 We are being recorded by Amherst Media. Very briefly, I want to express again my gratitude to my co- I'm sorry. Oh, that's for something else. Thank you, Pat. I just want to express my gratitude to all of you for the hard work. We did get liaisons and committee restructuring through the council. Now what we have to do is find some people who are willing to serve as liaisons and serve at the new committee. But I'm very grateful, particularly to have them for all the hard work. I want to go quickly through the agenda. Item number two, I'm going to start right away. With finance, you have an item in your packet that you should dig out, which is from the finance committee. You also have our voted finance charge in the packet. But you want to look at the finance charge revised by finance. So if you want to open that item, it's in SharePoint. Yeah. It's right above the finance draft charge. And I got that last night, and I put it in this morning. And we have the chair of finance here, and we're going to turn to that in just a second. Then what I'd like to do is go to the Tibet resolution. So that is something that came unanticipated. So item three will be Tibet. Then item four will be to look at bylaw 2.2. Item five will be discussed at rule 8.4, which is what it is on the agenda. And then six, I want to look at council rules of procedure 10.8. And then seven will be the roll of councillors. So I'm slightly reordering it, but I want to start with finance. But I believe we have something else. Mandy, you have something from CRC? Yes. That's items unanticipated. It's a resolution adopting and number... It's a resolution adopting an interim housing policy that CRC voted to recommend to the council today. And is there a timeline on that? Not... And CRC would love to be able to bring it at the next council meeting, but if we don't have time today in GOL, it can wait. But it shouldn't take too much time to review. All right. So I will add that to the list. Okay, so if we're ready, we're going to turn to finance. And I want to give everyone a moment to look at the document. So this is the finance charge revised by finance. You have the chair of finance here when we're ready. First item, you want to work through these... I think that makes sense to me. I just wanted everyone to have a chance to at least look at it. Are you ready to start from the top? Or do you want some more time to look? You're okay? Okay. So, Andy, if you want to come forward, if you would be kind enough, if many members have questions, or if you'd like to add anything to the mix, we're going to go through this change by change. Nandy, would you just explain this document, I believe is the result of discussions of the finance committee yesterday? Yes, it is. I'll be really brief on that because I just respond to questions about specific sections as you go through it. But the process, which anybody can get to on Samuris Media, which actually does broadcast it by having somebody here, so it should be up fairly quickly. We had a fairly substantial discussion of it. If you watch the meeting, then you'll understand that a lot of the amendments were proposed by committee member Shane, and there was discussion and revision of some of what she had proposed that we think about, and she was addressing one area of concern that I had had, so I didn't even take my one area of concern separately, and we just had the discussion with hers. The version that she has, if you follow it through, is the result of the committee discussion that she tried to do that very quickly so that we could get it to you. And the only thing that then I added after having reviewed my notes to make sure that I thought that she had it right, which she did, was that the comment box at the top, we agreed that we would raise that issue and that we would forward our thinking about that to you for consideration, but we didn't make a proposed change on it, and that was how the motion read at the finance committee meeting. Does everyone see the comment box? I didn't. I had to open it. Pat, you see it. It's a comment about how long-term it should be. We're not going to discuss it, but that's... So, I do the first suggestion under purpose, first change. Are we not going to discuss the... I mean, they didn't recommend changing it, but should we discuss... They recommended we discuss it. All right. I don't... I just want to say I don't want to change it, because then it would put finance committee different than all of our other town committees that are one year, and it would put the president appointing a two-year term, even though the president only has a one-year term and the president's in charge of appointments. And so, if a new president comes in in the middle of the council term, they could just rescind those two years. It just seems weird. Any other thoughts, Pat? Well, Mary Lou was really concerned about the complexity of municipal finances and the work connected with it, but I agree that we don't need to shift it to three years or... Just speaking for Mary Lou for a second, if I may. Having both of us were chairs of, at one point or another, of the old finance committee, and finance committee terms were three years, and what all of us who had been chairs over the years found was that it took a year for people to go through a cycle of the budget to really understand how the budget process works and how municipal finance law works and how it relates to the complex issues that you're dealing with. And so, when I used to talk to people who were considering coming onto the committee at that time, I would say to them, if you can't commit to the three-year term, you need to say so and let the moderator know that because it is really important and I explained it. I think that Mary Lou did the same thing. And so, when she raised it, I understood it. The reason that it didn't get into an actual recommendation was because those of us who were council members of the committee were recognizing the issues that Mandy just brought forward. And so, that's why it is treated a little bit differently than the other recommendation. I agree with Mandy, Joe. I think, one, it complicates the idea that these are presidential appointments, which is separate than the non-voting resident members. And I think it also, in some way, sets finance apart from the other council committees. And I think there's been a lot of feelings on the council that I took issue when we discussed the restructuring about a month ago when one of our colleagues said that they wanted to make sure that counselors get to serve on key committees. And there was this idea that there are key committees and there are not key committees. And I think that's something we need to move away from. And I think this would be something that makes finance feel special from other committees. And that would be unfortunate, especially for those members of the council who are not serving on finance. Okay, no further comments? Under purpose, Andy, any thoughts? I don't exactly know what this one's trying to do. I guess that's my confusion. Consider any or all questions which it deems appropriate for the purpose of considering the budget, not which the council deems appropriate. So I guess I'd love an explanation as to what the thinking behind this sentence is in terms of why the original sentence advised the council on all town financial matters isn't comprehensive and sufficient. Yeah, I mean, I think that it did to go back to first of all, what does 5.5B say? And it says exactly that. So I think that ultimately it was sort of feeling, well, if the charter, and this came actually from resident, non-voting members of the committee were driving that point more strongly than the committee members who were voting members. And but that first part of the discussion that got us down to all of these amendments was really consensus driven. And so all members of the committee were really participating as a whole in the drafting. And so I think one of the members was just saying, well, if it's in the charter, why aren't we putting it in the charge? And I think that drove the discussion. I mean, I guess I feel like because it is in the charter, it's not needed. Good point. So on its face, that sentence makes me uncomfortable for a lot of the reasons I've expressed in the past. And if it was not in the charter, I would probably argue against it. But since it's literally the first sentence of the charter's description of the finance committee, and since that sentence in the charter seems to try to define the literal purpose of the finance committee, I would actually take the opposite approach of Pat, which would just say, put it in there because that's literally the purpose of the finance committee as articulated by the charter. I just went back and read the charter because it does quote it directly. Should it be in the purpose or should it be as part of the charge under budgets is one of my next questions. Like it seems to limit the advice the town council on all financial matters. It seems to limit that versus just if we're gonna quote the charter, could we just put it in the charge? As a bullet point of consider any and all questions, which it deems appropriate for the purpose of considering the budget and then reference charter section 5.5B specifically. Right, I'd say that makes sense to me. I appreciate the addition. It'd be nice to give the non-voting members a sense that their contributions have impact. And it's a sensible, yeah, and it makes sense. And I agree with Evan that if it's in the charter there's no reason why it can't be here. And I agree with Mandy that if you move it it seems more probed under budget. So it gets put in, but it gets put in. Yeah, I would, I put it as the second bullet point right under review and make recommendations on the budget. Good, good. Consensus, did that change? We're willing to accept it and just move it. It seems sensible to me. Next item, highlighted upon referral from the council. Bullet, I'm sorry, oh, I'm sorry, finances, yes. Sorry about that. Under the charge, finance shall. Budgets, finances, and appropriations. Thoughts on this? No thoughts, let it stand. Fine, good. Next, now upon referral from the council. Review, water, sewer, and other municipal utility rates and make recommendations to the council that