 Economic Development Commission leading to order. Recording started. Yes. What did you say? Recording started. I said before you get started. Do we have any changes to the agenda at all today? Not by me. I haven't done. Jeff, no. Todd Tanisha? No. Okay. Great. No changes to the agenda due to some time challenges. We don't have the minutes from the last meeting just yet. We're very sorry. This is not common. I'm 100 percent sure that those will be up presently in the next day or two. In the meantime, we will just carry on knowing that the recording is publicly viewable. It has been shared on social media. It is up on town meeting television. I feel confident that enough of us were here, that we can move into this meeting. Item three in our agenda today is public to be heard. If you're a member of the public and you wish to be heard, now is your chance to do so for items not on the agenda. Please raise your hand either in chat by telling us in chat, or using the hand raising tool, or simply turning on your camera and raising your hand. Yes. Gabrielle Smith, please welcome and go right ahead. I just want to quickly note to everyone who may not realize on the commission and in the public, that I am a housing commissioner, I'm on the Essex Housing Commission. I'm not here in that formal capacity, but we do try to sometimes come into other meetings and hear what other commissions are doing. That is, let me show you all, we're aware of my role. Thank you. Thanks, Gabrielle, for your constant dedication to community and for being on the housing commission, and for being here today. If there are any other members of the public that would like to be heard for items not on the agenda, now is the time, going once, going twice. The dog is trying to get in on this, but I'm going to say no to him. Great. Moving on to item four, cannabis discussion. The Economic Development Commission via myself, Annie Cooper, has invited Mariah Sanderson, the Coalition Director for the Brillington Partnership for Healthy Prevention Works Vermont to present some information that is not commonly presented at an Economic Development Commission meeting. The reason that I feel strongly that this is a good idea is not simply about cannabis and about the health of our community in that regard, but about a bigger picture vision that I believe in for the Economic Development Commission, which is that business, residents, community, all are important at this meeting and how all of that affects each other, I believe belongs here at our table for discussion. That being said, I welcome and invite Mariah Sanderson, Village Resident, to share with us some information. Mariah, will you do me a favor? Will you do a better job than I have in introducing yourself because I'm stumbling a little bit? Sure. I'm happy to. Am I going to be able to share the presentation or will someone else do that? It's a great question, Darren. I forgot to ask you that earlier. Mariah, I can promote you to a presenter so that you can share your screen. Wonderful. Let me just do that real quick then. I'm not as familiar with using Teams, I usually use Zoom, so give me a second while I figure out how to do that. Yeah. If you're on the app, there's a little box with an arrow pointing up. There you go. There you go. You can see it? We can see it, yes. Okay. Great. I don't know if there's a lonely worries that now I can't see any of you. I believe that in the bottom of this screen, you might be able to see me and you, but if you can't, that's also fine because most people have their cameras off anyway. Okay. Great. Well, I can see you all, but if so, maybe just talk and tell me if you have a question or want me to stop about something. Because it is, I understand it's very awkward to suddenly be alone in a room talking to yourself about material that you're trying to share to others. I get that. We will let you know as you go if we want to ask a question. Sounds great. Let me let, sorry, Mariah, to interrupt you. Anyone on the commission? I see Brian is here now. Brian, Jeff, or Tatanisha, and myself. Well, raise a hand if you want to comment. Actually, if you're on the commission, just speak up during the presentation if you want to ask Mariah something. I extend the same privilege to all of staff and Sam. Anyone that normally sits at our table, if you have a comment or a question during the presentation, feel free to politely insert your comment, remark, or question. All right. Thanks, Mariah. Sorry. Sure. As Annie said, my name is Mariah Flynn Sanderson. And I am the Coalition Director for the Burlington Partnership for a Healthy Community. So I work on public health and substance misuse prevention in Burlington. But this is a community that I live in. So I have a vested interest in this community, which is why Annie invited me to come speak here today. And I, you know, I come from the world of public health. So that'll be what I talk about. And you can think about how that's relevant to the work that you're doing in this commission. And I'm sorry, I was typing this up and realized I just kind of naturally write Essex Junction a lot because that's where I live. But I meant to say Essex here. And I use she, her pronouns, just if that's helpful for anyone. So now I just have to figure out how to switch to the next slide. So I always start with a couple of disclosures when I do a presentation, just so you know. So as I said, I'm the Coalition Director for Burlington Partnership for a Healthy Community. I'm also on a couple of statewide and regional groups. I'm just working on substance misuse prevention. So there's one at the county level called the Chittenden Prevention Network and one at the state level called Prevention Works, Vermont. I'm part of both of those. And then I live here in the village and I have two teenagers that are at ADL and EHS. And I'm also in my personal life, a steering committee member of grassroots organization called Smart Approaches to Marijuana, Vermont. So I'm just, I'm gonna try to go quickly because I know we don't have a ton of time. I could talk about this kind of issue around promotion of legal substances and how it impacts the community and public health probably for a couple of hours. So there's way more to say than I've said. I'll stay here today and you know, there's ever any more information. I'm happy to answer questions or come back again or whatever else is useful. But I'll just quickly kind of know a few things about Act 64, which is the law that passed this year to legalize commercial sales of cannabis and how that impacts the conversation today and then share a few data points, very few, and talk about risk and protective factors for substance use at a community level and then like at a municipal level what we can do to reduce substance use, misuse. So I always think it's helpful to make sure that everybody's on the same page when we're using language about what we mean. So I get in my field the words cannabis and marijuana are often used interchangeably to mean the same thing and in some ways they do, but the definition is slightly different. So cannabis is the plant, right? All the products that are derived from the cannabis plant and there's a lot of different things that come from that. And then marijuana refers to the parts or the products or the plant that's usually the leaves and the flowers that contain the THC, the part that is the psychoactive component that gets people pie. And in our state and just in general, people are replacing marijuana with cannabis with THC or some other way to delineate the psychoactive components of cannabis just because there's some racial history connected to use of the word marijuana, but you'll see it interused interchangeably a lot. And it's important to note that in Act 164, that law I mentioned, the legislature mandated that marijuana be changed to cannabis and all the laws. So in that, for the purpose of that, they're referring to anything that contains more than 0.0% THC. Just an FYI, Mariah, this is really helpful and beneficial and we're all listening. Thank you so much, keep going. Sure, and I tend to, just FYI, I tend to make my slides a little text heavy. So I'm gonna gloss over a few things just in the interest of time, but you have the slides and the purpose of making them text heavy so that you can refer back to them later too. So I might scoot over stuff that, and you're like, oh, there's more on there, but it's just so you can have it for later. So THC, which you might have seen kind of popping up in stores across Vermont, is stands for cannabidiol. It's one of the components in cannabis. It's usually derived from the hemp plant and by itself it does not usually cause a high like THC. So CBD is allowed to be sold in stores in Vermont if it contains less than 0.03% of the THC, like I mentioned. And the thing I always, I think there's a lot of confusion around this product. I don't wanna get into that today, but I do wanna kind of note