 All right. Thank you, everyone. We're back on Tuesday afternoon. It's going to pick up on a conversation on an age 96 pretty. But first I just get a mail from Katie McClean that said that she is available at 10 after four for us. And I'm just going to check my phone here and see if anyone else got that. So Kira, can you post that? Okay, so online is is the new draft of date of 244. I suspect with that one change on it, but we can look at it at 10 after four representative. I know you'll be in another committee. We can hold it open for you. I don't want to take a vote in advance for you. So thank you all for the conversation on 329. That's what we'll have. I did reach out to see representative graph. And ask Ron to set up a time to meet with them. Looks like on Thursday. So that still works for us. We just have to make sure Damien's available. Time on this week. Each 96 is also on our list of priorities. I've also shared based on the notes that I have from our previous conversations and also from the document that I shared with you from the International Center of Transitional Justice. The comments that were made by our friends down there. And so Damien is working on a new draft that he'll provide for us before tomorrow. That again, I'll take responsibility for listening to the comments that we've heard thus far. And also with the notion of pulling back a little bit. Just to say, what is it we're trying to create? Trying to get there. And Howard, yeah, it's the same question we've been working on. With the bill. And so I just wanted to open the floor of conversation on 96 to see what people thought about. The comments that were made by ICPJ or anything that you contemplated during the break. So I just wanted to take a little bit of a moment on it and just kind of take today as a, as kind of a preview. We're pretty much going to be doing all 96 for the next two days to see if we can finish it. And so I just wanted to take today. It's kind of a, as a, as a preview for the next two days. I read the memo from the ICPJ and I, I do have a lot of the same. Concerns about the size of the stakeholder group, even though I have advocated to have as many voices, different voices as possible to reflect the eugenics apology. And also. I think that the sheer breadth of this bill. It's not specifically about one particular wrong. Like for instance, the Maryland truth commission. Is specifically about one. Issue, which was lynching. And the Canadian one was specifically targeted for one typical, one type of population. Indigenous peoples. So I feel like this is, it's really broad and big. Broad isn't necessarily bad in my mind, but big, big in scope, in vision. So I just wanted to, I just wanted to look at, to see, to understand what this bill is about. And share numbers of people and also in. The amount of funding that it's going to take. So those are just some thoughts, but I was pleased to see. This group of experts, global experts. Also raised some of the same concerns that I have. Well, I guess I've left everybody speechless. I think when I re-read the document, I hadn't looked at it, I printed it out before we left and I didn't want her to stay married, so I didn't open it up all of a sudden on vacation. Yeah, it was great. Dinner was great. Had I opened up this document, I think I would have gone, you know, very far away. I'd be just arriving at St. Lawrence. And I think it was surprising to me whether between that and the comments, first the comments, because the comments were like, oh my God, this is so broad. Oh my God, the stakeholders are in the selection panel and I kept thinking, that's not what you've been talking about. But there was in version 3.1 was saying that the stakeholder group and the selection panel would have, I think, an oversight over the commissioners that I wasn't intending. In my thinking, and I hadn't been thinking of it in that way. So the conversation was always based on they would peel off or they would peel off and the commissioners would be the ones who are running it as autonomously and independently as possible. And with the input, the inclusion comes in with whatever groups, whatever commissions get formed that obviously the commissioners would be working with each of the interested stakeholder groups. And so, but I did see that. Again, counted my blessings that I didn't open up the bill, I was gone. It was 24 hours or so just working on it to get shared with Damien, just like some of these comments that were made here to go through the bill and just to try to streamline it back again. And I think details we'll talk about tomorrow, but I'm just so grateful that ICTJ is following us and is providing us with this kind of guidance because it's really, it's really good. Are they going to be around again tomorrow, like a Zoom available? I don't know that they've been invited, I just, you know, I did, they always at least watch on YouTube. And we can make sure that they have the Zoom link for our work again. And again, I think Ron has changed the agenda so you can see it on the computer. So it's, it's pretty much all 96 tomorrow I had to check in with Matt on bumping the alcohol bills down the week a little bit. I hope we're on the same page. And again, the theory behind the alcohol bills is to get something. We've talked a lot about some of the bills, some of the pieces, but we want to