 wouldn't be able to get there. And I think it's, you know, we're making lemonade out of lemons or whatever it is. And good luck, and I'll join in this afternoon, even though it wouldn't be a place I'd normally walk to. Well, we welcome you, Ken. And, you know, you make a great point. I will say that I, having eight hours a day of Zoom meetings, I do agree with you, like, you know, the wonder of technology, right? In the way that it can bring people together. We live stream our commencement ceremony over the last couple of years anyway. But you are bringing up, I think, a great point. This technology has been able to bring us together, you know, when we are apart. And it could still be poignant, even though it's not the same thing as being able to be close to somebody and to hug somebody. But, you know, you can do the virtual hug. And I think it will still be meaningful today. And I'm glad to hear the bar mitzvah was special as well. Thank you. I wanted to bring up a town business matter, which is planning and zoning. I attended the planning board meeting Wednesday night by Zoom, in which they spend a lot of time talking about consultants' proposals for a new 40-hour zoning that might come to Amherst. We've been very slow and deliberate to talk about this. The last public meeting was in December. And now, of course, it's hard to get public meetings in which people appear in place. But I think this is an extraordinary opportunity to have a very deliberate look at our zoning because, for two reasons. One, the disastrous economic situation now may mean that a little bit of the pressure is off for developers to come in with their money to build new buildings. The other is that we really don't know what's going to be after this is over. And so we don't know what the town is going to be like. I don't have to tell you the questions about what the university and the colleges are going to be like, how they're going to behave, who's going to be here. It's going to have real impact on this town. So this is a time when I think, rather than have the traditional meetings where the board that's concerned runs up some proposals, invites the public to come and speak to them in a public session, and then to deliberate among themselves, that won't serve us well now. What will, I think, are a series of conversations in which we specifically invite people who have no specific interest in an immediate project. So I'd like to hear from developers now who don't have any plans for what they want to do, but want to talk about what they think the town should be doing and what the town should be like. I'd like to hear from not only the business people in town, but their landlords. I'd like to hear from citizens who are close to town like me. I walk to town, but from people who also drive to town and need to find places to park in order to do their business or decide they can't and go out to the highway. And I think if we ask the planning board, or whoever the right or the planning department to set these up, looking at the proposal that the, and it's a very beautiful and elaborate proposal that the consultants brought, we have time over the next year to give some deep thought to this. So I hope we will not, I hope we will think unconventionally about how we get input from the public for this. We have done this over years, a long time ago in ancient history, there was something called the Select Committee on Goals for Amherst. And I'm the only, probably the only living person who can remember that. But this is now a time to bring the people who have interested in this. And that of course, Tony includes significant conversations with people from the university and the colleges. So that's one part of my interest. The other is a question, Paul. The Wall Street Journal today has an article about Airbnb. And it says in it that one third of the people who are Airbnb hosts have single units. Two thirds of the Airbnb people really are in effect commercial developers who have multiple units that they rent out. And I wonder, I just don't recall how the town is managing the Airbnb process in the town. And I just wondered if you could tell me, I'm probably talking too long and you wanna give the other people a chance so maybe we can do this some other time. But again, it's an opportunity now to look hard at Airbnb because Airbnb I think is a stealth invader of residential neighborhoods. And if we're doing this right, that's great. But if we haven't thought enough about it, I think maybe now is the time. Well, I really appreciate that Ken. Always you bring up great points and I'm glad you'll be watching graduation this afternoon. So I think, Breonna, I think it might be really good. I see Lynn Griezmer is on the call. If she wants to join the room, you could raise your hand Lynn or something because the first thing that this, or second thing Ken talked about, which was zoning and the 40R district, that's really is a town council thing. And it'll be a zoning issue that goes through the planning board and then the town council. But Lynn and I are on a call every week with the business improvement district and the chamber talking about a bunch of, what are their interests? This sort of resilient Amherst initiative to not just save our businesses, but to be able to be in a position to bring back the businesses that are going to survive and reposition the town for whatever comes next. And you're right, nobody knows what the shape of our economy is going to be in or the shape of our institutions. I mean, all the words, I mean, Hampshire has announced that they're going to reopen, Amherst