here that CBD is not currently regulated for safety and purity by the Food and Drug Administration. So there's no necessarily, you don't know that there's 0.03% or less of active THC in it. And when they've done some tests around that, they found that oftentimes there are things in there that are not on the label. So it's just a note. So I'm not gonna go over the Act 164 basics, but I put it in here so you'd have it. It just kind of notes what passed for the law, what communities are being asked to look at. And one of the things I wanted to kind of just key to is that top one, which is what I think the reason for this discussion today is that retail sales of cannabis will be allowed in communities in Vermont that vote to opt into that. So communities have to have a vote and that retail sales at this point, unless things change, there is a proposed bill to change some of the pieces of that. At this point, we'll be able to start in March of 2022 for some licenses and in October of 2022 for all licenses. And then there's the timeline here for kind of what's happening in Vermont right now around at the state level around getting things ready for retail sales. And kind of the thing to note about that is that there's a cannabis control board that's been put in place that is working on additional rules and regulations that will happen for cannabis. So there's a lot that's still unknown. And I think that's important for communities to know, especially if you're thinking about whether or not to have a vote on this in the community. One of the things I recommend is waiting until we actually know what the rules are gonna say, what the regulations are gonna be so that you know what you're voting on. And so why I care or why I think communities should care about access to cannabis at our level and how we think about the policy for that is that we already have cannabis use rate, cannabis use problem among our youth in our state. So substance use rates for Vermont high school teens have been dropping over the last decade, except for marijuana or cannabis. And then here I'm using the word marijuana and cannabis interchange on you. Yeah. I'm so sorry to interrupt you, I apologize. Anyone that has their microphone on, please turn it off. I can see that Irene Reiner's microphone on is on. I can see. Oh, thank you. That's great. Mariah, I'm so sorry that I then made noise to interrupt you. No, no worries. Happy to enter anytime. Oh, they're on the top, sorry. So here I'm using the word marijuana because that is what the survey where the state collected this information, that's the language they use. So in Vermont, our marijuana use rates increased the last time youth were surveyed about it. From I'm sorry, 24% in 2017 to 27% in 2019. And I actually pulled out the data for Essex High School too so we'll take a look at that in a little bit. But this is something to be thinking about. Our cannabis use rates, our marijuana use rates are already increasing. So how are we as a community gonna address that and think about that to support our kids in Essex? And I should note that even though substance use rates in Vermont and other areas around tobacco use and alcohol use have been dropping, Vermont has historically for quite a long time had the highest substance use rates for youth in the nation for alcohol, tobacco and cannabis. So even though our rates are dropping, we're still much higher than a lot of other states and it's something to be paying attention to. So this is just quick visual to show you that this is just Chittenden County data. I didn't have time to pull out Essex but our rates of kids in high school who've been drinking the past 30 days who said they've been drinking the past 30 days which is to have either four or five drinks within a one block of time have been dropping, which is great. And then this is our Essex High School YRBS data I just pulled out from the data that's online. You can just see the blue line is alcohol. So it shows that in Essex actually alcohol use went down, was going down and then did a little uptick just recently. And cannabis, which is the green line has been or marijuana use has been, we were already at a slightly higher rate so we're now kind of matching the state rate. And you can see one of the other things to be thinking about as a community is that vaping has become a real challenge for Vermont youth. So the first time we started asking questions on this survey in this state about electronic tobacco use or vaping was in 2015. So we only have data starting there but it stepped like drastic increase very fast. Normally these rates of use change at a very slow increments and vaping is one of those things that did not follow that same trajectory. So the big thing to know kind of in terms of thinking about substance misuse prevention or how to help kids make healthy choices is that delaying the age of first use is really important or delaying how kids using while their brains are still developing is the way I think about it. So a lot of people talk about addiction or substance use disorder is really an adolescent disease. 90% of the people who develop a substance use disorder started using before they were 18. So if you can just get kids to wait until those brains are fully developed it's likely that they'll never develop a problem. So that's something to be thinking about when you think about policy at a local level and how we support kids is what can we do to help encourage them to delay use for as long as possible. And the way we talk about that in Burlington where I do work is to say make the healthy choice the easy choice. And that's for everyone, not just for kids. Raya, excuse me. This is Raj. One of the trustees, can you just talk a little bit about or I don't know if we have time but how this relates to other issues that the youth might be experiencing? You know, my understanding from the YRBS data and from other research is that, you know, students that are participating in these behaviors are also more likely to experience depression and other risky sexual behaviors. They're more often these impacts are disproportionate on minorities and students who are LGBTQ. So I think it extends a little bit beyond or I'd like to hear if you think it extends a little bit beyond simply the idea that they're using a substance and usually is either a sign of other risky behavior or it's often hard to figure out I think what came first, you know, what the cause and effect are, but I think that's an important piece of information to keep in mind. And I don't know if that's what you're finding but that was my understanding as well. Absolutely, that's a really important point that substance use is usually mixed up with a whole bunch of other risky behaviors for kids. And, you know, and I'm talking about this in terms of developing a substance use disorder but you can also think about it in terms of if you wanna create healthy kids who thrive and have future success, you know, supporting them along a variety of different ways, preventing substance use is kind of one piece of that puzzle, it's not at all the pieces but it is connected to things like risk for depression and other mental health issues. And you're right that there's are, so again, I work with the Burlington data all the time and I've only just recently started looking at our Essex data, but so I'll talk about the state and maybe folks can delve into the Essex data but at the, in Vermont and in most communities, our students who are identifying as LGBT, which is the way that the questions are asked on the survey have higher rates of kind of risky behaviors, particularly substance use than students who are not identifying as LGBT. And that varies a little bit for BIPOC students. So oftentimes the BIPOC students are reporting higher rates of struggling with mental health issues and lower kind of assets in the community. So lower rates of feeling like they matter to adults in the community, but that doesn't always correlate to substance use. Sometimes we see that happen in other things. So it's a little bit different there, but yes, this does impact our, some of our more vulnerable populations more. So it's something to be thinking about if you're thinking about trying to create a community where everyone thrives, looking at how you promote substances really impacts that. Or how- So if you have a population that may be already at risk or struggling, access is an important issue. Yes. And we can talk more about this, but historically too, and I don't know how this will play out in Essex, but in Burlington, one of the things we look at is our lower income neighborhoods end up bearing the brunt of retail because they end up having more retailers in the lower income neighborhoods. So kids who live in those neighborhoods see more advertisements, see more promotion of substance use than kids who don't. And so that's something to be thinking about. How are we creating a community that doesn't