The gut microbiome has been found to be associated with a myotrophic lateral sclerosis, ALS. Gut microbes such as E. coli have been shown to cause changes in the gut microbiota composition, leading to increased levels of certain bacteria and decreased levels of others. This imbalance may lead to the development of ALS by altering the immune system and causing inflammation in the brain and spine. Additionally, E. coli produces proteins, which are functional bacterial amyloids. Long-term exposure to curli producing E. coli was found to accelerate the progression of ALS in mice. Furthermore, this study suggests that gut micro-mediated changes in the immune system and inflammatory processes in the brain and spine could be responsible for the development of ALS. This article was authored by Zimbal Keralawala, Joseph D. McMillan, Rika A. Singul and others.


Hello, my name is Brian Borum and I'd like to show you a new way to visualize what's going on inside your Kubernetes cluster. First of all, let me introduce myself. I work at Weaveworks, the GitOps company. I've been involved in open source software for decades now. Right now I'm a maintainer on a couple of CNCF projects, Cortex and CNI. I worked on lots of other ones and contributed to Kubernetes. But what I'm really passionate about is understanding what's going on inside computer systems. A lot of times I'm saying, what is it doing? Why is it so slow? And so really interested in tools to understand those things and get a better idea of what's going on. What we're going to talk about, what are events, these things that the idea is based on? What are traces distributed tracing? What's that all about? And I'm going to show you a program I wrote to implement this idea and it's called K-Span. If you're watching this talk live at KubeCon, any questions or comments, please type them into the question box. They're watching along with you and I'll get to as many questions as I can at the end of the talk. So the first thing to talk about is events.  And they are generated by some component in the system, here by Kubelet or by the scheduler within the system. And they're sent to the API server. So you would typically look at these events using the command line tool kubectl. So if you, at your Kubernetes cluster, if you type kubectl getEvents, you get a list in text form. But it can be a little bit hard to figure out exactly what it means. So I've drawn the events coming from different Kubernetes components. They can also come, these are supposed to be your pods in the system. Events can come from anywhere. They can come from your pods, from operators, controllers in the system. But in terms of what I'm demonstrating right now, I'm using the events that are built into Kubernetes itself. Let's take a look at some events. So this is what you might see if you were to run kubectl getEvents. Each event has a type, which is either normal or warning. It has a kind of cryptic reason code. It is about some object within the system. I mean here the first few are about a pod, then this one's about a replica set. This one's about a deployment. And then there's a message, which is meant to be more human readable. So each one of these is a point in time when something happened within the system. If we drill further inside, I've docked out the contents of one event in YAML here. And from the top you can see an event object is a Kubernetes object. So it has an API version, a kind, it has a name and namespace and the metadata. These are fields you find in pretty much any Kubernetes object. And events are no different in that respect. Each one has a unique name. They all live in a namespace. Then we see the fields I was talking about, the type. The same event might happen more than once. And Kubernetes will count them up for you and tell you the range of times they happened over. This particular one's only happened once, so the first and last timestamp are the same. The message, the reason we talked about a little minute ago. And each one also has a component that it comes from, the source of the event. This one came from KubeLit, which is the part of Kubernetes running on every node. And finally, the involved object. So this is the way that we refer to another object in Kubernetes. It's quite long-winded, but we need all the details. We need the name and namespace of the object. We need what kind it is and the API version we should fetch it at. So that's one event in quite a lot of detail. Next thing I want to explain is distributed tracing. So the idea here is when you're operating a big system with different components running on different machines, that to understand one operation as it flowed through the system, we can collect what are called spans from each component. And we give them an ID saying how they interrelate, a context of an operation. And then we can collect them together in a distributed tracing system. So I'm using one called Yeager, which is a CNCF project. There's a few other ones around. I think Zipkin was one of the first. There are commercial products like Honeycomb and Lightstep. So there's a few of these things. And what they do, they collect these spans. Think of a time span with a beginning and an end and something that happened in that time. And they can put on the screen this kind of Gantt chart view. So this is a timeline, time going from left to right and all the different operations that happened. And they're kind of a hierarchy, how they relate to each other. So that's really useful to understand as a tool to understand what is going on in your distributed system. Now, you might notice that I drew this picture without any spans coming from the Kubernetes components. And that is how things stand as of the time I'm speaking, that Kubernetes doesn't have the code to emit these spans. It will come, but just not yet, still under construction. A lot of debate about exactly how that should work. So the idea then I had was, well, we've got these events which are kind of similar to spans. They come from all different parts of the system and they tell you what happened. So can we turn those into spans and get the same kind of picture on screen? So the answer is yes. I've written a program called K-Span. And it lives at the Weaveworks experiments repo because it's still very much under development work in progress. But what it does, it listens to events and it emits spans using the open telemetry protocol, which a lot of distributed tracing systems support now. It takes a bit of work to match up all the events inside so we can figure out how they interrelate to each other. But I'd like to show you it now. Let's take a look at the demo. I've got a little Kubernetes cluster running and I'm going to apply a manifest. So brace yourself, YAML coming. Here we go. Don't be scared. All it is is we're going to create a deployment object and that's good to create two pods. And we're just using a demo image called pod info from my colleague Stefan at Weaveworks. But it's really just to make Kubernetes do something, generate some events and see what we can do with the visualization. So let me flip over to my terminal window. So I'm going to do a couple of things here. I'm going to print out the events as they come out and use the minus w for watch flag. So it's going to sit and wait for any events to come along. And on the other window, I'm going to apply that manifest that we just looked at. So let's see what it does. Okay, events coming out. It has created pod. It's pulling images. Okay, so more events. It has created two pods, started two containers. Well, that's what I asked for. So that's great. Now, that's the text coming out of those events. I was running caseband in the background this whole time. So let's flip over to my Yeager window. Yeager has this cute mascot. And let's see. So let's just refresh that view. Okay, so Yeager has now heard of Kubelet. And I'm going to ask it to find traces relating to that. Great, we've got one trace. A trace is a collection of spans. In this case, we've got 14 spans coming from, what is that, five different components in the system. Just a minute ago. So that's probably the one I want. Let's go click in on that. Wow, okay. Here is our Gantt chart view. Let me adjust the display slightly. Just click that one up, give me a bit more room. And drag this guy over. So let's see what was going on here. The whole thing took nine seconds to start two pods. We've got a hierarchy of things going on here. It begins with an update to the deployment. Well, that was me applying that manifest. And sure enough, it says it came from kubectl client-side apply. Next thing that happened, something in the deployment controller. We can click in, take a look at that. And we've got some more detail here. So K-Span has pulled out these details on the