College, they've self identified as a residential college. And I know the university expects and Tony can comment on this. They expect to be an on-campus educational institution. I don't think anybody's going to remote education at the college level anytime soon, but it is the right time to be talking about what the impact is and Tony can weigh in on that. And then as far as the Airbnb, there is a new tax. If you do run an Airbnb that you have to file for that tax. And we were looking at sort of doing an inventory. We are scanning previously until now the Airbnb listing so we could make sure that we could capture all the people who are using, you know, offering Airbnb rentals to make sure that they were complying with the state law requiring them to pay a tax because a piece of that comes to local cities and towns. So in terms of, you know, I don't know what the impact will be economically. I don't really, we haven't heard of a lot of the apartment buildings utilizing Airbnb as an income source, but it's been more, at least the developers haven't indicated that and we haven't seen that really happening. It tends to be more, I've got a second unit in my house. I've got a second, you know, extra spare bedroom I can utilize and that's where we have seen it. I know in other places where we were in, as in Baltimore and there's like a whole apartment building that was just Airbnb. Basically people bought the units and they utilized them and they were managed for them as a way of building a building. I have not seen that here and I don't think that's the model that most developers are looking at. I don't know if there's just a big enough market and Amherst for that, but Tony, do you have thoughts on any of those issues? Yeah, I think, well, a couple. One, you know, Airbnb as the single unit in someone's house, you know, as we've seen, I think we'll be struggling probably going forward, you know, in the same way that a lot of other businesses within the share economy may suffer through, you know, in the aftermath of the pandemic, both because people will likely not be traveling as much and, you know, the idea of worrying about transmission and also, you know, costs are things that I think may hurt the industry. I think it'd be, you know, with regard to Airbnb, I think it'd be roughly akin to what's going on with the hotel industry. You know, I mean, we can all hope that it'll rebound, but I think it's gonna take some time. And there's an article, at least in today's times, which I haven't read yet, that talked about this very issue. I don't think that we've seen, you know, in our conversations with landlords and other developers, because we do have a connection with them through the university. We haven't seen, you know, Airbnb as, you know, method for them to bring in folks, you know, for short-term or long-term rentals. I would expect that those folks that are doing Airbnb who didn't want the hassle of having a tenant, you know, maybe a detached unit or an attached unit that, you know, had a discrete entrance or something like that, will likely have to go back to that, you know, renting out, you know, more long-term. And so in some ways that would be, you know, helpful to the town to at least understand what the Airbnb census is in the future. So from the Airbnb perspective, I think, you know, it's gonna be interesting to see how that goes. I can't remember the second part of all this, sorry. About rezoning and downtown and stuff like that, I think. You know, it's interesting. I mean, you know, I'm sure that, you know, is a discussion from a standpoint in which the university would be an interested observer. I don't think that we have a direct relationship to the zoning in downtown. I would hesitate to say that we do, but, you know, we'd certainly love to talk about what the possibilities would be for, you know, given the kind of innovation and spin-off possibilities, you know, does that have anything to do? Does that factor into any kind of rezoning or any thoughts for downtown? But, you know, I'm sure we'd be an interested observer and, you know, we'd certainly love to have conversations, but I can't say that we're directly connected to that. Oh, am I in the room? You heard. Hi, Lynn. Lynn's the president of our council. So for those of you who don't know. First of all, thanks for the comments, Ken, and nice to hear your voice. The, just only quickly on the Airbnb, the Airbnb's that I'm aware of are people who actually either leave their home for a weekend and then rent it out like this weekend would have been a big weekend to do that. And then there's also the situation where somebody may occasionally use their home in Amherst, but then they actually do Airbnb. And occasionally that has led to some serious disruptions where parties go and then they travel to another place and all of this is silitated by Facebook. But the thing we're not seeing in Amherst is what some of the towns, for instance, our cities in Italy have seen where people literally have given up their urban apartment, moved out, and now they use their urban apartment as a Airbnb. And it leaves the inner core of the city very decimated in many ways, very transient. So that's your scourge issue. Going back to this zoning, I really wanna say there's many efforts going on. One is even before all of this, the council and the planning board had started and the staff had started into a very serious conversation about an opportunity to really relook at zoning. And we're geared up for that. And there's been a couple of different ways that this has been going about with the