inadvertently or inadvertently target vulnerable youth as well? I see you, Wiso's hand up, just dive in there, Wiso. Excuse me, Mariah. Go ahead. Hi, Mariah, this is Wiso Makuku. I'm the Interim Community Development Director for the town. Hi. Oops. And I had a question because I was just listening to the NPR piece on the Sacklers yesterday, and I wondered what role opiates, you didn't give any data on pills and opiates or anything in the community. And I wonder under what category those may have fallen in your graph. Yeah, so there's a reason I left those out. And it's not because opiate use is in a problem and it isn't something to be looking at. It's because I focus this presentation on youth and for youth, the place where they usually start substance use is not with opiates. So it's with cannabis, tobacco, and alcohol, that's usually the first use for most people. So when you think about opiate use, it's really kind of the second tier. Students who are already using or already struggling with problems with these substances then often graduate too. So I like to think about, I think people talk about what's the gateway drug? What's the drug that leads to all of their substance use? And there is no one gateway drug, but these three kind of are the gateway drug. These three are the ones that lead to other future problems for youth. So it's kind of that same reason. So I didn't focus on opiates and we could look at it, but the rates of opiate use are much smaller than. Oh no, and I didn't want, we didn't need to focus on it. I just wondered because it has been so much in the media over the past few years and of course. Really important point that you bring up is that it is the one that gets talked about the most because sometimes the, you know, for folks who develop a substance use problem with opiates, it ends up being devastating, right? And so, and there's so many consequences for the individuals and the families and the community. So we talk about it a lot, but in terms of the larger impact, these three actually have much more financial impact on communities or on our state, we end up putting a lot of resources to deal with the consequences of this use more than the other. I'm gonna move on just in the interest of time, but it is important point to think about. We often put out, there's often a lot of attention on opiates, but it's good to think about all of the substances in our community and how they're impacting health. So investing in prevention and again, this, you can think about how this is relevant for your commission, but saves money, which is usually common sense for most people, but this is some data from the health department saying that every dollar we invest in prevention saves 10 to $18 that we might end up later having to spend on things like healthcare or criminal justice or lost productivity at work. And if you think about some people talk about this in terms of alcohol and tobacco and marijuana and opioids and the other drugs in the community kind of turn up the heat for kids and prevention strategies, things that you do at a community level can turn down that temperature and keep things from boiling over for kids. That's just a way to kind of think about it. Vermont uses, this is the Vermont prevention model also taken from the Vermont Department of Health. So if you wanna think about reducing youth use or preventing problem use within a community, the best way to do that is to think about hitting strategies at every one of these levels. And today I'm just gonna focus on that community level. What's the physical environment look like? What's the social norms in the community? What's the cultural environment? But true prevention or true public health models, this is really a public health model. Don't aren't, are only effective if you're really supporting people at all of these levels. And you can have the most impact at that policy and systems level. So the, we tend, oftentimes folks tend to, it's hard to think about beyond the individual strategies like how do you think about mentor programs or things like that that support an individual person. But if we really wanna create change or we really wanna create a supportive community, we also work higher up to a policies and systems. So there are things like risk factors within a community and there are protective factors. Risk factors can lead to increased use or problem use and then protective factors help make it easier for people to make healthy choices. So these are just a couple of pictures. They're actually a little bit old. I did a community presentation a couple of years ago where community members went out and took pictures of their community. And so I just pulled a couple of the ones from Essex to use for this slide. And I'm trying not to like call out any one place but you might recognize some of these from our community. So this is just one of the risk factors for underage use within a community is if the community norms are either unclear about substance use or they encourage use or promote use. One of the protective factors, one of the things that makes it easier for people to make healthy choices is if the policies and the social norms within the community encourage non-use or responsible use or however we wanna think about that. So I just put a little picture here of Maple Street Park where they have a nice sign that prohibits alcohol and smoking. So in a public place, people are encouraged not to use and not use in front of kids. Oh, there's the arrows. I was wondering where those went. And so I'll talk a little bit about what, when you're thinking about the new law, one of the things I would encourage our community to do is be proactive regardless of what the community decides whether to have retail cannabis in Essex or not. There's a lot that we actually should be looking at already in terms of how our community is designed around alcohol and tobacco. And there's a lot that we can do prior to even allowing any more retailers in the community to help support people. And so this is just a little data around the impact of cannabis advertising. And there's more and more kind of information being collected about that now that there are legal sales in other states. But just shows that exposure to marijuana or cannabis advertising is associated with higher rates of use among adolescents. And this lovely picture is a young lady who works with us in Burlington. So when thinking about community level prevention, there are some root causes of substance misuse at the community level, normalization of use, access and availability for use, substances availability in the community, low perception of harm. If people don't think that the substance is harmful then they're more likely to use, which is definitely a challenge that we have with cannabis. There's a lot of misperceptions there around harm. And then like I said, early onset of use substance misuse, so people using early. And some of the things that you can do to prevent youth initiation in use is create buffers for adult-only product sales near places like schools and other places kids gather. So if you think about a lot of these strategies are really just about not having kids constantly bombarded with advertising and messaging that promotes use or being in situations where adults are using or using excessively. So thinking about our community events, how often do they promote alcohol? Or are they smoke-free? So prohibiting use in public and a family-friendly events. And then requiring clear warnings on labels at stores and maybe information about health risks, banning smoking and vaping in public areas. And looking at establishing density maximums. So that means like in communities where there are a density of retailers. So a lot of retailers within a small area, people use at higher rates. And I don't know that we have too much of an issue with INS6 yet, but it's always good to be proactive. Like I said, because it's very hard once you've arred as folks have probably realized over the years, once you've already approved a license to then realize, oh no, we have too many here. So it's better to create zoning or ordinances that allow us to already keep that from happening, from becoming what's called like a tobacco or a cannabis or alcohol swamp where you have too many in one area and it ends up causing problem use. Can I ask you a quick question, it's Roger. Sorry to interrupt. Do you have anything at your fingertips for what CDC and others recommend for minimum distances for some of this stuff? I think there are some suggestions, I just can't recall. There are, and people do it differently based on the community and the design of the community. So, and actually I've just been starting to look at, are there recommendations for density, which I haven't found yet, but there are recommendations for like how far away or those buffer zones I was talking about. So most, a lot of the places I've seen communities have created a thousand