strikes hold hearings. Andy? The reason that Kathy proposed hearings, but then we very quickly came to the conclusion in reading the charter that the hearing process belongs to the council and not to the committee and that therefore that piece of the original recommendation got struck by the finance committee in its discussion. I think we're having this anyway a little bit because we're trying to understand and get a presentation from finance as to how the water rates are calculated and how the long-term planning of the department, DPW and its water division, for example, on water rates reflects and that we feel that the finance committee really ought to have a better understanding of that on behalf of the council. So we're kind of doing it and I think she was just kind of saying, well, if we're gonna do it, maybe we should just be clear in the charge. Evan? Content-wise, no. My only, from a consistency perspective, all of our bullets start review and make recommendations, review and make recommendations. This is saying the same thing, but it's just structured differently. Would it make sense to say review and make recommendations? Upon referral from the council, upon referral from the water. Just from a consistency perspective. Right, I agree, thank you. Any issues with content? I'm okay with removing the hearings, yeah. Next item, bullet point. So I don't like the removal of upon referral from the council. This is the one we discussed in extensively last meeting. Right. I guess the feeling in the committee-wise is that if something comes forward and has a substantial, and people perceive that there's a budget consequence, that the committee ought to just say it and to go through a process of saying to the council, we see this issue and it ought to be referred to seems like an awfully complex process. I don't think it's gonna arise that frequently, but when it does, it just didn't seem that it would, it added complexity where complexity is not needed. So we just passed a number of charges yesterday that added upon referral because the council didn't want things going automatically to certain committees or being considered by certain committees automatically. And so to treat finance any differently to say, oh, something that maybe the council's not sure of to allow finance to get it automatically without that discussion to quote, avoid complexity when every other committee technically has to go through that complexity. Again, concerns me about treating finance differently than the other committees. So I'm gonna venture out of my role as chair in presenting what that's discussed yesterday and because I actually did think about the point that Nandy just made, and I think that the problem comes into the words, make recommendations and we never really got a firm discussion of that piece of it because it wasn't the question of saying you should make recommendations, but you should perform a financial analysis of and report to the council on as opposed. Making recommendations is like saying you shouldn't pass it as opposed to you should consider, we identified some financial information and we think it ought to be considered, which was kind of a distinction. I don't think that the discussion yesterday got to. And so I've ventured beyond my role as representing what was happened yesterday with that additional comment. So to complicate this, because I would probably agree with what Nandy just said. However, we just added a bullet that says the finance committee shall consider any or all questions which it deems appropriate for the purpose of considering the budget. That could be construed a number of different ways. But to me, that's a very broad mandate to finance to consider literally anything if it thinks it will impact the budget. And the only reason we'd ever actually refer a proposed bylaw policy or measure to finance is if we think it would impact expenditures or revenues of our ability, which would affect the budget. And so I'm actually, and I'm willing to consider things but I'm actually wondering if this bullet act even necessary, because to some extent if we're saying part of finance is charged to consider any questions which it deems appropriate, which is a really huge broad thing which I'm uncomfortable with. But again, we can thank our charter commissioners for that. To some extent, this bullet is implied within that other bullet or it's inherent within it. And so I wonder if this bullet is even necessary unless we wanna specify that those questions also include and maybe we do, but I think it's worth considering that to some extent that which it deems appropriate pretty much says the council can refer but finance can take it up if it deems it appropriate with regardless or not regardless. So I'm curious to how to reconcile those. Nanny. So, yeah, blame the charter commission. You know, those nine crazy people. For the purpose of considering the budget. So when I read that bullet point in that language in the charter, I read it to mean you've got a budget in front of you and you now get to consider all questions that you deem appropriate for figuring out what to do with that budget and making the recommendations on that budget. Which to me is different from measures that we're considering throughout the year when a budget has already passed and is in effect or we don't have a future budget in front of us, you know, what those effects might be on revenues. Revenues, expenses and finances while they relate to budget don't always relate to a specific budget. So I actually do see them differently and I can make an argument that the bullet we just added is actually somewhat limited to when it's considering the budget, meaning the one in front of them may end June, not any budget. And so the bullet point to me is essentially any budget, any theoretical thing that I've always had concerns about which is why I was okay with adding a language upon referral. Maybe it's not make recommendations on the bylaws, maybe it's, you know, present analyses, I don't know, on the effect, you know, or maybe we need to change the word make recommendations. Although frankly if there's something in front of TSO or, you know, the town services committee on a budget or on a bylaw or the community resources committee on a bylaw, maybe we want finance to make a recommendation that says, you know, that is on the financial aspect of that bylaw and say, you know, we didn't just identify this, these are so severe, we don't think you should pass this bylaw versus just saying, well, here's the numbers. You know, you know, at the CRC meeting, a couple meetings ago, when we were talking about a process and do we make recommendations on things, there was a comment that said, well, maybe we shouldn't make recommendations because we need to consider all options and present all the options to the counselors and all. And one of the counselors said, no, we are a body that makes recommendations to the council on a proposal in front of us. We don't just show what the potential effects are, we say, and given that, we say yes or no. We recommend yes or no. So maybe the finance committee does need to be making a recommendation on a bylaw. If the council deems that bylaw potentially affecting revenues or expenses significantly enough to want that recommendation. But I think it still needs to be a council decision to say we want that recommendation. I'm finding myself leaning more towards giving committees greater leeway in a sense. So I'm personally not that concerned about that the council has to be making the decisions constantly about what finance should or should not be looking at. So I guess I need for my colleagues, I mean, we just created a new committee on Monday and then took out a bullet point that seemed to allow it to actually do its job. And I'm beginning to get the sense that we're too focused on making sure that the council is always aware of everything that's going on and making sure that every committee is doing exactly what the council wants it to do. I don't, that's not my personal approach. I trust that finance will do its job. I trust that GOL will do its job. I trust that TSO. And I want to hear what they're thinking. I want to hear the recommendations. It doesn't mean that I will agree with them. So it seems to me that, well, I guess I'm just speaking personally now that I would tend to defer to the judgment of the committee and also give deference to letting the committee do its job. And I know when I served in town meeting, I greatly valued the finance committee's recommendations and I always looked at those. And so in a sense, as the councilor now, I still have this attitude of looking to the finance committee to give us some sense of what's the financial impact of the things that we're considering. And the thought that we have to constantly, as a council, be referring these things to them before they can actually do anything, strikes me as not a very efficient or actually probably very fruitful process. So I guess maybe some of my colleagues need to help me understand why it's so important that the council be constantly making these referrals when we're talking about things that strike me as pretty much within the general responsibility or charge duty of the committee. Now, I would make the same argument for TSO, but that didn't fly. So can somebody help me here? I mean, I'm willing to let this stand as it is because I do want to hear what finance, what recommendations they want to make and I want to give them the leeway to look at things without having to worry about whether, oh, did we get referred to this or not? Now, Mike, is that opening up the Pandora's box? Is that the concern? I just, I'm trying to understand why this is such a big problem. Other than just the council always has to be in charge. Evan. So I'm finding myself not sure where I stand on this, but one other aspect I'm thinking of is some sense of clarity for the council and perhaps for sponsors about what's going on. So three members of this committee right now have bylaws or bylaw amendments that are sort of in play. None of those have been referred to finance. Even though you could argue they all have financial implications, right? I mean, non-criminal disposition certainly has a financial implication. My amendment to open containers