get more than the technical with the assumption that it's going to come back to us because the Senate will add something, but they won't. And we'll reverse our work, especially there's so many pieces that we know that we have to deal with the alcohol bill, but we'll have more time this week. Well, I just want to share that I did take some of this committee's work with me on my holiday and in Maryland, in one of the public libraries that my grandchildren and I went into. The last case exhibit in the entrance way of the committee, the committee collecting soils, there were large jars with soil that was from areas where lynchings had been. There was a description of the project I was looking for my pictures because there are a few pictures might have my daughter take I can't find it, but I just I thought it was for me it was a connection to what we're doing here and it was a tangible of what we see as an outcome agreeing with Lisa that if there was some specific we're looking at and maybe it happens after this next, but as a goal where there's something out in the public domain that people really can connect to emotionally and and with understanding that this was part of history and I think that's been a successful piece of reconciliation commission outcomes of I was up in Quebec City and went to the Museum of Civilization which I didn't get to four years ago because our town meeting break coincides with school break. And so four years ago when we went, it was impossible to get in. And for probably COVID reasons, we could get in this time and so in the museum of civilization, they had a dedicated space for their indigenous and Indian populations. That was really well done. And it's part of, I don't know celebration is the right word but commemoration and and and it was written in their language, like we did this, and this happened with us with so much, you know so much art so much. In other words, including a section that included the recent 2021 conversations about the findings of the of the bodies at the schools. And it really was, again, given the context of our work it was really kind of powerful but it was an example to of where can this go. I don't think we can say in our, we can't say in our legislation that this is what the commissioners and everybody and the stakeholders will determine now. And so this is part of pulling back and saying, well, it's, we know that the commemoration is necessary we know, perhaps that something kind of is it a museum is it a series of public concerts or public, you know whatever, whatever the outcome is at the end of this process, it should cap all of the work that went into it. And in Canada, right now it's this museum in Quebec and it's just, you know, it's, it's crazy good and very powerful stuff. Listening, listening to somebody there in the video of someone being interviewed and he was in the back of the back of a pickup truck and he's driving through their neighborhood that the government had given them it's all houses, totally normal to us neighborhood he was just talking about how this is just so it feels like jail. Yeah, because of the connections that are connected to the wilderness and the outside of this that it can no longer participate in and I don't think it would have been as powerful to me to learn in this context right now. I think increasingly more comfortable with the openness of it at the beginning, because I feel like it. In the four years that I've served here I've learned so much. History experiences. And with a lot of the framing and even the bills that are on walls dealing with kind of systemic harm. And I think what's really missing is for us in Vermont to understand the harm in Vermont that's happened to our different populations. And I think this is an opportunity here to really be Vermont specific about issues, and have that as as as the filter I think it was community input. Both about what are the harms we should investigate. And then with the commissioners. It's like, what are the steps that are needed. It's not saying we're going to do this and we have a conceptually anyway these three commissioners and we have conceptually chosen three different communities right those communities may choose other than the three that we chose the BIPOC community the disabled community. Right. And so I think in terms of kind of self determination of community voices. I think this is a great process. And I think it's one that can work in Vermont, because we cannot take only national data on kind of systemic racism in banking or in anything, unless we really investigate in Vermont and then we can say, what do we owe Vermont in this process so I, you know, we don't have a single incident that we're trying to redress. But I think this is a great way to understand if there are issues to address, you know, and, and what those issues are and what those communities are. So I I'm very comfortable with the openness of it. And I've gone to like it more and more. I went to other big city in Canada Montreal, my partner for a couple of days and went to a really good museum that if you haven't been there before the McCord Museum. And it's a, it's a cultural museum. And there's a very I was not extensive, but it's a really interesting, diverse exhibit on indigenous culture in Canada. And a fair amount of it went into, you know, the work of truth and reconciliation and