foot buffer, so not within a thousand feet of a school or a community center or in our area might be Essex Chips where kids gather, but some places do it even farther away. So there's definitely others where it's like a half mile radius. So you'd have to think about what fits and works for this community. Yeah, I imagine thinking about the village downtown and how it's sort of the hangout hub for students coming, basically most students going to school if they're walking, travel through that area and congregate after school, especially the fourth through 12th graders, for instance. They're the ones that you're more likely to see, especially in warm weather as we make more areas for that possible in the village center. So I'm curious how we do that. And if Brown L is as a youth center, almost a community center, how that fits into where are we able to site some of these thoughtfully? Yeah, that's a really important point. I think you're right. It's the place that I think about a lot when I think about what could Essex do is that area, because you're right, kids are constantly walking through there. And a few years ago when we started to have vape shops pop up all over the place in our community, I thought, gosh, we didn't plan for this very well. So because they all, for a little while, there was a whole bunch right in the area, kids are walking around. So there's a couple of different ways to think about that, whether it's in terms of density or whether it's one other thing you can do is eliminate window or sidewalk or street view advertising. So if there are places where kids are unlikely to go inside, it could just be about eliminating the advertising on the outside. But if it's things like corner stores where kids are gonna be going in for a snack after school or whatever, then you might wanna think about it differently. But there's a lot of things. So I think there's no one answer. There's no one like this is the right fit because you do have to look at your own community and what makes sense here. But I think the kind of key recommendation I would say is, you know, just in general, I showed you cannabis advertising information, but in general, youth are more impacted by advertising than adults are. And research shows for lots of research over long periods of times that advertising of alcohol, tobacco, cannabis, it doesn't really matter the substance. Kids are more impacted by that. And the more they see of it, the more likely they are to have favorable attitudes about using and then eventually that leads to kind of more likely to use substances. So the more we can just create a community that supports healthy choices, that doesn't promote substance use or misuse, the better kids thrive. And there's lots of other ways to, it's not just about advertising. California has done a lot of work around this topic. And so I think they'll be a good resource. Also, the colorful advertising and making it look like it's candy and tasty are aspects of advertising to children that has been absolutely banned in California. But we have some good precedence, I guess that's all I wanted to say. Yeah, I think that's great. There's, I think that's also an important point is that we're not the first to be looking at this. There's so much great information out there about what other communities are doing, what's been successful. So like I said, I only pulled out a tiny bit of things, but there's a lot out there for us to learn from. And I don't want, like I said, I'm sharing this with the thought about the community at large, not necessarily related to Act 164. So I have my own opinions about whether or not we should even allow a vote in Essex, but one of the things that on whether or not to have cannabis retail here, I do think we should be really thoughtful about our own community and what that might look like in this community. I think Essex is a very, is a large school district. There's a lot of youth and families here. So you have to think about it differently than another area, which is maybe more rural or has less families and kids. It may not be a good fit for this community just because of the design or the population here. So we have to be really thoughtful. It's not, I wouldn't, I would want us to think about what makes the most sense here. Mariah, I'm sorry. I'm going to interrupt for a second because I see Brian's hand up, but I want to interject just for a moment for the community at large in that I believe cannabis has space in our community for sales. And I just want to make sure that nobody thinks that I invited Mariah here to take some kind of political stance against sale of cannabis. So I believe confidently that kind of the sales does have a home in our community. If the committee that is formed, that's getting formed now also agrees with that. And so I just want to make sure that no one thinks I'm out here playing some kind of politics with this. Brian, can you please go ahead and wait? Well, hold, hang on, Annie. I just want to, I hope we don't predetermine the outcome. I mean, it sounds like what you're saying is the economic development commitments. I mean, these are important things to consider. Raj, I'm only saying that as a person, I did not personally invite Mariah here to set some kind of political stage. I am not speaking for the Economic Development Commission at all. But I do believe that this conversation, just look at you and me talking about it right now. This conversation belongs at a business table. It belongs at a, like, absolutely, this kind of conversation must take place for our community to decide and choose what to do next, which is why the committee is being formed, which is where this conversation goes next, away from the EDC. I guess my only point to that, and I appreciate that, as always, Annie, I do, is that I don't want that view necessarily to be labeled a political view. Oh, fair. Science, it's public health. It's the things we need to be considering first and foremost before we do any business. And so I'm sensitive to the idea that that would be misconstrued as a political opinion when really we're talking about science. Okay, I agree with you. And my apologies, because now I better understand our conversation from last night. And I agree with you at 100%. And I'm not saying that I'm against it. I just want to make sure that it's well thought out, I think like everyone else. So that's what I'm saying. And I think that people are wanting to make sure that we have someone other than Mariah speaking. And I agree, which is where that happens next at the committee table. So for us, it is not common at the Economic Development Commission to have a public health speaker. And the reason I thought that that was a novel idea is that without this look, I don't know that the, I think that committee needs to have this in mind as they move forward. And I think that from a business standpoint, we don't frequently invite public health to a conversation and we should. Can I point out? Agreed. This is Sam. Can I just point out, as you're discussing does it fit or not fit? Currently there's legislation in front, a bill in front of our state legislature that would say if a community does not vote for or against retail cannabis sales, it's assumed then that the community will, not it's, the community will then be assumed a yes vote and cannabis can be sold in that community. So unless you have a vote before the set date in the bill, they're going to make, the bill would make the decision for you. Sure. Right. The goal of the cannabis study committee that we're putting together internally from of the different boards and committees and relevant departments like police is to gather information to present to the public before a vote is held in November, I believe. Right. Right. The goal. Great. Yes. And to that vein for one second, what I want to do right now is we never got to Brian and then Mariah, I'm not sure how much is left of your presentation but I feel a lot of hunger for conversation that I want to open the floor to. Brian, can you share your thoughts now and then I will go back to Mariah to somehow either maybe pull her presentation down so we can have conversation and then put it back up or finalize or something. Let's go to Brian. I just had a quick question. I'm sensitive to Mariah's the line item on the previous slide about density. However, it was my impression and correct me if I'm wrong please that Act 164 only allowed one retailer per town. So maybe that's not an issue, but maybe I'm wrong. So I didn't know if you knew Mariah. That is incorrect. So there's, I think what you might be thinking about is that like I said, there's retailers that will be allowed in March of 2022 and then all retailers allowed in October of 2022 and in March, it's just a few that qualify for that. So that might be where that's coming in like there won't be as many then. But I think the, so this is actually one of my last slides there's just one that's