could increase revenue stuporments and certainly the wage that bylaw will, could fairly dramatically impact the way we do procurement and finance. None of those have actually been sent to finance. And so I guess I'm curious, it would be weird for me if I had a bylaw amendment as I do on the table to find out after the fact that finance considered it and was gonna make a recommendation. And so, and maybe finance would let me know ahead of time and I hope they would. That would be a common courtesy. But I'm wondering if that plays into it at all and that if it's not referred to finance, if that's not a decision then will people know that finance is actually considering it? Because if finance was going to consider, say, the non-criminal disposition bylaw amendment, I imagine Mandy would want to be there. So I assume they would reach out and say, hey, just FYI, but I'm wondering if there's value in just having that clarity and that public statement of, okay, now finance will consider this. Or if it's just something that we can trust that finance, which is full of good people would be communicative about that. And I'm throwing that out as a question because I don't actually know. Mandy. So yeah, I think the communication helps, it helps the public too, right? Because they don't necessarily know the rules of what automatically goes when it automatically goes or see any of that. Whereas if it's on an agenda with a specific motion, it's more public for what they might want to follow. I think, so I still want the referral. I wonder if we can, as a GOL body, as we try to consent agenda last Monday, potentially discuss with the president ways to streamline agendas for things like referrals of bylaws, because we didn't really have a lot of discussion on the wage theft at this time. It was a referral. So could that have frankly been on a consent agenda for, oh, consent, this is here it is, to give the council the information to put it out there in writing to do all of that. But then pass it on on a consent agenda, pass these sort of initial referrals, just throw them onto the consent agenda and say, here's where things are going. And that doesn't add a lot of time, but provides that notice. So I guess I'm still for keeping it in there despite George, your argument makes a lot of sense because I've been there, but I don't feel this council's ready for that, given what we saw Monday night also. Well, it seems to me the council or members of the council are selectively for against this. And I feel like I agree with George that committees should be able to investigate issues that are coming up. I do think those things should be communicated to the council. So I feel torn. So maybe there is a compromise in the sense that, say, finance sees some things that wants to look at, you would notify the president to put these on the consent agenda. And the thought would be that that's a way of notifying everyone that they're looking at something. And hopefully it would not take up lots of council time discussing it. And if someone really didn't like it, they could just have it removed. Andy, would that, do you think that that might be a compromise and where you would still have, I think, hopefully the freedom to look at kinds of things you want to look at, but it would require the step of notifying the president and having it put on the consent agenda. Or would you feel like that still kind of hamstrings you where if you just want to look at something and understand this, you see something you think, let's take a look at it. Somebody says, oh no, we can't do that until we consult the council and they refer it to us. So I'm not sure if this would make it any quicker or easier, but that's one possibility. It's a difficult question. Is that trying to think of it in practical terms as Evan was when you get into the question of, paying prevailing wage on town contracts, which is really where he started from with those revisions. That has financial consequence for the town. I don't think anybody really questions that, so I'm not sure, because we already are doing it. So it's not like it's a change. But if that was the kind of issue that's coming up, there's really various levels of things. You can't stop somebody from thinking about it. It could come up and somebody raising it and getting some discussion at the finance committee meeting anyway before the chair says, oh wait a minute, we haven't been given the authority to talk about that. So some of that process is gonna happen anyway. I think you really do need to get into the questions of are we talking about analysis to get understanding of the financial impact or are we talking about making recommendations which really are two different things which is what I was trying to point out and then you get to the question of, do you have notice to the council that you're doing it? Do you have notice or can you know how far do you go down that path? So there, it's a lot more complex issue than I think we've all had started with. Sorry about this, but take this wage that, it couldn't go to TSO automatically. It had to come to the council for a referral because of how things are written. So what's the harm in including in that motion if people want finance, making the referral to both TSO and finance? It adds no time to the council that's already there. I guess I just don't see the harm in requiring it to have that referral unless this committee is going to make a recommendation that none of them require a referral and they kind of automatically all go to the appropriate spot with notice to the council at some point. I'm not sure that recommendation would fly in this council at all on a blanket level so I don't understand when we're dealing with bylaws why the finance committee would get special treatment when the motion's already sitting in front of the council. I think that the counter to that is because of the charter. The charter says that if it could have a council, if it could have an impact on the budget, the charter makes it. For the purpose of considering the budget, not impact on any budget. It's for the purpose of considering the budget. A bylaw is not, considering a recommendation on impacts is not necessarily for the purpose of considering the budget. Are people happy with, can they accept the wording so that clearly finances work hard to come up with some wording here? And you have two bullet points. I think where we have a different differences about upon referral to the council. And what I'm hearing from Mandy if I understand it is that she would prefer that both these bullet points have upon referral from the council attached to them. And finance has asked that they not do that. And we have some different opinions here on this body. I'm not, you know, wedded to one of you or the other but we need to move ahead. I'm wondering if you're okay with at least the language and we could either insert upon referral and with the note that this is obviously council's gonna have to decide or we could just leave it out. So I hadn't even gotten to the second bullet point yet. The first one, the language is exactly despite all the crossouts and all the language is the same that we had proposed except deleting upon referral from the council. Thank you. I don't know why it was shown fully crossed out and retyped but it's the exact same language that was already there. So the other question is do we want to reinsert it or do we want the bullet point make recommendations on proposed bylaws including revisions, et cetera, et cetera. Mandy points out it is the exact language that we had but took away upon referral from the council. And the question for us is obviously the language we have no problem with but do we want to accept the deletion is basically what's being asked. I pretty clearly, Mandy does not. I'm somewhat. I hear the argument that with the body but we could leave it in and then leave it up to the council to decide or we could leave it out and let the, I know, I know. How do, any thoughts here? We're trying to be, I think part of what we're trying to do is be collegial and we appreciate the input and if we do decide to keep it in obviously it's for good reason but there's also reasons to take it out. Perhaps we as a body, since we put it in the first time and I'm not hearing strong argument to take it out we're just going to leave it in and then finance can raise that or anyone can raise it at the council meeting if they so choose. Because otherwise we're adopting the finance perspective and it doesn't seem like we have consensus here on that and I'm not quite sure myself where I stand. So I'm gonna suggest that that bullet point we're gonna leave it as it is but we're gonna reinsert upon referral from the council. One place where we did not agree or we chose to not accept, okay? How about the next bullet point? Consider and make recommendations. I think we don't want to insert on. Want to insert the word ON. All other financial measures related to the financial health of the town of Amherst including sources and or potential sources of revenues and the town debt capacity. Can we get an explanation from the chair of finance committee on this one? Yes, sirs. And just my device froze having a problem with that. Let's see if we can get it back. But anyway, go ahead, ask the question. So I just want to understand where this language came from, what the purpose of the language is and why the finance committee believes it's necessary and not included anywhere else. I'm sorry. To piggyback onto that, I'm not quite sure how this bullet, all other financial measures is different from the previous bullet which says bylaws, policies or other measures. I don't understand what the meaningful difference is between these two bullets. Let me get back to my where I was. So shall we just read the bullet for you? Would that help? See if I can reopen it and see if, go ahead to that while I try. Consider and make recommendations on all other financial measures related to the financial health of, I guess the town of Amherst, including sources and or potential sources of revenues and the town debt capacity. And the question is how is this different from what we, the previous bullet point, why is it being added? I think that Rich was, Shane was here to, she was the one who was sponsoring that