consultant, for example, that you heard the other night and also the work of the town staff who have had ideas for what we might look at at zoning for a long, long time. But then in addition, Paul mentioned the quick, not quick, but the ongoing meetings we have weekly now with the bid and chamber. And so the chamber and bid have presented once in general, just about the situation going on with our businesses. They did that at our community resources committee which turned out to be a committee of the whole for the council because 10 of us were there. And then we had them actually come to the council just this past week where they presented, I don't wanna say a wish list because it goes beyond wishing. It's a list of what it is we could do as a town to help reopen Amherst to be part of resilient Amherst. And we met just yesterday with that list and we started saying, well, this one goes to this group, this goes to this group, this would be done here and this would be done there and well, and we're able to do one of these. So it's a very serious effort and I just wanna compliment our bid and our chamber for their just outstanding work during this entire time as well as the town staff. I mean, Amherst is actually making its way through this in a manner that is probably exemplary for most cities and towns. The other thing we're looking at very seriously and hope will happen before the end of the month or right after the end of the month. And that is the reopening of the Amherst Farmers Market. So that's a very, but we wanna do it in a way that people feel safe and it's healthy. So the plans for that are still unfolding. And finally, congratulations Brianna. Thank you, Lynn. Thank you. I take you back off one thing that Lynn said just about the bid and chambers efforts. And I think that this, so I am on full disclosure on the board of the bid and I think most people know that I was, worked for the chamber for many years. And so I have a close attachment to the business community. I'm also part of the new downtown Amherst Foundation Board and with it, there's the Relief and Resiliency Microgrant Fund. And that is one thing that the chamber and bid have bound together to do to provide support to local businesses. And I think the one thing I wanted to say about this because I think it's really important is that our local businesses really matter here to the quality of life of Amherst. I won't say it's more important, but I think it's equally important as supporting them as it would be to a nonprofit that supports some of our neediest. Most like, most for real because or to say this has everything to do with the businesses, these businesses and who they employ. There's some of the same people that are using the services of our beloved social service agencies. These businesses support them. They support our local economy, our local nonprofits. They're the ones that are sponsoring everything from Little League teams to family outreaches to light up the night. And so our businesses matter and our downtown and our entire Amherst area business community has always been really, really important to us. And so I just, I want to put that out there. The Microgrant Fund has been very successful thus far, but there are still ways to give. And I just, perhaps I shouldn't have this impassioned plea right here, but just thinking about the difficulties with local businesses and what it looks like going forward when we come out of this and we start to reopen, it's devastating. We'll likely see up to, maybe I don't want to put a number, but a significant number of our local businesses will not be able to reopen. It's really exciting to watch those that have been able to innovate and have been kind of successful through the pandemic thus far. But, you know- What would you say to the people who are listening about, who want to help? What's the best way people can help right now? I would say go to the Downtown Amherst Foundation site and there you can make a gift. You know, again, the fund has been successful thus far. It's raised about $170,000. We're hoping to raise $500,000. We know that the money that will be distributed from this fund will not be enough to keep businesses afloat on its own, but it's hopefully a lifeline along with other federal programs and state programs that and perhaps some relief in other quarters that will be able to push these businesses to solve and see once we reopen again. So I do ask people to keep that in mind. I do want to give Liz a chance who's still in the room. Liz, did you still want to ask a question or make a comment? Yeah, yeah. Actually, Liz's name came up, but Priscilla Bice and I was putting my hand up, but we share the computer, so. Okay, well welcome Priscilla. Yeah, so hi, I just wanted to briefly say I'm also a UMass grad from way back as is my oldest grandson from a few years back. So lots of ties to the university and hope to tune in today. I live on Lincoln Ave, diagonally across from the Lincoln Apartments. And I talked to some of the students in the house nearby and so it's a hard time for graduating students. I have another grandson too who's graduating this year. So what I was calling to ask about today was the status of contracting with a developer for both the Lincoln Ave and the Mass Ave projects. And I was grateful to Dorothy Pam who I think contacted you prior to COVID-19 about you, both of you, about just some of the logistics of the demolition and construction. But so I was wondering today if a developer has been chosen and if so, are there permitting applications going forward? What's the timeline for