event, particularly the message. So the first thing was it scaled up the replica set. So that's great. Replicas set. This is just the way that Kubernetes manages pods in a deployment. And you might never know that without this kind of display of how things happen inside the system. So the pod was scheduled. That means assigned to a machine. And then we pulled the image so that I just cleared out the cluster, started out fresh. So it took a few seconds to pull the image down over the internet. And that's a very typical use of distributed tracing UI is to show the bit that took the longest time was pulling the image. Also that it pulled it twice for two pods. So it pulled the image. That's when it finished pulling it. Then it created the container. Then it started the container. And those things were very fast. And it did two pods, which is what we wanted. So there we go. That's the big picture, the visualization of a relatively simple operation. Which I asked for to create two pods. It turned out to involve 14 different steps in the system. Let's go on. Let's do something a little bit further. I'm going to go back to the manifest. So let's say I want the new version. I happen to know there is a 5.1.4. So let's go back to the terminal window. I've changed the manifest. So if I rerun that apply command, well, more events start coming out. Okay. So back over to Yeager. See what it shows us. Find the traces again. So there's two things have happened now. There's the one that we were looking at earlier. And this one, which is kind of just a few seconds ago. So same thing. Let me straighten things out here. So what happened here is that it started pulling a new image. And then it deleted one of the existing pods. So in this process of updating a replica set. Actually, I'm just going to refresh that. Maybe there are a little bit more. Yeah, more events came in, in fact, while I was talking. So that's kind of the nature of this thing, that it's asynchronous processing in the background. And the UI, the Yeager UI doesn't update in real time. But I refreshed it there. So now we can see a bigger picture. That it started by firing up a new pod. And then it killed one of the old pods. I killed another one here. And then started up the new one. So the process of updating a deployment from one version to another proceeds like that. And we're looking inside the operation of Kubernetes. By default, it starts a new pod and then kills one of the old ones and then starts a new one and kills the last one of the old one. So that's a little bit more detailed operation. You can still see the hierarchy of what's going on. And you can still see how these things relate to each other. But it just gives you a bit more of a taste of the kind of things you can visualize with this technique. So that was our demo. And we got a result on screen very much like this. Now let's drill into how K-Span goes about this. Well, here's the really big picture. Events come in one side and spans go out the other side. But how exactly does it work? Well, the first thing that happens when an event arrives is we take a look at it. And inside each event, just like we saw earlier, there's a reference to an involved object, in this case a pod. So we go to the API server and fetch that pod. And then we take a look at it. And what we'll find inside a lot of objects is this owner reference, which is a reference to something else, in this case a replica set. So we go fetch that. And that has another owner reference inside it, in this case to a deployment. We go fetch that. And when we look inside that, it has no owner. It's the top of the chain. It's the thing I, as the operator, applied the cluster to request my two pods. So that's what K-Span does. It walks this chain of references, of ownership of objects, and thus builds the hierarchy of spans. Let's go back to the architecture diagram. So events come in, but they don't come in in the perfect order. It's a distributed system. These events are being generated from all over it. And it's very much in the nature of distributed systems that things will arrive in an order that may not be convenient to you. So first thing we do is we stack up events that have come in on the basis that we might not be able to make sense of them yet. Each one as it comes in, we do that process of fetching the ownership chain that I just showed you. And we end up with a collection of all these things. Now, let me stress K-Span is not coded, well, 98% of it is not coded to understand things like deployments and replica sets. It just takes each object as it comes in and tries to walk the ownership chain and see if it relates to something else. So we end up with this kind of collection of objects and things which happened recently, which are sometimes pending events. And then at some point, say, when we walk to the top of the chain, we figure out that we've got a whole new operation. So we start a new trace. And now we can start assigning spans to these events and generating it spans to emit from the program. Now, the last thing that happens, we're not quite done yet, we hold the outgoing spans because the Kubernetes events that come in just happen at a point in time. They really only have one timestamp on them. So in order to generate the spans that you saw on screen with a longer length of time, what we do basically is watch for... Every time something new happens on an object, we call that the end of the previous one, and we mark the beginning and end times that way. It's kind of fudging it, but it makes for a much better, more understandable display. And you saw things like the pulling of the image. There is, in fact, an event at the start and end, so we can very easily map the time span of that thing to when the next event happened. So we kind of hold them at the beginning to match up to find out how they relate to other objects. And then we hold them just after we generated the spans because we want to put the end time on. We don't hold them indefinitely. If nothing happens for a few seconds, we send it off. We're trying to do a reasonable job trying to balance having a GUI that's reasonably up to date with trying to put the accurate information on the objects. So that's the caseband program. It is a little bit finicky exactly how to match all these things up, but after a few months I got it to work, and it's all open source, so you can take a look at it. Where can we go from here? Well, if you have thoughts, if you're alive at KubeCon, please put them in the comments, questions box. Otherwise, the link on the screen you can open up an issue and let me know what you think. But I'll just share a few ideas I've had about how this program caseband can be extended and integrated. So first idea is more detailed from Kubernetes. I said Kubernetes doesn't emit spans right now, but it can do. So let's say we got some really fine-grained detail information coming out of KubeLit. We could emit that as spans, and then a caseband could integrate together the information from events and the information from spans and put it all together into a much richer display. A more tailored GUI, by which I mean, we could draw this in a way that makes more sense for Kubernetes events. The generic display of Yeager and other distributed tracing systems is oriented in a particular way towards analyzing transactions in a system. So probably there are ways to put this kind of Kubernetes information about deployments and things like that on screen in a more focused and relevant way if we get some talented designers on the job. And lastly, what is upstream of the point where something happens inside Kubernetes? So if you think about rolling out a new version of the software, maybe something happens in your CICD system. You could get spans from there and link them all together. I work for Weaveworks, the GitOps company. So of course, we would expect the moment of which a change is applied to Kubernetes to come from a Git commit. So that would be this operation. And how did we get here? Did we go through a workflow? Was there an approval testing environment? All this upstream information in how did we get here and why did we apply this change? All seems very relevant to understanding your cluster. Well, thank you for watching. We'll flip to question answering live in just a minute. So if you do have any questions, you still have time to type them in. And I'll just leave you with a few links there. The code for the caseband is there at GitHub Weaveworks Experiments. OpenTelemetry, which is the protocol linking everything together and Yeager, the distributed tracing system I used in the demo. Thank you very much.