discussion. So, I got it now. So we're back down to which bullet are we at in number or in the second of the last? Yeah, so the question is, isn't it redundant of what's proposed in the prior one? Both of them in it. So the suggestion is to simply delete the next to last bullet point as redundant. And it was met anyway as an alternative to what we've just accepted. That's the other history now. So she took, that doesn't mean. No, it's just the, so she apparently did intend it to say something in addition or further than the bullet point above. Well, we're having, we're trying to, I mean, she must have had something in mind. Yeah, I don't think that we got into that one deeply enough that I could really offer anything. I think that financial health of the town is really where the additional language is. And that's sort of implicit in the discussion that you're gonna have all the way through that. The word financial in front of measures, I guess is one of the things that's throwing me off is was there a feeling that all this other stuff doesn't include potential financial measures like budget, capital inventory, capital improvement plan, purchase sale, leasing of land, borrowing debt, all of that. I can't think of any other financial measures, frankly, beyond all of that stuff. Was there a concern that we missed something in everything else that might be a financial measure? Cause it's not any measure. It's got that, yeah. Well, we really need to move along. Yeah, I'm sorry, but. Why don't you, as you did with the other one, you can consider eliminating this for the time being. And if a member of the finance committee wishes to propose a change and articulate a change at the council meeting, let that happen. But I do see the point that there's some redundancy. We just need, okay. So the consent seems to be we're going to eliminate that bullet point, the final bullet point, hold public hearing related to the budget is required. It's fine. Okay, so we have gone through all the items. We have, we recap quickly. We have, so go ahead. So it's part of the sentence. Oh, yeah. So is there a motion? So the motion would be to recommend, we're not relating, we're just recommending this document. We have our current recommendation now. Do we need to rescind that former recommendation? Or does, if we just recommend this, does that essentially? Cause we voted one already. So I move to rescind GOL's previous recommendation on the finance committee charge and recommend the town council adopt the finance committee charge labeled finance charge revised by finance committee 225, 2020 as amended. Is there a second? Any further discussion? Let me call the question. All those in favor of the motion signify by raising your hand and saying aye. Aye. And that's four, zero with one absent. Thank you, Andy. Thank you. And if you could please just send me a copy of the amended version, I will forward it back to the finance committee and we can then get it onto the next council agenda. Thank you. Next item on our agenda, moving right along is Tibet. And in your bracket is a, the Tibet resolution, but more valuable is a amended version or an edited version by Andy. So if you can pull that up, which I just didn't do through this. So Mandy has looked at this and has made some suggestions. This is a more elaborate version than previous years. It is the first time I believe that this committee has actually looked at it. I think last time it was done without R and R. It's my recollection. So now we actually get to have a say. Do you wanna go through it whereas by whereas? How do you wanna proceed? Evan? Yeah, so given that we spent much longer than I think we anticipated to on the finance, I'd rather not do the whereases. I did have two questions about this. And so the first one is we usually put the actual date of the, like the time, like please join us at such and such a time on this date for the flag racing, which isn't in here. And I was wondering if it's just not scheduled or? It might not be, we might not know the time yet. Just the second thing. So it's something that will have to be added later, which I think is usually what happens. And then the second question was the clause proclaim each March 10th as to bet day. Is that intended to make it each March 10th? Does that make it so that we don't have to pass this resolution every year? Is that the intent? Because in perpetuity, March 10th will be to bet day? Last year's resolution said the same thing, but they like one being passed every year. It brings up my question, which was once we're through these yearly ones, once, can we just like have a rule that says if all you're doing is updating the date, it doesn't have to come to us. It goes back to another agenda item on this, but like. I'm going to move things along, sure. On a yearly one, I feel like we shouldn't have to pass it, pass it, but a sponsor should be able to change it and then have it come to us. I'm thinking if they don't change it and all that's being changed is dates. So we have in front of us the resolution. We have the changes proposed. The issue of the date of the actual flag raising will have to be added later if it can be. It is March 10th, we just don't know the time. So it's the time that's uncertain on March 10th. We could actually insert that and with just the time left blank, otherwise. So you would want to make a further change, which is what's the usual wording? We, the Amherstown Council, invite the citizens of Amherst to join us on March 10th at blank time to hoist the Tibetan national flag. So the separate sentence or do you want to try to incorporate it in the very last sentence? We're recognizing this proclamation by hoisting the flag to help cultivate comment you could say and we invite the citizens of Amherst to join us on that day at blank time. Begin with the, so the Black History Month one was beginning with a flag raising ceremony to be held in front of Town Hall on Saturday, February 1st, 2020 at blank. It could be further instead of the and, just further recognize this proclamation by hoisting blah, blah, blah from March 10th to March 20th, comma, you know, awareness for all residents in Amherst, comma, beginning a flag raising ceremony to be held in front of Town Hall on March 10th, 2020 at blank. Yes, just the last bit. So that therefore would be we the Town Council of Town have Amherst and the Commonwealth recognize the local Tibetan communities plea for justice, blah, blah, blah, comma, continue to proclaim each March 10 as Tibet Day, proclaim the year 2020 as the thank you Dalai Lama year and further recognize this proclamation by hoisting the Tibetan national flag from March 10th to March 2020 to help cultivate awareness for all residents of Amherst, comma, beginning with a flag raising ceremony to be held in front of Town Hall on March 20th, March 10th, 2020 at. We're ready for a motion. Sorry. I move to declare the 2020 Tibet Day and thank you Dalai Lama 2020 proclamation or Dalai Lama year. It actually should, I thought I was saying insert year. Okay, I'm gonna start that over. I move to declare the 2020 Tibet Day and thank you Dalai Lama year proclamation as amended, clear, consistent and actionable. By raising your hand saying aye. Aye. And so that is four, that's four zero with one absent. Want to go now to, and here I'm willing to take suggestions but I was going to move to bylaw 2.2. We also have rule 8.4. Any preference in terms of difficulty, complexity or another, so I was going to move now to bylaw 2.2, non-criminal enforcement of rules and regulations. Okay, all right, let's go there. And I'm going to turn to Mandy to lead this discussion. So as I said at the meeting where I proposed this, I am proposing a bylaw amendment to section 2.2 B and then C so that the council does not need to approve every regulation of the Board of Health or the Board of Licensed Commissioners in order for them to enforce them non-criminally. This language as set forth in the memo is generally consistent with various languages in other cities that do this so that it's just automatic. You'll see an example of one from the city of Waltham in the memo itself. So that basically the biggest change is to delete the provided that the town council shall first approve that language. In doing that, I had to change a little bit of some of the stuff because I added MGL reference and stuff and the reason for this change in C is because I felt if we did the change in B, C only talked about the data block identifying it and that was specific to bylaws and regulations might not have them. So I just added the bylaw data block to refer to the bylaws that use that and then rule or regulation itself because they have to be specific so I just tried to clarify where things would be identified for who the enforcing person is that it could be identified directly in the regulation that it's no longer just in the data block. I don't know what this committee feels. It's obviously in front of us for clarity, consistency and action ability, but given our charge, it's possible that this committee could also consider it and believe that it is possible to consider it on making a recommendation on the substance of it too, which I would personally support, but the committee's decision on making that recommendation or not. Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because I was gonna ask you a question. Are we declaring or recommending because we do have some expanded authority now as of Monday? So the obvious first question is did this go through or do we feel like it needs town attorney review? I can weigh in there for just a quick moment because I was reaching out to Paul on another bylaw which has not yet had legal review. That's item six on our agenda. The town manager's comment was for what's worth is he felt that all amendments and all bylaws should be given legal review. That's just his view, but that was his comment. I didn't solicit it, but he actually, actually in a way I did. I had raised, I just pointed out to him and said we were struggling with this and he offered the thought that he thought that all, he's one case I think where something has been, comes from another town or city, and it's been on the books for whatever. I just wanna answer Evan's question. It has not been, this version has not and language has not been to the town attorney for review. I did speak to the town attorney at the MMA conference about this and she was like, well you just do it in your bylaws and I said, but our bylaws say, provided that the town council approve and she's like, well just delete it. You know, she's like, you can delete that and then you know, but the town attorney has not seen this specific language, but she did confirm to me that it would be possible to, if you removed that language from the bylaw, that it would be that that was one way of automatically having regulations be non-crimitally enforced once adopted, but she has not seen this specific language, but she did confirm that it was doable. We have an issue A of whether this needs to be sent for legal review. We have a question of whether we want to make a recommendation beyond simply declaring a clear, consistent act, so I need some thoughts on are we comfortable with offering a recommendation and if so, what's our rationale? So I also have an additional question from Andy. If there was any, for violations of any rule or regulation currently existing or hereafter adopted for any violation of any rule or regulation adopted by, does it need a, to me, currently existing or hereafter adopted is like, it sets a moment in time, but couldn't you just say regulation adopted by and that covers anything that's been adopted? You could, yeah. So you'll see Wathams is just used for violations of any rule or regulation of any municipal officer doesn't even use the words adopted by. So the whole phrase could in theory be deleted. Does the author have any strong feelings on this? And then you keep the of. No, I don't have it. I actually did it in an attempt to potentially be clear that, hey, if they've done it in the past that we're not just going forward, we're also reaching back. Obviously if there's a legal ruling that says you can't reach back or that if we pass it, it doesn't reach back. They can always just re-adopt if they want, right? You know, I mean, so I don't, if we're looking for simpler, I'd be totally fine with deleting that language and going with just the of that's already there. You're okay with it as it stands. I'm always in favor of deleting unnecessary language. Okay. So we have a recommendation to delete unnecessary language. How does the author feel about deleting unnecessary language and inserting all of that? I'm fine with it. Okay, but that change? Any other changes to the language or wording? We can do this as a single motion or we can do it as two separate motions. In other words, the first motion if we did it as two would be one motion. Can we then have a discussion or do we need a discussion on how can we do on why we wish to recommend this? I know the sponsor would like to recommend this. Obviously, but I'm trying to let other people. I understand that. And so I'm giving other people an opportunity to speak. So I've trained myself to be so, to pay no attention to the actual substance of any matter that I find myself in uncharted territory. I can't express an opinion, correct? Evan, please. So our role has largely been defined by clear, consistent, and actionable. And I think we could say that this measure itself is clear, consistent, and actionable. That gets to the declaration. We also are looking to propose revisions that improve clarity, consistency, and actionability. And to me, this hits at clarity because it makes it clearer for the body on how their regulations become enforceable through non-criminal disposition because right now, those regulations could be adopted or a bylaw could be written that actually includes non-criminal disposition. And so there's sort of two ways it could go and a body might feel like it's not sure if it needs to approach the council to adopt a regulation or to revise the bylaw. The council may say, well, do we want to adopt the regulation? Do we want to pass a bylaw, alter the data block? And so to me, this just provides some clarity that look, it's simple, it does it. And then I think it also improves actionability for the regulations themselves because the moment they are passed, they can be enforced by non-criminal disposition. And I think that the problem is so the Board of License Commissioners passed the BYOB regulations, I believe, in August, maybe July, even, I think it was July. And so we are now in February. So from July to February, those regulations were technically in effect, but only enforceable criminally. And I don't think that they would have wanted to enforce them criminally. And so they were, to some extent, almost unenforceable because for them to be enforceable, you'd have to be willing to take criminal action, which you wouldn't want to. And so there's always gonna be, if we don't do this, a gap between when the regulation is passed and when the council adopts it or passes a revised bylaw, during which period, that regulation might be questionably actionable because it's actionable on the surface. And so I think this improves the actionability of the regulations by making them enforceable by non-criminal disposition from the moment they're adopted. So that's, thank you. Two good reasons for recommending it. Any other thoughts, Mandy? So I would actually take a completely different tack, even though I agree with all of what he just said. We're also governance, and I'm not gonna pull up the charge for where that falls, but governance of us as a council and others, if you think about how our government runs, it kind of goes to that actionability or clarity, but I think it does help the council lessen its timing and time commitment in meetings to track all of this, to adopt them, to do all of that. So I think it helps make more efficient the governing of the town for non-criminal disposition, which is under sort of a different sort of bullet point in our charge, but nonetheless, I think an important one to recognize. And specifically of the council, right, so okay. So those are three good reasons for recommendation. So I'm willing to entertain a motion that we declare this both clear, consistent, actionable, and that we recommend that the council adopt it. So moved. All those in favor, signify by saving, rising and enhancing, aye. All right, and so it's four, zero with one, abstention. Item five, rule 8.4 and all of the rules relevant to referral process. This is something that came up in a number of discussions and last meeting. And so I put it on the agenda. I know that the council president is eager for us to look at this. Are we ready to take it on? So we are required to have two readings of bylaws. We are required by our rules to have two readings of our rules. So the things that I think carry really a whole lot of significance are covered. I would be amenable to just deleting 8.4 altogether given that we keep just, we just keep suspending it anyway. If we were going to keep it, I would maybe, so this gives exceptions of when 8.4 applies. But if we did want to keep it, we could say we could make it instead. What rule 8.4 applies to. And so maybe it's just bylaws, rule changes. And then I guess you could say policies because maybe policies, like when we have the comprehensive housing policy, that might be significant enough that we want two readings required. Even though I think even if we get rid of 8.4, we will probably still have multiple readings on substantial things. But I would either say let's delete it or instead of putting in exceptions, put in what we actually want it to apply to. Because then we don't have to try to think of everything we might want to accept. So I support deleting a whole cloth. No putting in the other way. We have a charter option that could require a second reading, which is the right to postpone. If there's a vote on the agenda and there's a motion after discussion and a counselor or multiple counselors says, whoa, hey, we should talk about this a second time. We have a mechanism for forcing that discussion a second time with just one counselor doing that. So I guess I'm to the point where I say, well, we should start using that method instead of creating extra methods and extra requirements. Let's just use what the charter has given us the ability to use if we're not happy with the president putting something on for a vote on the first time it's on the agenda. Start using your right under the charter to say, well, I don't like that. I'm gonna postpone that vote. So I'd delete the whole thing. My understanding of at least some of the logic behind this rule is to allow the public a chance to weigh in on matters of some substance. And so I think there is a reason why certain matters have this requirement. And while it slows things down for us, it allows, so things get in the newspaper, people have conversations, they go, oh, I didn't know that was going on, blah, blah, blah. And so what do you all feel about that concern? That I understand the desire to streamline and I hope we can figure out a way to do that. But if we remove this whole clause, we're basically relying on counselors to apply, well, I wouldn't say arcane, but up to now only been used once rule to ensure, I mean, motive, at least in my case, would be to ensure that the public have a chance to weigh in on something. So that's my concern about doing this whole clause and sort of leaning a little bit towards identifying those matters where we really feel that a second go round is important. Maybe not so much for us, though I think it could be, but so the public has a chance to become aware of what's going on and if they wish to speak or contact us or lobby or whatever else we wanna do. That's my concern, any thoughts on that? I think that concern is very valid. So, and I agree with you, we should not get rid of it whole clause. And if we don't get rid of the whole clause, and I'm not saying that we shouldn't or should, but if we don't get rid of the whole clause, then we're back to Evan's point, which is then we need to decide if we can or at least we need to recommend what we think would be those particular items. So we would change the rule and say that we just list specifically those items that we would recommend be required a second. I feel it's vaguely odd to me because if you're worried about the public's opportunity to comment and something's not on this