demolition and construction? Are there elevations that we could take a look at of the plans? And if it's imminent, I'd like to have a chance to talk about one concern I had, again, way back when I thought it was gonna be May that the June that's a demolition would take place. It's just about occasionally we have construction vehicles or trucks that queue on this block and they just sort of sit there for, it's not a lot, but it's occasional they sit there for half hour, 45 minutes with diesel, noise and diesel. And so we have to go inside. I'm gonna be 75 this fall and so we're sheltering a place here. So this is our little sanctuary for, we don't know how long. So anyway, that's the line of questioning I have. Where does it stand now and what is available to share with the public in terms of plans? So hi, Priscilla, how are you? Hi. Been on many email trails together before. So it's good to hear your voice. What I can tell you right now is that the university continues to move ahead with the process in selecting a developer. No developer has been selected as of yet. So we anticipate that will happen soon. I think at the point that it does, I'd be able to reveal more information, but at this point, I think the only thing that we, or that I can reveal is what we've had, what we sent out to our developers, which I think you can find through our news office and the news office press release. I can send that to Paula to be, I don't know how we can kind of distribute that. And that shows what we sent out to developers to solicit feedback from them. So we are still moving ahead with the process, but at this point, there's no firm timeline for demolition and construction. The issue of the trucks, I remember that email very well, and I've talked to my colleagues who oversee construction. There are reasonable accommodations that we can make, and particularly not having diesel vehicles idle in front of the Lincoln Abbey residence and coming up that way from, from fearing up Lincoln. So there are things that we can do and ensure that the trucks and the route that they have comes off Mass Ave and then down towards the Lincoln Apartments, there will still be some noise, as you might expect that would be associated with construction, but we can do things that are lessen the impact as much as we possibly can. So I think what I would like to say is that, we will from our office, because it's the role that we play with the community relation side of things, continue to have discussions with Paul and his staff, and of course with the neighbors around our progress when we know more. And at this point, we're still in that very long planning process and now the interviewing process with developers. So that's where we are, and I promise we'll continue to have that conversation. And I know that Councillor Pam will make sure that we do. And I appreciate that by the way, so. I appreciate all of that. Yeah, yeah, thank you. So that's, we have a little bit of time, breathing time. My family was all in construction. So I'm very aware of the importance of it and the associated distress to the neighborhoods. And so I'm not, you know, I know the construction is going to be what it'll be. So I just thought just to sort of mitigate some of the trafficking would be great. So it's like you're thinking about that. Yeah, and it all makes sense. We want to be good neighbors and we realize that, you know, we don't live in a bubble. And so, you know, with that in mind, you know, we'll do everything. And I think that this is part of the conversation though, too, you know, if there are moments where, you know, you are impacted, we want to know. And so we'll do what we can to make sure that we mitigate that impact or, you know, remove it completely. So Tony, since there hasn't been a developer chosen, then it's months, many months out before anything would be considered moving forward, I'm guessing. I mean, there's, once a developer is chosen, then things can start to happen. But until that happens, so are we, are you thinking it's like three, six, nine, 12 months away? I have to say, I really don't know. The, and I say that with all honesty, you know, these things are really long processes, but at the same time, I think that, you know, we're still proceeding on the, you know, at least in our minds on the timeline that we've been talking about, about the, what is it, 2022 I think is what we were talking about. And so that is still our hope, you know, construction timelines are always, you know, kind of fluid. And so I certainly, I think we'll all know a little bit more shortly. And the pandemic hasn't derailed the process that the need is the need in terms of what you've identified. Exactly. And, you know, unlike Boston, which put a moratorium on construction, you know, as you know, all of our building projects have continued. So I think with that in mind, this process is continuing, I wouldn't say full speed ahead, you know, the pandemic may have delayed things just because it's harder to meet or it's harder, you know, but, and I don't know that for sure. I mean, we could still be on just a, you know, the regular timeline that we were on, but, but no, nothing, nothing will stop that. And we have identified those needs when we will be moving ahead. All right. Well, thank you. And just one last thing, if I wanted to see what you put out for your request for information did you say the new, how would I find that? On the news office, you can look up. I wouldn't know at the moment what the best keywords were, but we did put out a release. I believe I want to say in the fall, probably October, September, October. So it has been a while. So if you send that to me, Tony, I can share it out with the town council and they can share it out or we can, I can talk to Brianna about if there's an appropriate place to put it on our website I'm not really sure about that. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you both. All three of you. And congratulations to Brianna. Yes. Thank you, Priscilla. Thanks for joining us. All right. So I do see another hand, but I want to remind attendees who might have just recently joined us. You can use the Q and A feature if you have a quick question you want to pose or if you'd like to join the room, please raise your hand via Zoom or press star nine from your phone. I do see that Ken has another question. So I'm gonna pull Ken in the room and ask that he unmute himself if he has another question. Thank you, Brianna. Ken Rosenthal on Sunset Avenue. Earlier, Tony, you said you didn't think there was much the university could say in a discussion, further discussion on zoning, but I'd like the university to think of itself as having a very important role in these kinds of decisions you are. After all the biggest landlord in the area and more than that, your attraction of students who don't live on campus means that you're responsible for bringing people in who then are residents throughout town. So we no longer have the university town of Amherst Collaborative. There's no place for a voice that I know of for the university to join with the general public in talking about this. So I'm just hoping that when the 40R planning gets to become robust that you do participate. And I'm sorry, then I have one more thing to say about downtown. Okay, if I can respond to that, Ken. I don't mean to say that we would not be interested, we're very concerned about what's best for Amherst and what's best for downtown. I think that how we play in that though is I think more as an observer and a supporter of a strong positive downtown and what that may look like. I think that there are ways in which we can partner and Paul and I have talked about that a lot and Paul's had that conversation with our chancellor and our university relations staff about ideas and thoughts. And we've talked about a lot of this with UTAC, but I think we do recognize some limitations there within the process. However, if it's a matter of bringing in expertise or thoughts, the university is represented perhaps not officially, but we do have of course many faculty and staff members and plenty of people of expertise in their roles as private citizens that certainly would weigh in with and have opinions on creating greater connections perhaps between the campus and community through better zoning. So I wanna make sure that I explain that well perhaps I don't and haven't, but I hope that that makes a little bit more sense. And then the other thing I wanna say is about the UTAC thing. No, we don't have UTAC, but we still do have the campus and community coalition which was originally the campus and community coalition to reduce high risk drinking. And we have in many places in the absence of UTAC the CCC has kind of grown beyond its original mandate to reduce high risk drinking. That's still a big part of what we do, but we've looked at things like quality of life issues and environmental interventions. The business community is a big part of the CCC. We have town council members that attend and it has been a forum for ideas that may not be contained within the CCC meeting structure but have created organic opportunities for different people from the campus and the community to come together and come up with great brainstorming ideas for solutions. And I'll point out one thing that even parallel to UTAC is several years ago we had a grant from the CCC to kind of envision what a downtown, a late night downtown might look like with activities that weren't related to alcohol. And the forum brought together about 40 people. It was before Amherst works was completed. We were in the roughed out space there and it was a good conversation. We had a lot of input and a lot of student input and during that meeting was really quite good. And I think the CCC might be able to play in more of that role in the future. It's just a convener of nothing else for ideas. So fear not without, in the absence of UTAC, there were pluses and minuses with our committee structure more than anything else. I mean, I did enjoy the coming together with that group though. Thanks, Sony. I just wanted to add one more thing and it's about the downtown conversations. I think it's great that the bid and the chamber are talking with the town council regularly with the town administrators. There needs to be a place for the voice of the citizens of town, the people who you want to come into town to support downtown. And again, this pandemic is giving us an interesting opportunity. Not only is the town of Amherst economy in a mess there, but so are the malls on the highway. And we're all behaving differently. We're staying home, we're ordering and having delivered things delivered to our houses. When this opens up again, there may be more interest in coming downtown to a small community where there are fewer people going into smaller stores, rather than large numbers of people going into big stores. We may be just behaving differently. And this may be a great opportunity to think about the revival of downtown. I'm for one, very much supportive of that. And I hope there'll be an opportunity for the voice of the people who are the shoppers, the ones who are spending the