there was one, there was one paragraph that stuck out for me and, you know, reading these different panels and I just thought I'd share it with you is the reason so many indigenous voices have been raised against the idea of reconciliation is that it must necessarily be preceded by healing. Imagine that reconciliation is possible without change is too easy. There are actions that must be taken before a true encounter between the different populations occupying this territory can take place. And that, you know, and it, and I, we may use the word reconciliation in a long term goal. But I think that the truth part is, you know, is key to that healing. And, and, you know, there were several people who talked about, you know, something that this committee has certainly heard about language, how language and it, and its absence, you know, how many, how many different languages were lost in indigenous cultures in Canada and, and that, you know, the first steps some of folks were arguing is, you know, that you need to make it a little bit of an attempt to understand that there are these languages. And, and that that's we communicate and we find languages to do that and I am sorry I'm going on. It just was a, it, it was, I couldn't get away from age 96 when I went on vacation. I was really struck by the, by the email we got from the truth and trust this group and thinking, oh my God, you know, does this mean we've got a scrappy sections of the sending style all over again. But no, I don't think so. Let's look at the details. I was also a little bit disheartened frankly at the end of the week, before we went on break and we heard testimony that sounded like you guys are going way too far. You're supposed to be dealing only with the people who are affected by the eugenics project that not talking about history that happened long before the eugenics project. That message would seem to be coming from a couple of people. So I think we do have to remain broad, but I do think we do have to remind you have to look at the original set of stakeholders you know is it up to 37 I don't know what the total is anymore. We have to make sure that we have sufficient. Representation of the affected populations. But, you know, doesn't mean that the group has to be that big it can't become unwieldy clearly. Right. So I'm ready to charge ahead on this. A couple of hard days. I'll bring something. Cookies with espresso beans. Barbara, I think. Cheryl, if you can just like, because you had a context, like when you saw the display that you were like, yeah, the one degree of Barbara separation. It was, I guess I told my daughter and she said she had actually seen that we had it because she peaks at our work sometimes. I did find my photographs and one that I can pass around is, I don't know who can see it so send it but it's three jars ones from pools filled to her from Rockville, and it's soiled from the area where these lynchings were they and, and then this. Yeah, read the sign. The sign is from Brian Stevenson who is. He is the director of the equal justice Institute he was the movie that just mercy. Jordan this. So he's an attorney in Montgomery. He's been on death row wrong commitment. He's quoted heroes reconciliation with a difficult past cannot be achieved without truth believe that public history and finding a way forward as thoughtful and responsible. And I thought in conjunction with you put you said john that they really looking at Vermont. And what occurred here. And, and you know that that's the piece that brings it to a focus as Lisa was saying having a somehow pulling a focus and obviously that's still a very broad focus maybe that needs to be further but but that it is that Vermont. What did what did Vermont do or not do what did we permit to happen. And so there's other, but that was the only one I downloaded. But it was it was two glass case you know you walk in a library and you got those cases. They had done this display and I think they're doing them in all of the county live all the libraries that. And is it one batch of soil per lynching. Yes, and that has the person's name on it and the date of the lynching. So it's, and obviously it's current day soil so right, but, but it is that, and they also collected and sent to. There's a display where I think all of them are for the whole project. And so, because these three they're, they're where they were there in the communities where they were here to it. And there's also a collection somewhere of all of the lynchings, and they had similar jars that have been sent for that. So simplistic in a way but it's very moving and very connected. I think that's part of my issue with the broadness of this first of all I really did think Tommy that we were going to be addressing the eugenics apology with this legislation. So I guess I was mistaken from the get go, and with respect to the broadness of all of this. I, I feel like we need to identify what we're trying to solve what we're trying to make better, not what we're trying to solve but what we're trying to make better, what harm that happened that we are trying to make better by this by establishing the reconciliation committee because I think you need to know the harm before you convene a committee to study the effects of whatever that misdeed was or misdeeds. And I don't feel like we have identified that. That's it's an