preferred list, it may not get the airing that it needs and we might really consider it not needing a second reading, but. Well, that's where the counselor could use their right to postpone. I mean, if you felt, if you personally weren't aware, this is going way too fast. I just say I want to exercise the right to postpone. I'm just thinking that if we take it all out, then you have to use that. You'll be using it much more often. And, well, Evan? So I think part of this is how we conceptualize the right to postpone. One of our colleagues constantly refers to it as the nuclear option, which makes it sound like something that should be used incredibly sparingly. I think other people view it as something that could be used fairly commonplace to say, you know what, I want to talk about this more, so I'm gonna use my right to postpone. There's also the option that you just make a motion to postpone to a date certain or table. I don't think you have to necessarily invoke your right to postpone, which feels very, very heavy, right? But I do, I think, agree a lot with George's point of a lot of the reason for this is not just so the council can sleep on a measure, but which some councils do also appreciate, but also to allow it to get in the press. I would like us to make sure that the public has enough time to have notice of issues that might be of public interest. I would also like us to move beyond this fact where we have five or six motions per council meeting to suspend rule 8.4, and so I'm not quite sure what the exact middle ground is, but I think we need to find a balance between those two. What if the middle ground is not making it a shall? What if it's the council shall strive to discuss or strives to discuss policies, and you know, how do you word major, you know, strives to discuss major legislation or major legislative matters or something at a regular council meeting prior to the meeting on which the measure will be voted, something like that, that's not, so it wouldn't require any motion to suspend it because it's not a rule that needs suspended, it's a statement of values, as some people would say. Now that goes against the why have a rule, but it allows us to potentially not have to parse out as much what needs to be there, what doesn't or have to be so exact. We could say strives to discuss policies, financial measures, and bylaws I wouldn't even put in there because the charter trumps whatever we say, but policies and financial measures at a regular council meeting prior to the meeting at which the measure will be voted, something like that, and just leave it with policies and financial measures, the rules requirement is a separate rule completely. See, I have this thing about rules, you know, that it's a rough rule which says, thou shalt strive not to commit murder. If you're gonna have a rule, that's the rule, but if you're not, then you won't. So I hear you, Mandy, but I think if we're gonna have a rule, we need to have a language of rules. For now, we should just, you know, we're just rah-rah. Sorry, we could rewrite the 10 commandments. Further thoughts? Do we wanna come back to this? And I know that the president would like us to come up with something, but I mean, the simplest would be just, we're just taking it out. We're throwing it out and just tell counselors that they have the right to postpone and they can use it and, you know, it's time for them to sort of step up. My objection has been noted, but that's just my objection. They not just tell them the right to postpone, but have in suggestion of, hey, there are multiple motions we can have when something's in front of us, including a motion to postpone. You can do this, start using our parliamentary procedure that many of us are not knowledgeable about, but that might require the president to mention the options on the table. So how do you respond to the objection that things just, I guess you would just say, well then use your parliamentary process, but it seems that some things, just by the very nature, require time for deliberation, reflection, and communication. And it shouldn't, is it that hard for us to come up with those categories of things? Just because we don't have the rule doesn't mean the president has to put a vote motion on every agenda. I mean, the agenda can just say discussion only. You know, I don't know, I think it's hard to generalize, but. I feel like given council dynamics, given council concerns about power of the president and vice president, the power of GOL, the blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, that taking this out is a mistake. And saying, yeah, you can do this, you can still postpone, you can blah, blah, blah, but I think it, I don't wanna be part of that discussion the night it happens because it's just gonna be a lot of, some people being reinforced in the idea that this committee is not trustworthy, that committee is not trustworthy, so-and-so is not trustworthy, and I'm tired of that. So I'd rather leave it in. And I do think it's important. And, because we do call it the nuclear option, reminding counselors that there is parliamentary procedure that they can use at any time that's not nuclear, or perhaps we- So how does this help the president and help the council in its desire to move more quickly? It sounds like, I understand, but we clearly see that there are times when we do waste a lot of time. Yeah, but you can't guarantee when those times are or what it's gonna be about. You really can't, because we can all sit in here and really think something is gonna go through very easily and we'll spend an hour or more on it. And I don't always know why, sometimes I appreciate that truly, but oftentimes I just see that it's a discussion that really is trying to talk about other things or is premised on other things than what is being said. More robust use of the consent agenda and a willingness to continue to suspend rule 8.4. Is that our advice to the president? We have a divided committee on this right now, I think. So Mandy wants to get rid of 8.4 altogether, which is something I'm sympathetic to, but I don't think I'm quite there. I think that my reading is that Pat wants to maintain 8.4 as is, I see the argument for not deleting it and I don't think I'm completely on board with completely deleting it, although I could get there. I'm not on board with keeping it as is because I think you have a broken rule if you vote to suspend it every, we literally, since we've discovered that we have to, because early on we actually were violating it constantly, just we didn't realize it, but since we've realized that in November, I'd have to check the agenda, but I think we have voted to suspend rule 8.4 at least once every single meeting since then. That's a broken rule, that's a rule that's not working. And so to me, if we're going to maintain it and I think there are valid reasons to maintain it, we need to fix it. And that's why I thought maybe my suggestion, which I don't know if it's a good one, is to say, what are the things that we know we'll need to get read twice and let's say for these things, but I'm not 100% sure what those things are, right? And so looking back on some of the things, we suspended 8.4 for climate action goals. We suspended rule 8.4. So we wouldn't maybe put goals in here, but in retrospect, I'm not sure that was a good decision. Maybe that we actually should have had it. I think we actually suspended rule 8.4 because there was so much public here and there was a public pressure for us to act that night and I'm not sure that's right. And so this is tricky and I don't think we're gonna solve it at this meeting, but I do think that 8.4 is broken and we need to fix it. I'm just not quite sure what that fix is. Evan's made a very strong case for the need to fix it. We can't fix it now. Perhaps it comes back to the next meeting with further thoughts on if we were to fix it, what would the language look like? What would we, I don't know. I mean, obviously deleting it is just one possibility still. My suggestion of just sort of making do with what we've got, which I'm not critically strongly in support of, but that's just a possibility. Then the third is Evan's suggestion that identifying specific things that we could simply say for these items. Boom, boom, boom. Percent by art bylaw, item six, I just pretty much gave you the update. We do not have legal opinion. The time manager got back to me yesterday and again today. I think this is gonna be a continuing issue for us. I think we had this before with other matters on the Evoca in particular, where you just wait and wait and wait. And I'm not sure there's anything anyone can do about it, but I certainly can talk to the time manager about it. But my sense is that what he does is he just sends a request and then he waits and waits and waits. I imagine in a really dire circumstance, there is a way in which he can get something done quickly. But what we might think of as, like Percent bylaw has been out there now for a while and probably some of us or maybe more than some of us would feel like enough already. So we're kind of like get this done, but I don't think that's gonna get communicated to the lawyers. They're gonna do it when they get around to it. And when does something rise to the level of we want this by this date or else? It's just a question. I didn't have anything on that. I thought item five was also gonna consider the revisions to 8.2 and 8.6 and other eight points because of the town committee changes. 8.2 and 8.6. And apparently 10.3. That is correct. So let's go back for a moment. The document titled Council Rules, draft revisions committees. I'd left 8.4 in there even though there's no potential changes to it because I figured that was on our list of discussion items. So this is in the packet, correct? Council rules, draft revisions committees. Open it up. I can go through them quickly for the public that might not have it in front of them. 8.2 D references, outreach communications and appointments so under town manager appointments. And so that now references town services and outreach because that's where town manager appointments fall now. 8.6, the change would be under appointments. Again, town manager appointments change from OCA to town services and outreach. 