money to get their interest, to get their ideas about how they could look more to the town than to the highway for shopping or to the mail for shopping. So I hope we'll just do that. And now I'll yield the floor. Thank you very much. Thank you, Ken. Yeah, thanks, Ken. So we did have a question come in through our Q&A. So I'm gonna read that now. This question came from counselor Dorothy Pam who's on the call with us. If UMass is remote instruction this fall, what kind of oversight will the university have over students who choose to remain living in the town of Amherst? It would roughly be the same oversight that we have now. And Dorothy, thank you for the question. Either the student code of conduct, excuse me, still is in effect off campus. However, it's only utilized when with working through the police, if there is a police complaint and then there is a police action that is taken and that is brought to the Dean of Students Office and then actions are taken. We have over the last several years worked closely with APD, with our Dean of Students Office to take an education as first approach. And I think when those students come back, if we do have a sizable number or even a small number of students that are living off campus, we'll be doing the same manner of education that we normally do, except perhaps, maybe we will be doing the doorknocks, but it will be done in a way that is safe and maintains respectful social distancing. But we've come up with some great team efforts. Dorothy, I know you've been on a number of emails with your constituents and Officer Laramie, Captain Ting, me, Sally Lenowski over the last couple of days and we will continue to maintain the same level of support and commitment to our off-campus community as we have under normal times. Great, great. Thank you for the question, Counselor Pam. Tony, I wondered if you could give us some examples of past successful town gown initiatives and maybe some ways in which you envision the town and the university working together in the future. Sure, I think that there's a ton of things that we do together and a ton of great ways in which we work together from regular meetings that Paul and I have with my boss, Nancy Bafone and Dave Zomex also involved with that and those meetings are happening on a regular basis. Jeff Kravitz was a part of that as well before he left and went to Sunderland. We also have quarterly meetings with Guilford Moring staff and then what comes of those meetings are often more meetings, but there's a lot of things that happen there. I think what we're most proud of is the work that we've done with public safety, both the fire department and with the police department. It's a great partnership and it has come up with a number of terrific solutions. Through the CCC model, which is a collaborative model in which the community and the town and the university all take responsibility for the response. We pick each other up where we need it. So I'm just thinking about CEPTED, which was such a successful... Nobody knows what CEPTED is. Yeah, it's a concept called crime prevention through environmental design. And Ian Sear, who's deputy chief at UMPD was recently certified in CEPTED and was teaching a little 101 class to UMPD and invited my office to be a part of it and invited some members of APD to be a part of it as well. And as part of this little thing, there were some projects that they did and a group of us took a look at what was going on in North Amherst and at the time, there were a number of gatherings there with lots of students in open courtyards up at the townhouse apartments, particularly we also looked at Hobart Lane. And what we did through that partnership is, the group took a look after adopting CEPTED principles, which often, it's about more light, for example, or changing the flora and fauna of a certain place to make it inhospitable for people to either walk through or in some cases in a dark area, it would be to be cutting some brush back so that people could see and feel safer. In the case of townhouse and the Hobart area, over in Hobart, in a place where there was a lot of darkness, it would be a place for easy congregation by large numbers, light is a great fumigator. And so it was suggested you put a light in a place where it couldn't be knocked down. And you kind of flood that area in an area where there was an open space for people to get together. So again, inhospitable plannings were put into place over at the townhouse area where courtyards were open, by working with the landlords who were also a partner in this. Pat Kamens was able to construct a fence that was really high and so kind of hard to get over. The only way that you were able to get into the courtyard was to go through an apartment. So we would have a sense of who was bringing people together and creating large gatherings. So it really cut down on what we saw that phenomenon of the day drink that are on a regular basis up in North Amherst. And we were really proud of that. That was one great successful initiative. It's been studied through presentations and conferences with the International Town Count Association. So we talk about what we do. And that's one example, that's one big example. There's so many others. Yeah, so I think there's also a weekly call every Monday, the police and fire and from both police departments and the fire departments and others get together and they just go through what's happened over the weekend and get into really the nitty-gritty detail about where have all the calls come in for noise disturbances, nuisance calls and start to