and now we're live. This is the September meeting of the disability access advisory committee. We're starting at 1132. And I guess roll call. Well, I know Elise is here. I know Marty is here. I know Sarah is here. I know Tori is here. And I'm here. And that's all we've got. So I don't know. We need a roll call. No, I think you're fine. Yeah. We do. Excuse me. Don't we? We only have five members at the moment. So we have a quorum. And I guess that's something I wanted to bring up as something I don't know what to do because I've written to the town manager a couple of times in the last 13 months when we lost member number seven and we have no member number seven yet, even though when Xander came on, there was another person. Or was it Marty? I don't even know. There was another person, but he didn't stay too long. I think no, no, no, there was another applicant. And that applicant did not get called back, even though the applicant was pretty strong, I thought. And so I don't know what happened, but the town manager hasn't acted on it and now we're down to. So what can we do about it? So can I just insert something? Yeah. I was talking with the previous executive director, Estabros. He asked me a question and about ADA regulations regarding the town fairs that are set in the common, like which passengers could be denied access? Is there anything in writing? Well, I said nothing that I know of. But I said, you know, you were thinking of applying to ADA, I mean to DAC. And he said, yeah, but I put it off. And then he said, I cannot find the link. So I kept the link that Marty sent him a while ago. So I sent it. And yesterday, I was at the Amherst neighbor's picnic and the town manager was there. And I brought it up to his attention. Did Jim Kudnir ever apply? He said yes, he did. And he said he also gave me as reference. And I said he'll be very good at it. And I said, not only he's very knowledgeable with all the ADA issues, his late wife was also a woman with a disability. So he's very on top of things. So that's where we left it. Yeah, that's interesting. He wasn't even the applicant I was talking about. So about a year ago, then we've had, there are interested people, but there is no activity. And especially since he applied, what is the town manager waiting for? I don't know. And each time I write, I don't get an answer. So, I don't know, Maureen, can you try to find out what's going on? Sure. Hailey just joined. Hi, Hailey. Hey, nice to see you again. Hey. Hi, Hailey. Well, I can certainly send an email to the town manager, reminding them that now there's two openings on the DAAC and asking if they're going or working on filling those seats. And I'll see if I get an update and all that. Okay. He might answer you. That'll be good. Yeah. And so, although this wasn't on the agenda, Maureen yesterday sent me an email mentioning she had some questions about accessibility and the senior center and the bank center. So I said, oh, well, let me see if Hailey Bolton, the town's senior services department, could attend because I think she can answer some of Maureen's questions. Hi, Hailey. I'm glad you're here. Yeah. Great introduction. I'm Hailey, the director of the Amherst Senior Services Department. Yeah, I'm happy to answer your questions, Maureen. Thank you so much for asking them. Right. Mike, first of all, I got these great emails. I get a whole host of them about this and that and the other program. And all the programs are live at the senior center. So I didn't see a link on any of them. So it appears that they're not hybrid. And I wanted to know if you have any plans to make them hybrid because it's not that easy for people to get to the senior center all the time. So I guess that was one question. And the other question was when I got my van tickets last time, you told me that the town had arranged to get a used van from the PBTA and Paul Burns told me that it's been released to you. You should have it. And I wondered if you had any plans for how the van was going to be used? Sure. So I can start by answering your first question. And yes, we are trying to do more onsite programs. I think that you'll find a lot of senior centers are now pivoting to that direction. I've been in touch with Northampton and Hadley. We are trying to do a little bit more onsite to get people back at the bank center. However, we do still have cosmology virtual. Healthy Bones and Balance is virtual. We have another exercise class that meets virtually. Looking to do a couple more Zoom programs, but certainly the priority is to get people at the center. And how are they going to get there? So you can take the van. We have a few people who walk over. A friend could take you. I think there are a number of different options. You can take the PBTA van. You can take the paratransit van. Amherst neighbors provides rides. So there are options in the community and you are right. At some point in the very near future, we're going to be driving down to Springfield to bring the van up to Amherst. And once we have that, working with our new volunteer and outreach coordinator, we're going to be identifying, you know, how do we want to recruit volunteers to drive or, you know, how do we want to implement this new program? The great thing about this van is that unlike some of the other options, you know, say a friend taking you, we have the capacity to take people who have a walker or a wheelchair on the lift. Hailey, could you just for folks that are not familiar about the van? I think it's being donated but from UMass. It's a retired van. So once the vans hit 100,000 miles, they retire them, but they're still perfectly drivable, particularly if you're driving it within like a small sphere, we can easily get, you know, another I think 75,000 at least out of it, if not more. So they're all in good condition. The one that we picked out doesn't have any major problems. It's, you know, working in good order. And again, it has that wheelchair lift, which is really important. So it can seat eight people. And then of those eight seats, two of them are wheelchair seats. So we can take up to two wheelchairs. So you're looking for volunteers to drive the van? We're exploring a number of different options. You know, it's hard to pinpoint one thing right now, which I know is not always a great answer. But to be sustainable and hopefully have this program for a good long while, we want to look at, you know, do we want to use volunteers? Do we want to potentially try to hire for a position? If we do that, what's the funding? So there's a lot of layers. And then drivers are one issue, right? But somebody has to take the rides. You have to have someone setting the appointments. You know, there has to be a vetting process for drivers. So there's a lot of layers to do a transportation program. It's unfortunately not as easy as just going picking someone up and taking them to where they want to go. So we really want to do it smart. And again, very happy to have Julia McFadson, our new volunteer and outreach coordinator. She's going to be pivotal on how we recruit people to participate and to hopefully drive. Okay. So I guess what I heard, yeah, you can take the PVTA event, but those of us who do take it know that it doesn't come when you want it. It might get you there an hour early, and it might pick you up an hour late. So for a one hour program, that doesn't seem worth it to me. I don't know. Does anybody else have this concern? Tori, you don't have transportation.  Right. But yes, that's the frustration with the PVTA van is that typically they wouldn't drop you off 15 minutes before a program. They drop you off half hour to an hour early, and then anywhere from half hour to an hour after. So yeah, if the program's an hour, that's a lot of waiting time. Right. And that is frustrating. I absolutely agree with that. I've been in positions in my life where I didn't have a vehicle and was totally reliant on public transit, you know, and oftentimes having to take a bus to get to the subway to get to where I want to go. You know, I can say that we do have a lounge. We have coffee. We try to have lots of snacks. We have a fully staffed senior center for the first time in a long time. So there's people you can hang out and connect with, you know, we all love to chit chat. We love to come out and see who's hanging out. We have games, we have puzzles, there are computers you can access. So even if you have to wait for, say, 30, 45 an hour, there are some things that you can do. And you might even find a new friend, you know, in a perfect world. You might meet someone that you get along with very well and might not have met otherwise. And so I have a question. I am working and I wouldn't be able to do daytime programs, but what is the age? How old do you have to be to partake in the senior center activities? Well, I'd say our main focus is 60 and older. You know, we definitely want to make sure that our, you know, older