10.3 essentially delete OCA, change to town services and outreach and delete audit and change the number five to four council committees just to update based on what we passed committee names. And I'm not asking for the discussion this week but in looking at all of these, I wonder if 8.6 as a rule is even necessary or necessary to the extent it is there versus 8.2 and their interaction. We've got a rule that says these things need to be referred or get automatically referred and then two or four rules later we say, you can't consider these things until these committees have referred. They seem kind of, well, not contradictory. They're the same thing. They almost mentioned the same thing. So they're kind of repetitive, you know? And so maybe for a different meeting we can discuss whether we believe both rules are necessary. Can we go ahead and adopt these changes? So we adopt the changes to rule 8.2 D, 8.6, that's right, two, 8.6 and 10. I'll move it. Second. So where? Clarifying motion language. So we're not adopting. We're recommending the town council adopt. We're recommending the town council adopt these changes to those rules as amended today. And one of the things I wanted to point out, rule 10 would need, 10.3 would need a hyperlink added in. It's just that can't be created until the webpage for that committee is created. It's formed and all right. And we're looking for members doing recruitment. So there's a motion that has been seconded. There's a motion that has been. That is council created. There's a motion that's been seconded. I'm not gonna have any more discussion about anything of any kind or any nature. All righty, all those in favor please say hi. Hi. All opposed, no. So it's 4-0 with one abstention. The motion carries. And what absent, thank you. And thank you, Mandy, for reminding me about 8-2, 8-6, and 10-3. Pat? Okay. You've been updated on 6% of art by-law. The larger issue of legal review of all by-laws is one that perhaps we'll have to leave for another day. It weighs on the back of my mind and I'm sure it's weighing on the back of Paul's mind. Because it sounds like we've been making a lot of phone calls to the lawyers. Item seven is discussion of council roles on town committees. And I don't know if Councilor Ross is ready to take that on. I'm certainly willing to discuss it. Yeah, it'd be great if we could talk about this today because this impacts some meeting I have tonight. Good. So just as some preface, although I'm sure you're all aware. So there's one committee of this town which is a town committee which also has two counselors on it as voting members. The only committee that has that. I think that there has been some frustration expressed from some members of that committee about the role of counselors. And so I very recently had a meeting with the chair of that committee to talk about how she felt it was going, having two counselors as members. And she expressed quite a bit of frustration over not knowing what exactly the role was of the counselors on those committees. And she had in fact sent an email to Lynn in November, maybe even October, asking the council to provide clarification to the committee and to the counselors as to what their role is. And that was never done. That discussion has never been had. If you remember when we created that committee back in January, there was a question that was asked literally minutes before the vote was called which was do the counselors on that committee speak on behalf of the council? And that question was never answered. But there's certainly been some frustration about the role of counselors on that committee and how to differentiate a counselor from just a resident who's on that committee. And having being one of those counselors, I've had some concerns with the fact that counselors are given extra weight on that committee. Their concerns are amplified. And my concern has been as a counselor is I have often played the role of the Debbie Downer, I would say, and that I am often the one to speak up to tell the committee why what they're thinking of doing won't happen and why not even to propose it. And I see them getting frustrated with that because I am constraining their vision and their ambitions. I think my other counselor plays a very different role that could be differently problematic, which is that that counselor is constantly bringing proposals to that committee and there seems to be undue weight given to those proposals over the ideas of the resident members of the committee. So there's been a lot of frustration. And in the meeting with the chair, she basically said for her to really go forward and function effectively as a chair, she either would like to see counselors removed from that committee, which I recognize would require a charge change and that's a pretty dramatic move. But from a chair's perspective, she thinks that having just resident members might be easier and or having clearly defined roles for the counselors on that committee that come from the council. And when I asked her what she thought those roles would be, she kind of struggled because when she actually described what she envisioned a counselor's value would be on that committee, I said, oh, so what you're doing is you're actually describing what we call a non-voting liaison and what she was unaware of even. And so when I explained to the chair what a non-load voting liaison was and what their role was and also what the restrictions we put, she had a very, very, very strong preference for that committee not having counselors as voting members but having a council liaison. She thought that was very important because she thought that where the residents really need the help of a counselor is on navigating the council and figuring out what the steps are, but that could be accomplished through a liaison. And so this is I think of importance as we're looking at that body itself. We'll have some reappointments of both one of the counselors and also some of the residents coming up in April, I believe, April 22nd is when that, I think the term I am. Well, that's when they were appointed for one year term, I don't, it might probably June, June 30th, because that's our standard. But, and given the possibility that one of the counselors may be stepping off of that committee, that the chair was very concerned with the idea of onboarding a new counselor without clearly defined roles. And it was very concerned is maybe an understatement because there was a thought of if there's gonna be turnover and counselors are put on without having a role to say, okay, here's your role as a counselor on this committee. It makes it very difficult for her to manage. And the last thing, because I know I'm talking awhile, that it also brought up a complication which this body back in January talked about at length and we came to a conclusion that I personally think was a poor conclusion, but I went along with it because it's what we decided was that counselors have the same term lengths in theory on that committee as residents, which is three years, which really does not make sense to have counselors appointed to terms longer than their actual elected terms. And so the number, the frustration expressed by the chair, the logistical complications, the question of who the counselors are actually speaking for when they speak on that committee, I think introduces a lot of complications and we let this go for almost a year to see just how it would work. And I think there's some feelings that it's not working. And so, and the reason I wanna bring this up now is there is a meeting of that committee tonight and I would like the committee to discuss this. And I would actually like the committee, I've asked that the chair discuss it without the counselors in the room. I think it would be appropriate for the committee to ask the counselors to step out of the room for them to have an honest discussion, but that she didn't want to do that unless she felt that this body was actually interested in making recommendations. If we said, we don't care, she didn't wanna have a potentially contentious conversation. Mammy? So I was actually gonna ask whether the committee discussed it, so thank you for answering that ahead of time. I think I was one of the people a year ago against putting counselors on that committee. Given what has been explained to us about the difference in treatment and difference in treatment of comments is concerning to me because I don't want our board and committee volunteers to feel like they don't have equal weight in a discussion simply because they aren't a town counselor. And it's something that we, I think as counselors, as we get a year into our service, sometimes randomly realize that what we say people give more weight to because we won an election and we sit on this body, whether that be at a different meeting, given in public comment to a different elected board even. And I think we have to realize that presents challenges that does potentially limit what we can say and how we can participate. Given my experience as chair of CRC, you know, CRC just today struggled with some of this in terms of we were asked to appoint a representative of CRC to the planning board for purposes of discussing master plan updates. And then during a different discussion, there was a proposal put forth that said, well, maybe you can do the same for zoning updates and have a representative of CRC attend every zoning subcommittee meeting for discussion purposes. And we talked a lot about that, but that goes to what is our role? What is everything, all of that? And what would that committee feel like? You know, the appointing of a representative for the master plan purpose came pretty much from that committee and said, we want someone there. That's going to be our easiest way of keeping this updating process going. And given the process that the council adopted. So it was not the council saying, hey, we're going to put someone on there to do that. It was them coming to us and saying, hey, can you do this? It might make our job easier. But even given that we discussed how difficult it might be for that representative to actually go to those meetings and represent the committee's position and how that's tough. So I think I would support removing counselors from town committees and having some