interesting point. I mean I think we don't know that that's the point so we don't know the car. We know that people feel that harm was committed we know that I was, I was visiting with him today. And the picture we gave him to commemorate when we rewrote the alcohol lines. And the book was from the 20s, or maybe the 30s. It was just a Xerox of that. And his comment was along the lines of, you know, things that you see when you go back and look and hold statute. You know that is the system that we lived in the things that we did that we put down on paper. I think the goal of this is to not know what the harm is. We need to have the folks feel like they can tell us and literally really again. I mean we've heard a limited number regarding eugenics but in terms of the larger history or the larger feelings of feelings of discrimination of bothering. That's what this is. This is trying not to prescribe what the end game is supposed to be. We're not used to that as legislators we're used to having. We want, we want to do legislation that has a definitive outcome. And I'm not sure this is in that category. It's just my personal thoughts on it. Yeah, it is like, we're trying to create a container, right? That is safe and supported within which people can do this work as they essentially define it. And the scary thing I think for a legislature is that it's iterative. It has its own kind of, you know, hopefully it will learn as it goes along. Things that will somewhat shift direction or require more. I guess I just, I, I haven't ever thought about this. Legislature, a legislator's terms in that, like, you know, I'm comfortable. When I was running a nonprofit, allowing things to be iterative, we had strategic goals and all that but, but, but here we like to, we like to nail everything down, you know, and we like to be able to anticipate every situation. And, and I think that this kind of a process just, it, it defies that or, or if you, if you stick to a, we will make a great mistake. I think if we try to spell everything out, you know, it's, it's not really fully ours to spell out. It's not really ours to support and provide an established an interest in, but anyway, it's unusual, it is, it is different. Just in response to you representative. Yeah, so that's, that's my biggest problem is I like concrete. So it is really hard for me to have a big broad open ended piece of legislation to write because I mean yes we have identified certain harms that have been done, but we're not targeting those harms and I think that's where I've gone off the rails with this. Because it's too open ended for me it's too broad I can't. I don't know how to write that type of legislation. So, that's, that's me. I'm sorry to defend our other bill. Bring our bill home. If I'm not that in a reasonable amount of time, do you want to take the vote without me on 244. It's not even open. Come back here and, and I will, I can, I can send Karen down to like post her head and just go. We'll see you. I'll be here. Representative Trump. So one of the things that I recall from ICJ and from Chief Joseph and his daughter were consistent message that you need to identify that harm was done. I think we've done that. I think we've done that in a big way. I think the time we spent researching eugenics apology last year was just a total eye opener or it should have been to everyone on the committee. As far as that we that the state of Vermont had done such a gastronomy. I think to extend on what the chair said, I think that we need to be told what that harm was, because as outsiders, we cannot identify what happens. I mean, the piece that I remember is she is Don Stevens coming in and talking about an elderly woman in his community that still won't leave her house at 90 years old. I mean, how is that what how can you live that way. And the reason she didn't is because she was in fear that someone would come and do something to her. Now that fear is just unimaginable to all of us. And it's so we need to be told, we need to be told these stories we need to be told how this has impacted the lives of the people. And that being said, I do think that the state, the number of stakeholders is unwieldy. You know, I've spoken numerous times in this, in this body about study committees and various committees that are just too large. So, you know, I think a little work should be done on that as far as seeing if we can whittle it down. And, and going to the fears that were the concerns that I see TJ as far as keeping or the stakeholders being in some sort of some position of power over the committee and the possibility of intimidation and and steering things within the committee is probably not a fair way to go as far as I can see. So the interview that we had with Chief Joseph's daughter Karen, as well, just the idea of, you know, her admonition to us, you know, just acknowledging, you know, to represent a Pango's point. It's not. Susan Aronaut, but she said her vision would be to have county by county or section by section. They're all passed and present legislators sit and listen, which is possible. Right. It could be possible to have that other destruction is what I see. But it's just, yeah, I'm sorry, go ahead. I would say, I, I, what, what Chip representative Trayana said about, you know, we, we heard the harm in conjunction with eugenics work we did and I think that's