 There we go. Thank you, Jennifer. We do have a quorum. So we will call this meeting to order at 615pm African Heritage Reparation Assembly meeting on Wednesday, October 27, 2021. Let's move into chapter 20 of the acts of 2021. This meeting will be conducted by remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so by a zoom or by telephone, see instructions below. No in person attendance of members of the public will be permitted but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time by a technological means. And I will now confirm that all of our members are present. Just going in order folks I see on the screen. Ivan. Hi, present wonderful. Michelle. Michelle. Yes, excellent. Dr. Shabazz. Shabazz present. Great. Hala. Lord present. Alexis. Present. Excellent. I did not receive a notification of any announcements. Michelle, did you have any. I do not. We have a lovely agenda, which will need to be modified just a little bit because we've, there's some changes and in personnel tonight. So I think Michelle will handle those as she's going through those items. So the final, the final event before we move on to public comment is approval of the minutes. So we have three sets of minutes, October 8 October 13 and October 20 that went out in this packet. And so I hopefully folks had a chance to at least glance at them. I think we're sort of reflective of the work that we're doing here. And I am willing to. Yes, Jennifer. The packet only has 10, eight minutes in it. Oh, I'm so sorry. Okay. Packet only has the 10, eight minutes and then we will do the 10, eight minutes. Yeah, I'm seeing that as I go through. So, a motion to approve the 10, eight, 21 minutes. Second. Yeah, I think we're good. Who's second. I'm sorry, Michelle. Michelle. Yeah. So I think we can put that to vote. Alexis. I'm sorry. Whether or not we're going to approve the minutes. Oh, oh, yes. I. Okay. Holla. Holla I. Dr. Shabazz. Shabazz votes yes for approval of these minutes. Thank you. Michelle. Yes. Excellent. And Yvonne, I know you can vote this week, but you weren't here for these minutes. So, right. Okay. So Jemison. Yes, I understand. Great. So that's. One, two, three, four, five. I am one abstain. Yes. Great. Thank you. Thank you. Ready to move on. So let's move on to public comment during the public comment period. One of the co-chairs will recognize members of the public when called on. Please identify yourself by stating your full name, preferred pronouns and residential address. Residents are welcome to express their views for up to three minutes at the discretion of the co-chairs based upon the number of people who wish to speak. If you would like to make public comment, please make public comment. Please make public comment here. The AHRA will not engage in a dialogue or comment on a matter raised during public comment. We will certainly be listening. So if you would like to make public comment and please note, we do have a second public comment period as well. Toward the end of the meeting, but if you'd like to make public comment now, please raise your hand. Okay. It does not look like we have any public comment at this time. We do not have any presentations this evening either. So as Dr. Jemisin said, we're going to move our action and discussion items around a bit to allow for Dr. Shabazz to speak about the website update, which is I before he has to leave. So Dr. Shabazz, you can go ahead and take it away. Dr. Shabazz. Thank you. I had to unmute. Appreciate this opportunity. On behalf of the assembly, I had the opportunity to meet. With staff in the town hall, along with Jennifer Moyston, who is still here as well. The, we met with the communications. We met with the director or staff member in charge of that. I don't want to mess up the title. But the, the gist of it is and what I would like to recommend is there with the passage of the minutes we've just done, as well as our beginning to stream. Other items we think were, to be important as to make the website a more dynamic resource for. For educating the community for allowing the community to keep track of our work. The current page that the town has will be able to facilitate a great deal more than what's presented there. The column on the left most side will now be able to be populated with other links than just what's there now of the generic kind of a town of Amherst links. And, and instead it will be populated with links to different resources and things that we choose to, to post there. I encourage you to email any thoughts, suggestions. Jennifer moisten and to myself, you've seen myself with the link to or whatever the resource is, you're recommending it. You may hear it from the public. You may, you know, be receive recommendations to you as a member of this assembly. Well, funnily, if you look at it and you think it's valuable to be included on our website, then as I said, email Jennifer CC me and we will, we will be working together to build out more the, the town of Amherst AHRA website to, to incorporate resources, we think important regarding the more extensive or not extensive, but the intensive work to create the black census right now, we're looking at resources through online kind of a form based documents like a Google form or or something to that effect. That can be very easily and readily accessed by the public who can get online and with the information requested, similar to the US census about how they identify the or asking them if they do identify as black or African American or African heritage to let us know where they live, how they can be reached to be kept abreast of the work of the AHRA and the work to develop proposals for municipal reparations plan that we will, you know, come up with those, those forms come up with that form and then be able to promote it through the AHRA website and and really begin to build the communication channel to begin to engage the community, African heritage community for their ideas for their input for this suggestion as well as to keep them informed and because I do have to go I'll mention one other thing by way of keeping folks informed. The Community Preservation Act of. Funded a marker program, a writer's kind of. Marker program of various writers who have lived in Amherst, one of them if you go to the end at Boatwood right across from the commons, you'll see a metallic marker with information about in a picture of. Shirley Graham Du Bois who during the time that she was a member of the faculty of the WEB Du Bois Department of Afro American Studies at UMass Amherst. The. This is where she lived she lived at the end at Boatwood and so there was a marker there that marker was funded by the Community Preservation Act so we're we're reaching out to Anna Devlin and go to and others with respect to that process how to fashion a an application for a similar heritage walk heritage trail that will center African heritage sites that that we will be putting together or having the black assembly of Amherst will be you know coming forth with a proposal for that or just individuals in the community can come forth with that proposal but we hope to to find ways to find the right folks from within the community to direct and to produce the this marker program so I'll just leave it at that for now but but again that's the information on the website and as I jump off Jennifer did you have anything to add to the website discussion and I'm forgetting no I think that you said it all it you can tailor the page to meet the needs of the HRA and I think that's really what the point is or the need there is for it so that's great and Jennifer can I actually tag one communications thing on here there's been talk about an email address and then you had said this was something we need to bring to the group I was wondering if you had further comments on that as I was actually going to talk about that more I think well this is the website update we're just out of order so the you know I think that that might happen it might be a little bit because I think it's bringing up a concern of other committees and so I think the Paul would like to the town manager would like to just think about that a little bit more before sending it so typically what's supposed to happen is everything is supposed to be filtered through the staff liaison that kind of helps us in case there's public records requests and so forth keep all of the information housed in one place and I don't think we're the town manager was the town manager was not against it I just think he's trying to think about the bigger picture of whether or not other committees would would need the website as well and you know I kind of think that a good way maybe to think about it too is that there are specific committees that you know might require more community engagement than others but either way that can still be done through the staff liaison and I oh Yvonne you have your hand raised okay yeah I have a my question is what the time frame is for the website if there's any other like procedures that we have to do to get it get the ball rolling with it you know Dr. Shaba said to send our ideas to you but is there like something we can work from that you know to add to those ideas or are we starting from scratch that's one question and the other is what the what is the time frame for having this you know move forward so I'm going to pull up our page now and try and share it so that you can see what's on the page now and also Dr. Shabazz if you need to leave thank you I'm about to hit it I'm about to get into the elevator and I just would say yes we're we're not completely at scratch because we're building out from the existing page yes can you see the existing page yes yes okay so the left hand side so this is all very you know local government looking because it lists all the other different boards and committees that are that the town has so here we could put it if once we put just one link here on this side it will remove the rest of these so we could have resources and different links on the left hand side similar to the way that CPAC has theirs which I can show you in just the moment you know this information here is pretty standard this information here is pretty standard but it's really this page this side of the page here that we could change it to change a bit and so I'm just going to stop share for a minute because I don't it will be so you're you're saying that would be our navigation so if we wanted to have like goals for the committee we could have that as a link or we could have like meeting minutes those are public record right we can't do that the the meeting minutes are already there they're on the right hand side okay alright but basically you're saying that you know if we decide we want to do a census right we want to try that Google Doc we could have the link come right from that page that's right that's right okay all right I get it okay and well actually Dr. Shabazz I need to recall if we were going to use the engage Amherst for the black census or not what was your thoughts on that we're still looking still looking at that that's to be determined we we but yes that was another part of the meeting is that we did see the opportunities with the engage Amherst for for different kinds of surveying and and communicating with the public about activities of town government so even if not whether for the census or not there could be other projects there are likely other projects that would be relevant for for us to be thinking about so that's another sort of things to do as you think about our communication strategy and is to also go and look at an engage Amherst page and so the thought is we can have a photo of the group of we ever or in person together or you know you could send me in a photo and we can have your name next to your photo just kind of let people know who it who is on the AHA and if you look here this is a community preservation act committee but you see their left hand side has a list of their proposal I mean of their proposals that they have and so once you click on it obviously it goes to that proposal and then the rest of them remain there so it would just be a nice way to add some so again we could do the page have on there somewhere like you know meet the AHA and have folks photo here just so that the community members know who everyone is you know a lot of times things about are