sort of general understanding that counselors do not serve on town committees. They serve on specific committees, depending on the committee. And so I don't think it can be a blanket policy if you look at our upcoming MSBA building committee that's going to be required. There's going to be a counselor on that. But that's a different beast than some of these other town committees, I want to say. So I don't think we can say, nope, you can never have a counselor on the town committee, but because there's certain town committees that we will serve on. But I do like the idea of a liaison to it, especially if the committee is receptive to it. And I would even propose potentially putting that in the charge instead of it being a separate, oh, it's one of our priorities. Maybe we put it in the charge. We have a line on charges that say non-voting liaisons. We could put on that line non-voting liaisons, one council member to formalize that and say this is one that we can't give up if we don't have volunteers that there is a liaison. So what I'm hearing here is that there are two issues. One is the larger issue of counselors role on committees and then more specific one of this particular committee. And I would like to focus on this particular committee. And that seems to fall more easily and more doable. We could communicate to your committee that you'll be meeting with this evening that we do hear their concern and that we might be open at some point to revising the charge. So if there would not be a general blanket policy, it would be something that's basically motivated by the committee's own communication. So I'd like to keep this, we can come back to a larger discussion at a future date. But I wanted to make sure that you shared that we're concerned about three year term limits as well. So I think you can, by consensus, we can sort of communicate that. I would certainly be open to putting it on the agenda sooner rather than later. And I assume that we would then consider, we could consider a revision of the charge that would, do you exactly what Manny suggested to move the counselors, but include a non-golden liaison as part of the charge. Sure. Since there's a member of this committee on that body, I think it would be helpful if going forward, if this is going to be consideration, if the committee seeks that change that they actually make a formal request for that change, including with a vote. Now you guys, the counselors have a vote on that committee. So I, you know, it would be awkward, right? What time do you guys meet? But it could also, Just tell them about it. Since the votes are supposed to be recorded by member, any no votes would be recorded as to who and any yes votes would be recorded as to who, which the council could take into consideration based on what names might be there, obviously. But I think it would be helpful to have a formal recommendation so that if this committee decides to do it, they recognize it's not solely coming from here. It's actually coming from the committee itself. So just from a timeline perspective, so we're all on some page. So that committee meets the same days as this one. And so I will bring to the committee tonight that it needs to be an agenda item that likely won't be discussed by the committee tonight, which already has a full agenda, which means it will likely next be discussed by that committee at the March 11th meeting, which then means the earliest we would talk about it, we shouldn't talk about it again till after they talk about it, would be the March 25th agenda of this committee, which then if we're sending it to the council doesn't go to the council until April 6th, which is I hope after, I hope after the president makes her appointments and I say I hope after because I'm hoping she doesn't wait until April 6th to make committee appointments, especially for a committee that currently has no members. And so timing-wise it is a bit complicated, but it looks like the earliest that we would really be able to discuss it again would be March 25th. Given that we don't know what the makeup of this committee is also gonna be and when that's going to happen, I'm not sure I'm ready to do anything now, but would it be possible for the chair to consider a special meeting since we've already sort of previewed a discussion that might be able to be held quick just for one agenda item if in two weeks potentially that committee comes back with a recommendation. In order to. That chair, that chair, the GOL chair to potentially consider a special meeting to speed it up a little bit. Well that's really a matter of also what the rest of you think because I'll be there if that's the issue. I guess the other question is if that committee comes back with a recommendation, does it go through the council directly or can it come directly to us? No, no, I mean, we're considering the findings. I mean, what we're doing is part of our, well, OA is like the ECAC. And then I don't, I have conversations with the chair and the other thing is just observations from having served on the committee of frustration from other committee members, sometimes also appreciation for the information, but again, the appreciation always seems to be oh, I'm glad you could help us award Smith that motion or I'm glad, right, which is could, you don't need to be a voting member to do that, but there's been a lot of frustration with sort of the constraints that are put on the ideas by a member, a councilor member of that committee who shall remain unnamed right now. I know, but many raises a very good question. How we do proceed with this since it's not a council committee, but it's a council appointed. Another thing that seems so important to me, we talk about respecting people with expertise, we want people with planning experience doing planning. I think it's critical that residents have the largest voice on that committee and in general about the design for sustainability and I have a great faith in that so I would like to see that happen. Okay, what would the loophole be? So maybe it doesn't have to go back to council because it has counselors on it right now and so we could argue it's part of our looking at our own governance and our own organization and our own counselor time. If that's truly the changes and the only changes we're looking at, we could argue it was part of looking at the whole committee reorganization and restructuring and all. Perhaps a communication from the chair to the president that this is in the works, I mean you, right? And we do have a timeline in front of us, there's a time consideration, but we want to do it in such a way that people feel that they're fully apprised of what's going on. We don't want to just drop this on the council and people are gonna go, well why are you guys doing this? In the next GOL report to the council, absolutely, that we are considering the, now do you want it phrased as a general issue? Do you want to focus on a particular committee? I know, but outside, all right. We need to move along with the remaining items are discussion items, the one dear to my heart, public ways with Mandy's suggestions. I think we're gonna have to leave for it next time. Hopefully next time. And we'll see what happens at the council meeting with Lincoln. But there's no public present. I'd like to adopt the minutes of February 12th by consensus if people had it there in your packet, you had a chance to look at them. I've looked at them, I thought they were fine, but any, so can we adopt the minutes of February 12th by consensus, okay? Future agenda items. I have wage theft bylaw for future, for the next meeting. Correct? No, no. So wage theft bylaw has to go through TSO before it comes to GOL. So it's just on a long. It's on a long journey, a long journey. We wish it well. And it'll get to us when it gets to us. It'll get to us when it gets to us. Okay, we're taking, yes. The resolution adopting an interim affordable housing policy sponsored by CRC. CRC resolution, and where is that, where can I find it? I just sent that to everyone because we just did it today at CRC. So that will be on agenda next time. Anything else that people would like on the agenda? I think there was a request for, I don't know when you wanna do this and it might need a town manager, the redevelopment authority and housing authority charges, but it was, if the town manager wants us to look at them or something. So talk to Paul about the redevelopment authority charge. Is your thought, I mean, it's not an agenda item, but just a suggestion to the president. I mean, sorry, to the chair, okay. No, those are ambitious. It came from another counselor and then the president. Anything else for future items? I mean, I had my random 8.2 and 8.6 working together, but that's not, and then I guess the one thing we might want to really push forward on, consent agendas aren't mentioned in our rules and so there isn't an agenda item for consent agenda. So when we were at agenda setting, trying to start consent agendas, we were like, where do we put it on the agenda? And so we put it as an action item, but it might be good for this body to clarify that it is an allowable thing and maybe write some quick rules around it or the language and stuff like that. If we do want to use it, many councils have an actual, we've got an announcements agenda item in this. They put a consent agenda item somewhere in there as a separate number. Okay, so good, that's three items. The RDA business is a long term, it's not an agenda item, that's three. Anything else? Mucanime, obviously. Exactly, no, I hear that and that's definitely, that's really, I know, but we know. Exactly, no, it's, I will try to structure the agenda next time, barring any horrible surprises so that we will get to it and we will get to public ways, but I will put bylaws ahead of public ways I think for the moment, which is painful for me, but that's all right. So random chair to chair with the appointments of new committees coming, it's possible that a new chair and a new meeting time might need discussed if the committee make up changes. But we won't know that until we know when the president's actually appointing. Evil sufficient under the day. I'm ready to declare an adjournment. So I declare this meeting adjourned and I thank you all very much.