adults, 60 and older have a place that they can go and feel comfortable. But, you know, if you're 57 years old, we're not going to kick you out. You know, very rarely would we ask you to leave. So yeah, I would say we can be a little open-ended and we hope that if you are in your early 50s that you will stay with us for a very long time and be a regular attendee. And are you planning on, I don't know, do you take trips? We do. We have actually the, or the friends, I should say the friends of the Amherst Senior Center, they have sponsored a bus tour to Lake George happening October 18th. So we're going to drive the bus up to Lake George. There's a little lunch and cruise. Folks will have an opportunity to do some shopping. It's just kind of a kickstart onto what will be more trips in the future. You know, we're looking at going to the MFA one day to see the art. Oh, okay. So is your plan so the bus you're taking, is that an accessible bus? Or is your plan to take the van if you have people signing up who have disabilities? The van that we have is very small. So I'm not going to say that we won't do vans, trips with this ADA van, the special PVTA van. There's nothing in the immediate future. But again, you know, we're looking at how do we even get drives or riders for the immediate area, let alone a trip. If the trip is something you're interested in to Lake George, I can ask the bus company. I've, this is my first time using them. So I don't know, you know, exactly what the bus looks like. But if you'd like, I can ask and get that and let Maureen know that she could relay that message to you. Yeah, absolutely. Sure. Not just me. Assume it's a coach. Yeah, it's a coach. But I'm not sure what they look like. No, not any of them. Okay. Well, I don't know. I mean, you could check. Have you ever seen one that's accessible? City bus, yes. I have ridden in one too. That was a coach and it was to New York. Your center organized many years ago when Nancy Pagano was the director years ago. How did you get into the bus? How did you get in?  I think they had a lift. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I'll look. This is our first time using the company and, you know, again, just to kick things off. So I'll certainly check in and and if it's not, we'll look at how can we make that right and do some trips with the van that is. Right. That would be my concern is making trips as accessible as possible. Sure. Can I ask a question? Yeah. Why would the town not rent a bus that's fully accessible? Well, this isn't the town doing it. So that the town's doing it. The Friends of the Amherst Senior Center. Okay. And it's a 501c3. It's a nonprofit organization. So that's its own organization. It's affiliated only with the senior center by virtue of the fact that they raise money for our programs and services, but it is not a town entity because the town can't fundraise. Yeah, correct. It's illegal for the town to fundraise. And so it already has a very good question. And I share the I think, I think the ADA requires that all programs. In fact, I know that's true. All programs that are offered through the town. That is true for the town, but this is not a town entity. I think even private entities have to do that. If it's open to everyone, then it must be accessible. But this, it's not a free trip. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. That's the issue. It doesn't matter. Like I said, I mean, I'm happy to look into that. But again, it's not a town. I mean, I guess it doesn't matter. I don't think it matters. All right. Well, we can, yes, Haley and I can. It falls under. Oh, I think it falls under. Actually, I don't. Yeah. I'm not sure. I think you ought to look into it. I will. Yeah. Cause I mean, my understanding is that if it's a private organization, they can definitely do, they have a little bit more leeway than if they, if the town of Amherst was doing this event, yes, we would certainly make those provisions. So are you advertising this through the senior center? In the senior spirit, it's sponsored by the friends of the Amherst senior center. So the language is pretty clear that it's not put on by the town. It's by the friends group, which is our separate nonprofit. I will say so, which is akin to what many other senior centers do. I think if you look at Hadley, their friends groups sponsor trips a lot more than we do actually in Amherst. This is our first four way back into doing so. I think this is a really interesting topic, an important topic to explore. So Haley will look into it and, you know, if it is something that needs to change or if there's something that, you know, the friends of the senior center should be doing and they're not doing, then I'm sure obviously they would be happy to oblige. But it's, I think, a good educational component just so everyone's aware of what are the rules on it. And, you know, if, for instance, if they receive a request for a reasonable accommodation regarding this, regarding this, like, how can that be provided? And so, yeah, let's, Haley and I will regroup after this meeting and touch base about this. And then at the, I can send an email out to everyone to let everyone know exactly what the regulations are. Because I think at this point, none of us none of us truly know. So we don't want to sort of, you know, make sort of accusations or just come to conclusions at this exact moment. But you were taking with the bus company to see what they have to accommodate, because I have witnessed I have been in one of those. But before we jumped to the agenda, there was something new, new thing that happened. And Haley was present also. And Elise was a I attended a Amherst neighbors picnic yesterday at Mill River. Yes. And it was held at the pavilion. And when I had a little duty there to get the names of people and name tags and whatnot. So and maybe about two hours later, and at that time, town manager was also present. Present. A woman fell off the pavilion. Oh boy. Yeah. And then I talk with the town manager. And I say, whoa, this is terrible. And this is really a violation of the ADA. Because I don't know if you're familiar with the pavilion or not. I wasn't, because I, I hadn't been there for ages. So when you park at the parking lot, you go up a little pathway to take you to the pavilion. And the pavilion is maybe like about, oh, six, seven inches higher than the ground level. And I said, how in the world am I going to roll myself into the pavilion? And then I saw one entrance into the pavilion, which was kind of leveled, but not really very nicely leveled either. But the whole platform was about six, seven inches higher than the ground level. So this woman didn't see where she was standing. She fell backwards. And she fell. Oh my God. Luckily, I mean, at that time, we didn't think she suffered any injury or not. But I said, we have to look into this. And I said, we have to bring this up to our DAC meeting. And Paul said that has it been in the transition plans? I said, I have no knowledge of that. No, they didn't look at anything that wasn't downtown. Well, I mean, they did. The Mill River Recreation Area. Yes. They did. And so it was the pavilion that's outside. Yes. I am writing this down. So I will certainly look into this whether anything was noted about the pavilion. Yeah. I didn't know about that event. So thank you so much for telling us about that. There were quite a few of town employees that were present. They had lots of presence from Crest, which was very impressive, and lots of presence from Haley's group, the new staff that were working there. How did you find out about it, Sarah? How did you find out about it? Well, I'm a member of this Amherst Neighbors. It was a member appreciation picnic. They were thinking they're volunteers and all their members. And there was quite sad.   Yeah. Well, I'm not. I guess I need to know more about Amherst Neighbors. Yeah. It's very nice. Very nice group. Yeah. Yeah, I don't. And so Paul saw exactly what happened. You know, he really witnessed the whole thing and so was Haley. And I couldn't get near because, of course, it is so inaccessible. And then in this day and age, in Amherst, you wouldn't think this would happen. But I knew it never caught my attention because this really happened right there. So I think we should give high priority. And then on the agenda, Maureen, I saw number two is what is that? A FY23 municipal ADA improvement grant application. Maybe this project could be part of that. It could. Yeah, that's a really good suggestion, Sarah. And I'm thinking not only the entrances to the pavilion, but there's also a playground on the other side. And you can step off into woodchips. And I think that drop off is even greater than a few inches. So I don't know.  