about being able to relate to folks and know and so maybe someone sees and well oh I know this person and and so forth and so forth so that might not be a bad idea but it goes to a name so what's the what's the time frame for us getting you our ideas for what we want as far as links on that page so just as they come in right the sooner they start coming in the sooner we can start you know adding to the existing page and Dr. Jemison did that answer the question about the emails I just wanted to make sure I was a little bit confused about the difference between the website and then what Paul maybe was still exploring around the emails and I could actually probably use the clarification myself I just I'm like it sounds like the website is go and the email is still a question mark yes the email still question mark because we're waiting for you know it just brings up whether or not this should be applicable to other committees or not cool and that sounds like that's something internal to the workings of the town and okay got it awesome so we will take a cue from you when that has been resolved one way or the other I might add one other quick point the in the process of naming or recommending to the town council all of us to serve some it's part of public record already the biographical statements that were put together by council by town manager Bokeman's office and so we thought as well as we build out we could just link to our name link to however we're identifying to include those to include those bios with your permission that sounds good yeah okay well thank you so much Dr. Shabazz for taking that on and meeting with the the folks in the town to really move that forward so I look forward to that very much all right are there any other questions on the website before we move on we would have ideally oh yes I'm just wondering also if there'll be any sort of historical background information on what on the idea of reparations I'm not sure if that exists already on the page and I guess my question is more about content and you know I think one of the things that we certainly would want to include is the historical timeline that reparations for Amherst put together the disparity reports some of these reports that we already have that are Amherst specific but I do wonder how we might vet the other information that people may want to include particularly as we haven't really explored what reparations means with respect to this body so I have some concern around what we might present there and electress you have your hand up um yeah I was just I know that this is like a complicated thing but I guess I wanted to offer as well that you know the Shabazz made some excellent content through Amherst media that there's a few programs actually about reparations um I don't know if that's like I don't know how that if there's like any sort of conflicts or whatever if there's like some sort of I don't know I don't know but those are available and I can in terms of content that's also there might I ask Alexis if you would assemble those links and again send them through Jennifer we can we can all collectively I think the vetting process Michelle to go to that question is we've had it we've had it and whether by acclimation if not if not by acclimation maybe through some consent agenda or some process beyond having to have a actual roll call vote on every item if there is some other simpler quicker way to put it as part of the consent agenda that can go out in the mail and we can you know give our give our agreement to it then for me that might be an easier we can think about the easiest ways possible to to weigh in on those if it's something too complicated and requires a whole lot of discussion and okay you have a meeting and you can go through the vote and all of that but but otherwise I think we can do this pretty simply pretty readily sending those suggestions to Jennifer copying me and then at some point you know we'll do our own internal look at it and then we can bring it again in whatever channels of a consent agenda or what have you to just get a rapid a okay or or hold back let's let's discuss this more however that would work but but yes I would think as well consistent with actions by the Council on this such as the endorsement of HR 40 we could certainly go to that extent to include federal and state legislative news in relation to to the to the work for that but again let's let's figure out a way to run this by each other and give our consent so that we can do this quickly and build out the the website as a real resource thank you thank you great well I'm I'm so excited about that and so alright any other questions on the website before we move on we we were initially going to begin with meeting etiquette and we have a couple items under meeting etiquette to discuss so if we're good to go we'll move on to that Dr. Jemisin do you want to start us off on that I know we're going to bring up the ropes document at least in the beginning of each meeting and I let's see do you have that handy Jennifer that you could bring that up um I can have it I can bring it up I can also get out of here I can bring it up if you want to but I don't know if there's any way I can I can just bring it up for you I can bring it up for you I'm also looking for while you're looking for that so we will be adopted the ropes last week and so I hence wanting to present them each week and I think it's a nice reminder of the sort of principles we'll use to perfect a month now and, you know, one starts to notice kind of the patterns of who often steps up to speak and who might hold back a little bit. And so what I wanted to sort of test the waters on a little bit were if folks are willing to say what makes them the most comfortable is thinking about some ways to leave space for folks who are not getting hurt as much as everyone else. And so there's a couple of ways to do it. It can be, you know, Michelle and I can be conscious to make sure that every time there's a round of discussion, we sort of either generically leave space for, you know, any other comments and like make sure that it's clear that there's room for folks who haven't spoken a lot to say something or alternatively, same thing every time there's a round of discussion, we can, you know, make sure to check in, sort of call in the folks who haven't said anything yet and see if they do have something to add and they just didn't have a chance to put it out there yet. And so I'm wondering if people would be willing to speak on which of those options is more comfortable, sort of generically leaving space or if you actually like to be like called on and have people just check in with you and make sure it's all okay. Okay, so Alexis. I can, for myself, I can say I don't love being called on only because there's a lot of times where I feel like I need to sit with information and kind of digest it. And sometimes that takes a little bit of time and sometimes it takes me until next meeting for me to be like, oh wait, I, you know, I feel this way or I feel that way. So I definitely, at least for myself, I tried to practice leaving space and like, and doing that with like my silence and my listening, but I'm also like, I know that we are in a time crunch and we have to get things done. So if it's most helpful for us, for me to be called on and then for me to say like, I need more time to think about it, like that's okay too. So I'm flexible, but I also need time to think about stuff. I totally appreciate that. And how long I see your hand is up. For me, both can work in different circumstances. Sometimes I'm feeling self conscious, like what I have to say isn't important. So I appreciate when I'm invited into the conversation and other times it's similar to Alexis, I just need a little more time to process it and sit with it because I want to research it. I'm realizing I like the raised hand function. And so I'm wondering if we're three conversations in and we prioritize maybe the voices that haven't spoken if their hand is raised. That would work for me. So I know I'd be able to speak. Yeah, that's just a suggestion. Thank you. That's a great suggestion. Before I start chiming in, because as a chair, I get to chime in a lot. I'm going to leave a little space. I just want to. Yeah, Jennifer. The hand raises too much when I'm sharing screen and typing minutes. So I just wanted to say that you did ask about us using leaving the chat open. And unfortunately, it's town policy that we don't use the chat. We've been zoom bombed via chat before. So we try to eliminate any way of being zoom bombed. That is totally fine. And I appreciate the answer on that. That makes it clear. The only other thing I wanted to sort of add to the conversation was to pick up on both Alexis and Hollow were saying about sometimes we don't know in the moment. And I think one of the most challenging things about this format and the structure for getting things done is it kind of puts you in a reactive stance all the time. The packet this week was 88 pages because there's a really big document in there and stuff like that. There's almost no way to digest all the information before we all come together. So I mean, it's probably an accident of the historical setting of this type of gathering and this type of process that favors people who are really comfortable and quick on extemporaneous speech. And that is not everyone. But I just want to show everyone that there's room for folks. Believe me, I would be sitting back and being way more of an introvert about this if I was not a co-chair. So that is more my nature to be listening and to reflect on it. And then three meetings later, I have a clear thought. So I do understand and I really welcome. I do think it's very powerful if folks can even say, you know, I just need to think about that a little bit more. So thank you for being willing to try that. And as always, I will also say that we're humans and fallible. So we'll definitely do our best to try to feel it out and get the right type of calling and invitation each time. But thank you for being patient as we go forward. Jennifer. No pressure on a late packet and an 85 page report inside. So that is actually for next week in preparation because the conversation had been moved over. So you guys have, you know, or whatever time it is that we're going to the next time that we meet, which was another thing that we can talk about later around when we discuss the next meeting date. But that packet is actually for the following week. That's right. Thank you for that. So see everyone. You get a little bit more time to digest. One step ahead. Yes, we're ahead of the game for a second. Anyway, that's all my comments. Michelle, did you have anything else you wanted to say about the ropes or meeting etiquette? Yes, a couple other things in here. The with respect to packet materials, it would be a good idea for us to agree as a body on a time that we want to have packet materials submitted to Jennifer by. So if we have a Thursday meeting, for example, do we want to say that all packet materials, with the exception of some sort of emergency material that may need to get to Jennifer? Do we want to say Monday, for example, or Tuesday? And I also want to ask Jennifer, given her workload, what would work best for her so that we can find a place that works for the whole group and make sure that we're not inundating Jennifer the day before meeting with 88 pages? And a million changes? No, that's never happened to me before. So, you know, it's interesting because I was thinking about this, like, what is the best way to do that? And because we meet weekly, it's a little bit different than it is for the other committees that I might work with. Or if you use the council, for instance, they meet well, pretty much bi-weekly. So there's a week in there where you have to put in information before the following packet comes out. So I'm going to say, and the problem with, you know, last week was a little bit off. And again, I guess if we're talking about meeting and meeting materials underneath it for meeting etiquette, then the timing is also available. So we're getting ready to come into holiday time. So I'm actually wondering if, in general, if you guys, rather if bi-weekly will work better or if meeting weekly is what you guys feel like you need to do, because all of that would change the way that the packet materials, I would say two days. And, Alyssa, I'm going to stop share so I can let Alyssa in because I'm just not quite that savvy quite yet. I think you're in, Alyssa. Oh, thank you so much. As Jennifer says, it varies so much from committee to committee, right? And some committees have legal plans they have to look at, right? And huge drawings and some committees have 88 page reports they have to digest, et cetera. So I think that's why it's just really important that you guys, as you develop your meeting calendar, right? And I know you're feeling all this time pressure. As you develop your meeting calendar, just be able to take a step back and say, okay, realistically, if we're meeting Wednesday night, if we want anybody to have read this stuff before they show up Wednesday night, when do we need to have gotten it to them? Because there's basically no circumstance under which you should be receiving materials the same day as the meeting if you're expected to have read any of them. And when I say expected, that means you don't substitute putting stuff up on the screen for not having read the packet. So when the council meets, which sometimes is every week and sometimes is every two weeks, unfortunately, although we do have the ability to put materials up ahead of time. And if any of you have followed our packets online, just like you have your packets online, occasionally we'll get something ahead of time. But unfortunately, like real life, you know, everybody does everything at the last minute. So sometimes we get stuff in advance, but mostly we get stuff starting on Thursday for Monday night's meeting. And that's because there's usually something last minute that comes in on Sunday, but if we can get the bulk of it, so the people have like a weekday weekend day. So it all depends on what your guys schedule is going to look like for you guys in terms of then you say, okay, well, if we want it by X period of time ahead, then you have to build in a reasonable schedule for Jennifer to be able to do that and for you guys to get it to Jennifer. So it's just a matter of backing it up from whatever you think will work. And it may well be that if you have some real big complex document, you treat that differently than a two page set of minutes. So just saying there's a lot, your mileage may vary, but it's not normal to not get to not get your packet until the day of the meeting. If you're actually going to talk about anything that's in the packet. And everybody in theory should have read the packet before the meeting. So if people don't have enough time to do that, then then you just have to figure out what works for you guys because maybe some people can never do it on Mondays or whatever. Thanks for listening. Thank you, Alyssa. So, you know, I would say that so I think first of all, starting next Thursday, I'm available on Thursday. So the first question is, do you guys want to move the meeting dates to Thursdays? Which again, may not have been on that email. We did have an email that went out that asked the body. I apologize. I don't know Dr. Jemison if Jennifer was wrong. Yeah, that's my fault. That's my fault. Yes. Okay, she's not on it, but yes. Okay. Okay. So we had indicated that we would be meeting for the next three Thursdays, I think. We can pull, I can try to pull that up. And then Dr. Jemison sort of stopped there because of the holidays, as you mentioned. So Arden and Yvonne, I don't know that I don't think that you were with us at that point either. So this is good. And so I'm wondering, are the next three Thursdays doable for everybody? That would be November 4th, November 11th, and November 18th. So if that works, thumbs up would be really good. I am not sure. Can you hear me? It's a bit of an echo. How's that better? That's better. Yeah. Okay. I am curating a jazz series and it might be on Thursday nights. But we haven't finalized it yet. But at least one of those Thursdays, I might not be able to make it. But I don't know which one yet. So I think it's fine for now. I can let you know as we get closer. It's going to be either the 11th or the 18th. Great. And Jennifer, do those three Thursdays work for you? Oh yeah, I've been doing CSWG for Thursdays. So if I don't have a meeting on Thursdays, I don't know what will happen. Alla. I just realized, I don't know that this would affect us, but Thursday is the legal holiday. The 11th is, yeah. Yeah. Are we allowed to meet? Well, isn't that the Thursday we're talking about? That's Veterans Day. No, it's, yes, it's Veterans Day. That was one of the dates proposed, no? Yes. It was. Yeah, yeah. We can't meet that day. No, we can't because I'm not working. I mean, I guess I would if I had to, but I rather not. So I guess, again, I don't know, at least until the next, there's about two months of holiday times that are coming in and out. And so I don't know if you guys want to attempt to meet every other week during that holiday time. Because if we meet on the 11th, we won't meet on the 11th, but we can meet on the 18th. And then we don't meet that following Thursday. And then we're back and now we're in December. Go ahead, Dr. Jonathan. And I was just going to say, I mean, meeting every other week would certainly would not be unwelcome. I will say that. But I do sort of wonder on forward progress. I need some time to think about whether or not how well that can work. So we will also, at least some of us will probably be going to the Town Council meeting on the 8th. So just thinking about the beginning of November, being busy with election on Tuesday. We have a meeting on Thursday. Town Council meeting on the 8th. Can't meet on the 11th. So then we'd give ourselves a good long time before the 18th, which is great. Folks could do some some asynchronous work and some reading and we could have a good discussion when we came back. But so those are thoughts with no actual action item at the end of the month. Don't we have a report that's due by the end of the month? Yeah, we're going to get we're going to that's one of our items for tonight, probably the next item. So yes, definitely need to talk about the report and the presentation that Dr. Jemison just mentioned, which is going to happen on Monday, November 8th at the Town Council meeting. I see. Okay. All right. The report is due by November 3rd. And so maybe we're going to segue now. But before we do, I wanted to so it sounds to me like we're going to meet on Thursday, the 4th. And then everybody's going to kind of figure out and think about future meeting dates based on what we just discussed. I'm sorry, did you say Thursday, the 4th? Do you mean Thursday, the 18th? No, Thursday, the 4th. Thursday, November 4th. And then November, probably November 18th. We're skipping the 11th, right? Exactly. Oh, yeah, I don't even know what month it is. I'm sorry. I thought we were talking about October 18th. I don't work. Okay. Yeah. So our next meeting we can confidently say is November 4th on Thursday at 6.15. And then we'll go from there. I just had one other quick item under this under the etiquette that I wanted to make sure we addressed, which is we may begin to receive requests from the press as we continue with our work. And so there's I believe that the town council at least has a general guideline that it is the co-chairs that respond to or the chair that responds to the press. So we just wanted to to sort of come to an agreement on that, that Dr. Jemison and I would be responding to any press and of course, bringing any relevant information back to the group for deliberation as needed. And I feel like we didn't close the original question, which was packet materials. And I know it depends a little bit on how far out the meeting is, but given that our next meeting is going to be approximately a week away as they all have been, packet materials to Jennifer by Monday. Does that give everyone enough time if you get them on Monday or they're up Monday that gives you Tuesday and Wednesday? Okay. That sounds good. And do we have to acknowledge about the protocol for talking to the press? Is that something that we need to vote on or is that just something that needs to appear in the minutes? I think as long as there's not an objection to it, we can just have it appear in the minutes and not take any action on it. Hala, you sure? I was thinking like if it's regarding, let's say Alexis is doing or one of us is doing the documentary, would there be a chance for a chair to bring in the member who might be working on that specific thing the reporter wants to know about? Or do we just give the information to you and the chair is the the pace? I'm a big fan of having people that are working on the work be quoted and get, you know, have their voice heard. So I would, I would be in favor of that. I don't know if anybody else has a different thought on it. I agree. Okay. Great. Goodbye, me, nor the Marrior. Yeah. All right. So, all right, we're finished with the meeting etiquette. I did have a question, Dr. Jemisin, for you. I know that we had the report to counsel up at the top of our agenda. And I'm wondering if, given what else we have to update on, and some of these are pretty quick updates, do we want to get some of them out of the way and then use the remainder of our meeting for the, to talk about the report? Or do you think we should go ahead with the report now and then deal with the other items? I think we can do the small things. I mean, yeah, let's, let's try seven o'clock. Do you think we can do the small things in 15 minutes? I mean, because like words need to be added to the report. Like people are going to have to sort of like read and like tell me what words need to go in here more, if people want more words. And so I just don't want to get at the, you know, the tough part of the meeting time for that. So I think that's the, that's my only concern. Right, as we're getting tired. And well, I can just, I know that there are a couple of things that we're not even going to be, that were on the agenda, but that somehow already got taken care of. Okay. Like for example, G, Committee Preservation Act update. Dr. Chavez already gave that. And to the extent that he had an update. So I think we can cross that one off. Unless there was any other discussion about that agenda item in the group. All right. And then the reckoning in Boston update. Alexis, are you available to offer that? Yes. So the time frame, I'm sorry, I just got back. So like, I don't have everything right in front of me, but the timeframe that they're hoping to like do this screening for, which an important clarification was that they were not going to be able to give me like a written permission in order to be able to broadcast it on cable. Instead, what they want to do is do a online screening. I'm still, like I still, it's been, it's been tough trying to get this back and forth with Marga and with Kathy, but we're still trying to work out the logistics. But basically, I don't know if they're going to be hosting the online screening or if Amherst Media is going to, but one of the bigger changes or clarifications is that it will not be broadcasting on cable. We will be able to advertise it through our carousel on Amherst Media, but it's pretty much just going to be an online screening and they're hoping to shoot for either the first week of November or the first two weeks of November or the first two weeks of December. So yeah, there's that, which of course, if it was in December, that would give us a lot more time to be able to advertise it. But still, but if you guys have a preference, then when I meet with them and finalize these logistics, then I can report that back to them. Alexis, just for clarification, did you say meet for the first two weeks in November? That they were going to air it the first two weeks of November? No. So, so they haven't decided a day yet, but they either would like a day within the first two weeks of November or a day within the first two weeks of December. Okay. And was there any sense, Alexis, of who was going to be facilitating the talkback session? Not crystal clear yet, but they said that if we do it in November, then they will be able to have a speaker. So again, I have to sort of like finalize things, but I guess knowing what your guys' wishes are for that and making it work with like how they, I guess, normally run these screenings or whatever, then I can let them know, you know, what your guys' preference, what our preferences are and who should be speaking and when and where and all that sort of stuff. Is there no speaker if it's December? I can, I'm sorry, I don't have these things right in front of me. I can just check my email really quick and get that specific thing for you. Okay. So, I'm sorry for the wait. No worries. The internet is never quite there when we need it for you. Yeah. Okay. So, yeah, though she says ideally either in the second week, sorry, a clarification, ideally either in the second week of November or the second week of December. And that Marga had said that, yeah, they can arrange a single synchronous online screening and the second week of December would be best for them if there is a speaker from the film, otherwise either works. So, it's the second week of December that they would have a speaker from the film. I would personally think I'd like December just because I don't have plans yet, so that means that I can make this a part of the plan as opposed to the second week of November is already kind of crowded, right? And if they can have a speaker and we have more time to advertise. So, if there's, you know, if that works for your role in this, Alexis, I would certainly personally am promoting the second week of December. Yeah, I also support that. I think that looks really good. I just want to clarify the second week is the sixth, the week of the sixth, the end of November kind of fall goes into the first of December in that first week. So, I think that would be, if Alexis, if you could get a sense from them on that week, if it is that week, what day they were thinking or what evening they were thinking of doing this, that would be great. Do we have a preference that I can share with them for that week? And I have a day preference personally, so. And my experience with events in town, although there are events all different nights, but I know Tuesday nights have been popular for some of the reparations, symposiums and things that we've done. And if we don't want to have it during a potential meeting night, then we may consider Tuesday. But if anybody has their calendar out right now and has other thoughts on that. I can say I'm shooting a wedding on the 11th, so I am completely not available on the 11th. Saturday the 11th. Correct. Okay. I don't have anything. We can't be shifted or moved. So, if Tuesdays have been good, then let's see if they'll do Tuesday. Hala. This is just for the viewing, right? Yep. I may be able to get out of one school committee meeting. Oh, right. School committees meetings are on Tuesday nights. That's a good point. Well, maybe, you know, Counselor Brewer sent us this amazing list of important dates. So maybe what we want to do, Alexis, is we'll go through that and just figure out what's happening that week and then get back to you with a more firm date. Great. Well, thank you. I'm looking forward to that. And thanks for following up on that. So I think before we move to the report, Dr. Jemison, I can just say with respect to the legal counsel update that we don't really have anything right now to offer other than what we talked about at the end of our last meeting. So this is going to be one of those items that just kind of shows up every week and we'll use it as needed. Oh, go ahead. Oh, I know. Go ahead, Yvonne, and then I'll... No, I wanted to ask about something else that came up in the last meeting. So if you're... You can respond directly to her, I guess. I was going to ask about two additional items on the agenda. So go ahead with what you're doing. Oh, well, that's... One of them was that I know last time we spent a long time talking about Michelle and Dr. Jemison, you were going to attend a meeting. I think it was for our funding. I don't have all of the language, right? But I do remember the two of you. It was like a short notice and you guys were like, we're going to go and we're going to ask them for money. And I was like, oh, what happened to that? And then I'm not sure if that was the cannabis committee or if that was the other committee. I know that the cannabis money was also something we were talking about. So I don't know if you have an update on that and get me straight names, I guess. ARPA, the ARPA funds. Okay, ARPA, okay. And we did do that and we do have that as an item to discuss. So we could do that right now since that question has come up. And it's really not very well, actually, given what Irv added, it is a bigger discussion. So I don't know how you want to handle that, Dr. Jemison, if you want to go into the report now and then come back to that, because otherwise we've pretty much covered everything else in our action and agenda items, our action and discussion items. Okay, except for the Mass Cultural Council. Yes. That's the one thing. I was going to ask you about those. So if that's quick, let's do that and then report and then ARPA and we can go back to money. Okay, so I have a quick update on the Mass Cultural Council grant, but also needed a little bit of time potentially with you all. And let me explain why. So the Mass Cultural Council grant application is due November 1st, and I began the application per instructions of a previous meeting. And when I got into the application, I realized there were some questions that I didn't feel I should answer on my own without bringing them to the group. And so one option is for me to bring up the application and share with you in a shared screen what those questions are. But we may want to come back to that since we really do need to focus on the report to the council. I will say though, I called Cindy Harbison today. Cindy is the staff liaison for the Amherst Mass Cultural Council and is also a librarian in the Jones and actually yeah in the Jones, she's a special collections librarian. She worked very closely with us on the historical timeline that reparations for Amherst put together. She was a huge asset. And when I spoke with her today, she gave me some good ideas about this particular grant and what we might think about. But she also said that on a volunteer basis, she would be happy to begin research looking at all sorts of possibilities, grant possibilities for our committee and would loves writing grants and would work to complete grants for us. And so I thought that was just a wonderful, a wonderful offer and I'd love at some point to bring Cindy in and maybe talk with her. She was ready to go and start researching all sorts of things. But as it pertains to the Mass Cultural Council, Dr. Jemisin, you let me know if you want me to pull that up on my screen now and share or if we should move into the report and then we can come back to this. And if for some reason we can't get to it, we have a couple options. We could post another meeting that not everybody would have to come to, I think, maybe a subcommittee meeting or something like that. But let me know what you think about that. I mean, if it's quick, if we need to word Smith, that might be tricky. So yeah, it was more, let me just sign in here and see what we got here. She gave me a really good sense of, so they have about $43,000. And she thinks she said very clearly that this would be absolutely a focus that they would be very happy to receive an application from us to work on a documentary to document this work here. And Hal, I'm not sure because you weren't at the last meeting just to share that we talked about using any grant funds that we would receive to follow through on the wonderful idea that you had of documenting our work here. And so Cindy thought that would be great. She did say that I planned fully to ask Alexis and others because I don't have this information. But off the top of my head, I thought we would probably need at least $7,500 to $10,000 to do something like this. I may be way off on that. But what she said is because they have to split this between so many different groups, more realistically, we're looking at maybe, she didn't say these numbers, but I got the sense it was more like a $1,500 would be a lot. But we have to decide that and put that in the application. And what she said is that she would work to find other opportunities through the sort of umbrella mass cultural council, not just the Amherst and other opportunities to so we could get started with this if it was awarded to us. And then she would help us find other opportunities. And so here we go. Here's the draft. I'm going to open it and share my screen. And you please let me know if you can see it because I'm not great at this share. Let's see. Did that work? Okay. No, I don't want to update my zoom right now. Okay. So we have project information and you can see I'd already inputted $10,000 because I was being ambitious. But we do need to put in an amount there that we want to ask for based on the feedback that we received. There was a project title. I didn't want to leave it just as yet to be determined. So, you know, there's that. And then the project overview, I think what I was mostly wanting to make sure of is that I summarized the project appropriately. And I wonder, as I'm thinking about this, if this is something that Alexis and I could talk through and sort of or and or Ivan with your background in this to get some of these. In other words, I may not be the best person to answer these questions. And I want to take the burden off of the group because I sort of brought this and I want to get it in on time. And I will I can put a budget together with whoever. But if anybody's willing to help me on this, that would be great. Yeah, okay, fun. Great. All right. So maybe even we'll connect between we'll connect in the next couple days if that works for you. And I can probably somehow find a way to get so that we both have access to this. So. And then if we can touch base with Alexis, if she has any idea, but maybe we can just agree here on how much we want to ask for. Is that one point we can deliberate on? I would. Again, I think they're absolutely right. I mean, think the most that you're going to get is maybe 2000 to $2,500. But I think, depending on what kind of a budget you put together, you could probably ask for five, and you'll only get half of what you asked for. Yeah, you said that. Oh, she did say that. I feel I feel good. No, because, uh, yeah, they have limited money and trying to spread it around. You know, so, um, yeah, I would ask for like 4000 or 5000 and expect the 20, 2000 to 2500. I guess my larger question about the whole idea of doing a documentary is what, you know, you're putting a budget together, you'd have to put a whole project budget together. And so that means actually planning out or preliminarily planning out the project, how that project's going to come together. I mean, if you're talking about doing a partnership with Amherst media, because Amherst media person is on the committee, I think that is very doable. But I would talk to Amherst media and make sure that they're a partner in it, because then that would mean being able to use the facilities and have folks who know how to handle cameras and have people who know how to do editing. And that would be a conversation. And I see, you know, Alexis is looking up like, uh, but you know, like it means, it means you have professionals who are working with you who know how to put this together is basically what you want to prove in the proposal and that and partnering with Amherst media would mean that you'd have that covered. Perfect. Perfect. Okay. And I've done documentaries as well. As far as content and filming and, you know, storyboarding and all that kind of stuff, questions of what the content would be, you know, what kind of content you want to have in a documentary. I think it's a little bit premature, but it's good to go for the money. But I have to say, if we get the money, I think we need to have a much more deep conversation about what the content would be and what the final project should look like or be, what the purpose is of a documentary, who's going to be watching it. And that will determine how we put that project together. So right now, I don't think we were there, but that's okay. Well, as long as we have Amherst media as a partner, they've got all of the expertise, you know, you can use me and Alexis from the committee as having experience with that. And I think that strengthens the proposal enough for you to get $2,500. Awesome. And Alexis, I think you have something. Yeah, I was just going to echo exactly what you said, that at any time that I've dealt with a grant having to do with film, you have to have a formal proposal, which isn't that difficult. But I agree that where we are is so early in the stage that it's hard to say what the film will become in the end. But I don't think that that's necessarily a bad thing. It's just going to make it more of a risk to the grant people in giving a grant out. And that just is what it is. That's normally how it goes. But yeah, just echoing that, yes, like a formal proposal. I've never had a grant where I didn't have to do that. The other thing is that I feel like the project needs to be segmented. Because I don't think we're going to get to a final documentary by June of 2022, because we're not going to be finished with the work. So this is an intro video, because you're going to have to do the rest of it. It's going to have to be documented in the next fiscal year, which means maybe going back to them for more money for the second half of this project. It's definitely not going to be finished. And that's something that could make it so they won't fund it, because it's not done in a year. It won't be done in a year. So you have to think about what kind of a project you want them to fund that of something that's not going to be complete at the end of the year. And most of these projects are projects people go for that are done in within a year. Because I think that's one of the one of the things. So it has to be worded in such a way that's like, it's not going to be finished. The part that the part that we want to get funded is going to be finished. I mean, a good example would be like, oh, we're writing a script. And we're getting all these people together to write this script. And we're assembling everything and the script will be done by June of 2022. That's doable. But then the second half of that is, oh, the script is written. And now we're putting all of the pieces together to actually finish the documentary. So we're interviewing people and we're this and we're this and we're that. And that'll be done next year. You know what I mean? Because we're not going to be able to finish everything by June of 2022. That's not a good example. But it's a basic example of, oh, well, maybe we're just asking them to fund the planning stages. And we'll have everything set up to be completed the following year. But I'm not sure that they'll, you know, again, I don't serve on that committee anymore. But, you know, again, I'm not sure they don't, they don't really fund seed money. And that's in the, in the, the requirements. So they don't, they don't, they don't fund seed money. So it has to be, you have to, I don't know how, I mean, the three of us can get together and kind of talk these things through and figure out a way to come up with a project description where they might put some money towards putting something together. If it is something that is a smaller documentary, maybe it's more about the idea of reparations and how this committee is sort of addressing that idea of what reparations might look like in Amherst. That's something that can be finished by June of 2022. That's basically just committee members and interviewing people and saying, this is what we consider reparations, how we kind of discussed what reparations means. And these are the steps that we're taking to implement that, you know, and then to be continued. Yeah, that sounds great. And we can add this to our agenda for next week or for another time to talk more specifically. But as you were talking, I was thinking, all of this work in Amherst has happened for the past year to get us to this point. So there's already, you know, everything that got us here and that we could do by June to really lay that foundation, like how did Amherst get to have a reparations committee and a fund in the next. So that I can speak to very clearly. Perfect. Okay. Yeah, because even in some of the documents, someone said, me said that it's just Amherst and a town in Virginia that have even gotten this far. Yeah, that in itself is like something to, you know, be proud of and include in a documentary like that. Absolutely. So you get the gist of what I'm saying. It has to be something that's done. Yeah. All right, perfect. Yes, good. So Dr. Jemisin, you can take it away with the report. Okay, Doki. So I'm going to share the live version of what is in the packet. This is exactly what's in the packet. It's not anything new. So we are tasked with developing a report. These are the guidelines here that I went through last week. And the guidelines and some thoughts about what should be in it. I wanted to draw everyone's attention to this direct quote from my belief is counselor Brewer who I can make this larger if it needs to be who sent us these guys these guidelines. It does not have to be a long report of page or two is completely adequate. But so I went ahead and I assembled the stuff that was easy that needed to be in here. So boring title, we'll put a date on it when we know it's going in. Assembly members are listed by name. The assembly charge was taken directly from the website. Our meeting dates so far that predate when the item is due and this is a link out to the website where they can go see them. And then I just went into what was done and I went for bullet points. There can be further wordsmithing if people have stronger beliefs and beliefs and complete sentences than I did in putting this together. But basically the buckets I came up with were administration, funding, community engagement, legal questions and vision. And that's as far as I've gotten. So I will start here on page three and I will leave up all the administration funding and community engagement items. I have so prioritized the stuff that was already in my memory. So I welcome everybody else's memory because I'm sure mine is not faultless. But I prioritize things that were actually like done or had been voted on and not necessarily things that were like are still in discussion. So if there's something that's missing, it might be because I didn't realize it was solved. But what I need to know is what else needs to go here? What else have we done and whether or not it needs to be said differently? I'm just going to ask, I don't know if this is appropriate or not, but I do wonder since we have Councillor Brewer here if it would be helpful to hear from her. And I will wait for her to raise her hand if she feels it would be helpful. Otherwise, we'll keep going. Dr. Jameson, are you looking for, before you said something like, oh, I did bullet points, but you are looking for things to be filled out more? Do you think that's necessary? I am remaining agnostic, right? Somebody had to put something together for people to respond to, it puts something together for people to respond to. I will tell you, this is not, I'm not doing all the homework on this, right? Which is why we're here. So if you want it to be said another way, you must give it to me verbatim and I will. I like that. So I don't honestly don't know what a reckoning in Boston is at all. I'm just guessing. So for me, having a definition of what that is and why it's important to have it be a community event, I would include that. I would make that change. And I don't know what it is and I'm on the committee. So I think we should define it. So that's the film that Alexis was talking about. I could probably provide a link or something there. I would give, I would include a short, I mean, if Alexis has a short description, I would put that in there. We have something, so we can put resources in here for sure. So I'm happy, we can happily put a footnote or something in there. We got a long email from the producer that has a description. And I can put like, not a footnote, but like whatever, an end note in there. And then it can be in the resources section for sure. So we could take a look at this and then, like, you want this done tonight? So my goal was like, again, like, I'm not, I'm not getting, I'm not going to be the person who's stuck with their class project like the night before it's due, right? So if you want something else to go into this, like, I need to, I need to know now. And this isn't a shared document. So we can't go in there and make the changes ourselves. Is it? And I, I mean, I can put it in Google suite. I'm just not like, should we do that? Because I'm looking at the under community engagement. You have voted to develop and launch an AHRA website. There's already a website. We're actually just adding changes to the already existing website. And there's a reason for that. So can we include why we want to make the changes? Because that seemed like it was a discussion with the committee, why we would want to have changes made to the website. Councilor Brewer, save us for ourselves. Oh, I was just going to say, it sounds, I mean, you all are like so making so much sense about everything you're talking about doing here. And what Ms. Mendes just said, associated with, yeah, it's not correct to say that, that you decided you voted to develop and launch a website, whether you wanted it or not, you already had one, but you developed it, you're developing it in a way that you're going to find is, is more useful to yourselves and to the community. And so just saying something along those lines is great, because I mean, like I said, it was already there before any of you sat down at the first meeting. It was just a matter of how you were going to use it effectively. And I think that's really valuable. And I appreciated the discussion you've had about that so far, because many committees don't like they just leave list their members, their charge, and their minutes and agendas, which is great. But like it doesn't have that sort of dynamic approach that I think you guys talked about at the beginning of your meeting tonight, with adding lots of materials for people to be educated. I'm not sure what my other useful thing is to offer you here in terms of this beyond two things. One is you, I don't wish to sound unhelpful here, but you didn't fill a seventh seat, you had nothing to do with that. And so what would be ideal would be to say that you fully welcomed your seventh member at your second meeting to show that, yes, Paul was able to get you a seventh member and town council voted on it. And you guys got right to it. She was able to participate right away, which I think is great. People were looking forward to seeing that. And then the other thing is just as is probably on your next page, what you think are your next steps and any areas that you think the council needs to ask the town manager to help support you in. So if if something's happening either now or that you foresee, or if you're just saying, we're using the town manager and Jennifer Moyston a lot for these various things, I think that's just valuable to describe so that people on the council and in the public understand that this is a rather resource intensive committee in terms of you guys are having to do a lot of work. It's not just talking about stuff. You're doing a lot of exploration of different programs, etc. So that people can continually reflect back at the council level as we're writing our financial guidelines for the budget and that sort of thing to make sure that you're getting the kind of support you need to remind Paul that you need this support to be able to accomplish your goals. Speaking of that support, Alissa, they're so the stabilization funding the stabilization fund funding the stabilization fund. So it's my understanding that the funds have been certified and we do not have a clear answer on when those funds will be put into the stabilization fund but people are eager to know. And so I know last week you had talked about it not being in the timeframe necessarily that Paul had said, which was a couple months and we are meeting with Paul tomorrow co-chairs are meeting with Paul tomorrow. So this is certainly something we could ask him. But in terms of getting that piece into the report, do you have any recommendations? Again, you know, because I'm trying to channel the council is to help process would work. This is an unusual circumstance, right? And so it's a stable. We don't have many set aside funds. This is one that we were very excited to support. I think almost entirely excited to support. And I know it's frustrating for me personally, but maybe I'm more impatient than the average person about I want to see the money in there. Like I want to see that, you know, we set up the stabilization fund, we set up the committee and the money sitting there and we know there's other funds too. But I kind of want to tie up that loose end. But that's me personally. Maybe my friend Andy, who's the chair of the finance committee would be like, come on, Alyssa, you're being really unreasonable. We'll just do this in a couple of months like we normally would. And it's not like it's hurting anything because it's not like they need the money to spend to distribute tomorrow. So given all that, which I'm sorry, is too long for your meeting, just a very long day is maybe just try and figure out what you agree as a committee. It matters to you in terms of if it would, if you feel like it sends a message or it gives you some additional comfort to know that the money's actually there. I personally would like to see the money there before the changeover in the council. And so that may well be covered largely by your conversation with Paul tomorrow that you'll then report back to the rest of the committee. But there are only a handful of town council meetings left before the end of the year. And so there's not a lot of time to act on this. And it may be that they're not thinking of acting on this before the end of the town council term, whereas I would think you might like to see that. But that's really up to you. And I'm not, I don't want to put any pressure on you for my patients. Well, I know speaking to Irv in particular, he being the one that's been keeping his eye on all of this really does feel strongly that he'd like he sort of expressed concern that it hadn't already been done and that he doesn't want it to sort of get lost. And, and I have, I agree with that. I think, you know, I of course don't understand all of the ways that these things work. But I will say that I think if the money has been certified, I would like to see it moved into the account. And so I think it's a big, a big moment for us. And so if we can somehow, if it let's hope to clear it up with with Paul tomorrow, but I do think that we should somehow reflect something about the stabilization funding, the stabilization fund in this report. Yeah, I mean, if nothing else, maybe you can just say the sentence, I'm sure we'll come up with better phrasing between all of you, but something along the lines of that the money has been deposited, that the agreed upon funds have been deposited in the stabilization fund by December 31st. And just leave it at that. Great. Thank you for that. Dr. Jemisin, can you like make it a little bigger perhaps? Like, or can I do that? I'm not perfect. Thank you. So just so that it's in the record, I sent some or I sent some changes by email. So we could continue to do that. And then Dr. Jemisin, you'll just add them in to the document as we move along. Jennifer. Yeah, thank you. You're going to say something about that. So, Yvonne, did you just send them slowly to Dr. Jemisin? Send it to everyone? Yeah, she sent it to me. I sent it to her. Oh, you did. Excellent. So I should send it to everyone? No, you should not. Oh, okay. All right. I sent it just to Dr. Jemisin. So I have a couple of suggestions for a, sake of time and b, so that people can really kind of take a look at it and think about what needs to be added in there is that the suggestions get sent to Dr. Jemisin. If you could either send it out to everyone or send it to me and I can send it out to everyone and then they can individually respond. And also I was just thinking we explored specific funding streams and so I didn't know if you wanted to list those funding streams that we did. This has her hand up? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, obviously this was a placeholder, so. Well, no, I mean, that's, so that's what I'm saying is I don't know 100% sure of what you, it seems like there's a lot and people might want to be able to take a deeper look at it before and not have an idea right this minute. And so I would hate for us to leave this meeting and someone have some really good suggestions and then the report has been submitted. So that's why I was saying that and Alyssa. So yeah, you totally have this push pull in terms of what open meeting law enables you to do, what practical reality enables you to do, and then the timing, right, because you, you are intending to turn this in before your next meeting, as I understand it. Is that correct? When it's due. So it's due before your next age. You can't deliberate about the contents of this document via email. And so you can talk about all the things you think need to be in it and empower one or more of you to document that in the document and trust that people will do that. But you can't sit here tonight and say, well, we'll send another five things to you later, because that's not five things that the committee agreed to. That's five ideas that individuals had. So that's why open meeting law makes this really difficult. And I know some other committees in the town have been known to do things via email, but that doesn't make it possible to do. So it's important that you say your ideas tonight, even if they're not perfectly wordsmithed, and then they can be wordsmithed by whoever you delegate that to. Dr. Jemisin, for example, it sounds like, and then she can publish it and say, sure, hope I incorporate all your ideas, because this is what I sent. But it can't go through, okay, here's revision C, here's revision D, here's revision E in email, like that's deliberation by email. That's not legal. Can we set up a subcommittee meeting if people were interested in doing that? So a couple people could that could be posted for like Saturday morning. I'm not saying anybody should be getting together Saturday morning, but I'm just asking, is that an option? That is an option. And I realize until you all really get used to each other's work style and the time constraints we all have by meeting every week, plus your real lives, that that might help people feel like they feel more assured that what they have to say is going to get included because they'll have that other public opportunity, right, that other public meeting to do that. And so obviously, you can't necessarily expect staff to be dealing with you on a Saturday morning, but they can give you the Zoom ability to do what you need to do if that's what needs to happen. I'm also thinking of IRV and Dr. Shabazz not being here and wanting to potentially have input as well. So, right, that gives you that one more chance for everybody to have said it publicly. And then at the end of that meeting to say, okay, I'm confident that when we leave this meeting, this person we've trusted will develop those three bullet points further and I'll be fine with whatever they turn it. Yeah, because at this point now we've seen what Dr. Jemison put together. And so if we wanted to take that route, we could set up another public meeting so that we're not in any sort of violation of open meeting law. And then whoever, as long as I guess we had a quorum, Jennifer, do we need a quorum? What is, for a subcommittee meeting, how does quorum work? So what I will say about the subcommittees is once you title it a subcommittee, then depending on how many people are in there, we'll determine the quorum. But I, the way that I've always understood it is once it's a subcommittee, then that's a different piece of it. And so if you have three people in the subcommittee, then my guess would be two people would be a quorum. Is that correct, Alexa? Oh, Lisa, I'm sorry. Oh yeah, absolutely, Jennifer. I know you know that it's all good. Of course, you're exactly right. The only question there was ever was when whether or not subcommittees really had to be official. And as we all know, yes, they do have to be official. But yeah, if you want to just have a subcommittee of two, and then it turns out only one of you could make it Saturday, the only problem is, you know, you're trying to have your, you're trying to have it be that everybody has input, right? So potentially all your members have input, but you're trying not to post it as a full meeting because you don't want to have to say, well, we have to shut this down because we don't have quorum. So maybe you just pick two members and you say, that's the subcommittee for this one time, right? It's a one time only thing. Then as long as one of you shows up, that'll be fine. But then you say clearly on the meeting notice that all the members might be showing up and giving information and that's okay. And I actually think that with Irv and Dr. Shabazz not here, I feel like this document needs to be shared with them as well. And so it is in the meeting packet, correct? It is in the meeting packet. So I just accept that Dr. Jamison made a couple of changes to the document already. Right. And so I have a PDF version. Yeah, a new version. Because even, but so let me go, so we need their input as you guys need their input as well, right? That wouldn't be fair. So you have to find a way to get that. And so honestly, at this point, it looks like you should schedule, like everybody should take this look at it, review it and come back maybe if possible on, I don't know how much time you would need Dr. Jamison to make the, maybe you and a co-chair could, I mean, you and another member could finalize it, but a meeting just to have everybody hash out what should be added to this. Because it's a, you know, a pretty big thing. And I think even the agreed upon funds might want to be the little more detailed, like the free cash funds, because that's where it's coming from. Right. And so I just, to take some of the pressure off of Dr. Jamison, because she shouldn't be left with the homework assignment that everybody should equally have the opportunity to put their feedback into it in a way that it's going to work and meet the open meeting laws. And really, it seems like at this point, the best way to do that is to have a full blown miniature meeting. And if you can't come to that meeting, then that's one thing, but definitely somehow have to find a way to get your thoughts to someone else. Is it illegal to have it as a Google doc where we can make changes? It is illegal. I think it is Dr. Brewer. You've just turned into a doctor. It has her hand raised. Go ahead. Who has not worked nearly that hard in her life. And no, it's not. So yeah, I mean, like we talked about practical, that would make so much sense, right? And it would show track changes and everything. Unfortunately, that's just not a way that's going to work. In terms of, like, if you call that meeting, like Jennifer described, and then not everybody, especially the two people you were just talking about, can't even necessarily be there. If they can, if you can find, you just have to figure out the logistics of them to submit that information individually to one of those two people that's going to be there that is agreeing to co-chair this. And then they just read out loud what the person said, right? And so that's how you solve the, it was deliberation in public. If they're not there for a subcommittee, I don't think anybody's going to, you know, file an open meeting complaint against you for that. They are however going to, if you're editing documents behind the scenes, because it's incredibly efficient, it's just not public. So I think that that's how they can get, all of you can get your thoughts in, right? Because maybe none of you can make Saturday except the two people who are willing to do that. But they can send it to those individuals who can then discuss it on the Zoom. Here's what Dr. Shabazz sent us. And I know that Dr. Shabazz is a visiting professor right now with a big commitment for the next few days, including Friday the 29th. So is Saturday the time we wanted to consider this, or what about Monday? And if Dr. Jemisin had everything she needed by the end of that meeting Monday, Dr. Jemisin, would that give you enough time to finalize it for Wednesday? So what I'm trying to avoid is being the person to wordsmith this, because I don't want everybody going, I hate the way that was said for the rest of posterity. I quite