monitor that and strategize how to address it, whether at the university level or the town level or both. We have built in that meeting so much trust over time that we really have each other's backs and that's the great thing about that meeting. We see each other weekly. And again, it's an outgrowth of what happened originally with the campus and community coalition. This smaller regular meeting happens. And yeah, so I mean, again, a big, big success of Town Count success. I've got a couple of hands in the room. So if you don't mind, I'm gonna call on Joy. And Joy, you're in the room if you wanna unmute yourself and introduce yourself and ask your question, you're in. I'll give Joy a second to unmute. I like Joy's picture. Yeah, Joy's had a nice picture. Okay, so I am gonna pop you back out and just raise your hand again when you're ready and we'll pull you back in. I do see counselor Pam has her hand raised. So I'm gonna pull her into the room and counselor, you have to unmute your mic and you'll be in with us. Welcome. Okay, can you hear me? We can hear you. Good morning, Dorothy. Good morning. Yes, this is early for me. I gotta say. But anyway, there's no camera on me, I'm assuming, right? No. We see your profile picture, which is lovely. It's on Bob. Oh, I had such trouble. I understand how I did it. I was in the meeting, got bounced out and went back in. So I was in two meetings, so I was having this crazy echo. So thinking about the future, okay, say at HCC, they made the decision just about this past week that we're gonna be totally remote in the fall semester. And they're kind of holding off the registration a little bit until they see who's gonna be still in there. Let's say that we still have these students living in town and UMass is remote. You know, I've had to be really involved with my students at HCC. And I do see, except for the young people who are working so hard in nursing homes, I see a lot of them just totally adrift. And they're very worried and they're very lonely, a lot of them, unless they happen to be living at home and able to be helping their family. And sometimes that's positive and sometimes that's negative. So what kind of fun, what kind of activities will these UMass students living in the houses in our community do? And is there any possibility of some kind of new kind of social activity which combines them more with us residents assuming that we ever can leave our houses kind of in a new kind of being because many of them are actually mature and behave very nicely, but they don't have all the fun going on at the campus. I mean, it's the whole center of activity is gonna be gone. So I'm kind of, I'm not just worried about parties and noise. I'm also worried about their social and psychological happiness and wellbeing. And thank you for that, Dorothy, because I think that that's really important. This has been, I think traumatic for students all through, you know, I have a high schooler that's home and you know, it's been tough on him and a college student that has had to leave her first year experience in March as well. And it's been tough on her, you know, I mean, they've been okay, but I can only imagine what it would be like living far from home and trying to figure out what to do. So, you know, this is all new this semester, of course. And there have been a lot of resources that the university has come up with through our wellbeing access and prevention programs. Betsy Krakow is in a relatively new position at the university, but has really figured, trying is doing what she can to figure out ways and use best practices to connect with our student body from afar. So, you know, the, you know, again, continuing with psychological services for those students that, you know, already had a need and it is something that the university continues to do as well through that area. So, you know, Student Affairs is, you know, uniquely aware of the challenges of, you know, or student needs. It's very difficult to administer to them, though, from a distance. We didn't even really talk about what the fall was gonna look like. You know, we kind of alluded to it. And, you know, it has been announced by the chancellor that we will be open, but we don't know what that looks like. And so it's, and, you know, so we will have instruction, whether it be fully remote or a blend, or we have all of our students back is something that we're still trying to figure out. And we have a number of different task forces looking at all different aspects from a full 360-degree view of what it would look like in any one of those scenarios and what we would need in every one of those scenarios. And the idea of student well-being is a big part of all of these discussions. So I don't have any answers for you right now at the, but we hope to soon. And certainly we will make that really clear through, you know, through the materials and the information that we put out. Thank you. Any other comments, counselor Pam? No, just that I would like us to be kept informed of what's going on. And I do think the university is going to be doing new things. And I think it's also, this is, you know, for Paul to be thinking about a time for us, the town to think about how we can help, how we can interact. Great idea. Thank you for your questions and your comments. We do have another question that came in from our Q&A here. They are asking, how are you helping residents of North Village find alternative housing and just expressing some concern about those students during this pandemic? We have been working with the students in North Village from the beginning