I haven't been there in a while. They may have positioned the picnic tables in such a way that you would not fall off. But I don't know. But the potential is there. Yeah. Look at that as well. But the playground area that you can access off of the pavilion. I'm not saying to block off the, I would want the kids to be able to get onto the playground from the pavilion. But if they put a railing up with maybe a gateway, you know what I'm saying? Yeah. I'll certainly look at the transition plan for the Mill River Recreation Area regarding the pavilion and the playground. I do believe that the town is wants to replace the playground there. If memory serves me, I think I was in a meeting at some point this year about making improvements there. So the town is aware of improvements are needed. And so I'll, and then I'll certainly look at the transition plan in general for that facility. And also I don't think there is any restrooms nearby the pavilion. I know the restrooms are on the close to the entrance to the park where the pool is leaving the park. So if they're doing something, they might just as well look into placing restrooms near the pavilion. Well, that's a huge expense. Doing something to the pavilion is much more doable. But when you're talking about building a restroom, it's huge. And a porta potty, just something, because I didn't see anything. No, because people were asking me and I said, all I know is there is restrooms on the other side of the pool. So I mean, many of the people that asked me were ambulatory people. So it's no big deal. But if the pool wasn't open, the bathrooms may not necessarily have been open. And then there should be signage. If there is no restroom, they should be signage to where the restrooms would be. Because pavilions are picnics, you know, people socialize there for several hours. This is good. We'll get to see what's in the transition plan. Because we didn't look at that at all. I hope that they notated all this. Oh, yeah. They did a very thorough job for each of the facilities. And another, so since we have Haley here, do we have any other questions for her? I know she probably has a zillion others that, you know, matters that she needs to be handling. So I don't want to take up. I do have a question about the vanity. Sure. I know that you sell them in $3 increments. And I'm wondering if there's any way that you can get 50 cents. No, they're $2.50. Yeah. If you're an Amherst resident, they're $2.50. The cards are $3.50 for out-of-towners. The book is $50. Right. I realize that. But a lot of my trips, because I go between counties, are $3.50. And I'm wondering if you could get 50 cent booklets from PBTA. I can look into that. We've only had the $3 or the $2.50 books since I started, but they used to have 50 cent books. Yeah. So that's what I'm wondering. I mean, I know PBTA has them. I'm just wondering if you can get them, because that would be real. We haven't had them since I started, but I can certainly ask the PBTA if we can get some more different types of booklets. That would be great. I would truly appreciate that. All right. And then I took note of that, Tori and Haley. So, Haley, if you could just let me know, and then I can put you both in touch if that is something that's feasible. Oh, yeah. I'm happy to look into that. And again, I'll check in with the coach company that we're using. Yeah, I'm glad to answer any questions folks have. And I'm glad to see that you're talking a little bit more about Mill River, because I do think that could use a little fixing up for sure. Yeah, no, that's great that it came up. And I'm, I guess, in the age and dementia friendly amourst, and what's happening with a lot of places, I know you're saying that a lot of the senior centers are having people come back. And that for 95% of the people, that means they get in their own car and they go. And that doesn't work for everyone.  That's not really a good solution for the town to suggest. And Amherst neighbors is a good idea if in fact they do that. So that is something to pursue. Definitely. Do provide rides. There's a ride volunteer thing at Amherst neighbors. I mean, that's how I got to Mill River yesterday. Amherst neighbors is good. And I'm not saying that you have to use those. But until we have our van that's, you know, out on the roads and taking people to rides, you know, I'm just following a few different ideas you can use. You know, again, we have paratransit tickets available at the senior center. There is the fixed route bus in town. Amherst neighbors is a wonderful organization. And they've been so helpful doing these rides for us. So yeah, there are a few different options. But I agree, it can be frustrating when you want to go someplace and you want to go there quickly. And there isn't always an easy option to do that. So hopefully once we get our van up and running that'll help take some of the pressure off, you know, we can't do everything, but certainly we can alleviate some of that stress. One good thing that came out of the pandemic, and it is a good thing, is Zoom. Because three years ago, we would have all had to be in a certain place and we would have all had to give up half of our day to get there. And Zoom is great for people, you know, who don't have easy access to transportation. So I just think that it, I think that it doesn't have to be an either or. Either you come to the senior center, or you miss the presentation. Because it doesn't have to be that way. There are places doing hybrid things all over. And I'm hopeful that you can come up with some way to do that, so that you don't exclude people who don't have easy access to transportation. It's great to keep in mind and certainly something I can check in with our IT department and maybe consult with Maureen on some ways that we can hybridize certain programs. Yeah, absolutely. That would be great. Some of the programs you have are fabulous. Thank you. No, they really are. I can't see getting to them. So I'll check out Amherst neighbors and see if there's any.  What do you have to give back to Amherst? So you have to be a member and they do ask for about a week's notice so that they can coordinate the ride on their end. So, you know, again, if you if you're got your appointment tomorrow, you would have had to call the week before. But you just have to be a member and they, you know, they would like that you do more than just request rides. I know that they they love having people go to their their virtual programs, too. Oh, they have programs? Okay. Yeah, I can give you the name, Marty, of the woman who is one of the switch and you can do that. You could just email it to me. I'll do that for you. Yeah, I think that it's great that we have them. It's great that we have them. And I'm very excited about the van. However, you work it out. Volunteers have to I mean, you have to have a special license to have drive that kind of van. Not this one. You have this one. You can just use your class D license. You can. You can. And the wheelchair lift is just a simple push button up and down. So there's no special training that has to go into it. We will of course want to do our own, you know, vetting and, you know, everyone has to be quarry checked and we'll do it. We also have to go ahead and secure the wheelchairs. Yeah, that's right. That's the wheelchairs. That's not the easiest thing. I've seen people mess it up. That's right. Even after they have been trained. And that could be a big liability. Yeah. Yeah. So there will certainly be training, you know, it wouldn't just be the case that you show up and we immediately put you behind the wheel. We want to have a process for that. Yeah. Well, well, if there aren't any other questions or comments. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you so much, Haley, for coming. Thank you, Haley. Thank you. Bye. Hi. And I did see Joe Trigali is in attendance and he has raised his hand. I think he wanted to add to the discussion. So Joe, Joe, can you use your microphone? He's muted. I'm pressing the button to unmute him. So it might take him a minute to figure out. I've asked you to unmute yourself. Can you hear me now? Yes. Can you hear you? Yes. Okay. Hello. Hi. Hello. I've been listening all along. And I wasn't able to mention that conversation about who is responsible for transportation. And the answer is both parties are responsible. Both the company, the private company and the town are equally responsible to provide transportation, accessible transportation. And that's the bottom line. So it's a little too late because the woman's gone. Oh, no, it's not too late. We're going to look into it after this meeting a little more carefully and look up the regulations on that. And I want to hear a little more detail about the event itself and then the bus and whether they can accommodate a reasonable accommodation for anyone that is requesting it. Does it have to be fully accessible is one question. If it doesn't, how do they handle requests for a reasonable accommodation would be another question that should be answered? Yeah. Well, I don't want to bring in, you know, rehash the previous conversation. I just wanted to put in my two cents about that. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you, Joe. If they can't, you know, if they don't have a vehicle, then they can make accommodations to rent out a vehicle that is accessible. All right. Well, let's move on to our next item. Okay. If we're done with that. Yeah. No, I think my, yeah, my questions have been answered. Is that the FY23 and the ADA improvement grant? Do you have an idea, Maureen, of what you're applying for? Yeah, we could actually, you did skip over one, Tori, which was to discuss the town's Office of Disability Equity Inclusion. Sorry about that. Maybe I'll start with that one, because that might take some more time. So, Myra, you wanted to invite Pamela Young, who is the Director of our Office of Disability Equity Inclusion. But before you, the board invited her to a future meeting. Yeah, you wanted to discuss, well, what kind of questions do you want to ask? How can her and her office help be of assistance to this committee? Anybody has anyone given it any thought? I thought the idea was she was going to be the town liaison or maybe work together with you, Maureen? I'm unclear of those specifics, but I believe that the office of the RDEI office will be available for assisting this committee. I don't know what the capacity is and what the details are, but I do know that their office will be available to this committee. And so, if that's a new possibility, you know, what kind of, I believe Myra wanted to talk about what things are important to you all that you think that the the DEI office can be of assistance? Well, for example, the conversation that just came up, the question about how inclusive the Lake George trip is. And I guess her response was we don't have to do it. We don't sponsor it. It's not our problem. And, you know, it's the friends. So I guess if it's accessible, it's accessible. And if it's not, you know, we can look into it, but we don't have any responsibility. That's sort of what I heard her say. And that doesn't sound good to me. No, I don't know if it, did I, I don't know, did I misrepresent that as far as anybody is concerned? No, that's the way it sounded to me as well. I don't think she meant it to come across maybe quite that way, but it did. And these trips do need to be accessible to people. Whether it's private or public or yeah. Like Joe said, whether anybody applies for it or not. So it doesn't have to be a reasonable accommodation. If somebody applies for it, we'll get somebody to drive a wheelchair van along with the trip. That's, I don't think the way it's intended to be. I could be wrong about that, but I don't think that's what's intended by the law. So I think, I think that I mean, it's, is it her job to know the ADA? It isn't, right? Who, Pamela, that's a good question. No, which person? But I see inclusion as a part of the ADA. And I see inclusion as a lot of things that we often have problems with. Inclusion for parking. I mean, in many ways, she could be our advocate. Inclusion for parking. Inclusion for public events like Sarin just brought up. That it wasn't a terribly inclusive event if you couldn't get onto the pavilion. Now, somehow you did get on. But I think that's really what I think that she could help us with because it's the inclusion piece that usually ends up not being easy.  You can come and you can play games. We have games. Really? Do they work for everybody? They don't. So, right? You don't do puzzles, right? At least you probably can't do them. I can't do them. And you know, the other thing too, and I didn't want to take up time with this, was there's no sign, where the hell do you hang out in the senior center? It's not very inviting. Or inclusive. Part of it is the fault of, part of it is that it's at the bank center, and you can't do much about the layout. But no, you know, you can play games. You can play do puzzles. I don't know. Yeah, I mean, it wasn't a very inclusive response that we got. No. I don't know. Is it just me who heard it that way? No, it's sort of like, you can come and do our activities and our trips, but you know, you're going to have to do some legwork, or we're all going to have to do, you know, it's like. And it might not work for you. You might not be able to get on the bus, and we're sorry about that. Yeah, exactly. It's sort of like we're an afterthought. That's the whole thing for me is, and I think that's the Office of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, is all of the things that she's going to be responsible for, for various constituencies always feel like they're an afterthought. And I think, I think that's, that's where it is for me. And you said it perfectly, Elise, the afterthought, the afterthought part is, that's right, is the lack of inclusion. Yeah, it's never easy to get included, you know, it really isn't. Maybe the town could do some special training with all their staff that provide services to public. What is ADA requirement is? Inclusiveness and everything. And I think this really should go under Pamela Young to do that. Maybe when she comes to our meeting, we could raise concerns about this. We see these are some of the things that the town is not up to par. And why don't you organize some training for all service providers, including the Senior Center or other affiliated nonprofits, whether it is Friends of Amherst Seniors or Amherst Neighbors or any other place.  We cannot really only leave it to them, because then it becomes a liability issue. Because volunteers, you cannot really expect they're just giving their time to provide some help. So I don't think the volunteer thing is going to work out. Marty's raised your hand. Okay, go ahead. Hi, Mara, I think what you said was absolutely correct. And I have to say from my experience and in academia that this is an issue that you have quite often where you have a, I've run into this a lot and getting people to understand that it has to be inclusive for everyone. If you have a student group who is going to take a field trip and you don't provide accessibility, even if they're doing it with their own funds, because it's part of the institution, you have to have accessibility. And I think this is the same situation. I know the problems with trying to put tents and things on the Amherst Common, but there is a way to make them accessible. And it's just getting people to recognize that they have to do it. So getting to the Pamela Young question, I think we want her, as far as I can tell, we want her to know that we need her to put us on her list when it has to do with inclusion, what Saren said about trainings. I think perhaps she's thinking in the lens of racial diversity, socioeconomic diversity, and I think the ability diversity should also go onto her plate. When she talks about it, she should talk about all of us who are afterthoughts. And I like the way you put that, Elise. I really do. So I guess, I mean, that's what I would want to talk to her about, essentially, that would just be the opener. And I don't know what her experience is with issues of disability and exclusion. I don't know anything about that. Most people probably haven't thought about it until they have to. Like they know somebody or something happens to them, and you go, oh, whoa. When you sprain your ankle, that's when you figure out that it's really, really hard to walk on uneven pavement until you have a sprained ankle, you don't, you might not know that. Anybody ever sprained their ankle? It's pretty amazing when you walk on uneven pavement. You can't, you know, it's very hard because your foot is so unstable, even if it's in a boot, that you realize all of a sudden you say, whoa, if I were a person who had to deal with this 100% of the time, it would be really, really hard for me to walk on many of the sidewalks in this town.  You just do a wheelie.  