just resources. Mariah, what I want to do next is that if there's any strong feelings about our conversation, they go strong feelings need to come at me because I invited you here and I want to make sure that you don't end up in a conversation that's not anything that has to do with you. All you have done is come here for that information at my invitation. So I mean, please I'm happy to answer questions and I don't mind strong conversation. I'm happy with that and totally fine. And like I said, I'm addressing this from a public health perspective. So you all have to think about that from a lot of other perspectives, right? So from a public health perspective, there's considerations to think about from a prevention perspective, there's considerations to think about. And then in the interest of time Mariah in the interest of time, what I'd like to do and I'm sorry for being so bold. I know I sound a little rude. What I'd like to do is have you finish that up and then we'll pull the presentation slide down and then I will bring the meeting back to me and I will control hands raised and conversation directed to me. Sure. And we'll have you answer questions as they get asked of you, good? Absolutely. Thank you. So I mean, the only thing I want to say is make sure that public health is part of the conversation or you can end up with unintended consequences for some of these policy decisions. If you don't have people at the table who can kind of guide some of that. And then the other is there's so many great resources to help make informed conversations and informed thought about this. And I just put a few of them here but there's a lot more just like toolkits for communities. A lot of the like this Vermont League of Cities and Towns did a really comprehensive overview of what exactly we can do in Vermont. So there's lots out there to help with this conversation. Great. The first thing I'd like to do is thank you because your willingness to come even when you asked me why. So just for the public knowledge, you even said to me, do I belong at this meeting with this presentation? I said yes. And if nothing else happens this morning but that people get into strong conversation that is exactly what civic engagement is. And you and I have done a great job of creating that conversation right here today. So what I'd like to do now, thank you for pulling that presentation down is thank you so much, Mariah, for your time, your energy and your patience. Anyone that has questions for Mariah or for anyone else, I'd like them to go through me. And I also wanna make sure that I invite, I don't know what I wanna do before I move to hands is ask Lori Houghton or Rep. Sorry, Lori, I see I surprised you. Ask you, Lori, if you have anything to say right now before I move on to other questions. No, the only thing I would say is the reference to the March 22nd and the reference to the vote, that Senate, that bill came out of Senate, it did pass out of Senate. It is not currently being addressed in the house. So I don't know what the chances are of it passing out this year just to give everyone an update on that. And then just in general, I'm here to help answer questions as whatever committees are formed or whatever direction you take, please use me as a resource. Great, thank you so much, Lori. So to be clear to everyone, the committee that's being formed is being formed by our community development team of town and village of Robin, sorry, but we so iconic that said your name incorrectly, of Ovisu and Robin. And the committee sits in their hands with their decision-making and the committee goes there to have this discussion at a larger level. In the meantime, I'm really excited about the tension in the room because that is exactly what civic engagement is. Brian Sheldon, I would like to go to Brian Armstrong unless you- Just a quick correction. Yes. It originates from the manager's office. Thank you, Ovisu, for that clarification. I was trying to put it towards where it went and I didn't state that clearly. So your best one. To restate with Ovisu's correct correction, it originates with our manager's office, our unified manager's office. Brian Sheldon, may I go to Brian Armstrong first or would you like to speak first? No, my hand is stuck from previously, please move on. Brian Armstrong, I believe you're the next hand up. Good morning and thank you everyone for the time today as well as the fierce conversation. I'm a born and raised S6 Junction former resident. I now live in South Burlington. So I am very aware of definitely the challenges. I've got three step children that I've raised and I think a couple of things that we may get lost. The availability of marijuana for better or for worse is actually already exists at a high level with the legalization allow people to grow. I think there's also a natural chance that you're going to see not legal product but homegrown products start to increase. You know, for the record, as many of you may know, I also shareholder Magic Man, which is a CBD company at the Essex experience. And I just want to state that our hope in our intent is that Essex will move forward to this but we want to contribute in a positive responsible way. I'd be very open to have either excise tax towards substance control. My concern is that if the town doesn't opt in, we're going to live in the same cloud of the myth, you know, that just because it's illegal means the access is going to stay down. I'd rather see a town that I've been born and raised in than that I love get to the point where they have more proactive controls for community members and help any movements forward fund the actual substance control. In researching this morning, there's actually actually some indications from, I think it was the Newport Academy that indicated that oddly enough legalization had a saw a decrease in some use of youth in California and Washington. Now, for the record, I've seen conflicting statements to that from the NIH. So my hope is that we'll be able to move forward in a way that recognize what's currently happening in our community and better fund substance control, not through the foolishness of banning it, but it's not going to happen in the community. Before I call on someone else, I would like to say that honestly, literally, this is what civic engagement is. Literally, this is what we're supposed to be doing here. Yes, please, Lori Houn. Hi, thanks. I actually do have to go. So first I want to say thank you for this important conversation, but I also want to say that in the bill that in the, in the act, so in, I think, I think it's more, Ryan knows better than I. I remember it as S52, but whatever the act is, it does have a substantial part of the retail going to a substance prevention fund. That was actually one of the reasons why the bill was delayed in passage because there were many, many of us that pushed to ensure that some of the revenues, I forget the exact amount, are going. And quite frankly, it's not enough. It won't be enough if this, you know, if more retail shops open, but it is a start. So, but thank you for this conversation. I apologize, I do have to go. Thank you for being here and thank you for being present to it. And we really appreciate you. Brian, is your hand up and you're welcome to want to speak again, or is it still up from before? It actually took it down, but I will add as well. One of the reasons why I've, and I own several businesses or part owners of several businesses, one of the reasons why I'm passionate about this is I believe through small businesses, we can provide more economic opportunity to all classes of the community and create a more vibrant community through better sustained, you know, economic opportunities. And Mike, you know, we've already in our short time, as a CBD only, we created two or three jobs to the community already. And we are hoping that with the town's hope to move forward, that we'll be able to, you know, create probably 20 to 30, if not 50 jobs in the next five years. And to me, that may outweigh the net, any potential negative impact. That's an interesting statement. And I, okay. I would like to call on commission member Jeff Benjamin. Thanks, Annie. So I think my conversation wants to kind of bring it a little bit back to the EDC. Sure. I think the conversation that we had around health and prevention has a weird dichotomy with what we're trying to do in terms of promotion. So it's like we're trying to promote business. We're trying to build the community in terms of the economic development. So it's really that dichotomy of prevention versus promotion. So the question that I have for us to think about moving forward is, you know, with the conversations they're going to have on the other boards and the other committees is if this is something that we want to move forward with, what is a good recommendation for promotion that still doesn't impact the use and abuse of the youth where we can still safely