when the announcement that there would be, you know, eventually a new North Village was made. So we have a staff member, particularly that is working directly with all of those students. We are assuring them housing during the course of the construction. And, you know, as long as they are with us with the university, those that will be studying over the course of the two year construction period will be brought back to North Village if they choose to be. The rent will remain the same for those North Village students. We are, you know, working with the landlords to make up the difference. And so this has been an ongoing discussion. It's been fruitful. And, you know, with regard to moving times and things like that, that has, you know, been kind of more put on hold, but we have, you know, worked very closely with our North Amherst landlords in most cases because we wanted to make sure that we can keep that community most as, you know, much intact as possible and remaining in the school district that they call home. So we've done a lot of work with them. Great, thank you. So we are coming close to our 9 a.m. wrap time. I'm gonna give the room another chance to raise their hands or put out a question. But other than that, are there any kind of parting words from either Paul or Tony? Yeah, I was disappointed that Tony didn't get that, you know, Friday tie day. It's not, this is happening when you work from home. It's Friday's tie day. I've lived with my beatnik look throughout the entire thing. I don't think that I've not worn black, you know, more than maybe twice. You know, it's slimming. You know, you want to make sure that the 10 pounds that the camera adds. I can't add any more weight on this thing. We're all getting the COVID-19, I think. You can get one of those tuxedo T-shirts for tie day. Right. I was about to wear my happy jersey because I was looking around for, you know, some UMass gear, which has had to go to my son because it doesn't fit me anymore. You know, I've grown out of it just in the wrong way. I hear there's a pretty good store on campus though. You could probably. Yes, that's true. That's true. Just. So it don't. What are you doing to celebrate today, graduate? Yes. Well, obviously at 4.30, I have something to watch. I'll be watching the commencement video. Or what are we officially calling it? It is the commencement celebration video. And it's not commencement, but we are celebrating our graduates. We will bring those students back at some time when it is, but we can, you know, be safe and bring everyone together. So. I'll be celebrating by kind of doing my bit with the local economy and patronizing. I think Mission Cantina is going to be the choice tonight. So we'll be, we'll be doing a little bit of that. Yeah, you know, I'll give you a tip when we get off here. Maybe, maybe you've already learned this tip. It's really hard to get through on that phone line. I'm actually have it dialing right now. That's a good idea. Yep. Oh my gosh. I mean, there's, there's so wonderfully busy. It's great to see. It's like the poles on. I'll take the taco combo. All right. That's the graduate. That's for you, Brianna. I love that midi file. Yeah. So basically, basically just that, you know, be with the family and probably wave to some friends as they drive by and honk past my house. So luckily I live in a community where there's a lot of friends in walking distance. So I can watch them as they, from my office window here as they walk by. Nice. Yeah. Nice. Congratulations. Thank you. Yeah, it was a big accomplishment. She did it while raising a, raising a kid, working full time and then being the star of her class. So, you know, pretty impressive accomplishment, Brianna. Thank you. And thank you for that month off that you promised. That's, that's happening now as you home school. Thanks. Well, thank you both for that. And I do want to thank everybody who joined us here today and your questions, a couple of quick minutes before we wrap. If there's anything we didn't get to ask you, Tony, that you feel is important for us to know about Amherst, your work at Amherst or at the university. No, I just, you know, I think for those out there, you know, this is such a wonderful place to live and to work. You know, we are so blessed that, and I really mean that to have university and the two colleges here and everything that they bring. And, you know, there's a whole lot more pluses than there are minuses. I so am looking forward to the day when we can come back and when we can all be in the middle of the street at the block party or something and start to hug each other again because that's the one thing I miss. I mean, I was, you know, I just think back to the last, you know, kind of event, big event that we had, which was, you know, that I was in back in February at the Air Carl Museum and that's one thing I was able to say then was just how much this community matters and Amherst is about its people and, you know, I feel privileged to be here. So, and thanks for today. This was a lot of fun. It was good. Yes, thank you. Thank you for joining us so early on what is your birthday and usually your biggest day of the year with commencement? I am really disappointed that, you know, 25,000 people aren't here to celebrate me today at McGurk, but... We'll get them next year. And what are you doing, Tony, for your birthday? Actually, I don't even know. Probably sleeping after five o'clock, you know, so be happy. Good. All right. Thanks for doing this, Brianna. Yes, thank you all. Thanks for everybody who tuned in. Have a great day. See you.