the piece that Lisa was putting on the table that that's the connection we had and again back to John that that that's the harm that's the point of the Vermont piece that we've seen not to say that's the only harm Vermont is done or, or, you know, piece but that was kind of the vocal piece. And I think that's where this is trying to do so much more and for good or bad I'm not saying but but that's the difference like you were saying this is a natural what it is but again you tied it to the eugenics work we did. That's that harm point and that's very different from what this has become. This is much bigger than that. Well, it expands on it to a point where we learned so much more during that eugenics apology as to the expanse of what the, these things were in Vermont had I mean, we didn't expand on it. We didn't expand it as far as taking children out of the home because it was determined that that it was an unsanitary condition and putting them in Brandon training school. You know, you know, to the eugenics moment though that's still the 1930 1920 and, and that's what I'm saying that that's narrower than what this is. Well, I mean we heard about apartheid I mean how how broad was that trying to reconcile apartheid. Right, but that's, that's not the moment. Well, it's not in South Africa but it certainly has an impact on what you know I heard from my CTJ. Of course of course I mean that's the work they do is is so much broader but when we're looking at our piece. I mean again going back to the Maryland where it was a very specific action, not even really. You know it was very narrow and they were, they in some ways it was concerned that it was too narrow that it didn't allow. And so I think there is a. And we also heard from the main commission, right, that said, we started with the schools, right, and it went this way, right, you know, so again, we're all unique. Yeah, shape or form to represent. Well, yeah, I was just going to say, you know, I. And in many of the discussions we've had. I mean, why were these groups of people focus of eugenics. Because we thought of these groups of people as lesser human beings, and that has, and that has a history. We could isolate genics, but many of the indigenous people who have talked to us have also talked about, you know, their connection to the land and what it has meant for for them not to have that same connection. It's not just about ownership, it's about like this Western notion of ownership, right. And, and stewardship so so I don't know how you talk about something about it. I think that it ends up being a broader discussion, because it has deep roots. And, and I, I guess we would have to trust commissioners and committees to decide just how broad and deep to go. Right because we're the engineers like we're creating the tool, creating the process of all of this stuff that we want. And we think that we should hear about. We're not going to be privy to that at first that's that's the work of the commission. It's our. I mean, represent moving on we're on a short phone call with it yesterday and one of the comments that they made was that it felt like we were already starting the commission's work by allowing the conversations that we were hearing from. And they mentioned Susan in particular just about her thoughts about how it should be handled and, and that's different than what we're trying to do, which is to create the process where that can happen. And that's, again, it's a little it is a little scary, you know, I don't think it's not scary. I worry more about how do we make people to listen to what we're trying to do. And the reasons why we're trying to do it. What's that about the lynching conversation, which was that the last known lynching in Maryland was 33. You know, like, well, in the time frame, you know, we passed bill in 1931. You know, about it about each other. So the time thing is really interesting. The broadness of it is. And I can make conjecture about what people are going to find record keeping in Vermont was pretty pathetic between 1793 and whatever, you know, and. But just interesting to see how that. Yeah, we're, we're, we are doing something that we haven't really done before. So, represent a blackie. Well, I, we have we certainly did learn, I do a lot. But I think there's so much more to learn different communities. And, like all of us, we exist in many communities. Three years ago when we had a disability awareness day here, people in wheelchairs were told they couldn't come into the well of the house. It was like, how can we have a disability where to say literally outside in the hall. And it was like, no, this can't be. And, you know, just because people didn't know. Right. They didn't know. So, I had to scramble around to different people. And of course people were invited. But can you imagine coming here. Just they were in a state and wheelchair and be told to sit in the hall. It's happened two years ago, pre covid. Okay. And I now sit on the prevention discrimination prevention panel. And so one thing we did, we just invited people to work in the disability world. Just give us your perceptions of what it's like to come into the state house. And they said it's not our house. We all call it the people's house. How can we come in. And when we come in, we're told we can only have five minutes. And if you're in a wheelchair, a