promote the businesses to help the economic development without an adverse impact on what Mariah was bringing up with all the health prevention. So it isn't a question. I just want us to think more about where we go from here in terms of the EDC plan with how we promote businesses while still keeping the prevention of health in mind. I appreciate that, Jeff. So what I want to say about the Economic Development Commission is that we must serve our community in its totality. We don't serve only the business if we don't. I believe that the Economic Development Commission needs to look at our entire community and how all business impacts our community. That conversation is wide open all the time. In my opinion, it doesn't happen enough. I see that Raj's hand is up except Gabrielle Smith's hand has been up a long time. So let me call Gabrielle Smith and then Raj. And then Meredith Mann. Sorry, Meredith. Thanks, Annie. I have a question, Annie, if I could, if you could direct it to Mariah. And then I have a comment. So I've worked in, Mariah and I know each other because I've worked in the field of prevention for a very long time. So it's my, my question is I tend to goop. I know this is going to sound a little bit. Anyway, I tend to group tobacco in with highly addictive substances. Tobacco is the way that it's. I'm getting some coffee over there. So if you're not, get your microphone off. All right, are we good? All right. So anyway, Mariah, my question is, do you see marijuana and CBD and THC? Particularly THC, I should say. As a highly addictive substance along the same lines as tobacco is packaged by commercially here in the United States and also other highly addictive drugs, opioids, pills, or would you group it as a drug that is capable by many human beings who already have addiction issues along the lines of alcohol, would you group marijuana? How do you see that in terms of its potential public health impact as a recreational or medical substance that we might have a business for in our community? Is it okay if I answer that? Yes, please. Yeah, okay. So I heard kind of two different questions there actually. So to answer your first one, yes, cannabis or marijuana has addiction potential. It's at this point, we actually are just now getting better information on kind of the number of the people who use the number who will become substance dependence because the cannabis that's available today is so different than what was available when we did a lot of studies around this 20 or 30 years ago, right? The potency has really increased over the last 30 years or more. So we don't have a ton of information about what's the addiction potential now, but I just saw some recent studies that said of the kids who start using when they're younger about 13% to one in 10 will develop a substance use disorder of kids who use for a couple of years. It's one in 20. So it's somewhere between probably between 10 to 20% of the people who use reggae who will develop a substance use problem. So that's pretty much on par with a lot of other substances. So it's not any different than any other substance I know we sometimes put it into a different category but in terms of folks who develop a problem it's fairly comparable. And then the other, so, and then I guess that's the thing I wanted to note is that sometimes when I think adults, older adults have conversations about this and try to think about policy or community we think about the cannabis or marijuana that was available 20 or 30 years ago and we're making decisions based on that but that's not the product that's available today. What's available today is very different. The potency can be as high as 80% versus cannabis from the 60s and 70s was more like 3% THC, now it's 80%. That's a completely different substance. We're not even talking about the same thing. So I think that's important for people to get informed about so that you can make informed decisions about what that looks like and how that's available. Thanks, Mariah. And then I just had a comment about this to it. That whether we have an outlet and where we have that outlet are both economic development and public health. You can't separate those two things. Agreed. I was here when up in smoke came in, I was not here. I was here working for the school district when up in smoke came in and I was very vocal about that, about where that business was cited. Which I'm just, it's not fair anymore. Yeah, and I think it should be fair to be fair to our community. Current businesses such as, and I want me, I think Meredith may have been up so long that I got a call on her before you Raj, but Gabrielle, to be fair to our businesses in our community now is that it's a vastly different business than that was. And also, yeah, anyway, I could start. Anyway, I just want to finish, if that works. So the reason why I bring that up is because it is, Mariah mentioned that it is very important where we talk about, and I say this also with Raj present, and also for our select board, wherever we might cite this business is very important. It is as important as whether we have it as where it is cited as where we set up, if we have ordinances we can set up so that we are making it a place where we're just going to have a minimal, where we're minimizing the negative public health impact, especially for youth wellness in balance with the economic development opportunity and impact. Thank you. Thank you, Gabrielle. I'm very sorry for interrupting you. I just got a little nervous that people understand that we respect their businesses. I'm sorry for interrupting you. Please forgive me. Raj, I'm going to call on Meredith Mann, who's been waiting very patiently for quite some time. Hi, everybody. Thank you for your time. My name is Meredith Mann. I am one of the owners of Magic Man. Brian spoke quite a bit, but I just wanted to say that we welcome anybody coming in and having any conversation about cannabis. All of this is important. Public health and kids are extremely important to us. I am a parent. I have two kids that have now just graduated high school that are amazing non-cannabis using kids. And I have a lot of information and knowledge coming from a supervisor position at the dispensary. And I just want to say that on the THC side of this, which is very different in some ways now, there's going to be such strong compliance that it's going to be the safest way to keep kids out of it is to have a structure where you have to give an ID, go through security. It just makes it a safer structure for our community. And I do want to just say that as far as public health goes, it's extremely important and addiction is extremely important. And coming from the medical side, I've just seen what a huge positive impact cannabis has had on opioid addiction in Vermont and the need for it on that side. And that's not talking, that's just talking about everybody, your mom, my mom, everybody's parents who have used prescription drugs. I'm not just talking about your homeless junkie. It's a really important big problem in Vermont. And I'm really glad that Mariah is here addressing kid issues and health issues in Vermont. And we want to stay on top of those conversations with you as we grow as a business and be as transparent as we can and part of the community. Thank you so much, Meredith. I just want to clarify from the economic development standpoint that homeless people in our community with substance abuse problems are equal in value to us. As I know you weren't saying that, but I just wanted to like, you know, mild that out a little bit. And thank you for your time and your energy and for your patience with me this morning. I'd left you hanging there for a long time because I was trying to balance. No, I really just, my business partners really did a great job. I just wanted to say that we're open to all conversations. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Thank you so much, Meredith. I'm going to go to Raj and then to Oviso. I appreciate Meredith's comments. You know, as a resident, none of this has been speaking as a trustee, but as a resident, I want to, it was a little while ago, I don't know if it was Benjamin's comments. I appreciate those. And it is an interesting conversation to have, you know, with this committee. I do appreciate the fact that this committee is looking into the public health aspects. I think it's important. I'd say if the Economic Development Committee and businesses in Essex want to see success in this area, that they would be well advised to be aggressive in accepting thoughtful zoning, advertising, signage. And I don't want to call them restrictions, but, you know, accepting things like that, understanding that those have a positive impact. And it isn't, I just, I have to leave it at that. If the Economic Development Commission really wants this to succeed in Essex, you know, be honest with businesses and be aggressive in promoting prevention strategies that are proven to work. And I think failure to do that would make it more difficult. And unnecessarily so. I do believe there are some benefits, but, you know, I think we need to be cautious in how we do this. I'm as a village resident, not sure that there's a location I can think of, frankly, where I would feel okay with it, with having a site. So I see much more opportunity in the town outside the village, just in terms of space. But I really appreciate you all having this thoughtful conversation. It was great to hear from Raya Sanderson. And yeah, I look forward to talking about it more. Great, thank you, Raj. I want to be clear one more time to the public at large, anybody watching this later on video, and then I think it was a waste I was going to go to next, but before I do, what I want to say is that the Economic Development Commission is today going to nominate and elect, I guess, to someone to go serve on the committee for the cannabis discussion. This year today is simply a conversation that now takes place at that committee table with, led by our staff and what have you. Are we so, did you need to say something or did you retract your heat? So my first comment was just, I've taken my hand down for a sec because I thought it might be too granular and I was just going to point out emphasizing what Meredith said, that I have been to a dispensary in Massachusetts and they won't even let you in. If you're just a casual browser, you're carted, I mean, just about fingerprinted down there, but the fact is that it's not a place where you can even get in if you're underage and so that sort of protection to get into this space might be something that we want to consider. And the other thing that I was going to say is that on the committee, I mean, I hadn't been thinking much about the cannabis committee other than the fact that we're going to be studying the topic, but frankly, I think that rather than debate whether or not we should or should not be having cannabis and Essex, I think that the committee needs to focus on the regulations and all of the controls that we want to have in place, should the voters decide in November to legalize it. I mean, if I guess if they're not going to vote, if it goes down, then there's no point in discussing it. And so what we really need to focus on as a committee is the mechanisms that we need in place to keep kids safe to understand where places would locate to have a larger sense of what regulatory measures we need in place. And I'm not speaking for the committee because the committee doesn't exist. I understand. I'm not speaking for the committee. I understand. That again, we can spend a lot of time debating the issue when the voters are the ones who are going to choose. So I think that we need to be, we need to stay at a certain level where providing complete information to the community about what they need to consider and what we need to consider as a community to move to create a full understanding of the issue. Which is exactly why public health absolutely has to be at that table. You've literally just described for me and to me why public health needs to be at that table so that the community is fully educated. It doesn't need to be a debate. It just needs to be a presentation of information, my opinion. I'm only- That's what I was going to say. There are a lot of people that we need to bring to the table. And I think that the group that we're trying to put together is the group that's going to be extracting the questions from thin air or from factual information that create the speakers, that create the large pod of information. Sorry for the cannabis reference, but the body of information that we're presenting to the community. Sure. I didn't mean to say sure as though that wasn't important. It was complete to me. So I said sure as and I ingested that. In the interest of time, it is now 9, 10 a.m. and we didn't get to any other items on the agenda, but this has been absolutely exactly what I feel our community needs for a conversation. Civic engagement is important. And when this video goes up online, once we get it to CCTV, this value in bringing the conversation to the committee, I don't know if the committee is gonna be publicly viewable or not, but the conversation is important from every standpoint. I saw hands go up and I'm gonna, suddenly out of nowhere, I'm gonna put a limit because otherwise we won't get finished. So I'm gonna put a, I don't know, one minute. I'm just kidding. But if you could throw down in a very brief way, the next thing that you wanna say. And I saw Brian's hand go up, Liz's hand is up for the first time. So I'm gonna throw down over to Liz for a second. Liz, you can have longer than one minute because obviously you didn't talk yet. I don't need longer than one minute, but thank you. I just wanted to say that our community has a robust history of having really hard conversations. And we know how to do that, and we know how to do that well. And I would just encourage this group to stay involved, of course you all are, and to make sure that when we get to that point that we are having facilitated really informed and really intentional conversations with the community about all that this means. And I just wanted to thank you all for having this. And again, just to shout out that Magic Man, the business and the owner, it's a wealth of information over there. If there's any question that you have about anything related to this topic, stop in there and talk. You will be amazed at what you find out. So I would encourage everyone to visit the business and to continue to stay engaged in this conversation. Great, thank you, Liz. And what I want to reiterate, just to pull out from all the important things that you've just said, is that it sounds like what you're saying is, and I want to just throw it because I think it's so important, is that as the committee finishes and finalizes what it's going to offer to our community for decision making, that we have at that point a community wide conversation that invites this kind of powerful tension filled, and I don't mean tension as in fighting, I mean tension as in shining, as in really crafting and growing something that has value. And so this kind of civic engagement has the most value. And so I'm hearing you say that after the committee finishes this work, which I believe will be robust also in conversation, that the community gets engaged at the level that creates more opportunity for learning from both what Mariah's talking about and what Brian Armstrong is talking about and what Jeff Benjamin is saying, so that the totality of what we decide upon when we vote is revealed to the most people that we can reveal it to. Now that I've said all that. Yeah, I just add one thing to that, Annie, and I would just encourage us not to wait till after. I think it's really important that the community be involved while the conversations are happening and while the study committee is getting going, because the questions that we all have as community members can really inform a study committee that is working to try to see how this committee is caring about. Absolutely. I would just encourage us all to do this, not one after the other, but to do it collaboratively. Oviso, is it possible that that committee that gets formed, that you're forming now, is it possible, Oviso, that is on video like this is? Can that be a community-wide access so public can be heard and is that possible for that committee? I don't see why not, but as I said, I would divert questions to the town manager's office because that is where this request or process originated. I didn't see Evan here and I don't see Greg. So I guess what I'll do is I'll send an email directly after this meeting to Evan and Greg and present this as an idea because the fact that you are also on, I'm teary-eyed right now. If the committee can be this open and people can have this conversation and be in disagreement but towards an outcome, that's for all. I think that's the healthiest way. Also, I agree with Liz and I see Oviso does. So that's really great. Oviso, I'll send that email. Thank you for being courageously open to being the case. So I wanna wrap up this conversation not because it's not interesting but because we could probably do this till midnight. I'd like to ask Brian Onsturing, a Meredith man to speak briefly. I'm so sorry, not because I don't, thank you, go ahead, Brian. So really quick, first, just a background. One of the companies that helped start was KW Vermont which actually has over 180 agents and community members and it's been rated one of the best places to work. And I mentioned that because our goal is to be a vibrant member of the community and provide sustainable economic opportunities. The friction of the extremes does chart the best course. Please also remember as business owners, we are looking to purchase in excess of a half million dollars probably worth of real estate. We have to start the process now to be able to operate in this environment. So any indications the town can give us that they're gonna work with our industry to find that balanced approach for public safety and economic opportunity is gonna be needed sooner than later so that we know which towns to invest in and I'd love it to be Essex where I grew up. That is greatly and deeply appreciated. And if you don't mind, I would like to be really frank and say that literally that. Because Marat, because Anne- Quick Darren, mute Liz, she doesn't know she's on, was she talking to her, did you get it? Thank you everyone. Thank you, Brian. And to Brian's point, that is why I feel that public health needs to be engaged in the discussion because yes, of course we want jobs, of course we want investment, of course. And I wanna make sure that that is balanced so that we're fair-minded for the totality of our community because yes, Brian, I agree. Absolutely, invest in Essex. We don't not want that, but we wanna make sure that this particular conversation has a totality. Meredith, did you, is Meredith Mann's hand back down now? Yeah, my hand was up by accident. Oh, great, thank you. So I hadn't put it down, so I'm good and thank you very much. And Meredith, you've been so patient because I saw some emails come through and I really appreciate your willingness to come to this meeting as a member of the public and to bring your voice to this conversation in the way that I had set it up for and I really value that you were patient and thoughtful in your engagement with us and I really respect you for that. Thank you so much. My pleasure, thank you. It was an honor to be here and I look forward to being involved in as many frank conversations as I can in the future. Thank you, everybody. Thank you for being willing to have hard conversations. Okay. My pleasure. Unless, Mariah, I don't know, I feel like I hijacked your presentation at the end and so if you had any closing thought about what you were saying, I'm open to it now or if you feel confident with the way I kinda yanked you out of there, I just felt a rise of communication needing to happen and I was like, let's just do that. That's great. It's great. I think it's fine. I'm glad that you got time for everyone to speak and when people, I always forget that when people ask questions, things take a lot longer so the presentation took a lot longer than I was intending so I'm glad that everyone got a chance to check in and know I think I'm excited to hear that there's work to think thoughtfully about this in Essex and a group of folks that are gonna do that and my kind of final thought is to ensure that there are people who are very seeped in like the research and the evidence-based strategies like Raj was saying to make sure that you're making those decisions based on good data. Great. Thank you so much and thank you for taking us. I know that we only intended five minutes and I think this has been great. If anyone else has one last tidbit to put on this topic, I'm happy to have you do it but then we have to nominate someone to the committee and then have that conversation move on and the Economic Development Commission will post about or it actually, no, we won't. I'm sure that the town will post about, sorry, I took on a role I should not have, excuse me, I got excited. I'm sure that Evan will post about what that committee looks like and where that will take place and how the public can interact with it. Are there any final closing thoughts on this very exciting conversation? Wow, all right, it is now midnight, just kidding. And so our next item on our agenda or the piece of our agenda that is next, if I can quickly find it, is a nomination of one EDC member to serve on the research committee. I had had, oh thank you so much, Darren. I'd had a brief one-on-one conversation with each member of our commission and if nothing has changed, please, Brian or Jeff, raise your hand if something has changed for you this morning. But if nothing has changed for anyone, I don't see any hands going up. I would like to personally nominate Tatanisha Redita for a seat on the committee for the Canada study being led by our town staff. Do I have a second? Yeah, I'll second that. Thank you, Jeff, for this second. All in favor of Tatanisha Redita being named to the cannabis study committee, please say aye. Aye. Aye. The dog also said aye. Can I have a, can I please have a verbal aye from each person? I'm saying aye. Aye. Ms. Brian, aye. Okay, and Tatanisha, are you also an aye for yourself? Aye. Great, the ayes have it. Tatanisha Redita passed this unanimously as the economic development commission representative to the cannabis study committee. Thank you so much. That's perfect. Thank you. And then, Oviso, I'm sure you will connect with Tatanisha in that regard, yes? Yes. Great, I'm thrilled with everything. Somebody's running, I don't know who, but that's okay, I gotta move on. The local option tax conversation I wanna move it to the next agenda except that there might be people here that were literally here for just that. Can do, let me just take a little navigation. If you are here only for the local option tax conversation and you feel very strongly that something you need to say about that has to happen today and cannot wait for two weeks from now, please raise your hand whether you're a member of our commission, the public staff or a guest. Oh, I could hug every single human being in this room right now. Oh, you all are beautiful people. I'm just giving it another second. Oh, I love every person in this room right now. Thank you for being willing to let this agenda be different than it had been put out as. So local option tax was our fifth item. We're going to move that. Was there someone trying to talk? No. We're gonna move local option tax discussion exactly as it is. Well, actually I don't know. We're gonna move local option tax item five to our next meeting two weeks from now just in the interest of time. And number six of the interweaving Essex committees and commissions to our next item. If we have an update from partners or staff that must happen today and cannot wait till next time, please someone raise your hand if there's an update that absolutely must happen today. Universe is working in my favorite today, friends. Oh, I could hug you all again. Brian, I'm gonna look away for a second at the agenda. If you see a hand go up, please verbally let me know. Business contact, let's check in. We'll also, I'm just gonna move that automatically to the next agenda. Our next EDC meeting is Thursday, May 6th, 2021. And before I adjourn this meeting, I would like to thank every single person who even just came here to be present to this conversation and who showed up just because they heard about it and civic engagement is the most valuable tool we have in our community. Please be civically engaged everywhere that you have interest. Is there anything else that anyone needs to offer to our meeting today from anywhere, from public, from the meeting? Annie? Yes. This is Sam, two weeks from today would be April 29th. Thank you. So could you clarify the next meeting? I really appreciate that because I forgot I did do that. So when I was creating the date for the next meeting, I understand that the Economic Development Commission meets the first and third Thursdays of a month. So when I looked at the calendar, that put us to the date I just stated. So is that date Thursday, May 6th, the correct one? Was I correct to decide that because it's first and third Thursday and it just so happened that it's not two weeks? Okay, great. Thank you, Sam. I appreciate you. Thank you. The next meeting of the Economic Development Commission is not two weeks from today because the first and third Thursdays of a month don't always fall two weeks from each other. So due to that, the next, I'm correcting myself from earlier in this meeting, the next Economic Development Commission meeting is on Thursday, May 6th, 2021 at 8 a.m. However, please don't confuse the Economic Development Commission meetings with the Cannabis Study Committee because we are not that. So this was a launch for us sending one of our members to that committee table. The town manager will offer out information about that kind of a study committee and how it can be publicly viewed and interacted with in the near future. If you have any questions about that, please email our town manager. Yeah, are we good? Great, anyone for last thoughts? Brian Armstrong, if you wanted to say something, I don't know why I'm just deciding that I don't know you that well to be asking you that. Okay, great. I just read in your face, I don't know. All right, thank you all so much. I really appreciate everyone and everything that has happened here today. I had so much fun, I can't even tell you. So thank you all so much and I will adjourn this meeting of the Economic Development Commission. Thank you so much and have a great day.