frankly would like that to be on somebody else. I will happily collect all of the data that people want to go in here. If you tell me we need this topic covered, this topic covered, this topic covered, which is what I was hoping to get out of tonight. And then I can put the bullet points in if people want to send me things like Yvonne did. I like these words and I'm happy to put that in there, but I don't have a horse in the race about the eloquence of this document. I just wanted to have the information required in the way that it's supposed to be out there, which I gotta be clear on. I've never done this before for this type of body. So I don't really know what that is, right? So if there's a better person to do that, I'm happy to turn the finalization over to them. Hala. I just want to say thank you so much for your work. This, to me, it helps me understand it and visualize it better. So I just really appreciate what you've done. Thank you. I can't word Smith better than this, and I thank you for that. Thank you, Hala. And I was actually Dr. Jemson hoping that whatever would happen on Monday, if that's the meeting date, that that would avoid you having to word Smith anything and that you at worst case scenario during Monday's meeting be working on an actual live document like you just were. So that it's really just tying everything together for the final report. That's what happens. Listen, I'll run the risk. This is my first radio. You have everything outlined very well. I think it just needs a little more detail to it, right? So that people who aren't aware of what's going on with this group can understand it. And so I think you just I'm hoping that on Monday, you know, we take whatever amount of time and just say all we're doing here to do is to, you know, hash this out really quick. And the reason not to do that right now is to give us the time to digest it since we're only seeing it now and also to give Dr. Shabazz and her the time to submit or at least come to the meeting on Monday, if it's on Monday. And by the way, Dr. Jemison, I love wordsmithing and I love words and I love all of that. And so I would be happy to, I agree with Jennifer, ideally on Monday, we would be able to do all of that take all of the information, but I'm also happy. And I have read through all of the sort of other reports that are like community safety working group that 88 page report we were talking about earlier, and they did a fantastic job wordsmithing that. So I have a sense. So I'm happy to really put in and help with that piece. Can we still send our thoughts if you like, let's say I'm not sure that I can come to a meeting on Monday. So can I still send my thoughts to Dr. Jemison to include in the document or that's not a thing. Do I have to do that right now in case I can't come on Monday? No, I think that you can send them to Dr. Jemison. I'm going to ask that you CC me on them so that it can all just kind of be put into a last minute packet. Sure. Can I get some information sent to me about the reckoning film? I can forward you that information right now. And is the conversation included in any of the previous minutes from because I've only seen the November, the October 8th minutes. So if we can get are the other minutes available? The 18th minutes are almost done. This is what happens when we meet weekly. And I, you know, unfortunately, I would love to dedicate all of my time to committees, but it's just only a fraction of what I do. So I can give you they're really rough right now. Or you know what, you can also watch the meeting because she is there and she speaks for the first, the first section of first part of the meeting. So and she speaks so eloquently and so intentional about what she's saying that my word minutes of she's of just seduces of what I still feel like there needs to be something that's a little bit more in the in as a little description of why we consider that community engagement. And I'm willing to wordsmith that and send it to Dr. Jamison, but I'll watch the movie and do that and send it to you. And I'm not 100% sure if the 13th is up yet or not, but if it's not reach out and then I can send it to you. Okay, yeah, I like the idea of me doing the work to read to watch it instead of having you have to do minutes to send to me. Yeah, more work. So I'm happy to do that. And I'm seeing that the videos are posted somewhere already or some. You should be able to go to the website and there should be some list of videos already there. I don't know. There's four September 22, September 28, October 8, and October 13. Perfect. So those are there now. And I will make sure that the other ones get posted. I try to reach out to them about biweekly to get stuff posted. So I'll watch that one. Which one did you say the 13th? The 13th. Yeah, perfect. Thank you so much. And it is it's so inspiring to hear her speak. It's unbelievable. I think we were in tears. I was at least. Jennifer, is it okay to share those videos? I just I mean, if they're public, it's fine to put them out now. Okay, perfect. Yep. I just needed to wait for them to be shared from us first. Of course. So that just to note for other committee members, if you have social media or you have places that you might want to share the work we're doing with people, those videos or you can link to those videos. So I know I'll definitely try to be doing that. To raise hands. Sorry, I can't see both of them. Alexis. Hi. I was just going to say that if it's helpful, I can definitely air our meetings like we do all other government meetings on our government channel on channel 17. That would be awesome. Yeah, I mean, I don't know that I have any ability to say go ahead and do that. I don't see why that would be a problem. But I think either way, they still have to be released from us first unless you're Oh, I see what you're saying to record them. I would I would be getting them straight from the town of Amherst. Yeah. So yeah. So I'm going to send this to Jennifer. Jennifer is going to send it out to everyone. There is going to be a subcommittee meeting. I just need a date and time. Does Monday work for you, Dr. Jemisin? Yes. I mean, it has to be an evening, so I don't know if there's their election stuff that night for you or. No, that's okay. I don't think that there's a town council meeting that night, although I could be wrong. But I know there's not October 4th. No, wait, I'm sorry. November. November 8th is the next council meeting on the schedule that I have. So cool. Yeah, I can be there on Monday, the first in the evening. And maybe everybody else who knows they can be there can let us know right now so that we is Alexis, are you shaking your head? Yes. Yeah, sorry. I guess I was shaking everything. Yes. Yes, I can be there. Okay. And how about you, Halla? Yeah, it depends on the time. I have a commitment at 7.30. Okay. So I can start it. We started in Quorum. I don't know who it was. I was going to say folks don't have to be pressured. Don't have to feel pressure to be there. You can just send words to Jennifer and I as well. So you're always welcome. Happy to see your faces. But all right. So do we want to say 6.15 or so because I know Alexis usually gets finished up with work. Is 6.15 good? Don't even. I'm planning on sending words or getting stuff ready ahead of time. So don't even don't worry about me since this is not a regular meeting. For timing. Okay. So what would work for Halla and Dr. Jemisin and Yvonne for timing on Monday? 6.15 is fine with me. Great. If I can make it, I mean 6.15 would be fine. I don't know if I can make it yet, but if I can make it evening is usually better than during the day. So this is not a subcommittee meeting. This is a full regular meeting. Okay. Well, then we'll need four people who are guaranteed. And we have one, two, it sounds like Halla and Alexis are also guaranteed. There's four and we may pick up Dr. Shabazz and I'm sure Irv and hopefully Yvonne. So yeah, I think so. So I thought Alexis was not guaranteed. Sorry to speak to you, Alexis. I thought you said you were going to send things. Yeah, yeah, no, I can, I can make it, but I was just saying, don't like, don't use my work schedule for this meeting if it wasn't going to be helpful. And I'm actually tempted to call it a subcommittee meeting because it changes the guidelines if people aren't able to come through. Let's, let's do that. Let's, let's be safe. And Dr. Jemisin, if you're the only one that shows up, you can leave. I don't have to sit there and read everybody's comments. I can do that. I'll do dramatic readings or whatever you send me. Alyssa, Councillor Brewer. I'm fully expecting dramatic reading. I don't make great video. I mean, you don't have to read what everybody says word for word, but that's the way it's out in public. You know, that's great. We do, we must. Yvonne? Oh, no. Okay. I just didn't lower my hand. So I'm sorry. Got it. There we go. That's all right. Okay, I'm going to stop sharing. This is the version that I will send to you, Jennifer, for you to distribute. Thank you so much for that. And thank you, Councillor Brewer and Jennifer for the real time lesson. Like, I figured there was not a way for us to edit in real time, except for this. But it's nice to, it's nice to have that confirmed and have everybody understand why it's tricky. So I just wanted to check in about Irv. Are we going to table the update for the ARPA funds? Well, the vote that Irv had suggested, or are we going to? So I was going to move, if we're finished with this, to the ARPA funds update, because Yvonne asked specifically about whether we follow or asked about the follow through that we did, Dr. Jemison and I, as a response to our conversation last week. So we can certainly update for that. I do think that without Irv here to propose this, and I can give a little context because I talked to Irv about this. So maybe we start with what we have done and then give some context. Does that work, Dr. Jemison? Okay. So in the packet, you'll see that we wrote a statement and we went to the listening session and we read that statement. We also submitted that to the ARPA specific page on Engage Amherst, which was soliciting questions and input. And so if you get a chance, please do read the statement that we made. We uncovered a couple potential issues, one being that when we read through the Treasury report for the ARPA funds, we realized that a rainy day fund or a reserve fund is not an eligible way to use, like for ARPA funds to be used, which means potentially that if we were awarded funds by the town, they wouldn't be able to go into our stabilization fund. So the way that we worked around that for the statement was to say that either funds to go into the stabilization fund or to set aside funds for some eligible use that we would determine at a later date, which is what Sean recommended. And so we followed up with Sean today. He's still in conversation trying to figure out exactly whether or not we'll be able to put money into the stabilization fund. And Dr. Jemison and I are meeting with Paul tomorrow. So we'll also be asking him that question specifically. And then the real question then becomes how much are we formally asking for? And this is why I would suggest we put this off until our next meeting because Irv has an idea based on one of the pots, which is the recreational pot in the grand scheme of the ARPA funds. And then there was the health and I think it was racial equity pot that we actually pitched for and you'll see that in our statement. So I think we can gather more information tomorrow and then we can come back to this at our next regular meeting and we would need to deliberate on how much we want it to formally request from the town. I don't know if you wanted to add to that, Dr. Jemison. I guess I was waiting to see if there were other comments that I was just going to say that that makes sense to me. So did we lose Alexis? Just about to ask. Okay. Are we still good? One, two, three, yeah. All right. So that was that. If there aren't any other questions, we could move on, I think, to the second public comment period. Cool. Well, all right. Go team. So during the public comment period, one of the co-chairs will recognize members of the public when called on. Please identify yourself by stating your full name, preferred pronouns and residential address. Residents are welcome to express their views for up to three minutes of the discretion of the co-chairs based upon the number of people who wish to speak. No speaker can see their time to another speaker. AHRA will not engage in a dialogue or comment on a matter raised during public comment, but we will be listening and taking note. So if there is anybody in the audience that would like to speak in public comment, please raise your hand and we will unmute you. All right. Looks like there is nobody that would like to speak during this public comment period. So we can move on and I'll turn it over to you, Dr. Jemison. I think that's it. I guess the one thing I think I did want to just provide a comment on just so it's on the record is I believe work process was still in the agenda, which was there were a lot of changes. So we don't need to to discuss that one anymore. So that's why we didn't discuss it. That's all. And I didn't have any other items. So I'm not like, yes Jennifer. I couldn't figure out why you couldn't hear me. It's upside down. So is the work process as a standard item correct under actions and discussion? We would like to strike it for just this week. I think for good. Ever? Yeah. Okay. Strike it as far as it being a standing item, we may come back to refer to it. I'm sure we will, but then we'll add it as an item. Is that is that accurate, Dr. Jemison? I guess I mean like it was sort of pertained to this document that people want to change before we kind of use it routinely. Most of the folks who had ideas about changes aren't here this week. So, you know, we haven't had a chance to discuss it. And I, you know, I, my personal feeling about it is it's just it's just a list. And so I'm not personally very attached to us using that list as a way to navigate, but I'm, you know, if other folks feel it's really important and it's a super incredible guideline, then let's, let's keep it, but it's going to need to be revised. And so we have to take time to do the revision process to sort of perfect it before then we go by it. And to me, it's just a list. So I guess the part that I just want to put on the record is that I think it was incredibly useful structure when we began this work. And one that perhaps other committees might want to consider if they don't already have something like this happening. And so I just wanted to just to say that out loud. Thank you. We can bring it back if people feel strongly about it. I just didn't, given the amount of time that we do have, I always worry about how do you balance process versus the like things that go to a vote. So to be continued probably. So I guess strike for this week, Jennifer, and we'll, may put it on in further, in further weeks if it needs to come up again. Okay. Yep. Public comment member reports. Upcoming agenda items. If we want to talk about, we've got a subcommittee meeting. So the report will be covered there. Do we have anything? Well, we do. We talk about her saying, would it be captured for next Thursday? I'd like to add, and I don't know if it's for next week. Well, so we have the community wide healing process and an update on that. Also thinking about a successor group. I just, I bring that up again just so that we can have it there to really start thinking about that. And we also talked about having a deeper discussion with respect to the documentary, to the documentary. Yep. I did not capture anything beyond that. The other folks on the call have any other things they thought you want to put forward for discussion on our next meeting? That was the community healing, the deeper discussion documentary. And then there was something else. The successor group or successor body to this group. And the ARFA funds, Jennifer. And, you know, I think it makes sense for us to just have a legal update and a financial update on every agenda and then have sub items. So like in this case, there would be a fund update and include ARFA and potentially the community preservation active. Dr. Shabazz gets more information back about that. And we talked about inviting somebody from that group like Anna who came and spoke to us. So maybe that's something we cover next week. But and also having the legal council update as a standing item. We also need to talk about the, I know that what was tabled was the private email because Paul was still thinking about that. So we might want to get an update on that if there is one. And then we talked a lot early on about submitting our changes or ideas about the website. So maybe we can include the website on the agenda so we can just just to keep it active. We can revisit it. Maybe there's a little bit of an update about when those changes can happen or. That's a great idea. I like just have that as an active item that we check back into. Yeah. Yeah, because part of that conversation was about the form that would be a black census. So I'd like to maybe we can include that as a part of the website conversation if we're going to move forward developing that. That's great. If people do have ideas for the website can can they just submit them though to Dr. Shabazz and Jennifer. Jennifer. Yeah. I because it would be nice to this is it's again it's the type of thing that I think can take up a lot of time. And so it'd be great if they were like clustered right you know like oh we've got this week's worth of ideas folks have they appeared in the packet because they were sent in in advance people have a chance to review them and it can just be like do people have objections to any of them. Yes or no discuss controversial items and then just vote up or down to have them all added. I agree. I mean would it be I mean I was trying to get a sense of if there was a time frame for submitting those. But now that we might not have meetings because we're going to hit holiday and our next meeting would be the 18th. Right. So do we want to have it not be the 18th. Maybe we can just set up a deadline so that it can be a part of the next meeting after the 18th. You know what I'm saying. So I think our next meeting is November 4th. Oh OK. Yes. So we do we don't do we not want to address it then. So the thing about the deadline is that I don't know that you can put a deadline on when helpful resources and other things come to hand. So that's why it's kind of there's not a deadline like there could be new information put out in you know two weeks the government could change their mind and say hey we're going to do reparations forever well whatever the case may be. So I just think that as things come to people that they feel like are good ideas to send them to us and then you know we can check with the group at the following meeting or they can bring it to them the actual meeting and do it that way as opposed to saying like you have to have everything because the information is going to just keep coming to us and like the community will have ideas as we move forward to and they will have thoughts that they we want it to be open right so that people can kind of give us different resources and input as they're they're coming as it comes. It would be nice to have it would make it easier for me because then it doesn't have to be manned but I think that that kind of defeats the purpose of why we want to have it to a certain degree. So I that's why I'm saying there's no necessarily deadline but as soon as you have something I would suggest submitting it. And just I would be really clear because I agree it's an iterative process but in the subject line specifying if something is a packet material or a resource material for the website so that Jennifer is inundated with a bunch that she has to you know sift through and I love the idea of sort of putting them on a consent agenda and then what they do in the town council is like if one is a problem for someone or a concern or there's a question around it can be pulled out from that discussed and as Dr. Jemisin said voted up or down and then the whole thing can also just be. So you know like if we for whatever reason for the November 4th is our next meeting so if by uh oh well that's actually really just next week. So if by Monday like everybody submit something then we can just use that to go into the consent calendar and they can send them out with the packet and everybody can review it and then can have it for discussion on the 4th. I think the what we'll learn over time is like basically what the turnaround is so once we've said the items can go up how long it kind of takes in general for things to then appear on the website and then we can sort of calibrate a little bit but I think the only other real timeline thing we've got is that this body is is sort of set to dissolve on the 30th of June next next year so you know we probably would not be I don't know if we'd be posting stuff further on stuff like that so that'll but that you know that'll come up in like May of next year and um question Jennifer this is just a brainstorm um if we are thinking about web forms of some sort what a what a web form for like community suggestions that is on this site be a solution to the email so I don't know where the web forms would go but would that would that work? That's still it's just somehow feeding back to me which is kind of a part where it gets a little tricky right like you know I my concern with just having it the way that it is having everything vet through me is that there just might be some people who aren't fully not necessarily me personally but have whatever feelings towards the government and really want to interact with um you guys a little bit more my guess is that we can somehow hopefully create through something through Engage Amherst would be the first is my first thought is like if we want to have something that we could have it on Engage Amherst and so we could have a link or we could have something on the page but again that's still coming it's still just comes back to me until we have that email um discussion solved okay which you know requires me just really to forward it to everybody so that's not necessarily the worst it's not so bad um but I just feel like something like this said it's not me that the community is going to want to communicate with it's you all that the community wants to communicate with and so I mean that might be very true for all committees but I feel like between this and the CSWG that the connecting with the actual members is really what is most important as opposed to the staff member um and the reason so and it would be giving you guys amherstma.gov emails which would it is where the the problem is right now because you know it's a little difficult for you guys to use your personal emails and if there's a public records request and you know everybody gets a million emails we can't guarantee that everything that was submitted to you has come out and we can't go in and extract to make sure um so it's just a little bit sticky so I will keep talking to reaching out to the town manager about a decision on that um as long as I can and then or you know as much as I can and then see what happens from there but I suggest that the two co-chairs bring it up as well um just as a friendly reminder to him absolutely absolutely so I think that's that covers it yeah unless there's any other topics that did not come up that are in the last two days they're mission critical all right was there nothing under the BAM update or was did Dr. Shabazz cover that yeah I just I was noticing that um I think there unless Carla had something additional to add um I think probably what Dr. Shabazz talked about is that good so before I leave I should schedule them will if you guys are having a meeting on Monday then I need to post that tomorrow and I think the report draft is the only thing that's in that packet so far it's the only thing on the agenda too so and then um November 4th no so it's hard to upkeep the page where it says there's a link to the meetings on the page and so if I don't do it the same night after we leave I notice that the following week when I go to the page I'm like oh man I never switched out the link so I just have to do it now to keep it you know on point understandable all right so uh it is 8 24 p.m move to adjourn or the second all right what time did you say 8 24 perfect all right thank you everyone thank you good night yeah good night maybe I'll see you on Monday thank you will this uh bye everyone bye