wheelchair could not get in this room. So, so if we really mean this, we'd have to go to a different room. And we can invite people in. Okay. And, you know, we heard today that we're going to address this subtitling thing. It's like you're on acid reading those lines of what we're saying. It's incomprehensible. And people have been bragging about how transparent we are and how much more open we are. And it's like to who. And on Thursday. Last week. I went and asked for an ADA accommodation for Friday. Because there was going to be five inches of snow. And I couldn't take my role to do the five inches of snow. And I said, no, it's not part of the resolution. So I sat there on Friday. I wanted to be, I had never missed a boat. I did not vote on Friday, but I sat on the screen. Every time someone said it's so great to be in the people's house. I remembered someone saying, who's people house are we talking about? I'm sitting here. Not able to vote. Because I can't walk through five inches of snow. And so I think it's essential that the openness of this. Because. We're all not dissimilar. We're all pretty similar. And even with our disparate life experiences. There's a certain thing here. And we're not reality. We're not the lived experiences of all these people, especially people who are invisible. People who are marginalized, who've never given a voice. And so I think this process allows us to build from eugenics. And hear about systemic harms. And, you know, in a 96% white universe, it's hard to understand systemic racism. And so we have to understand it, but not from our perspective. We have to understand the impact of community. So, you know, I think. You know, this institution has to learn a lot about disability. As I'm learning every day myself, but it's like, so this is going to benefit all of us. And this cannot be a top-down thing that all of us understand, because the people houses a construct for us. Not from communities that we don't let in here. So, you know, I just think that this process I really like. And we're going to learn things that we don't already know. So I have, you know, we're like a border collar. I want to get things right focus, but I think it's been great that this has taken as much time. But we have to learn from those, not us. Personally. Was not aware of all the difficulties. People with disabilities had until my husband had to use a wheelchair. And then you realize the sidewalks. Trying to find a way to get into a building. And then it was like, you know what, we're going in a lesion because they are certainly more tolerable. And, you know, not like, oh, it's like, and have to have somebody posted outside the door saying, Oh, my mother's in there with my dad. So I think, you know, unless you live it unless you are in it, you don't, you just, you know, you just don't realize. Well, in any community, I mean, that's, yes. True. True. Yeah. In the disability community, we say that those of you are temporarily able. So what are you looking for, Tom? Yes. What do you hope that we do next year? Your next on the bill. Yes. Yes. It's sort of, I had that too. It's like, what, what is building it now? So tomorrow. Damian, he's there listening, not that we're talking about specific policy changes, but. And I shared. My thoughts on what I've heard. So what are you looking for, Tom? Yes. What do you hope that we do next year? Your next on the bill. Yes. Yes. It's sort of right. That too. It's like, what, what is building it now? So tomorrow. We're going to review the draft. And we're just going to put our heads down and engineer. Do the best we can. To bring. Bringing the next version forward. That addresses some of the concerns. Right. Including the. Including the stakeholder issue. It's not, not done, but. Tomorrow's going to be. We're going to review the draft. And we're just going to put our heads down and engineer. To the best we can to like. Make sure that everything that we've talked about for the last two months on this bill that we. Kind of put our blinders on and say, what do we think works best? There's not. There's going to be questions. There's going to be arguments. There's going to be pressure to get it done by, you know. We should all be well hydrated. And, you know, We should all be well hydrated. Make sure we have. Take our breaks. All day. Or all morning and then after lunch. So. Keep it in the spirit of again, I appreciate that there are going to be differences. On this. I also appreciate it's not comfortable. Doing something that. We're going to start tomorrow morning and. Work our way through the bill and see what. Together, which. Two terribly different from. There are some radical changes in terms of the beginning of the bill. In terms of trying to deal with based on some of the stuff that I see TJ recommended. And some questions that still have to be answered, but. Yeah. So here you go. See what he shows up with. And so we're talking tomorrow, the 3.1. I believe it'll be a 4.1. Okay. So we're 3.2. It's more than the 3.2. It'll be a 4. It'll be a 4. Okay. Yeah, I started doing some work when I finally did open my computer on 2.1 and I'm going, God, I thought we changed this already. We did. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Let's. Finish with 96. Thank you, everybody. That was the, that was the conversation. I appreciate taking the time to just sort of.