But if you're on a walker, you have that problem. If you're on a walker, you can't do that. You can't go up the thing. No. No. Joe also has his hand. Yeah. Okay, Joe. Yeah, let's ask him. Joe, I just asked you to unmute yourself. I wasn't clear of the woman's job or just job description or that of Pamela's. The inclusion, is that from the high school or? No, no, no. She's a town director of diversity, equity and inclusion. She just started in July. Which is a new office. It's a new physician. Yeah, so the town this year created a new office, which I think is under our human resources department on diversity, equity, inclusion. And so Pamela Young has been hired as the director of that office. And then Hailey Bolton is the town senior services director. And she started in January. And they both don't know the ADA and what it's responsible for. We don't know anything about Pamela Young. We haven't met her. We don't know. She may know a lot about the ADA. We don't know anything about her. We haven't spoken to her. So we're just trying to figure out what we want to tell her that we, that our interests, that we have an interest in her office and make sure that she thinks in terms of inclusion of people with disabilities, as well as people, you know, who are excluded for other reasons. Well, it should be that it's basically arm and arm. There's no difference. We need to be included. Yep. No, I'm not sure. I just don't know what she knows about it. Go ahead, Tori. What? I would like to hear her definition of her job title. And what is the job description? Exactly.  Okay, good. Okay. Does that give you enough, Maureen, to go on? Yeah, absolutely. I've been jotting down everything. This is really helpful. And so I guess that hasn't been said yet. Her interpretation of her job title. Do you know what I'm saying? Yes. Yeah, sure. Before we even ask her anything. Oh, I think that's good. No, I'll just remind everybody that last January or December, Paul wrote to me or us and he said that perhaps that person was going to be involved with this committee that it wasn't clear at the moment, but it was possible that there would be, you know, joint oversight or because I would think at one point we were worried that we would lose Maureen. So I think he thinks of that office, or at least did at that time, of that office of including work on issues of accessibility and disability. Oh, I would, I would hope it's completely included. Yeah. So that's what we want to talk to her about. But yeah, and that's why I want to hear her interpretation before we talk to her. Maybe it might be a good idea if we can invite her to our next meeting and we can raise these concerns and then see what she thinks about. Well, actually, I like Tori's idea is to let her tell us first what she has in mind, what she's thinking about, and then we can see if we need to add anything to her plate, which is probably pretty full. But, you know, there are big plates, there are platters, there are serving plates, you know, a lot of plates. Yep. I like the way she put that. The size of the plate. So yeah, but I think Tori, you're right, let her talk first, which is great.  Yeah, I don't want a written statement. I want her to speak to us. Okay, so you want her to come to, okay, all right, so it wouldn't be in advance of the meeting. All right, so all right. I want to hear it straight from herself, right here. It sounds good to me. Yeah, sounds great. Because you can write, anybody can write and sound wonderful, but I want her interpretation of what her job title is. Good idea. Her responsibilities.    And anyway. This is what it is, I mean. Yeah. Yeah. All right. How about the FY23? Yeah, sure. So, you know, we just wrapped up the last MOD grant. And that was for, now my memory is beginning to, oh yeah, it was for the front entrance of the Bank Center. Bank Center. I almost forgot. And so the next round for fiscal year 2023, the grant cycle is open right now and applications are due at the end of this month on September 30th, which is in about 15 days from now. So I have... So, there's a few projects in mind, one being keeping with the theme of age and friendly, age and dementia friendly is the repairing the courtyard, the outside courtyard, making ADA improvements to that, the courtyard of the Bank Center to make that a usable space. There is a step down to the sidewalk and then there's a step up to get inside the building. So there's no accessible route to use that space. Where's the courtyard? The courtyard is near the self-entrance of the building, which is adjacent to the new stairs and the ramp. Yeah. And then where Johnny's restaurant is located. It looks like it was a lovely courtyard when it was new and... But again, it still has those stairs. But it has such nice potential for people, for anyone, any members of the public, but of particular seniors that are utilizing the Senior Center or anyone utilizing the Bank Center or folks that live in the neighborhood such as Elise. It's a nice sheltered location with trees providing shade. And then there could be programmatic activity that's provided there. So anyway, that's one project that the town is exploring. And I think that is what ultimately we are going to be submitting. There were other projects that we were looking at, but this was the one that we were thinking. And Hailey did speak to the Council on Aging about this project. And the Council on Aging really loved this and have been actually requesting that the courtyard have a ramp and have improvements to it. So that's something that they really are excited to see if we're awarded the money. So, but we were also talking about FM systems for the... Yeah. What's that? I mean, the audible listening? Yeah. Yeah. So that's already been funded through our capital budget. And so now I'm working with other staff about doing what is... We have to go bid for purchasing the equipment. Okay. I thought that had been postponed because of the door. No. No. No, we found another funding source. Yeah. Okay. Okay. So do you know how much money is in the capital budget? There's $50,000 a year reserved for... Correct. Okay. Mill River is going to cost more than that, I assume, Marty? Yeah. I'd expect it might, but it's worth looking at. Yeah. And I can certainly... So the Mill River recreation area is managed through the town's recreation department. So I will definitely be forwarding this information to... Especially before someone else gets hurt like that. Yeah. So I can't think of his first name, Mr. Harp. Real help. Real Harp is, I think, is his name. He's our RIC department director. So I'll bring this to his attention. But it's really the ADA. I mean, maybe he could put some of his money toward it too. But I mean, we're looking for ADA projects. Yeah. And then you are going to look at the transition plan too, right? Oh, sure. Yep. You know, it was already brought up in that, and why hasn't anything been done? And maybe high priority rather than to wait for these grants. Yeah. So the thing is, is that the transition plan, the consultants that came out and audited all our facilities did a wonderful job. It's so helpful. The thing is, is that they have identified so many things that need to be corrected. And we are correct. The town is making corrections. It's just... It's not feasible time-wise and cost-wise to be able to correct things all at once, as we're talking about millions of dollars. So it is going to happen bit by bit. And as things come to our attention, that will, I think, help raise a little more awareness of, like, oh, okay. That can help the conversation on particular situations, such as perhaps the pavilion or the playground. So the town is definitely putting in its efforts to correct things as quickly as possible. But it is certainly going to take time. And it will always take time. So whatever is fixed now will always have to... Everything will... It's a continuum that will always have to be monitored and corrected as time goes on. Joe has raised his hand. What do you guys say, Joe? One of the projects that I've seen that was somewhat successful was the project they used in Northampton, where they offered 50 percent of the cost of making the storefront accessible. And I'm thinking about the storefronts on North Pleasant Street. I think it's North Pleasant, where the pizza places and the... I forget what other stores are there. But there are a lot of stores that have just one step up. And I'm wondering if, to make themselves accessible, they could use part of the part of the money from the town and they could kick in some of their own to make their stores accessible. Thanks for your suggestion. I can certainly pass that information along. Capital budget money is for town properties and facilities. So that funding source wouldn't be available to private businesses. But there could be other funding sources out there that could help private businesses to make ADA improvements. I was also wondering about the sidewalk on the side of the street where the black sheep is. That is a pretty bad sidewalk. And it's not just because of the topography. It's just... It's pretty broken up. It's very difficult walking. I don't know what it's like to use a chair on it. But that's town property. So I don't know what kind of work is involved in that. I don't know what the plan is. I don't know if the town thought about it at all. Maybe it just goes under sidewalk repair. I don't know. But it's a problem place. I will say, I don't know when the last time you've gone by the black sheep. But a couple of months ago, it feels like a couple of months ago, in the last four months, I'll say that a part of that sidewalk has been repaired and has been greatly repaired where there were cracks and when it rained or if there was ice prior to when it was repaired, it would just be really dicey and unsafe. And now, since it's been repaired, ice doesn't accumulate and there isn't just a river going across the sidewalk. It's really helped. So I don't know where you are talking about specifically. But I just wanted to point out there has been some repair work done. The last time I walked on it, it wasn't so easy. I don't know. But maybe you're looking for different things than I am. Anyway, I don't know if that's part of the ADA. And it sounds like you have a project in mind. Does anyone, do you need the endorsement of the DAAC for that project? Yeah, that'd be great. Just remind us what it was again for the outdoor courtyard outside of the Banks Community Center. Yeah, I think that's important. You said there's steps up and down. I thought there was a ramp, but maybe no, there isn't. No, there isn't. Are you going to wait against the Mill River pavilion? Well, there's two pockets of money. This comes from a grant they're applying for. The other one is in the town budget under capital. And personally, if you want the Mill River job done, I think it would be better to push it through capital because it's more likely to get done because a grant has to be approved. The way the reason I'm saying giving higher prior to the Mill River is because there are activities planned on that pavilion. And I witnessed it yesterday that it is a hazard for people. What I'm saying is there's more money, very probably more money in the capital budget than there would be in a grant that you can get turned down for. Like you apply, but that doesn't mean you get it. Does that make sense? And yeah, it does. Yeah. Also because we're becoming an age and dementia friendly town, fixing the courtyard goes along with that because it's right by the senior center. So we're more likely to get that grant money to get that fixed than to fix the pavilion with it. Because yeah, I mean, I think you can make a case for both. But I was thinking that the capital budget, there is ADA money, $50,000 set aside in each capital budget. But that doesn't mean that there can't be other capital money applied to it, especially since Paul was there and saw a woman fall backwards off of the pavilion. And I'm sure, you know, other than the concern for the woman, concern for liability of the town is big. And if he talks about it with the Capital Planning Joint Capital Planning Committee, I bet they could find other money to add to the $50,000 that's ADA. That's what I'm thinking. That could have been me that fell out of there. It could have been anybody. Yeah, that's true. So I think but Paul was there and he saw it. And I'm sure he is aware of the liability of the town. And I'm sure that he, you know, had concern for the person. But the $50,000 is already there and more money could be set aside from through the Joint Capital Planning process. And I suppose this committee could advocate for that. When they do that, I think we found out last year they do it in February. Yeah, I believe so. I wonder, I wonder it makes sense for us to write a note to Capital Budget Committee. I don't know who to address it, including the Tom manager and Maureen, of course, that we need immediate immediate action taken to improve the Pavilion site, make it ADA, meet the ADA requirements of that area. Would it be give? How would you do it, Marty? Would you put what Marty, how would you do it? Would you put a rail? I mean, it's not required to have a rail. It's not required to have a rail. So, yeah, it's not because you have to have a rail if it's two steps up. Yeah, that is not. So they wouldn't, that there's no ADA requirement that they put a rail on it. But what could they do? They need to make it flush or they could put a threshold. They can't make it flush because then they're going to have water in it. But they can slightly pitch away from the edge. They could pitch the edges. Yeah, they could like a little tiny ramp type thing that way. Like they could extend the edges. That's what I'm talking about. It's called a threshold ramp. Threshold ramp? Okay. I wouldn't put a threshold ramp there. I'd build it up. I'd build the land up to the pavilion floor and have it barely pitched away. That's asphalt then because it's an asphalt sidewalk there. Yeah, that ought to be asphalt. There's no sidewalk. Let's solve that problem first. Well, I will say this is all great. We have building inspectors that can certainly go out and take a closer look at this and use their expert knowledge. We'll leave it up to the experts. I'll certainly bring it to their attention that a woman fell off the pavilion and suggest that they take a look and see if there's any improvements that could be done to the pavilion so no one else falls off in the future. All right, so do we have a motion about the courtyard? So I'll make a motion that we go after the grant for the courtyard and that we have the town look at the situation at the pavilion using our $50,000. I think that's two motions. Why don't we separate them? Separate it up? Okay, separate it up. Yeah, the first one. Motion to go for a grant to repair the courtyard. Second? I'll second that. Okay, I think we talked about it enough, Tori. How do you vote? Oh, I vote to do that. Okay, Saren? Yes. Marty? Yes. Elise? Yes. And me. Yeah, so it's unanimous. Now your other motion. Okay, the second motion is to potentially utilize the $50,000 in capital to ask the town to solve the issues at the pavilion at Mill River, to prevent someone else from being hurt, and to provide accessibility to the pavilion. Second. So that's a little messy, but we want, I guess we want the town to use capital funds to make the pavilion accessible. If it is, and please know, I did briefly go through the transition plan for the recreation area, and there are no non-compliant issues identified associated with the pavilion, and who knows, maybe the consultant missed something. So I think the motion should be to, if you'll indulge me, is to have a building inspector take a look to see if there's any, you know, non-compliant issues with the pavilion. If there are no non-compliant issues with the pavilion, I would say, but if there should be some other improvements paid, that's another conversation. We have time still. The money, the $50,000 is for removing, you know, ADA physical barriers. And so if this is not an ADA matter, then there should be other, any repairs should be funded with some other budget, not the ADA improvement budget. Does that make sense? I'm thinking since they did the ADA assessment, the land around the pavilion could have sunken, which made it, which is making it not accessible. Sure. Yeah, okay. Yeah, so I can ask. The more you think of having it inspected is a good idea, especially since the town manager watched somebody fall off the pavilion. I mean, not every accident is the fault. Some accidents are just unfortunate, but it's not because something doesn't comply. And so the question is, I guess, what you're going to, is the building inspector really that ADA aware that he's going to know what he has to do? Oh, yeah. Okay, okay. I have an issue with the $50,000 that is already there in the capital budget. I wouldn't put in a certain amount. I would just require or request the town to address the issue. Okay. Opponent ended. We got any dollar restriction one way or another. So we want the town to examine the pavilion at Mill River and make any recommendations for ADA safety improvements. Exactly. Or the way it is right now, it's a safety hazard. Not only people. Well, that's why I'm saying ADA safety improvements. Right, right. Okay. So can we do it that way? We can say that the motion should be that we want the town to have the Mill River pavilion inspected with an eye toward making ADA safety improvements. Yes. Does that work, Marty? Sounds good to me. Yes. Okay. All right. Is there a second? Yes. I'll check it. Okay, let's vote. Elise. Yeah. Sarah. Yes. Marty. Yes. Tori. Yes. And me. Yes. Okay. And then we had one more item, wasn't there? There is. Before we get to the items, we want to see if, I believe, Tracy Zaffian is in attendance. Okay. That was for an item that I wanted to bring up. So what else is there on the agenda? I wanted to talk about just bringing you, I guess, we can just do this real quick, is that it's been brought to our attention that there are some items at the, related to the pools at the Mill River recreation area that should be explored. