longer have the desire or wherewithal to operate, you could appoint someone or an entity to sort of take over the operation through that. And then the third sort of catch all is really any other action you need necessary to protect the best interests of the commonwealth. This is again intended to be broad and not prescriptive based on the circumstances. Nina, can we pause here to just check in because I think the idea of section by section makes great sense. Commissioner, is there any questions so far on either point one or point two? Or suggestions, comments? Commissioner O'Brien, I just want to see if you have, I can't see you leaning in right now. No, I don't have anything right now, thanks. Okay, great. I'm just, probably at the end of the day, it may not matter. But on number three, the catch all, would it be okay to add something to protect the integrity of sports wagering and the interests of the commonwealth? Generally, somehow protect the integrity of sports wagering and the commonwealth and the just advancing the interests generally of the commonwealth? Do you see what I mean? First, it's just integrity. Sure, yeah, I think we, that's a change that we certainly could make. I think that the intent is to be that broad, but yes. And really, I think it's borrowing from the statutory language, but really anything that you would do, you could do under 23N to protect, within your jurisdiction, you would be able to do here. Okay, good, thank you. 2503 is kind of the meat of what happens next. Again, this is in the ideal world and also with the emphasis on a communication between the commission and the operator. Very shortly thereafter, within five business days of providing the notice of intended cessation, the goal is to provide, the operator provides the commission with a plan of how it's going to wind down. That includes a few things and the intention is to protect the different affected parties. One is how are you going to distribute unredeemed wagers of winning wagers? How are you going to refund or otherwise address a return of pending wagers that will be decided after you shut down? How are you going to return funds that might be sitting in someone's account? That they have set up in the Commonwealth. How are you going to close accounts? How are you going to satisfy the outstanding debts, including excise taxes? I will note, we have checked with the bankruptcy council on excise on the taxes that are paid to the Commonwealth. Those would be considered the type of state taxes that take priority after federal taxes under the bankruptcy code. Again, I won't pretend to tell you exactly where in the priority order, but they are much higher up than an unsecured claim of a creditor. So that's the good news and there is a bankruptcy protection there that we didn't have to build it separately. In all of this, by the way, I should mention all of these sort of how you're going to do this process. Suggestion that was very helpful in our survey of internal staff from Director Band was to make sure that they provide us dates that can be communicated out to the public and to patrons of, if you're going to redeem bets, this is a day you need to do it by, accounts will be closed on ex-dates so that there's clarity to the public as well. And then G, which is the one that links to 23812 is a description of the letter of the balance and status of the financial assurance mechanism that the commission could then access to pay any patrons who don't get paid before. So pausing on this for a second and then when we get to 238, we'll talk about it in further detail. Already under 205 CMR 238, the internal controls, the commission requires a financial assurance to be put in place for a reserve amount that is equal to sort of pending an unpaid wages and sort of to make sure that if you're an operator, you have enough funds to pay the bets that you took it. The current regulation sets a few different ways that that can be done. It can be done as a cash set aside. It can be done as a letter of credit. It can be done in a few different forms. We've talked with Derek's team, we've talked with bankruptcy council about this at length and the suggestion was for at least that portion of unpaid wages that as opposed to operating expenses or otherwise that you need for the reserve, a letter of credit is the easiest and most secure method for the commission and the commonwealth to access. The letter of credit is typically issued by a bank on behalf of an operator. It is issued to, will be in this case issued to the gaming commission and if certain preconditions are met, such as cessation of operations or you don't need to go back to the operator to get the money, you go to the bank to get the money. It's essentially like having an insurance policy to turn in or a bond to turn in. However, and my understanding from Derek is there's actually been some interest in the operator community in using that mechanism more than others, more than holding cash on all wagers because it doesn't tie up liquid assets as much. It's like buying insurance policy. There's a sizable cost to it, understandably but there is at least a, it frees up cash on hand. This is one, we are proposing as Kailin mentioned outset the cessation right to go in through emergency but 23812 in the normal course and that's partially because we'd love the feedback to make sure that this is something that folks can do and that their finances work up that way. I saw Derek pop in. I'm happy to stop here and take questions and Derek, I don't know if you have anything to add to that. You covered it perfectly. We're looking for the most secure instrument to protect the patrons deposits as well as their wagers that are on hold and any payouts that are on hold to them in the bad circumstance that one of these operators ceases to exist, not just merged and taken over but actually ceases to exist. And we are very thankful that A&K was able to work with outside bond counts and outside bankruptcy council on this to come up with the most secure process because the operators have said it's a big inconvenience to tie up all of that money that other financial institutions would generally be using without having to go out and take a loan. So having this is I think beneficial to the patrons as well as to the operators to secure their funds. Excellent. Patricia's questions come for Derek or for Mina on that and then also for the cessation plan in general. Patricia Maynard? In general, Mina, I'm assuming that you looked at other jurisdictions, how did this compare? I wanna make sure that we're being as protective as possible because this is a pretty extreme situation if it comes to fruition. Yeah. I'll let any weigh in as well. Other jurisdictions candidly have a kind of mix of some of these processes, mostly the notification and cessation plan pieces. It did not appear to us that there was a lot of thought yet given to bankruptcy status. Now, a lot of them do require, I know when we were going through the internal control regs, the requirement to have a reserve is there. So they may have it sort of in that form. They didn't tie it quite as closely, but this was one that jumped out to us almost immediately and to the internal legal team in sort of tasking us with this reg almost immediately. Annie, I don't know if you have other issues. Good morning, Commissioner Maynard to address your question. We primarily looked at Colorado, Nevada, and Louisiana to see what they do with their cessation process. We fleshed out what we found in those other states. Those other states had something that was more general. Like notify the commission and tell us what you're doing and sort of just more keep the commission informed on the backend. We fleshed it out to have a little bit more checkpoints to make sure that sports wagering operators are developing a plan. They're submitting interim reports and that they're also, you know, in constant communication with the commission to make sure that everything is going according to plan. The other states were a little bit more of the approach of just let us know and we'll see what happens. We did take from Nevada and Colorado, as Nina will discuss later, the surrender of license such that when cessation does occur, the way that cessation becomes effective is when the sports wagering operator surrenders their license back to the commission and any vendors or other parties that received a license solely in connection with the sports wagering operator is also required to submit those licenses. We also did draw from Louisiana the requirement that sports wagering operators retain records sufficient to conduct audits following cessation. So the basic framework was sort of pieced together from other states and then we flushed it out to sort of make sure there was a process from beginning to end and also to include just sort of more checkpoints to essentially make sure that nothing goes astray or if something is going unexpected, the commission is kept informed and able to sort of put guardrails on the process. Thank you, Annie. I really appreciate that explanation. Of course. Of course. Can I just follow up on your reference to director Bann? I'm not sure. I think I understood it, but my, when I reviewed this, I was channeling Commissioner O'Brien. You'll appreciate this channeling our former colleague, Bruce Stevin, saying we want a communication plan. And he would say that particularly around the scene of business. And in this case, if we could incorporate that, I don't know if I missed it. I hear that director Bann may have indicated it, but I know at the end of the rag, there's some steps where they have to publish to the public, but I'm just wondering if we could have them while they're notifying us, they also take the snatchers to their patrons also. Yeah, so Madam Chair, I think you gave me a good segue for the next two subsections here. And again, we can certainly look at these and embellish on that point. What I was getting at is in the plan itself, when they give you the initial cessation plan for review, they'll propose dates. Here's what we want to give patrons 30 days to redeem, et cetera. Now, if they come in with dates that are a bit unreasonable, patrons will have two days, otherwise funds will be lost. You want to be able to, in step two, approve or deny, make comments, put conditions on it and modifications to the plan. So that's at the bottom of page 42, subsection two. And then subsection three is once the commission has done that approval, and we wrote, or it's designee here by the way, because some of this may be moving very quickly to give the commission that flexibility, but leaving that in the future for the commission to figure out. For number three, then they also need to provide you a noticed form essentially to communicate out the steps that patrons need to take to address uncollected winnings, closed accounts, et cetera. We could modify that to be notice of cessation and a communication plan, something like a lot of those lines would make perfect sense here. And so you just, I guess, part of their cessation plan, you don't want to include them telling us a communication plan. That's kind of what I'm looking for. That's, they could. Like at the same time. I guess, is it, is your plan, it's the red right now as I'm reading it and I'm maybe in this reading. Is it, there's going to be a lot coming to us and then at a certain point after that, they're going to be having to give notice to the patrons. I'm just wondering, should we be giving more communication upfront to the community at large? I think you're asking two separate things. So we certainly could include in the list in one, there's the A through G, a communication plan for notifying patrons, et cetera. What we are trying to avoid is, if their initial proposal is, we're going to tell patrons they have three days to collect their wagers and get out of here and then they flood the airway through that. We don't want that message getting out before you approve it. So that's why, the plans need to be approved into and the communication plan needs to be approved in subsection three, before they put out that notice. That's why we didn't envision simultaneous notice, but I do agree with you. We can certainly add an item. I would actually put it as G and move G to H that says a communication plan for alerting patrons, employees, vendors, and the general public to the steps in the cessation plan, including means to access funds, et cetera. Yeah, on the general level. Okay, yeah, I got it. Thank you, very helpful. I'm happy to add that as part of this. Mr. O'Brien, just checking in with you. Anything you want to add right now? No, no, not right now. I see your point though. I can hear Bruce's voice echoing with your question. You love a good communications plan. So, and then director Bain also raising it made me think I'll do something there. That's good. All right. Okay. So we talked a little bit about two and three, subsection four at the top of page 43 is where the notice goes. It's sort of a minimum requirements for notice. In addition to sort of normal on the website, newspaper, conspicuous location, the sports waging area, or on the platform notice has to be provided by email to all patrons for which the operators have an email, which for any of the mobile platforms will probably be really any patron. So this is again, in furtherance of that, although, you know, this would not be the only thing but just as a minimum. Any questions, commissioners on this? Okay. 2504, Annie alluded to earlier. Once the commission approves the plan and you're sort of in progress, this was borrowed from the other states. As Annie mentioned, there is a normal, is sort of a normal schedule of reporting how it's going. You know, what steps they've taken, where are they in the closure? We set it to be at least every 10 days or on such other schedules, a commission request. 10 days may end up being too much, you know, to have an update to every 10 days. But the reason we kept it in is we wanted to at least have a reminder of how quickly this time could pass so that the commission could decide, you know, actually we do need, you know, a weekly or every other week update or we'd like, you know, we actually knowing a little bit more about the cessation plan or perhaps the market share of the particular operator could have something lesser. You also could decide that the reports all, you know, come to you for public sessions versus going to the executive director or the IB. There's again, many different ways to do this based on the circumstances, but we wanted to have the concept of regular reporting. So it's not just a plan at the beginning and then you're sort of left wondering how's it going at the end. It also allows you to take steps as you get a report to, you know, to adjust the plan, right? If you're getting feedback that the communication plan, for instance, hasn't really been reaching folks and patrons still don't seem to have an idea that gets you a way to adjust. Can you go for a word about your evaluation for designation and why? You just mentioned timing, but I think you're good. Sure. The opening, the possibility for designation is that there may be a lot to do day to day and it may be the case that given the commission's meeting schedule or the ability to sort of handle as handle all of the stuff that needs to happen to cease operating that you want to appoint a point person at the commission or appoint team at the commission to really be the kind of core operations team dealing with that. And that's really the intent. And so we operate that way anyway. So I guess I'm wondering that sounds like team delegation that we use, what's this different in this designation? What's different in this designation may be that you, there may be a small decision points. I'll sort of liken this to the analogy of moving out of a house, which is really what this is, right? You're sort of ending that operation. There are some big decisions where you're going to move to, what's gonna happen with the furniture? Who's the moving company? Those may be things you make, but as you're packing up, little stuff happens, comes up all the time. Do we take this trinket or not? Do we, is the newspaper of general circulation this one or that one? And if you're waiting to come back to the commission each time, there may not be enough time. The commission in its discretion, entirely up to the commission at that time could decide we actually want the director of the sports wagering or the executive director or the IB to really be handling this point and have some discretion on their own to say yes or no when a phone call comes up rather than having to take it back. Again, it's not a requirement. It's an option built into it. Any other questions? I actually, I hate to do this, but going back to 0.03, subsection four, where you talk about the notice. When it talks about putting it on their platforms, websites that are, should we also be specifying any associated social media platforms or is that covered by how you've written it? It's not covered by how we've written it. Because we're saying website, we could add and social media platforms. Because I just feel like if they're, that might push it out a little better in terms of getting it out. No, happy to add that to sub-item B from Sherwin. Thanks. I guess I would just for the record add a caveat that while there's a lot of opportunities for designation, the differences, you know, we, of course, rely on our experts, internal experts all the time. The differences, for instance, where there's an amendment here to the cessation plan, it doesn't mean it could approve it. The, while there may not be an issue in terms of designating, what it does do is it takes it out of the view. Correct. Yes. And that's, yeah. And that's a decision. And that's why I say it's a decision that commissioner would have to think hard about is do you want to do that at that time? What, because those amendments may be happening really on the fly in short order. And what I guess I want to process that we aren't just a reminder to this commission, we are very nimble. And to the extent that these important decisions like amendment to the plan mean, I suppose if it's, you know, very trivial, then it wouldn't necessarily, but it just means that this designation process would, would take this parts of this discussion out of the public view. And I just am reminding myself of those implications of what that might mean. It might be favorable to the operator, but not necessarily favorable to the public. So just noting that. But this was, Madam Chair, I appreciate the point you're making. And so this would just give us, right, meaning the ability to designate someone at that time. Correct. So we could, yeah, let's go ahead. So we could weigh the situation. If it's something that's really, really bad, that the operator is closing under extremely bad circumstances, then maybe the commission chooses at that time not to designate anyone and just meet every day if that's what it takes. If it's a normal circumstance, perhaps just a business circumstance, maybe someone's appointed, but we would make that this, this reg would just say the commission would make this, that decision at that time, right? Correct. And what we're trying to do and the reason I ended to Madam Chair, to your point, how is this different than other regs? Why included here? Part of the thinking was that if you are in the time crunch of a very short designation cycle, the whole reason to have this reg is to make sure this is set up. The process and authority is set up. So we didn't want to leave the words out and not give you that option in that time period. And now you're going back, amending a reg on an emergency to also allow you to do the designation you might want to do at that point. But I agree, there may be very good reasons not to designate, it may be in fact a default not to, but knowing that, you know, there may need to be, and it may be that the designation is to a commissioner or to a subcommittee of the commission to move more nimbly as well, right? It's not necessarily to staff. It's to be able to have a way to handle that day-to-day stuff. Just another point of clarification for withdrawal when we've had one of an application was it under the reg or under statute, Mina, that they had to come in front of us? Was that under the regulation? Yes, yeah, and we're actually, we'll touch on that when we get to the racing. That comes in front of you for withdrawal, that's right, yeah. Yeah, okay. So, you know, I like in it, I understand there are many, many, many, many, many more steps to the cessation, okay, all right. So one important thing, though actually to this point is 250805, moving on to the next one, is when does cessation become effective? They have to tell you, we've done everything we're supposed to do and kind of come back and say, can we close now? And that the commission has to approve. And, you know, we've made that clear. The commission has to approve the cessation, the final cessation request, so that you can't say, okay, bye, we're leaving, we're leaving town now, we're done. You really need to have completed all the steps in your plan at that point. A designee could deny it. Number one, no, meeting number one. But it's, but they could deny it, but it can't be approved until the commission approves it. So if the designee that you've designated has the plan in front of them and says, that's absolutely ridiculous. You haven't fulfilled these steps, they would say, no, we're not done. We're not, you're not ready to close. But the commission would have to do the final approval. Yeah. The designee can't do the final approval. I understand. I kind of assuming that your answer is that it's those steps that the operative would take are very, very black and white, so that it doesn't need, but like if they deny it, there's no judgment. That or that the commission has decided to trust so that whoever that designee is with its judgment at that moment, yeah. Approval would have to come to the commission. Correct. Let's hope we don't see too many of these. Yeah. I hope so too, right? And, you know, again, and you know, one of the goals would be for it to be as black and white as possible. So it's, but that's right. I mean, but to be clear, the designee may have some judgment there, but again, that's a choice that commission would have to make at that time. Yeah. So we, the next section 2506, Annie also alluded to other states call this surrender of a license and in our conversations with the in-house legal team, we kind of got to the point of realizing it's really not a badge, you know, to turn in here for the most part. So really it's, it's expiration of a license. We also didn't want there to be any confusion that somebody has to formally say, here is my license. You know, once, once you've approved the cessation, you know, let's say you say the cessation is effective December 1st. The license expires December 1st. That's what section 2508.061 does. 250602 takes away all licenses that kind of flow from it. If they only flow from it. So a vendor that might be doing work for two different operators wouldn't lose their vendor license. However, a vendor that's doing work, you know, through and for only one, one licensee could have their license expire. So they would, they would have to, they may need re-licensure at that point because they're sort of nexus to the commonwealth is now gone. That's true for occupational licensees, vendors, et cetera. That's also true for tethered category three licensees, if you're, to the extent you no longer have that. Part of the rationale for all of this was to avoid the pattern that happens sometimes, for those of you familiar with the local licensing that situation sometimes for liquor licensing of folks sort of trying to close up and hold onto the license and then try to market the license as sort of a commodity that they can then give to somebody else. Especially if you are talking about category three licenses and you are at the maximum, you don't want, you want the commission to remain in control of who gets the license as opposed to trying to swing this through a transfer of interest when it's really a defunct operation. And as Amy mentioned, a audit period after for retention of records. Again, this will rely in part on the fact that that's still a going concern. There's obviously always a risk and entities not around. So that's 258.06 as well. Any questions now? If none, I'll go to 258.07. This is the bankruptcy related provisions. So these were drafted with good help from folks at Veraldana who assisted us on this. The bankruptcy provisions have a couple of things to point out here. Essentially it's sort of coordination between the bankruptcy process and your cessation reg. It sort of points out that the commission may really have a reduced role because the bankruptcy court is going to be driving what happens with the company, but you may still, the court may be asking for receivers or conservators to take over some of the business. This leaves a sort of an explanation of how they come back to you for licensure if needed. There may at that point be a need to sort of have two separate entities, one sort of managing the financial books of the entity that's appointed by the bankruptcy court. There may still, however, be a need and room for a separate conservator or receiver from the commission side. That's what this really contemplates. The last part of this is probably the most important. And that's 23812 that we'll get to, which is the letter of credit that we talked about before. One point to make when I mentioned the bankruptcy because I think this was a helpful thing for us to keep in mind, and we did discuss this with staff internally, is bankruptcy and cessation of operations are not necessarily always going to happen together. Under the bankruptcy code, there are ways and we see this all the time with stores and retail establishments for businesses to declare bankruptcy but to remain operative as a restructure and reorganize. We decided against trying to address that in this regulation. It's addressed in really the sort of full suite of the commission's regulations on sports wage rate. The commission cannot order someone to shut down or take back their license because they filed for bankruptcy and want to reorganize. That's not allowed under federal law. However, due to the fact of their bankruptcy or the relief they're seeking from the court or what the court orders, they no longer can meet the conditions of their license. They no longer can keep a reserve or they no longer can operate security at the level they're supposed to. That may be a basis to revisit their license to either amend it, to revoke it. So that would sort of be handled throughout the other regulatory processes and in our conversations with the IEB and Derek's team, I think that the team was confident that the regular reporting you get from entities and sort of about their financial wherewithal on a regular basis would be how you address those issues and it would flow through other regs. So we didn't want to confuse things by putting it in here. This is really bankruptcy and ceasing to operate not bankruptcy for the sake of reorganization. I mean, would you mind repeating the firm's name that helped? It was Veraldana, principally Tom B. at Veraldana. Questions on the bankruptcy provisions? We're going to circle to the other 38-12. Yes. In terms of steps forward, commissioners can go to check in with Commissioner O'Brien just one sec, Commissioner O'Brien, anything you want to add on bankruptcy or anything else? No, I'm fine, thank you. Okay. Questions? Commissioner Skiddy, you're all set right now? Commissioner Hill? Commissioner Hill's giving a thumbs up. Commissioner Maynard, thoughts? Good to go. Okay. So we need to move on this. This is going to go under emergency, right? It is. We did make a few suggested edits. There were a few suggestions for edits today. I can kind of walk back through where they are if we want to vote today. Caitlin and Todd, I don't know if you have a preference of doing that versus coming back with sort of adding those points in. I think the points were discrete enough that if we walk back through them quickly, I think we can vote with sort of the amendments discussed today and get this moving just so that we have it in place. Okay. Okay, so and of course, anybody tell me if I miss anything? The first edit was in 250203. So we're back at page 41. Just on that general note. Exactly. So I was going to add at the end. So take, it would say, take any other action deemed necessary in discretion to protect the integrity of sports wagering and the commonwealth or otherwise protect the interests of the commonwealth. Work for everybody. We'll see some nods, okay? In 250203, we would bump G to H. And add a new G that says the sports wagering operators plans to communicate the cessation plan to the public, patrons and vendors, including applicable timelines for cessation. Any, y'all except that came in the evening? 250303, for B, we will add before the semicolon, that this is about the notice being published on the sports wagering operators website and social media platforms. Leave that was it. Yeah. And so, madam chair, I do think this is ready for an emergency vote. Would it be helpful to see 238 first or not? Cause that's going to happen in a different course anyway. I'll take your lead. I want to just flip right over to 238. Well, just so you can see what's going to be what we're proposing would be in place and what will be in place today. Cross-reference, yep. Yep. So the good news is 23812 is already on the book. So there won't be a need to change cross-references just yet. 23812 one, which is on page 48 is the current forms of financial assurance that are required for the reserve. We changed one little word to say the reserve may be in the form of cash, cash equivalents, et cetera. That for the whole thing, but then added a proviso that the amount intended to cover sports wagering liability, which is really that sort of the winnings or pending wagers must be in the form of or backed up by, cause you could do both if you really want it to be super careful and a revocable letter of credit approved by the commission, which may be drawn by the commission in the event of cessation and of course a 205. So without this, the commission, if let's say that you decide ultimately not to approve this section, you would still be able to draw on whatever financial assurance mechanism is there. There would just be a risk that if the cessation is happening in the bankruptcy, really it's the only, it's the biggest risk. The reserve may be tied up into bankruptcy and so you may not be able to access it right away. And I should add one other just note on this, why this is only covering the sports wagering liability, not the rest. In our conversations about this with bankruptcy council and our short of thinking about bankruptcy, the sort of first step was to think who are we trying to protect with the letter of credit? The taxes, the money that flows to the Commonwealth as I mentioned has a protection outside of bankruptcy and would regardless of how cessation is done be an enforceable tax that the Commonwealth can get back. So that's sort of step one. Vendors and employees have a variety of complicated, and I really hope I don't get detailed bankruptcy law questions on this one, protections for how they get paid if a company goes bankrupt, including whether they're, and they really will differ based on how if they're secured creditors, unsecured, whether they had a lien in there as a contractor or not, et cetera. So what that left as sort of the whole in the protection are patrons, the folks who have no real contractual, direct contractual relationship with our customers. And there is a sort of legitimate question of to what level should that protection happen? And so this is why we're doing that, recognizing that if the whole reserve has to be in a letter of credit, it may be exceedingly expensive to do and difficult to get that letter of credit. We tried to at least carve it up to that. So that's sort of rationale for that carve out. I mean, I know I'm wrong on this. We just barely leave so that I make sure I understand it. So if you go back to the other red and look at G, G references 238. It does. 238? Yeah, and then it seems to, and I thought I was just understanding that the letter of credit would not address outstanding taxes, but then I see A to F cited at the bottom, and that includes those taxes so much. I'm just reading this wrong, right? No, you're not, but just to be clear, 238.12 is all the financial assurances that could be in place. So they should have a reserve that has all of their obligations. If you amend 238.12, the portion addressing the wagers, the sports wagering liabilities as it's being called, and what's called in 238.12, that portion will have credit or an operator could choose to put the whole thing in a letter of credit. That's a financial decision to have to make. Got it, all right. So I'm just, yeah. So the two, all right, all right. I see it was helpful to do a file for me. So thank you very much. You're welcome. All right, okay. And this one, I find I remember correctly, would be adopted by a standard application. That is our proposal. So we would ask for emergency adoption of 258 with today's additional edits that we discussed and the beginning of the promulgation process on 238, the change to 238.12. So we'll call it for public comment and have a notice period. Richard's questions. I asked mine first, sorry. Anything? So we need, if everybody is satisfied and to move, we need a motion on 258. And I think I'm understanding that we, I don't have a draft language in front of me, but it would be subject to the edit discussed today. And then we, and that would be pursuant to the emergency process. Do I have a motion? I would be more than, oh, I'm sorry, Commissioner Maynard. Go ahead. I actually don't have a motion. I just had another comment, which was even during this emergency period, we're open to comments from the public. So I just wanted to get that out there. Thank you. Yeah. Okay, now, Commissioner Hill. So we would get comments on this during this emergency time. Yeah, thank you. I just, yes, thank you, Madam Chair. And I just want to ask our legal team, with the language or the, an amendment that just says, as discussed here today, that would encompass all the comments and changes that were made. Is that an accurate statement? Absolutely, yes. So Madam Chair, with that said, I would move that the commission approved the small business impact statement and the draft 205 CMR 258 as included in the commissioner's packet and discussed here today. I move that staff be authorized to take the steps necessary to file the required documentation with the Secretary of the Commonwealth by emergency and thereafter to begin the regulation promulgation process. I further move that the staff shall be authorized to modify chapter or section numbers or titles to file additional regulation sections as reserved or to make any other administrative changes necessary to execute the regulation promulgation process. Megan. And any comments or questions? Commissioner Bryan? Nope. Aye. Commissioner Hill? Aye. Commissioner Skinner? Aye. Commissioner Maynard? Aye. And I vote yes. Okay. Now I would respect you to 3812. I have a motion. Commissioner Skinner? I move that the commission approve the small business impact statement and the draft 205 CMR 238.12 as included in the commissioner's packet and discussed here today. And that staff be authorized to take the steps necessary to file the required documentation with the Secretary of the Commonwealth to begin the regulation promulgation process. I further move that staff shall be authorized to modify chapter or section numbers or titles to file additional regulation sections or reserved as reserved, excuse me, or to make any other administrative changes as necessary to execute the regulation promulgation process. Dr. Thank you. Any questions on that motion, edits? Okay. Commissioner O'Brien? Aye. Commissioner Hill? Aye. Commissioner... Aye. And Commissioner Maynard? Aye. And I vote yes. Five, zero. There we go. Well done, Nina. Thank you so much. And thank you to Annie. Really helpful. On our next on our agenda is the race meeting licensing regulation. I had carved out a break for us for 10 minutes. We are just about 10 minutes behind our time schedule. Commissioner, are you in need of a quick break right now? Or do you want to continue? Quick break? Madam Chair, a quick break would be great. Okay. Then let's return at 11.20. All right. And both the started with our racing of Nina, are you all set? I will be doing racing as well today. So you're stuck with me for another couple of minutes at least. Okay, then you're all set. Thank you. Thank you, Annie. Okay. Mills, I think we're all set to take the screen down. Bye, Judy. Good to see you. Hi, good morning. Good morning. Good to see you. Good to see you as well. Okay. Commissioner Maynard, I didn't get my coffee refreshed. I had forgotten my water and had to go back and get it. All right. This is, I got Commissioner O'Brien here. Reconvening of the Massachusetts Gaming Commission. We just took a short break. Having started our meeting at 9 a.m. this morning. And we are now returning to our agenda for today's public meeting. Number 42, item 70205CMR2.0, our race meeting license. And Nina, I understand you're, must be you and Judy are working on this together. It is. It was a team effort. Paul Commoner is on our end, myself, Judy and the IAB and others, of course, and of course the racing division. So I appreciate all the help. Judy, I don't know if you have anything you want to start with, but or I can jump right in. Sorry, we're going to do a roll call before we jump in or are we good? Oh, I'm sorry. In my head, I did it. I am very sorry, Commissioner O'Brien. That's right. We're meeting virtually. I'm here, obviously. Commissioner O'Brien is here. Commissioner Hill. I am also here. Commissioner Skidder, I'm here. Commissioner Maynard. I'm here. And we can get started. I think what I did is I looked for you, Commissioner O'Brien, and in my mind, I said there, we're all set. Great, great. Thank you so much. Okay. We're turning to 70. Thanks, Mina. Thank you, Judy. Caitlin. All right. So I'll kick it off. So much of this regulation, 205 CMR 2.0, this is in the racing section. And I know you have this in your packet. So this is really more for my, with the bookmarks. So this is really for my purposes, page 55. The, much of the regulation is borrowed from the 200 series of sports wagering regulations. The aim was to standardize the evaluation of racing meeting license applications using a regulatory framework that's already designed to juggle similar policy objectives. And that's familiar to both operators, the public and the commission and its staff. The key, of course, is that the racing statutes are not the sports wagering statute, chapters 128A and 128C govern racing. And the most important and high level distinction is that racing licensees apply for a new license annually. And the statute sets firm statutory deadlines for an applications must be received and decided. This comes closest to mirroring the temporary licensing renewal process. So where the, there's a need to balance the annual burden imposed on the operator and commission staff to go through the process with the goal of making sure that information is accurate up to date and properly processed. So because of the length of this regulation, it covers a lot. I'll take it again, sort of in section by section, pausing on the important pieces. And of course, we're happy to answer questions as it goes on. And Judy and Caitlin and Todd, of course, please do interject on this one, especially. Not that you wouldn't, but especially interject on this one if you have something to add. Starting with 205, 201, authority and definitions. This is just, most of the racing regs weren't sort of inherited by the commission. So there weren't a lot of the initial definition sections that exist elsewhere. This is really to simplify language so we don't have to keep saying multi-jurisdictional personal history disclosure. We could use MJ, PhD, et cetera. So that's really what 201 is for. It's really a roadmap of definitions. 202 is the beginning of the actual application process. 201 says that an operator has to submit the application materials by their deadline. The list of required materials begins in 202.1a. You'll see throughout this language it says if the applicant is not currently a licensee. When the applicant is already under the jurisdiction of the commission and is already a licensee, the process is a little more limited. They need to update on new qualifiers, new disciplinary events and so forth. So there isn't a need to rescope the entire list of qualifiers every single time as long as they remain a licensee. However, if they let their licensee lapse, their obligation to keep up to date, they also lapses and so therefore you wouldn't need to treat them as a new entity. The remaining materials, 202.1b are, and so on, are sort of your typical things, the application form, the licensing fee, certified check, and a bond payable. Many of these come from the statute itself, so not a whole lot of discretion on our end in terms of how you do it. 202.2 addresses the sequencing of submissions and here we're trying to address a sequencing problem for applicants who aren't licensed. You would need to have, especially the work of the IB would need to scope who needs to submit BEDs, MG, PhDs, Massachusetts supplements, et cetera. And so the idea was to have the scoping survey done before those things come in and then to have the material submitted later. So that's sort of a sequencing issue that was addressed here. But to protect kind of the commission's resources and of staff time and money and so on that spent, 205CMR202C makes the applicant attest that they intend to finish what they started and agree to cost recovery if they don't go through the application process. So it's a little bit of a protection to avoid someone taking a shot at it, starting up the mechanics, the machinery of doing the review and then pulling on it. 2023 is the application form itself or sort of a description of the application form, I should say. Every applicant has to submit these but you might need different things from different types of applicants. So there's three subsections in 3A. This is every applicant. This is basically stuff they need by statute to submit. And so you really don't have, again, much discretion on that. 3B is for applicants who propose to operate at a track where they previously have it operated. These should be fairly similar to what we've done in the last year plus on the racing license application. So this is sort of codifying or capturing that here. And then 3C applies to applicants who need to fill out a scoping survey, the BEDs, MG PhDs, et cetera. The main requirement is that the applicant acknowledge if the materials are received by a certain time or not received by a certain time it may be held against them in the process. This is in large part because of the firm deadline for the submission of application materials by statute. There's not a lot of flexibility. So because we can't really give a firm deadline for the receipt of the materials, we can make sure applicants understand that that has to do, that it may be factored into their licensing. The dates were all just sort of timing, submission process, all of that was discussed and we're very thankful for a lot of good conversations between legal, ANK, IAB and licensing throughout this process. And of course, all of these add the catch all each other, each time that you may ask for such other information or certifications as the commission may require. So applications do not have to be stuck in time. If there's more to add, the commission can add that on the application. Any questions there? Is that commission? It's like, I don't know. Okay, 205-CMR203 is evaluation of applications and the decision, it's heavily based on 205-CMR218 on the sports wagering side. 20302 is the first place, draw your attention. This is administrative sufficiency review. We discussed this when 218 was passed. Because application materials may come in at different times, the division of licensing will have to review them as they come in, not all at once. So it's a little bit different in that sense. And the treatment of deadlines are a little different as well. It's sports wagering, the commission established an application deadline, because there's not even a statute. Here you have the statutory deadline. And applicants are permitted to cure deficiencies until the application deadline. If the deadline passes, there needs to be a good reason to resubmit corrections. So again, it's sort of a push to try to get things in early to allow review and to try to get cures. It sort of gives them an incentive that they get to freely amend their application or freely supplement their application before the deadline, but after they would need to go through the process for asking for permission to do that. Going to jump to 203-4 public meetings, the statute requires a public hearing and every municipality where the applicant proposes to hold a racing meeting. So this is required and consistent with 2805, the commission has the option to hold other public meetings, including in that jurisdiction. So again, this is a mix of statute and precedent from sports wagering. 203-5, and Commissioner Hill, I'm sorry, I was at a hand there and I'm sorry, I didn't see it. Commissioner Hill, are you all set? I see you, I think he's all set. Okay. Go ahead. Sorry. So 203-5 gets into the sort of evaluation of the application. The framework is again, parallel to 218. Many of the specific factors, however, differ. Some of the statutory factors in chapter 128A and others are based on other parts of 128A section three, others are elsewhere in the statute. There's also a few drawn from more general provisions are drawn from sports wagering licensing, gaming licensing, et cetera. All are in our view and based on our review of this in the scope of what the commission may consider in this statute, but they get a different aspects of these considerations. So it's intended to be coming at many of the same things in different ways. 203-5B, I'll note the application review must take place in adjudicatory hearings. There are pluses and minuses to that, there are pluses and minuses to that approach. And so, Kaila and I don't know if you have anything to add there or Julia. I can jump in on this. So this is a difference from the sports wagering temporary license process, whereas, you know, the temporary licenses are discussed in public meetings and decided in public meetings. There are a couple of different reasons why we are proposing that these happen in adjudicatory proceeding rather than public meeting. One and perhaps one of the most important is that there are no protection. So 23N, as we know, has Section 6i, which allows the commission to go into executive session for information that paraphrased relates to, you know, business practices or trade secrets, that kind of thing. There is no such protection for racing. And so that means that to the extent you have an applicant that wants to need to talk about their business plans or trade secret or confidential information, they would like to remain confidential. We don't have that ability. And so that is one of the main reasons why we are suggesting doing this in an adjudicatory hearing. It also has been the process by which we have reviewed applications at least for the last few years. These have been done in an adjudicatory hearing. And so those are the main reasons, I would say, why we are suggesting that here. We, just to elaborate, Gailen, we have been holding an adjudicatory hearing by the public setting. Correct. We ought to go into the private for those matters to be just straight. So do we need to include that in our regulation? Like you mean? We'd be opting for public and only use the adjudicatory, because we could also do all the adjudicatory in private. You could. And it is, but it has, as you correctly note, it has been the process of the commission with every adjudicatory hearing I'm familiar with in the last few years that they are for the most part conducted in public. And then to the extent there's a request or need to go into a closed session pursuant to a 25CMR 101, that can happen. But the commission does that sparingly. And so again, because of the lack of ability to go into an executive session under 128A or C, that's why we would suggest that here. And Madam Chair, to your sort of additional question of should we be referencing that here? I think our feeling was that because it's part of the process under 101 that you could choose to go into it that it's already referred to within that process. Has 101 been updated? Because I think they're, is that the one listening? I didn't look at it, I'm sorry. I don't know, no, that's fine. I think, I don't think 101 has been updated that recently, but we can absolutely take a look at that. Would just add really briefly. So 101 actually does already contemplate adjudicatory hearings for 128A. And so within 101, and I'm reffing here, I think it's 101 section seven, allows the commission to convene an adjudicatory hearing in public and then ultimately elect to close the proceeding at the discretion of the commission or at the request of the applicant. So there is, it's kind of already baked within this regulation. It may be the one that, as we've been through this process, Commissioner O'Brien, I'm not sure, Judy, if 101 has a reference to public meeting for the hearing, we don't need to get into it, but it's been on my to-do list. Todd is nodding this. I'm sorry, Madam Chair, I think I know exactly what you're referring to. That's either in 116 or 115, I can't remember the exact height. It talks about suitability hearings under chapter 23K. So it's a little bit different than this. And we do have to get to that, but yes. Thank you. Okay, thank you so much. Good. So it already allows for that. It's, in other words, the commission has the flexibility of going always pride on this. We've always exercised under our mission to always be as transparent as possible. But I understand the point is to preserve the option that wouldn't otherwise be available. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Any other questions on those provisions or what Kate would just describe before I go forward? That's just to make sure, Brian, the only other question that I have is I know you work closely with IEB trying to come up with these, but I didn't know if IEB wanted to comment at all. Like, are they satisfied with where you guys all came out? Was there any other, any of this that's sort of, you know, a fine line that was still kind of being worked out? Heather, I know that you've been involved all along, right? Thanks, Chair, and thank you, Commissioner O'Brien. We did have some bearded discussions about this. I think there are pros and cons for doing it both ways. I do, however, think that the way it's set up at this point is a fair process. And I think that the IEB can work with it as the reg is written currently. Okay, great. Thank you. Thanks. So, Madam Chair, the next section is 205 CMR 2036 here. That's the determinations on the application. This is drawn more or less directly from 218. The 6B, the sort of durable suitability doesn't have a direct parallel in the 200 series. What it's doing here is ensuring the commission has made a recent enough suitability finding within the last five years for durable suitability. For durable suitability or last year for temporary suitability. Again, this is sort of balancing the, have been ongoing, licensees versus ones that might be starting anew. The last provision to mention in 203 is seven C license conditions. Are relatively few license conditions that apply to all applicants as there might be elsewhere. We opted to include these at the end of the licensing provision rather than their own section. And as always, the commission can impose other conditions. So this is a little more truncated than some of the other regs you've seen with licensing conditions. The following section is suitability of new and existing licensees for organization substances kind of tracks to 205 CMR 215 in sports wagering. The fact that racing licensees must reapply annually meant we replace the idea of preliminarily with temporary suitability and a fact suitability for this year only. And the scope of the investigations and standards are similar to those for durable and preliminary which is here is temporary in sports wagering. 2043 are the factors to be evaluated in determining suitability again drawn from 128A primarily but also adding in the provisions from gaming at sports wagering and then the rest of the process sort of how you get the subsections five through 11 so it takes a lot of space but it's actually should be familiar because it's drawn largely from the sports wagering world. So a lot of the same process for how the suitability determinations are made reviewed, et cetera. And then finally, subsection 12 makes sure the commission has a suitability analysis before approving a transfer of an interest in one of these licenses. So that's the end of 204. So, Mina, can I ask the decision to say temporary suitability as opposed to preliminary like we said in sports wagering is that, you know, is that a, I know it's deliberate but can you just elaborate on that a little bit more? Sure, it really has to do with the tenure of the license in the racing license. It's not preliminary because under the statute it's not sort of presumed that it will someday become permanent. It has to be done every year. So temporary means we are finding them licensed, suitable for this year only. They're still getting the same license because it's one year. Whereas durable means the suitability behind it we expect will last for five years. For five. To be re-licensed every year. Okay. And in terms of timing, I know one of the conundrums is given how quick the statutory turnaround is on these license applications, et cetera is. I guess I throw this out to Heather again. Any concerns at all about the timing? I know they're trying to, we're trying to get the forms into early but any concerns on that? Yeah, thank you, Commissioner O'Brien. We did talk a lot about timing and as Mina mentioned, there was discussion with our licensing division as well. I think the way it's structured now, it will sufficiently address those concerns, particularly with the dates for the scoping survey coming in May or at least being cleared by May and then another date in August. And certainly Mina, feel free to correct me if I missed anything there. But I do think that based on our kind of communications about it and our analysis of it, we think we should be okay with it. Okay. All right, great. Thanks. Commissioner O'Brien, one thing I would add there is I think it is, I just do it to be clear because I think I know the commission has waited on this in the past. It is, I think as good as we can do under the circumstances handed by the statute that doesn't operate the need for perhaps more time. But so just to get everyone else listening, it's not fully solved here. Yeah, great. Okay, thanks. No problem. The following sections were reserved. The reason we did them as reserved is just sort of to maintain the same structure as some of the other licensing statutes, but they're not needed at the moment. This is for potential advanced deposit wagering, licensure, that's a category that I think is being worked on, licensing registration fees for owners, traders, stable employees, et cetera, financial payments announced. So those are reserved. There's nothing proposed now, but the Secretary of State's office doesn't like to see blank sections unless they're reserved and structurally this made more sense this way. 208. Well, let me just jump in for one second here. And I will just note that it is intentional. We wanted to bring these sections to you now related to the applications, get the feedback, get these in process and then we'll move on to these sections 050607. So they're coming just not at the exact same time. Right down the track, they're coming. The 208 is a cooperation section. It mirrors 212 and the similar provision in the, I believe 112 in the gaming and sports wagering licensing process. So this is the sort of typical, if you're going to apply, you need to cooperate with the commission and its staff and IEV, get us your staff, get us your licenses that failure to do so comes with consequences, including potential denial, suspension, et cetera. 213, sorry, 209, 2.09 mirrors 213 and this is back to withdrawal of applications. Again, if you're going to withdraw an application, there are limited exceptions for when you can withdraw without commission approval. Otherwise the commission will have to grant withdrawal. There's also the issue that was mentioned above that if you started withdraw, you may be subject to having to pay some of the costs for the review, if that's started. And so that I believe is it for this racing. Kay, like you remind me, is this, this isn't a subject to emergency. Well, so there's a good point actually to talk about next steps. So because this is new and long as a reg, we wanted to bring it to the commission today for discussion to see if there were any major changes or additions or subtractions that you wanted. So that's hopefully the conversation that we'll have now. We would like to then bring it back to you in very short order, so in November. And at that point, we would ask to move it by emergency. And the reason for that is that we have been told that there is a potentially a new racing, an applicant for a new racing license that may want to submit an application as soon as Q1. And so we would like to have this reg in place for that, if that happens. So that is why we are doing that now. And I will also note that the racing regs come with a sort of slightly different procedural mechanism for putting them in place. It's largely the same except we have to send it up to the legislature for the legislature's review for I think 60 days. Judy can correct me. So it actually extends the timeline for doing it by the regular process by a substantial amount of time. Drake Gailen. Commissioners, it is a long, a long reg and it's very helpful to go through it. Commissioners, I don't know if you have all your questions now, Commissioner Skinner, see you leaning in. Just a process question, please. Would this regulation be posted on a website? In the meantime, Caitlin, ask a comment. Okay. Great question. I should have mentioned that and Alex had also mentioned that too as something that she'd like to do. After today, we will get it up on the website and we will have it there for comment in the interim before we bring it back for what would be, hopefully a vote by emergency in November. So and again, I would anticipate the November 16th meeting, so there would be about at least two weeks for comment that we could then internalize and bring back to you on the 16th. We wanna make sure that the stakeholders are aware of it. So I'm glad that Dr. Leitham inquired. I'm sure she'll be proactive too, to make sure that folks go to the website for it. There she is. Yes. Yeah, I already have notified him that it was gonna be on for just a first view today. Good. And that I expected that there would be a public comment period, but I'd let him know after the meeting. So yeah, we're happy to take any comments, questions or you can think about it again for a few weeks and we'll bring it back, hopefully on the 16th, November 16th, and then have continued discussion and hopefully get a vote. Commissioner, is there any questions that you want to address now that would be helpful for the process? If you weren't answered as we went along. Commissioner O'Brien, are you all set for right now? Maybe she didn't hear me. Okay, sounds like everybody's all set. Caitlin and Judy and Nina. Dr. Leitham, thank you. Heather, thank you. I know it's a big group effort on this. Greg, it's been underway for a while and so such critical work. So thank you. Excellent teamwork. Okay, Nina, are you all set then? This is just a pause. You keep getting me. I am done with presenting things, but I believe Caitlin, you've asked me to stay at least as long as I can for the next item. For the next item, yes. I'm sorry, I was just saying he's here for backup for the next item, but then we'll release him. Thank you. Well, I was just asking, are you all set with racing? Yes. We'll really let you lose without some kind of a thing. All right. Then, commissioners will move on to item number eight on our agenda. This is going to turn to Interim IEP Director Paul and I guess it's back to Caitlin. Good afternoon, Chair and commissioners. Thank you. We are here to talk about the ESPN and Penn relationship, at least preliminary discussion about it today. And with that, I think for just to kind of set the framework, I'm going to turn it over to Caitlin. Thanks Heather. So yes, there's a couple of things that we'd like to do today. First, we want to walk through the potential processes for the commission gathering additional information regarding the Penn ESPN deal and any next steps the commission may need or want to take regarding that deal. And then once that process has been determined by the commission, it would be helpful to get information about exactly what the commission is looking to receive from Penn so that that information can then go be gathered and brought back for a discussion likely at a future meeting. And so with that, I will start by just reminding everyone that on October 2nd, Penn Entertainment presented information to the commission about its new partnership with ESPN. And per the presentation, Penn intends to rebrand the Barstool Sportsbook to ESPN-BET. They've represented that there will not be changes to Penn's ownership structure or management and that Penn will remain the owner and operator of the sportsbook. So ESPN is as a branding and marketing partner. Based on that conversation, the commission asked us to outline the process for commission review and approval in a situation when an operator with a temporary sports wagering license, such as Penn here, has a substantive change in its business. And then of course more specifically what steps must or maybe take in with regard to the Penn ESPN deal in particular. So because this is the first time we're discussing this, I think it would be helpful to talk through the general processes first and then we can talk about Penn specific processes. So in general, if there's a situation where an operator with a temporary sports wagering license has a substantial change in its business, there are two methods by which additional information about that change can be collected by the commission. The first would be under chapter 23N, section 6G and 205CMR 212.011. Both of those sections and empower the commission to require operators to provide such documentation or information as the commission may require to demonstrate that the operator continues to meet the requirements of this chapter and the rules and regulations of the commission. The regulation clarifies that the commission may request additional information and documents throughout the application review process. Now here, because Penn is in a temporary or really any operator in a temporary with a temporary license is still going through the application process, additional information can be collected. It's still subject to the application process and it would still be subject to 23N, section 6I, which we just talked about in our last session. The section that allows protections for certain type of sensitive materials. The second way that the commission can collect information would be through amending a license application. So depending on the scope and the timing of the changes, the commission can request that the operator amend its application pursuant to 205CMR 211.0110. And that's the regulation that you actually used once. You used a way back when, when an operator didn't get its application in or a potential operator didn't get its application in by the deadline and the commission used that mechanism to extend the deadline. And so that is a regulation that you absolutely can use and I think there are probably two situations when you would use that. One would be when there's a short miss in a deadline, something closer to the date of the application process starting, and then also potentially if the changes to the application are so significant that you would actually want an entirely new application or a heavily redlined application. So again, those are two ways that the commission can obtain information in this situation. You can either sort of just ask for additional information pursuant to statute and reg or actually go through a process of amending the license application. Once you have that information, the question becomes, what do you do next? And so pursuant to a case called Covel versus Department of Social Services, which is 42 mass app Pellet Court to 427 from 1997, agencies have inherent power to reopen their concluded proceedings in compelling situations as justice may require. And while this power should be exercised sparingly, it is appropriate to do so in situations where a licensee's business in the Commonwealth will differ significantly from what was originally presented to the commission. So here, again, we'll talk about Penn specifically, but this is really what we're talking about today. You know, the legal team does believe that this is a significant enough change in what the application was that the temporary license could be opened and potentially amended. Then finally, there is a transfer of interest. So if a licensee was going to transfer its interest in a temporary licensee was going to transfer its interest in the license or any direct or indirect interest in license, it would then go through the transfer of interest process under 23N section 6H and 205CMR 229. And it won't get into the details of that here because it's not particularly relevant for today. So then moving on to the processes for the Penn ESPN deal based on what we've just discussed, the first step the commission would need to take is whether it wants to obtain information from additional information from Penn and what process it would like to use. Here, I think legal would suggest using the processes under 212 which would allow the commission to ask more specific questions and get sort of a more succinct standalone document that would be considered an amendment or a supplement to its application for review. The commission could go through the 211 process and reopen the deadlines and seek a sort of a red line of the application but as you'll hear from Ms. Hall and the licensing division, we don't believe at this point that that would be necessary. So then once you have the information, what the commission can do with that is review it and set up time in a public meeting to evaluate the information and determine its impact on the temporary license. So based on that discussion, the commission can decide to amend the operator's license including the conditions on the license. Or not, you know, it could say no, you can move ahead as you are. But the one thing I will note that it's important to note is while the commission can amend the license and the conditions in a public meeting, which was what was done originally, it could not revoke or suspend a license in that forum. Again, that doesn't seem like the process that would be going forward here but in that situation, you'd need to use the processes outlined in 205-CMR-232. And then again, transfer of interest aren't really relevant here. So that was an awful lot. So I will pause for any questions on the process. Questions for Caitlin so far. So with that, what I would say is... Could I just make one note before I get to the question? I know that the transfer issue is not right for today. We could maybe note for educational purposes if we could go through that process, even if it's not right. Nothing but just with respect to category three operators, it would be helpful to me. And I'm not sure if all the commission is still, but maybe when we have very quiet public meeting agenda, Caitlin, include that in. Happy to do that, I just made a note. Yeah, I mean, I'd be stopping by your office and I think it would probably merit repeating anyway. So let's maybe make it a little bit of a public session. Thanks. So yes, I think it would probably be helpful if Director Hall discussed her section first and based on sort of all the information about the facts on the ground as they stand right now, the commission can decide the exact process it wants to use to gain additional information and move forward. Thanks, Caitlin. Chair, would you like me to continue at this point? Yes, thank you. Okay, thank you. So I just want to first say a thank you to Caitlin and the rest of the legal team, including A&K for the teamwork on this, as well as Chief O'Brien who has done a much more kind of surgical look at this than I have. So I'm going to kind of take it from a high level and then turn to her for specifics and she can certainly supplement anything I'm saying. So Chief O'Brien has taken a look at the general application and the business entity disclosure form that was originally submitted in the context of the applications for the sportsway joining licenses in this particular, for this particular applicant. And it does not appear that there are that many references to the prior relationship with Barstool in those documents. Now that said, what the IED and the licensing division are looking at this and viewing it as, is this is really more of a kind of a sports wagering registrant situation where they're actually a marketing affiliate. To the chair's question about the transfer of interest and I think you make a great point, Chair, that it's not right for this. This is really more of a, to be colloquial, a sticker change. And I know it's certainly more complicated than that but this particular change is not impacting the tech step. So in that context, you know, one might be considered a sports wagering vendor but that's not what we have here. So what we are thinking is, and I certainly want to have some feedback from the commission about, you know, all of your thoughts but what we would need, I think at a minimum is a written explanation from Penn with respect to how the relationship will be different going forward. There may be some specific topics that the commission would like Penn to address in that written explanation. For example, the commission may wish to ask about how the ESPN College Football Show will interact and intersect with this particular change in the relationship and connection with Penn. And I do think that it will depend on kind of what the commission is looking for in terms of their own submission. I have communicated with Penn's Chief of Compliance, Christopher Soriano, and they are ready and willing to provide, you know, whatever information that the commission would like coming out of this meeting. So I think in follow up with Caitlin's point, I think our goal for today is to hear from you all as to what you would like and then go forward from there. So I also, before I turn it to the commission, I also want to just make sure with Kara that I haven't missed anything or missed any of it. No, I think you captured it nicely Heather, thank you. What I also just want to add too is that ESPN Enterprises Inc actually anticipated being a marketing affiliate for a number of entities. You know, when we were originally having the discussion about level of licensure for marketing affiliates and things of that nature. So ESPN Enterprises, which is a subsidiary of ESPN Inc is actually currently registered as a sports wagering registrant. So that's one item that I just wanted to add. Thanks Kara. Any questions, speak back from the commissioners. Pusha, Brian, are you hearing this okay? Yeah, yeah I am. And so the comment that I had, I alluded to this when Mr. Shoriana was in front of the commission the last time, which is this licensee is a little bit different in that their branding is tethered to a completely separate pre-existing entity that they have, you know, they have attached themselves to. And so this is a rebranding remark, you know, third party marketing affiliate. There's different ways to conceptualize it. And some of the questions I'd be looking for if this is, if we're driving into sort of the meat and potatoes of this is, you know, you mentioned the college football show and then also how they're gonna be drawing lines. If you cannot have someone obviously who works for the entity and that is also recommending specific bets, right? That are gonna be on their platforms and that sort of thing. And so this was, you know, something they navigated with Barstool and I'm curious to get sort of the same information as it relates to the new branding relationship with the SPNBET. Heather and Karen, can we navigate that? Certainly, Chair, I mean, I think that's a good point and I think that's certainly something that the commission could ask Penn to provide information to the commission. Yes, I would say the goal coming out of this meeting would be for, you know, Heather and myself to be able to go back to Mr. Soriano and say, you know, here is the request from the commission regarding additional information as a supplement to the application. So we'll keep a list of all these questions. And so part of it for me, Heather, and Caitlin is, it may be a two-step process in terms of understanding, having them identify shows, you know, that might fall into that category because some of it may be, you know, look, we can draw lines here and these are the X that are left, right? That we're gonna have to deal with and here's how we propose to do that. Just a follow up to that. I think this process seems to me to be a little bit backwards. I am not aware that we have gotten anything from Penn payment relative to what they are proposing here. We've spoken about it in very general terms. There are a lot of, there's a much media attention to this deal. Everything I know about what is proposing to happen here has not really come from Penn entertainment. And so that's, I think, a disadvantage for us as a commission because we really don't know where to start. So I, for one, would like something to respond to as opposed to us coming up with a range of questions that may or may not include all of the questions that we have in their entirety. I am really looking for something from Penn to get, excuse me, yes, Penn, to get this conversation started in a much more granular detail. Commissioner Skinner, thanks for that. I think that's where I kind of pivoted last time when Mr. Saryana was here. You can see it said, you know, put it up, mark it up. And I'm like, I don't know what you mean to mark up because we don't have anything from you. I think today's effort was at least for us to understand the process because that was another piece, right? Like, whatever our options. And I think that was really helpful today, right? Commissioner Skinner like, oh, right. So in this situation, what's our process? But I am feeling like you a little bit disadvantaged because I, you know, they haven't come to us with other than, you know, an announcement of the deal. And they are complicated because, well, there may not have been many references to Barstow in Chief O'Brien's papers. They certainly were many references to it through out of the application. And in fact, there was a significant condition, which I'm not sure when we look at the additional options, whether those conditions would, you know, do they need to, would it need to stay or not stay? I don't, because I don't think I understand the relationship enough. So I'm with you, Commissioner Skinner. I'm waiting for the ask, I must, there's this notion that, well, they don't need to ask us for a branding change, but I think given the first application, that's what's really triggering it, right? Commissioner Skinner, is that how you feel? I didn't catch, I guess I'm just wondering in terms of why they haven't, why we haven't really received a request. You know, I don't know where the disconnect is. Yeah. Commissioner Brayden, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Shailen. No, I, oh, go ahead, Commissioner Brayden, sorry. So that's kind of where I am too. Madam Chair, in terms of, as I said, this licensee is unique in how they do their branding of their sports betting app. And they came into the jurisdiction with, you know, a media company. And now they're switching to another known entity that is a different type of business and marketing. But there are challenges to that big, different business model in terms of coming into a regular space. And as you and Professor Skinner said, I'm not clear yet on what these issues are because, you know, they presented us with information and we're seeing them the first time. I lead you have your mic covered. Commissioner Skinner. Okay, I think Commissioner Skinner probably hit it on the head with, I'm trying to give some guidance today, but I also do feel a little behind like Commissioner Skinner said, because there's nothing, you know, there's no sort of four corners in front of us of a document that spells some of this out that we can then say, these are the areas that are a concern or questions for us. Commissioner Brayden, I think all of these are very good points and they're well taken. I think that, you know, Penn is prepared to do that and to submit that document to the commission. I think what Caitlin and I were envisioning was kind of the preliminary discussion about the process options for the commission and to try to get the wall rolling, so to speak. I know it's already started rolling to some extent, but to get it rolling more fully so that the commission has what they need from Penn, I guess if that makes any sense. And they are certainly poised to answer any issues that the commission raises today, as well as provide, you know, more detail about this specific relationship. Commissioner Landon? I appreciate that, Heather. I joined just to give direction to both the licensee and to the team. I joined Commissioner O'Brien, Commissioner Skinner, Chair Stein. I think that I will hold ESPN to the same standard that I held Barstool during the application process. And so I agree with Commissioner O'Brien that, you know, really, you know, they're swapping one media company for the other, right? I mean, they're very different companies, but just because ESPN is big and a bohemath doesn't mean that I won't hold them to the same standard that I did Barstool. And so, you know, I kind of wanna see how Penn is thinking about this relationship swap. And it's not as easy as just taking one thing off and putting another thing on. I mean, there are shows and, I mean, I mean, really, arguably, ESPN has more opportunities to host sports shows than Barstool did. And so, you know, knowing how that relationship works is very important to me going forward. But I think my main piece of advice would be, you know, don't treat them any different. Commissioner Hill, any comments? I think Commissioner Maynard just covered what I would have said. So no more comments at this point. And I guess just to make sure we're being fair, you know, we're saying questions and concerns. There may not be any either. We just don't have enough to react to. Is that fair? Because I think we're all trying to surmise what it's gonna look like. Right. I think Commissioner Maynard summarized it well, though, in that they are substantial in terms of the breadth. And so we can see there are some questions we already have, but we don't know sort of how to categorize them and what the scope is. That's right. The scope, right. I agree with his sentiment that it's the same kind of relationship that they had when they first came in and applied. Is it, I'm just gonna turn to Chief O'Brien. You're saying that currently, is it the same entity or ESPN, like I didn't get the name, is currently a third-party affiliate registrant? Correct. So the ESPN Enterprises, Inc., is currently registered as a sportsway during registrant. The company that is officially doing the deal is ESPN, Inc., which is owner of that subsidiary. Has any other jurisdiction dealt with this yet? I'm not certain. Thank you. Questions for either Interim Director Hall or Chief O'Brien? So to Commissioner Maynard's earlier point, you know, we hope we're trying to, we're trying to be helpful to you folks on getting back to Penn. I think they've heard the process, the options that are available, your guidance on those options, and then we need something from them. And what that something is, do we need to be more precise right now for you? I guess there's no guidance from a regulation. You know, that's, you know, that's why we have a little bit of a chicken and the egg problem is, you know, what do they need to submit? What do we want to request? And so I think based on this conversation, you know, again, you know, the commission can request additional information and documents throughout the application review process. So what I'm hearing at this point is that the commission is requesting a detailed explanation of, you know, explain how the college football show is going to work, how will you draw lines so that entities who are employees of ESPN are not recommending specific bets. And then anything else that pursuant to their review of the regulations and the statute, they're going to have to point out that the commission is requesting a detailed explanation of the relationship with ESPN, including, but not limited to some of the questions that were raised. For instance, you know, I think that the commission is going to have to make sure that the regulations and the statute, they're going to have to put lines in place for or takes special steps for. So I think that, you know, police are going to jump in, but I think that's enough to take back and request that information and then bring that back to a meeting in November. I'm cognizant of the fact that there's, you know, in the public, we've been hearing that they're, they're aiming for a November switch. All that said, I think, you know, I think that the commission is going to have to make sure that it's, you know, if it's okay to move forward with the switch in Massachusetts. Thank you. Caitlin. And I also get, I think that while we're all here, it probably makes sense if we can set some kind of a timeframe that the commission is expecting and to get back. So if possible, chair, I think it would be helpful. Just to give that kind of parameter. As well. Well, the timeframe is a little tricky too, right? They have not switched over. They still are still, right? So there's complexities on that. And we need to understand that when you use the word switch, that's a, that is an important piece of it. And I think that's part of why we might be struggling. And in my mind, it's when the rebrand happens. And I think again, after this meeting, we can say to pen to the extent the process was not clear prior to today, the commission would like this additional information. It would then like to evaluate that information in the context of reopening the temporary license. And, you know, it may choose to amend the license and or the conditions on that license based on the information submitted. And at that point, once, once any amendments happen, and of course those, there's also procedural things they have to do, right? To the extent they need to change their internal controls and get that approved to the extent they need to change house rules. I'm not sure how much of that will apply, but there are procedural mechanisms they will also have to go through before any switch can be flipped in the new, the new branding can be used. In Massachusetts anyway. Sparstle. Did we treat them as a third party affiliate registrant? Good question. Sure. We actually did not because in that particular relationship, they were actually a subsidiary of Penn because of the full ownership. So they were not actually registered as that. They, as you all know, they were registered not being invented, but that was much prior to when the commission was looking at the sports wagering applications. That's an important distinction, right? And I know you've mentioned that there won't be an ownership issue. But when we say switch, it's really not Apple to Apple. Right. That's right. There's a different control issue. Of course, under our reg, every one of our licensees is held responsible for content, including branding content and et cetera. It all starts with the operator. But it was, it is just a distinguishing factor. But this entity would have to go through a licensing process of sorts with Chief O'Brien. Ultimately. So it's not going to be necessarily a switch. Right. I think that's what we're envisioning chair is that they would have to go through the sports wagering registrant process of the marketing affiliate. But of course, you know, with guidance from the commission. And that is, you know, that is a kind of a, I don't know how to raise it. It's a different process. And if we were looking at them as a qualifier, we are not looking at them as qualifiers at this time. And that's based on ownership issues. But I guess maybe a question that's underlying here, it's the activity issue. You know, is it truly a third party affiliate? So I'm asking these questions of just to sort of trigger what kinds of details we'd be looking for. From the operator from pet. I think that makes sense. And I think once we get the document from Penn, you will certainly evaluate that and as well as the commission come back and have further discussion on it as well. And I think it would require a back to where we were the last time we saw them is to understand. The cessation of barstrel relationship timing on that. Because I don't know that there's overlap. And Chris is going to do, I think raise that last time. You know, the timing issue is so important. It's a good point, chair. And I think that the commission could ask pens up to speak to that in the document. And I think that that would be appropriate. Right. Commissioner, help me out. Is there anything that you're thinking that you're, that's going to be. On your mind. That we can help them address because that we certainly brought up last time. I know it's on. Our minds. Anything else. Again, it's very hard to react. Commissioner Skinner's. Earlier point. And sure, just by way of update, I did just get a message from Mr. Soriano indicating that they could, they could submit. Something as early as next week. If that works for the commission. November 2nd is our next public meeting. The one in. That's getting longer in the agenda. Commission. I help. Let's, let's see if that. That's a possibility commissioners. If we could add that. I think that's a good point. I think that's a good point. That's a possibility commissioners. If we could add that. To November 2nd. It happens to be in spring. That doesn't matter so much. Commissioners. Are you okay with that? Or would you rather roll it to the later one? Yeah, I am. And I'm thinking more about. What Kailin said earlier, it just said in my head, which was, you know, when this. When the. The change happens. I'll use change instead of switch. But the, I think it's got to be before. Because. You know, we were kind of in this situation where. We're in between worlds. You know, and, and. You know, what if they go forward and there's something there that we just. Totally don't want them to go forward with. So I'm sitting here thinking we, I think we have to do it before. I don't know. As soon as possible. That's my answer. Okay. And I would say, again, based on this conversation, I think it's relatively clear. Tell me if you disagree that this, the change should not happen in Massachusetts until the commission reviews this information and decides how it is going to act on the temporary license. I have seen in the news. November 20th floating. I don't believe we've heard that date from Penn specifically. My only concern, we can definitely do it on the second. I don't think we can do it on the second. I don't think we can do it on the second. I don't think we can do it on the second. I don't prefer it's very tight for getting the information in evaluating it, turning it around that. That. But it could be done. Also, we just want to make sure that Mr. Soriano and any one from Penn could be in that meeting, you know, remotely, however, it's going to work because it is out in Springfield. I mean, I think the sooner they get us the information, the better. But in terms of marking it up, it's a little bit hard to say until we see what they submit it. I mean, I don't know. We don't typically do that, but. I'm just thinking of procedurally like the, if this had to go into an executive session in Springfield, would we have to clear the room, that kind of thing, because it's a, you know, it's a different type of meeting. But that's, that's my only thought on that. We could, of course, also add a different day, right? That week or the week after for a, for a meeting on this subject. I think we're planning on an executive session in Springfield, but that, so those logistics shouldn't drive the decision. I think it's better like how prepared we will be. We could also consider a separate date. I hate to add to the schedule commissioners, but if you thought that it was a warranted, a one hour special public meeting, I would be okay with that. If it, if Springfield doesn't feel quite right, November 2nd feels too soon. I shouldn't say that Springfield commissioners, otherwise we're, you know, November, November 19th, is that right? Oh no, I'm in 2021. The 15th is the next one after the second, right? The 16th. Or 16th. Yeah. So. Madam chair, if we had to put an hour or two aside before then, you know, that's something that I would agree to for sure. I'm like a commissioner main at the sooner, the better here. Yeah. I don't know the week of. Maybe the week of November 6th, we could entertain a short, you know, one item. Agenda. So that we can. Get guidance and give guidance. She doesn't have to decide now. Just generally commissioners. I, I, are you a member of that or two? Just rather go up to 16. What did you see about November 20th, Cameron? Director Ban circulated a news report this morning that said that there'd been a media report that they were aiming for the 20th, but again, we have not heard that from Mr. Soriano to my knowledge. So. To, to actually. Make the change. Two over two to switch the app from barstool to ESPN. Yeah. Madam chair, I'm looking at my schedule and I'm looking at November 7th as a possibility in the morning between nine and 12. To put an hour aside. I don't know how everybody else feels on that day. Just as a quick update. I understand that pen could be available on the second and also. During the week. Of the six and it may not be exactly, you know, the same people that we've talked to before, but they were available. If the commission decides to go forward with that separate meeting during the week of the seven. Or I should say the week of the six. Trudy, how's November 7th looking in the morning? The morning is looking pretty good for everybody's open. I think you have. Internal. Yeah. Yeah. Mine's all internal. So. One very special one with you. So I'm, I could be freed up and then. I can be arranged. So everybody's available. Yeah. A nine or 10 o'clock start with bigger that out. How's that sound commissioners. Okay. I've got one thumbs up. Commissioner. Brian. Yep. That works. Okay. Commissioner's going to do with that with you. I worked for me. For me. Yeah. I think that's the best way to do it. Thanks. Thanks, Trudy. Thanks. Commissioner. All right. Is that. Anything else we can do to help. Caitlin or Heather. If it's not. Okay. Yeah. I think this was kind of what we were looking for today is to try to get on the same page about next steps. It is a different circumstance. So we're, you know, kind of. Evaluating and trying to do the right thing as we go. So it's really helpful to have the commission's input. We appreciate it. All right. Okay. Well done. Thank you very much for. It's very helpful. And now if I can find my agenda. That takes care of item number eight, right? We're all set for now. It is. Top 30. Which puts us back on the timeline. We circulated. Is it lunchtime? Fishers. We appreciate it. All right. Okay. Well done. Thank you very much for. We appreciate it. Is it lunchtime? Fishers. And then we would have turned to. At one. All by the game sense quarterly report. Sounds good. Sounds good. All right. Joe, I'm sorry. But we're going to break for lunch. Thanks so much, everyone. That's fine by me. Okay. We'll convene back at one. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Mills. Thanks. Okay. Hey, we have everybody. Okay. Thanks. Mills. This is a reconvening of. Massachusetts game commission. Holding this meeting virtually. So after our lunch and a nine, nine a.m. start. Are you here? I am here. I'm. Fully here now. I'm getting everything. Yeah. You were completely here before. Now we have. You visually. Okay. I'm here. Mr. Skinner. I'm here. And commissioner Maynard. I'm here. Okay. Let's get started then. We left off with. Fishing up the. I don't know. Eight never turning to you, chief Delaney and communities. Thanks. Thank you, madam chair and commissioners. So today. We are asking. For the commission to vote to put out for public comment. The draft community mitigation fund guidelines for fiscal year. 2025. And the municipal block grant formula. You know, these documents bring to fruition. Many months of work by the community affairs team. To essentially, you know, completely revamp this program. You know, this is really a sea change for this program. You know, it's changing the entire way that it operates. So, so this is. You know, for us and community affairs, this is, this is a big, a big moment for us to get these guidelines done and in process. So earlier this week, we held our local community mitigation advisory committee meetings as well as our subcommittee on community mitigation. And, you know, we've been working with them since the summer on this project and keeping them informed every step of the way as we have to the commission. And we've really received very positive feedback from, from those groups. They all seem to really like the direction that this is going. So if the commission does vote to put these documents out for discussion, I think we'll be able to do that. So if you have a comment, the next step is we'll hold a public hearing a week from today. And to, to hear from the people that will be directly impacted by these guidelines. So what I thought I would do here since, since you each have the benefit of a briefing on this and the documents are, are lengthy. I thought I would just quickly go through. And then I'll open it up for any, any comment from, from the commissioners. So, you know, the, the main change that we're talking about here with the program is, is essentially creating two programs under the community mitigation fund umbrella. The first one being the municipal block grant program. And the second one being the regents, regional agency grant program. And we'll be talking about each one of those programs individually in just a little bit. So the couple of the other major changes, the program is being moved to a fiscal year. So you'll see on all the documents is now fiscal year 25, which would be starting July 1st of 2024. We did provide some additional guidance to our applicants to try to make the process easier for them. And more successful for them. We have also a lot are now allowing some administrative costs to be charged against the program, which is one of the requests of our communities that we deal with. And then the last thing we'll talk about is the proposed grant formula. So on the municipal block grant. The guidelines outline who the eligible communities are to participate in that program. And essentially they are all of the communities that have been eligible since the start of the community mitigation. And as you said, this, because this is a block grant, the way that the money goes out to the communities is through a formula. So we've developed a formula that we'll, we'll go into a bit more detail in, but that's what determines how much money the communities are eligible to receive. Similar to, to previous years, we have, we have five categories of grants. We have a community planning, public safety, transportation, gambling, harm reduction and specific impacts. And the only major change in those is in the transportation category, we combined both our transportation planning and our transportation construction together in that one category. One of the big changes for our communities is that we will only be accepting one application per community. And so, with previously a community might submit two or three or maybe even four applications for different types of projects. In this proposal, the communities will have to get together and decide how they want to spend their money amongst those categories that, that we just went through. And so that one application to us, which will be due as it is always on January 31st. And in this program, if we do not receive an application by January 31st, the grant amounts will be forfeited. That is one of the hard deadlines that is in 23 K, one of the few, you know, pertaining to the community mitigation fund program. So, you know, we will stress to our applicants, you know, the, the criticality of that due date. So the regional agency grant, you know, in the past regional agencies have been eligible for funding and we have funded a number of them. We funded DA's offices and we've done workforce grants for the regionally. And 23 K does identify a number of regional types of entities that are eligible for grants. But for this first year of this split program, we're proposing to focus on three particular types of grants. One is a regional planning grant that would be eligible up to $250,000 for the regional planning agency that represents the community in which the casinos lie. So we have MAPC for Encore and PVPC for MGM and CERPED for Plainville. The second category of grants is regional public safety grants. These would cover the district attorney's offices, potentially the attorney general's offices and any other regional public safety agency that's, that is, excuse me, that's eligible for funds. We are proposing a cap of $100,000 on the DA's offices. We've done some significant outreach to the DA's that have not been participating in our program and they are very interested in doing so. So we're encouraged by that. And then the third piece is our regional workforce development grants. We have up to $750,000 in each region, one grant for Region A, one grant for Region B. And as the 23K outlines that there are other agencies that may be eligible to come in for funding. And what we are asking is if any other eligible agency has a project that they want us to consider to please contact us well in advance of the application deadline so we can have a discussion about eligibility and availability of funds and all of those kinds of things. So as we mentioned before, one of the things that our communities and our applicants have said is that they would love to have some additional guidance from us. One of the most difficult things that the communities have is identifying the casino related impacts and making that tie back to the casino. So what we've done for this year is that the commission itself has identified casino related impacts. And we did that through a review of all of our research that we've done through Mark's team. We actually used a consultant that Mark uses to help us look at other jurisdictions and what kinds of things that they've been looking at and our own just sort of internal research. And what we've done for each one of the grant categories, we've listed out what we agree are the impacts of the casino. So a community now or an agency only has to say, well, this is the impact that we want to address with our project and they don't have to spend lots of time trying to dig up documentation of that. We agree that that is an impact of the casino. So the second additional guidance is we've also identified potential projects to address the impacts. There are some things that we've identified as eligible projects or projects that could be considered by the applicants. Again, we looked at some of the previous applications that we've had and projects that we've done and talked with various groups and tried to sort of identify what are those types of projects that would address these impacts. And then the third thing that we provided for additional guidance is an identification of ineligible projects. We've had in the past some communities come in and they've spent all this time on an application and the project's really not eligible for funding. So we're trying to get that up front as much as we can to help people out and have them not come in with something that wouldn't otherwise be eligible. A couple of other program changes. Again, we are going to be operating on the state fiscal year. That's something that should not be a particular note to our applicants and our grantees. Things will pretty much operate the way that they do now, which just helps us come into alignment with how the community's operated and how the commission itself operates. Another item is that up to 7.5% of the grant may be used for administrative expenses up to a cap of $50,000. Again, this is something that our grantees have requested, especially some of these smaller communities that may not have the staff that maybe larger communities have. And then the last major one is in the transportation construction category, we've revamped what our subsidy looks like and we've gone instead of just previously, one-third of the project cost was eligible. We've now gone to somewhat of a sliding scale where we're saying that the first $250,000 will pay 100% and then as you go up, the percentage of the total project cost comes down. Again, that was at the request of some of our communities to give them a little bit more flexibility and we think that will do that. And then I'm going to just talk a little bit about the grant formula. And we had this back in front of the commission, I think a month or so ago in a draft form and the factors that we dealt with then have not changed. We looked at four factors. The first one was that there should be some type of a base grant amount and those vary between the regions because the regions generate different amounts of money for the program. We also agree that those designated host and surrounding communities should receive additional funds because of that status. We do have other communities that are eligible for the program that are not designated as surrounding communities. So the thought was there that we should have some additional funds for those designated communities. And then the third factor is a portion of the grant funds is distributed based on the proximity to the casino with the notion here that the further you are away from the casino, the smaller the impacts are. And we looked at a whole bunch of different factors here. We looked at maps and we looked at physical barriers and we looked at highway locations and other things to try to make that assessment. And then the last one is a portion of the grant funds are based on traffic impacts and we generated those numbers using earlier traffic studies and trip distribution maps from the environmental impact reports and so on. And in the document that you have, we have the proposed grant amounts for each of the communities. One of the things that we did do here in the guidelines is we added a waiver. And then we also added a grant. Any community has identified a project that might exceed the grant, the proposed grant amount that they're getting, they would be able to come in for a waiver request to see if we could fund that project for them. And the example that I use here is, say a community has their proposed grant is $350,000. But they've identified a transportation construction that would otherwise be eligible for a million dollar subsidy from the commission. Well, clearly the 300,000, 350,000 would not be enough to cover that project. So in that case, if they've identified a very discreet project that would exceed their allocation, they can come in for that waiver. And of course in any of these, we have to look at how much money we have available to fund that. And we have to look at the eligibility of the project and so on and so forth. And we'll deal with each of those on a case-by-case basis. And then the total proposed grant amounts for this year, region A is $11.5 million. Region B, $4.3 million. And the category two facility, that's the Plain Ridge Park Casino, $500,000 for that area. And then the regional projects will be funded out of some previous, some unspent money from previous years. And okay, I think that is it for my presentation. So at this point, I guess I'll just open it up for questions or comments from the commission. I know we've had a bit of a couple of sessions on this as well as two by twos. Any questions for Joe and his team at this point? I know he's looking for approval to allow for public, you know, go green lights so that you can put it out for public comments. This is marked up for what date? The 26th, the week from today. Right, a week from today with written comments. On the Monday, the 30th. Yeah. Thank you for reading the questions. Commissioner Hill. I have no questions, Madam chair. I just want everybody to know the extraordinary work that's gone into this whole process. It's been, it's been a process that I think normally would have taken a lot longer than it has. They condensed it into a very short window to ensure that we could get this going for this fiscal year. So the work I want everybody to know it just been extraordinary what they've done. Joe and Mary and Lily. Perfect. And then I would just reiterate. Joe said at the beginning of his comments that he's met with the subcommittees on community mitigation and each area. That's been a long time. And that's been a long time. So I was in the area of the state. And I sat through a few of them myself. And there was really no negative feedback during those meetings that we received. I thought for sure even with formula talk. That we would have some negativity toward us. It. but he was very, very positive about what had been proposed. We certainly will may hear a different story once this goes out to a public comment, but overall what has been proposed has been received with open arms and appreciation quite frankly from the communities that we heard from. We thought we'd probably get some negative feedback maybe from some of the bigger cities and we didn't. And the smaller towns who are always been involved, they too were very positive in their comments toward Joe and his team once he showed everybody his PowerPoint presentation. So Madam Chair, with that said, if nobody has any questions or comments, I certainly would be willing to make a motion right now. Commissioner's, any questions? Something that I know we are all very impressed by all the work that's gone into this and pleased. I'm very pleased with the briefing. So go ahead, Commissioner Hill. Move on. All right. So with that all said, Madam Chair, I move that the commission see public comment on the FY20-25 draft community mitigation fund guidelines and the FY20-25 community mitigation fund municipal block grant formula as included in the commissioner's packet and discussed here today. Second. Any other questions? Commissioner O'Brien. Aye. Commissioner Hill. Aye. Commissioner Skinner. Aye. And Commissioner Maynard. Aye. And I vote yes, five-zero. There you go, Joe. Thank you very much. Stay tuned. Stay tuned. Thank you. Excellent work. All right. And now always a wonderful report to hear. Item number 10 from Research and Responsible Gaming. I'll have Director Vandal and if you'll introduce the folks and Long is right there too. So thank you. Yeah. Long is here in the way, so we need him. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and commissioners. It's my pleasure to offer you the Game Sense Quarterly Report today. I see all of our team members from the Game Sense team here, including Chelsea Turner, who is the Chief Operations Officer, Jodi Neely. Hi, Jodi. Director of Recovery Services, Yolanda Gonzalez, who we met just a little bit ago. She is a Game Sense Advisor at Encore, Boston Harbor. And then finally, Anna Thomas. Hi, Anna. She is also a Game Sense Advisor at Encore, Boston Harbor. So I'm just gonna turn it over to Chelsea. Thanks so much, Mark. Really appreciate it. Phil Sherwood's gonna run the deck for us today. Thank you, Phil. Good afternoon, commissioners and Chairwoman Judstein. As always, really a pleasure to be here before you today and looking forward to talking about what we've been up to this last quarter. Topics we wanna touch on are, we're gonna start today with a personnel update, mostly so that I can brag a little bit about Yolanda and Anna and you can get a little bit of background information about them before they present. We'll briefly touch on our interaction highlights from the quarter across all three properties. We're gonna talk about the gameline and the number of calls that we received through that and where we refer them to. Of course, Responsible Gambling Education Month was a big initiative of ours this past quarter and Yolanda's gonna review all of that with you. Jody's gonna also talk about September, which is also Recovery Month and our Recovery Advisory Board, which has really expanded over the last few months or so. Anna's gonna cover our Game Sense Champion Award winners, which is always a highlight of our presentation. We'll talk a little bit about our internal Racial Justice and Health Equity Committee. I'm not sure we've ever actually reported on that to you. So excited to share a little bit about what we've been up to. We'll give you some communications highlights and then of course we'll talk about some of the things we're currently working on and what's in Anna pipeline. I'm gonna start by introducing Yolanda because she's gonna follow me in terms of talking about Responsible Gambling Education Month. As you can see Yolanda's on the call now. She's also the person on the far right of this picture. These are all of our new staff who started in July. And Yolanda came to us from Bailey's Tiverton Casino. She was a surveillance officer there. She's also been a table games dealer at Encore and at Tiverton. She has a her associates degree in business administration and general management from Racial Community College and she has hit the ground running. Next, I'll talk a little bit about Anna who's in the middle in this picture with the gray sweatshirt and she's also on video right now. Anna comes to us most recently from PPC where she was a host. She also has a significant amount of customer service and marketing experience including a couple of years with the New England Patriots which I think is pretty fun. She's a graduate of Bryant University and both Anna and Yolanda are members of our overnight team at Encore Boston Harbor. Also wanted to talk about JoLynn Taylor who's on the left in this picture. She's our new game sense manager for the overnight team. She has a wealth of gaming experience. She came to us from Pennsylvania Casino there most recently but she has over 20 years of experience in the gambling industry. Her past positions include a floor supervisor, pit manager, table games trainer, dealer and various other supervisory positions. She has worked in casinos in Pennsylvania, California, Iowa and even at Encore Boston Harbor. The person to her right is Larry Green. Larry is a retiree from Fox Woods. He has over 28 years of experience in the casino industry. He's supervised the operations, conducted and conduct and game security of table games departments at Fox Woods. He's filling in as a floater for us which is really helpful for us. So when we have folks who are out on medical leave or maternity leave or just on vacation, Larry comes in to fill in those gaps across all three properties. And the second person from the right is Lulu Lovansi. She is in the daytime nighttime shift at Encore Boston Harbor. She's most recently worked in security at Encore Boston Harbor. She also has a bunch of customer service and sales experience. So we are super excited to have them all on board. They have already been rock stars and been value added to our team. I'm gonna present the numbers a little bit more generally. This presentation just because we have so much to cover. So these are our numbers across all three properties for the last quarter. So as you can see, our team is performing very well. We had an 18% increase in demonstrations and exchanges this quarter compared to the same quarter of last year. These are our substantive interactions. It means that we're engaging with patrons and talking to them about safer play. That could be play my way. It could be through an educational activity. It could be telling them the difference and explaining the difference on the casino floor between different blackjack tables and how the odds change. We also had a 33% increase in voluntary self-exclusions year over year, which is great. We obviously want to reach anybody who is struggling and that's a great tool for many folks. It's a great starting point. We had 100% increase in remote VSEs. So as you may recall, this is an initiative that we started really around the pandemic time where we're able to now offer voluntary self-exclusions remotely or the computer with a live game sense advisor. And that's great because folks that live far away from the casino don't have to travel to the casino. They also don't have to come back into the casino if they are struggling where they might be tempted again. So we're happy that's been so useful. And obviously it's been great with sports betting and those VSEs. We had 164% increase in VSEs and reinstatements initiated by live chat. Live chat is when we're able to talk directly with a person over the computer. We promote both live chat and the remote VSEs through our communications team and they've done a fantastic job of doing so as you can see by the uptick in numbers. We had a 6% increase in reinstatements. So those are folks who have completed their VSE term and they believe they're okay and ready to go back and gamble healthy again. We had 2,953 new play my way enrollees. I couldn't really compare this year over year because we just launched play my way during September of last year. So we didn't have a full quarter of numbers but that's a very high number. It's significantly higher than the quarter was last year, obviously. We had 8,793 raffle entries over the course of the quarter. So I'm not sure if you all are aware but I think you are based probably from your visits to the properties but we always have a raffle basket out. It's a way to draw folks into the game sense information centers. We try to change up what we're offering for the prize. So in July we offered a kind of a fancy cooler and August we had a barbecue themed basket and tools and then we did a RG tool kit during Responsible Gambling Education Month and I'll let Yolanda talk more about that but we mixed things up to try to appeal to a wide variety of people in an exchange for engaging in an educational responsible gambling activity. They get entered into a raffle to win one of these prizes each month. These are our game line statistics. Our game line is different than the helpline which the helpline is DPH helpline for folks who are in distress. They won't have questions about problem gambling. We refer people to the helpline but the game lines a little bit different. So if you look at this and you're just looking at the top section here you can see the first line says Siegel that's safer gambling education line. Those are calls that come into us that somebody might have a question about a sports betting app or how to sign up for a sports betting app. A lot of sports betting calls lately or it could be a question about voluntary self exclusion or reinstatement. These are questions that, you know the game sense advisors can help navigate. The second option when you call the game line is to press one. That's if you are struggling with your gambling anything related to problem gambling we are gonna warm transfer you directly over to the DPH helpline. So you can see if you look to the second sort of section down you'll see 46% of the calls that came in were folks that wanted to talk with a game sense advisor about a variety of topics and 36% of the calls that came in we refer directly right to the DPH helpline. The third option is if you are struggling and you want to engage in a urge surfing meditation you can press two and you'll hear a recording of one of our staff who worked with a social worker and a clinician to record urge surfing sessions so that if you are feeling craving to gamble you can do this meditation and research has shown that oftentimes by just simply listening to one of these after about three to five minutes your urge will subside. So we had about 6% of callers do the urge surfing. And then the next one is folks that want oftentimes the daily numbers are old number is still out there on lottery tickets and stuff like that. And so if they want lottery we give them a lottery number of course and try to be helpful. Then the last option is if someone wants to leave a message we don't get a lot of folks that leave messages but we wanted to leave that in case somebody didn't want to directly engage at that time we call back almost within an hour at the most those calls are answered very quickly. Usually they've been mostly about sports betting at least in the last quarter. Next slide Phil. At this time I just want to take it over to Yolanda who's going to tell you about what we were up to during responsible gambling education month. Yolanda. Thank you Chelsea. Hello everyone. Hi commissioners and madam chair. As you may know, September is responsible gambling education month RGEM. RGEM was launched in 1998 by the American Gambling Association trade for the gaming industry as a way to promote responsible gaming and increase awareness of problem gambling at a nationwide level. Since the first casino opened in Massachusetts in 2015, the game fence team has partnered with three mass licenses, EVH, MGM and PCC to engage patrons through educational activities and advertising efforts about responsible gaming. And in 2022, the American Gaming Association decided to extend the responsible gaming education week to a full month which now it's responsible gaming education month RGEM. The American Gaming Association announced different themes for each week of RGEM this year. Game sense worked to complement these themes where it made sense. Our theme was play it smart from the start. We focused on play my way and educating players about the various player management tools available to them inside the casino and on mobile sports betting platform. Positive play and the lower risk gambling guidelines were also woven into these interactions. Efforts this year included promotional efforts inside and outside the casino. We provided each property with digital materials that they could use both front of the house in the back of the house and through social media. We also ran new and refreshed educational activities at the game sense information center. My favorite was the scenarios quiz where we'd have on our back screen, we'd have like a little quiz thing. If you were on slots and you want X amount of money, would you pocket half, would you leave, would you take a break? And it was kind of a nice way to kind of interact with the players and give them safe tips. Also play my way pop up banners with stations just outside the game sense information centers at MGM and PCC to help call attention to this voluntary tool. We had raffles for special responsible gaming toolbox theme pass baskets in front of the house, the back of the house. These baskets contained a core listed drill, game sense education brochures and in order to enter the raffle, they needed to complete the quiz. These baskets were very popular with the guests and casino staff. We ran tables outside of the game sense center as the way to reach more people. For example, at EVH, we ran tables both outside of promotion for patrons and back of the house to panel staff. Folks engaged in a lot of educational activities in exchange for a raffle ticket. We also table that different times of the day to reach different shifts. Additionally, we offered an internal incentive for the game sense staff to encourage patrons at each property to sign up for play my way. And over the course of the month, any PPC game sense staff who signed up 10 or more new patrons for play my way would receive a $50 Amazon or Dunkin' card or $25 gift card. The same rules apply for Encore and MGM, but these goals were a little different. 40 for new patrons, Encore day shift and 10 or more for the overnight staff, which I am. We also created and ran special mooncakes which you can see right here. This is a very popular mid-autumn festival, popular in the Asian communities and cultures that they basically celebrate the successful reaping of rice and wheat or harvest. So the food offerings are made in honor of the moon. Folks that took this quiz received a small piece of mooncake. So these are the pictures on the side. They have really cool designs. So for our second slide, the most popular activity was word scramble, which engaged 386 patrons, followed by Jeopardy, which engaged 362. Our running tables at promotions and other areas prove their worth reaching 1,364 people across all three properties. This does not include all people we reach through Play My Way or educational activities at the Game Sense Information Center. Our Play My Way incentive for game staff was not only fun, but it worked. So at EVH, we were up 53 Play My Way, signed up in September over August. Seven GSAs reached their goal. At MGM, we extended the incentive due to the cyber attack. So we don't know the numbers yet, but 1GSA has reached their goal. At PPC, there were 37 Play My Way signups in September over August. All the staff at PPC reached this goal. So in total, 527 hours were dedicated to RGEM efforts across all three properties in the month of September. And we also wanted to give special thanks to PPC for purchasing Hubok theme swag for patrons and casino staff, and for donating $550 in various increment gift cards to patrons and casino staff, and also donating candy for patrons and casino staff, as well as MGM who donated $200 dining gift cards for the RGEM basket. And lastly, the picture to the right is my colleagues, Winnie and Lulu, and they're tabling at the back of the house in RGEM. And that's them, RGEM. Chelsea, you just want me to go? Yes, please. Okay, hi, good afternoon, Madam Chair, commissioners and my wonderful colleagues. My name's Jodi Neely. I am the Director of Recovery Support Services, which some of you may know is pretty amazing, considering where I was a few years ago. Some of you I don't know, I don't think I've met you, but it is a pleasure. And I'm gonna talk about one of my favorite things, which is recovery. I am a person with 15 years of lived experience. My last bet was June 2nd, 2008, and I am honored to have been a part of the Mass Council in various forms for this is my 12th year. So it's pretty cool to be here. Thank you. So I'm gonna talk a little bit about recovery months, and what I do, I was able to get out on the road again this year. That's me in the white shirt. It says I am in recovery. I'm hovering under the Gandara Center Hope for Holy Oak and Springfield Peer Recovery Center's tent, because it was really hot, and they let me stay there. And this is one of my favorite things to do is to go to the Peer Recovery Centers. And there's a great one in Springfield. I know you guys, I heard of a meeting, you have a meeting in Springfield. It's called Valor, if you ever wanna visit a Peer Recovery Center. There's one right there. And I went to seven in-person events. I reached out to about 15 organizations, but the cool thing is just so you know, that there are going to be up to 39 Peer Recovery Centers in the state of Massachusetts. I mean, Massachusetts is amazing, I digress, I know, for many reasons, but the fact that there are going to be 39 Peer Recovery Centers all the way up North Adams, Pittsfield, like everywhere. I don't know if I'll make them all before, I don't know if I'll make them to all of them, but I will certainly try one way or the other. Anyway, so, you know, recovery month is really important to me because my work with the Peer Recovery Centers for those of you who don't know is that they're mostly focused on drug and alcohol abuse, but I have been going there for years, raising awareness about problem gambling, always well received, everybody there in recovery, they get it, I only have to say like three warning signs and like, oh yeah, we get it. And it's just, you know, it's a little bit prevention and awareness raising and it's really one of my favorite things to do. So the other thing I'm to talk about is the Recovery Advisory Board. I'm calling it Recovery Advisory Board 2.0 because we've had one for many of the years that I've been here, but we decided to revamp it and expand it and man, have we expanded it. I can now call it, not officially, I guess the International Recovery Advisory Board, just so you all know, we have 13 people, all with lived experience, 11 are gamblers and two are loved ones, but we consider them with lived experience because they've been living with gamblers in their lives and they are all over the world, well, mostly Ireland, Wales, Oregon, Nevada, five from Massachusetts. Yeah, five from Massachusetts and the rest are Oklahoma and it's really wonderful. I mean, these are people that many of them are in the field. Some of them are just people who've been with us for a while. One new guy we got, he was the first one to apply as soon as you put it on the website. He's from Eastern Mass. He's sports better. He's only three years, four years in recovery and we have a wide range of people in different stages of recovery. They're all in recovery from gambling, but we have from one and a half years up to 20. So in all types of gambling, sports betting, I was a casino gambler, you know, like land, what do you call it, brick and mortar, casino didn't have the online thing yet and it's a lot gambler, but we have people who did online and they did brick and mortar and they did just sports betting and they did just lottery. So we have everybody. And, you know, I wanna let the commissioners know that this voice of lived experience is yours to consider if you need it. All right, these folks joined the board because we said we're trying to do this new thing and make sure that the voices of people with lived experience are out there, are available to be accessed. And so that's what we're doing. We've had one meeting in August. I know all these, I knew all these people except the one guy who applied. And we are working with them. We're having another meeting next week. So that will be our second meeting and they're really great people. So if you need that voice, you always have me, but you now have 13 other people who we can access. And I think that's all my points, Chels, okay? That good? That's great. Thank you, Jodi. All right, thanks. We'll turn it over to Anna for the game sense champion awards. Thank you, Jodi and thank you, Chelsea. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the commission, fellow team members of the Massachusetts Council on Gaming and Health, and all other guests who have joined us and are here in attendance today on this Thursday, October 19th, 2023. As Chelsea noted, my name is Anna Thomas and I am one of the newest hires at Game Sense Encore Boston Harbor. I am honored to present you all with the recipients of the Game Sense Champion Awards of Excellence for quarter one of the fiscal year, 2024. This moment is somewhat of a full circle moment for me. Just about nine or 10 short months ago, I was in the similar shoes of the nine champions as I received an award of excellence in customer service. At this time, I was working in the marketing department at Plain Ridge Park Casino, and I can attest wholeheartedly how gratifying and humbling it is to receive such praise and acknowledgement. I feel that in the casino industry and perhaps all industries, it is sometimes easy to feel like your hard work and your efforts go unnoticed. To receive such a prestigious award from Game Sense and the Massachusetts Gaming Commission provides a true sense of accomplishment and a reassurance that I feel we all deserve. Game Sense is, by nature, an extension of the casino. Daily, we work hand in hand with the people who make up the fabric of these establishments. To receive such recognition from peers can mean more than a gift bag or more than a title. It can mean a support that feeds the soul and waters the seed of greatness. So with that said, I'm very pleased to announce the following nine recipients of the Game Sense Champion Awards of Excellence. The Game Sense team worked together to select three employees at each of our respective properties who demonstrated an excellence in commitment to responsible gaming and who have successfully incorporated it into their daily roles. First up, we have Encore Boston Harbor. The first recipient of the Game Sense Champion Award of Excellence is David Hernandez of Food and Beverage. David has shown countless times his eagerness to share responsible gaming with friends, co-workers, and patrons alike. Whether discussing budgeting, time management, or just taking breaks, he always encourages others to play responsibly and to leave when they're ahead. The second recipient is Juan Carlos of Win Rewards. Juan Carlos is always helpful to team members and has offered his translation services whenever Game Sense needs them. Juan is well-versed in responsible gaming and has encouraged customers to come to Game Sense for advice or if they are seeking help. And the final recipient of Encore Boston Harbor is Bryce Finley of Security. Bryce is always willing to lend a helping hand. Directing guests to Game Sense when needed, he is always looking out for the wellbeing and safety of the Game Sense team. Bryce hasn't even asked how to help and what is in our scope and to learn more about Game Sense daily. So that concludes Encore Boston Harbor and we're moving on to MGM. The first recipient of the Game Sense Champion Award of Excellence is Andrew Bedecker of Table Games. Andrew noticed a player on his game who appeared to be sad and engaged the patient in conversation. The patient expressed concern about himself because he felt his gambling spending was out of control. Andrew and a supervisor then provided him with information on how to do a remote voluntary slough exclusion because the MGM center happened to be closed for the night. Because of the actions of Andrew, the exclusion was completed and the guest was taken care of. The second recipient is Jonathan Terrell of Security. Jonathan is a passionate MGM employee who regularly interfaces with Game Sense to ensure he knows what is happening and that we are taken care of. He is close to all Game Sense personnel and is interested in what we do and wants to always collaborate with us so that we can do our jobs quickly and effectively. And the final recipient for MGM is Margaret Murty of Environmental Services. Margaret spoke at length with Game Sense advisor Aisha about Game Sense and what we do. She had many questions and was impressed by her role in the casino and how we can help customers stay safe and healthy. She was glad to learn more about the Game Sense program so that she could help pass it on to guests. And in your right corner, you'll see a photo of Margaret Murty with MGM Springfield's president, Chris Kelly and our Game Sense advisor, Aisha Shambly. And to conclude the awards, we have PPC, last but not least, Lisa McKenney of Compliance. Lisa knows the importance of Responsible Gaming Education Month, or RGEM, for PlayMage, Park Casino and Game Sense. She took the initiative to communicate with the Game Sense manager, Lynn, on the needs that led up to RGEM. She kept her team up to speed and provided gift cards for the RGEM baskets and co-branding swag items. The Game Sense program deeply appreciates Lisa's exceptional commitment and partnership with Game Sense throughout the year. The second recipient is Walter Fathergill of Facilities. Walter was accommodating during the makeover in the office. Walter and his team helped move some of the heavy furniture from the office. And with this help, the Game Sense office looks great and provides us with a better atmosphere for when we need to have private discussions with patrons. And last but not least, we have Arthur Rosata of Security. On multiple occasions, Arthur has reached out to Game Sense with customer concerns. Arthur is a firm believer in Game Sense and Responsible Gaming. On one of the occasions, the patron signed up for an exclusion after learning about Game Sense and the voluntary self-exclusion program through him. We are very grateful for Arthur's passion and support of the Game Sense program. This concludes my portion of the presentation. Thank you, everyone, for your attentiveness and for listening. However, before I hand it off to Chelsea, who will provide you with recent progress and updates on our Racial Justice and Health Equity Committee, I would like to make one final note. On behalf of the Game Sense team, thank you immensely for... Oh, excuse me, Madam Chair, allow me to address you directly. The final note is for you. On behalf of the Game Sense team, thank you immensely for your continued kindness, which comes in many ways, I'm sure. But for today's purposes, I'd like to acknowledge and thank you specifically for taking your time and effort in writing handwritten notes to our Game Sense champions. So this is the one that I received earlier this year, and it was so heartwarming, and I'll treasure it forever. In today's digital world, I believe it is the small gestures that really go the extra mile. And your handwritten notes, Madam Chair, and the kind words within them are surely one of them. So thank you, Madam Chair. And without further ado, it's my pleasure to pass the baton onto the Massachusetts Council of Gaming and Health's Chief Operations Officer, Ms. Chelsea Turner. Thanks so much, Anna. So I wanna take just a little bit of time to talk about our Racial Justice and Health Equity Committee at the Mass Council on Gaming and Health. This is an internal committee that's comprised of staff at all levels, including our Game Sense team. And it also even includes one of our board members who is a history professor. We talk about lots of different things as part of the committee. I've been on it since this inception 2019. It might be something that's happening in the news, but we also sort of really delve deep into different topics. And over the last year, we've really been focusing on Native American communities. One of the things we did recently was develop a land acknowledgement statement, which is a formal statement that recognizes and shows respect to the indigenous peoples as traditional residents and caretakers of land. So we use that when we're doing community outreach events and stuff like that sometimes. It was something that, you know, we feel pretty proud of that we did together. We're also currently reading the book, Flowers of the Killer Moon, hopefully I said that right. That movie's coming out too, which is a great story based on a true story about a Native American community in Oklahoma. And furthermore, the Mass Council continues to prioritize diversity, both in our internal policies and also in our hiring practices. So to give you a sense of what this means for us, collectively we speak 19 languages. This includes Spanish, Vietnamese, Cantonese, Mandarin, Taishanese, Tagalog, which is Filipino, Portuguese, French, Italian, Romanian, Kazakh, Russian, Haitian, Creole, and five African languages, including Swahili. We are, the council has approximately 57% women and 43% men. And in terms of the game sense team, it's exactly 50-50 in terms of mental woman ratio. We have 10 minorities as part of the game sense team and then about a third of our entire council are minorities. So we have 20 non-minority folks, five African-Americans, four Asians and one Hispanic. Our team also includes one veteran who's former international guard member and two who self-identify as part of the LGBTQ plus community. Next slide. I wanna take just a second to talk a little bit about communications. Phil Sherwood, who's running this show for us today wrote and produced four radio ads that are really aimed at educating folks about voluntary self-exclusions. We really tried to target this towards sports better since those are newer to the gaming industry in Massachusetts. And we know that when we are really pushing on our advertising efforts around VSEs that it's reflected in our numbers, some people still don't know about VSEs. So these efforts do, I believe, correlate to increased voluntary self-exclusions. And just a second, we're gonna show you one of the ads that he created. Pay attention to the folks that are in the video. You will recognize many of them as many of them are part of our game sense team. It's just one example of how Phil and his team use our internal resources and use our internal resources well and help to stretch our marketing dollars. Phil? If gambling's no longer fun, remember there's a way out, voluntary self-exclusion or VSE lets you choose to pause your gambling. It's a commitment you make for you. We're here to help. Call 1-800-GAM-1234 or chat with us at gamesensema.com. So he produced this in various ways so that they can be used digitally and also live streamed and they've been a great success so far. Thanks, Phil. Next slide. Few things that are coming around the corner. One of the things we've been working on is getting test accounts set up through the sports betting operators so far. BetMGM, Fandle, DraftKings and Better have agreed to set up accounts for us when Bet has already done so. This is a fantastic tool for us. This is really just for internal training purposes. One, it helps us educate ourselves on sports betting and all the different types of bets and everything else and reinforces what some of the things we've already learned. It also is helpful to us because while most of the play management tools are similar across all of the sports betting operators, there are some small differences such as cooling off periods, for example, aren't necessarily the same from one operator to the next. We get lots of questions about sports betting. We try to answer certain questions that are appropriate for us to answer and other ones that aren't. We will refer directly, of course, back to the operators. Another thing we're working on is just our internal governance documents and making sure that those are all in good order. As part of that, we're looking at our disaster recovery plan. So I've reached out to each of the properties just to make sure that game sense is included in the properties disaster recovery plans and I thank them for their assistance on that. And then we are working with the mass lottery this year and really excited about that. We are going to be offering them a series of responsible gambling trainings over the course of fiscal year 24. We're gonna offer three different types of trainings. One will be for a patron or players facing staff, frontline facing staff. So those are folks that like working in the claims department or sales department out in the field. The second one will be for the advertising and public relations folks, both internally and any outside agencies that they might work with. And the last will be a more general RG training for everybody else. So we're really excited about this. There are over 400 employees at the mass lottery as commissioner knows. And so we'll probably offer some of these a few times in order to try to reach as many folks as possible. And then lastly, it's almost time for us to gear up for the NCPG McGill gift-responsibly campaign. This is a campaign that is now evergreen so you can run it throughout the entire year but we really run it around the holidays and this is centered on educating adults. Lottery tickets aren't appropriate gifts for kids. One of the things that we know from research is that if a young man or a female that's say 17 or 18 years old or 16 or 17 year olds old buys a lottery ticket and they win let's say $500 that could be a lot of money to that individual. And because their prefrontal cortex isn't completely developed yet, it can be a trigger or a risk factor later in life. So we have some fun with this campaign. It's run all over the country, almost every council that I know of participates in it and every single US lottery does. So we're looking forward to helping on with that. And lastly, at this time, we are happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you very much for your time. Pleasure. Everybody's just happy. You can just see it, I can see it, it's great. 19 languages. So I just had a question. I love getting these every year. It's like, you know, it's like the feel good every time you guys come in quarterly, it's like the feel good part of the job. So thank you for the work that you guys put into it as well in addition to what you do every day. The one question I had about the presentation you gave today in terms of the lottery trainings, is this the first time you've been able to do this or is this something you guys have been doing historically? It's actually, I believe that we've done them in the past. As you may know, there's lottery tickets that are sold inside the casinos as well as the keynotes offered. But it's been the first time since I've been here, I've been here for about three and a half years. So I would say it's a little bit different. And I also think we're customizing them more than maybe have been done in the past. I don't know if Marlene's on and Marlene wants to add to that, but. I think you got it right. I think that's how I first got to meet the chairwoman was through some of the training we used to do with the lottery. And yeah, we would do kind of during onboarding sessions or at least once a year. But to your point, Chelsea, I do think that this is a more customized specific approach, which hopefully will yield good results. All right, yeah. So I may have heard it early on when I first got here but it's the first time it sort of has registered with me. So I think it's great. Yeah, and also commissioner, they've been kind enough to do trainings for us in the past. We, you know, we're not, a lot of times when we're doing hiring, we only hire hiring one or two people at a time. But what's nice is like if once a year they could come in and talk a little bit about, you know, what they do and their products, I think it's helpful for our team. So they've done that in the past and we've been very grateful for that. Great. Chelsea, did you work at the Connecticut Lottery? I did for nine years. So I could probably for our team and I do teach them about lottery, but I also think, you know, every industry changes and I'm not necessarily up to date on the latest thing. So. Right, and I, because you didn't mention that, I thought, am I wrong? Because I knew that point. So yeah, so Chelsea comes from that lens and I'm not sure if former executive director Sturmburg is still on your board, Merlene or not. He is. So he's been a great advocate for response picking. Yeah, we are actually quite lucky to have both former executive director Sturmburg and Bresna and Beth Bresna-Hins on our board as well. So. Oh, Beth is too. We're quite lucky in that way. Yes. Oh, that's excellent. So deep knowledge and that's great. Madam chair, I don't quite know where to start. I'm just bursting with praise after that presentation. But I'm with you, 19 languages. Wow, that to me is unheard of. Really, I haven't heard of that in any organization anywhere before. So kudos to you on that and your other diversity initiatives. Just an excellent presentation. I think it's probably one of my favorites so far. Anna and Yolanda, welcome. And Chelsea, Merlene, congrats to you on adding to your staff. Jodi, it's nice to meet you. I think this is the first time for the two of us to be engaged. I had a couple of questions. The urge surfing. Chelsea, could you capture that again just in your description again? Sure. So this is actually done in other parts of the world. And I think when I first learned about it, it's from New Zealand. And so researchers learned that basically when people have cravings, whether it's for behavioral addiction or substance abuse addiction, oftentimes those cravings only last for three to five minutes. So the idea behind an urge surfing is that you listen to this meditation. I want to go back into the casino, but I don't think I should. I've spent too much money this week and you can call and you can listen to an urge surfing meditation. Or I've been spending a lot of money on sports, listen to the urge and the urge surfing meditation and that's supposed to calm you down and recenter yourself. Excellent. And is that new to the game sense? It's relatively new. Yeah, we've been playing around with it for a while. We worked with a consultant. Her name is Dr. Lori Rugal, who has a plethora of experience in RG and PG. She headed the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services in Connecticut. She was head of a responsible gambling problem, gambling center for excellence at the University of Maryland. And she helped us to create the urge surfing meditation and then it was recorded in Odessa's voice. Odessa's our chief of programs and services. I also just wanna add to that because we should give credit where credit is due, which is Daniel Miller was the one that made the suggestion to us. We may have mentioned this previously, talking about players who were calling and they kind of didn't know where to direct them and obviously you can always direct them to the games and center, but with the centers only and MGM only being open 60 hours a day. He suggested that we maybe use the line also to deal with people with urges and then that's where Odessa took it from there and figured out how to use some of these, her recording on the line and the videos that are on the website in order to do some of this urge surfing. So we're doing an evaluation of it. People after they've completed have the option to go right into an evaluation platform or portal or whatever and so we'll have some more data in the future on that, on the efficacy of that. And just one last thing is we know that everybody's different and different people deal with how they're struggling with their gambling differently, right? So for some people it might be GA, for some people it might be telecom recovery support, for some people it might be smart recovery. So this is just another option for somebody who might be struggling. It might not be for everybody, but if it's helpful to even just a small percentage of folks who are struggling then we think it's worthwhile. Yeah and it looks like it's getting some utilization so that's great. My other question is about the gains over your gains and we're just talking about, just going back to that slide, you don't have to put it up if it's not convenient but this is just for quarter one FY24, is that right? That's correct. And so that is huge gains. They are, but you have to remember that it's easy percentages jump quickly if you're going from, so if I can just briefly share with you my screen so for some reason I'm having difficulty. We have it in our pocket. Anyhow, what I can do is I can share with you sort of our, I know that you should be getting this soon our written report that will correspond with this oral report and the numbers for the quarter and there are all the detailed numbers but I guess what I was trying to say is that if you're going from 50 to 75, that's a 50% increase year over year versus if you're going from 3,000 to 3,500 or fourth, it's just harder the more volume you have. So when you're just talking about VSCs and you're talking about, I guess I would say on average, we have 50 to 75 VSCs a month. It's easier to make those numbers go up but yeah, they are significant. And I think because of sports betting, getting added into the fold, you're going to see more VSCs. So. Yeah. I love this slide. So I just wanted to comment on it. I'll stop and let my fellow commissioners have a chance but once again, excellent presentation. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Hill, Mr. Maynard. Very good, Mr. Maynard. I'm happy to. I echo everything my fellow commissioners said. I looked forward to hearing this when I saw the packet. I remember the last time that we spoke, I was more newly minted then. I actually recognized some of the names on the award winners this time, which was nice. And just have to comment that, Jodi, I felt your passion come through and what you do and with your lived experience from 2008. And I think it's important to have that voice leading this effort and this charge. So kudos to you for what you're doing and turning something that could have been a negative into something that's extremely positive for the entire Commonwealth. Thanks, Commissioner Maynard. Commissioner Hill, Commissioner Bryan, are you all set? Thumbs up. Great work. Long, I know that you're working closely with this team, Mark. Anything that you two need to close with? Yeah, great job as usual team. It's wonderful. Commissioner Maynard, you're absolutely right. Jodi is a bedrock of this work and I really appreciate the work that you do, Jodi. I want to just reiterate the recovery panel that you've mobilized, that you've organized. I think it sounds like a great resource for the commission, but me specifically, as we think about how we're designing, promoting responsible gaming tools to seek out the advice of this recovery board, if there's something that we're missing, if there's a way that we could be doing it better, if there's something that just completely misses the mark, I would love to hear that information from that recovery board. So count on me to use them. Well, I guess that the award, he's got it right when they decided to award Anna the award of being a champion for responsible gaming because now she's with you. So well done. Now it really was a path forward. So that's wonderful and Yolanda, thank you for coming in early. I thought maybe you were going to add to that conversation and I just wanted to make sure not to miss you. And Jodi, your story is so compelling and moving and one issue that I know having attended G2E last week or so, one issue that needs to probably be addressed and I'm sure Mark and Bonnie and Long, you'll be thinking about this as well as you, Marlene, is the inequities in terms of women who are challenged with problem gambling versus men. I happen to do work in the inequities in health delivery in terms of gender. And it occurred to me that we probably will see that there's quite some disparities and that topic came up over G2E. So I look at you, Jodi, you are a star in your own world as a advocate and survivor and as a female. So just something for us to think about and look with respect to that gender issue. More on that, Mark, I took advantage of Jodi's presence but I think it's a great topic for us to explore. Okay, so thank you everyone. We're always really touched by the good work that we do. All right, so our work is done here. At least our public session, I think it's done. We've had a really productive day to the folks and the council, thank you so much. Chelsea, we'll see you later. Chelsea and I bonded over G2E with our ski racing. Chelsea and I both race ski racers. So we were having a good conversation on that. Nice to see you. All right, thank you. Commissioners, we've got a couple of outstanding items. As I mentioned at the beginning, 9 a.m. this morning, we're not going to go over item number 11. So we have a couple of topics that we anticipate going into executive session for. Should we so move? I understand Mills has sent links to us but let's take them in order. There's a consideration for a lease update. I know in terms of executive director Grossman and our very own Marion Julie who is our office operations manager as well as Chief Lenin. Thought this would be a good time for us to explore our lease. I have to read this into the record. The commission anticipates that it will meet an executive session in accordance with GL, chapter 30A, section 21A6 to consider the lease of real property specifically the commission's office base at 101 Federal Street in Boston and associated considerations as discussion opening may have a detrimental effect on the negotiating position of the commission. We also would consider going straight to separate them out. Yeah, we do them separately. So let's consider that one on the respect to the lease. Do we want to move today for that executive session? Sure. Okay. Okay, you're right. I can move if you're looking for a motion Madam Chair. Okay, thank you. Yeah, I move that we go into the commission vote to go into executive session on the lease matter that was just referenced for the reasons stated by the chair on the record. So I can. Okay, any questions? Commissioner O'Brien? Aye. Mr. Hill? Aye. Commissioner Skinner? Aye. And Commissioner Maynard? Aye. I vote yes, 5-0. We also have some executive session meeting minutes that we would, in order to review and adopt would require an executive session. Commission anticipates that it will meet an executive session to review those minutes from two previous executive sessions as their discussion and an open meeting may frustrate the intended purpose for which the executive sessions were convened. And that's pursuant to general laws, Chapter 30A, Section 21A3, do I have a motion? Madam Chair, I move that we move to executive session to review the minutes that you just referenced for the reasons stated by the chair on the record. I'm used to, Commissioner O'Brien doing those, by the way. It's all good. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Hill seconded. Thank you. Commissioner Skinner. Oh, Commissioner Skinner. Sorry. Commissioner Skinner. Thank you. Thanks, Commissioner Skinner. All right. Commissioner O'Brien? Aye. Commissioner Hill? Aye. Commissioner Skinner? Aye. Commissioner Maynard? Aye. And I vote yes, 5-0. So I just want to thank everybody for very productive meeting. Got a lot accomplished. Some difficult, complex matters that I know are continuing. So thank you to each and every team member. Guys, just do such a great job. And now I see Mills who's covering for Dave Sousa, who's got a little vacation time. Doing a great job, Mills. Thank you. Doing my best. What do we do? We go to our... There should be a link on everyone's calendar to the executive session. So we can leave this meeting and go to those. I should note that we do not anticipate coming back from either executive session or a public meeting. So to any members of the public who have been watching when streaming or otherwise, thank you for your attention. We appreciate it. And we'll be concluding this directly from our executive sessions. Thanks. All right. Thank you. Thank you.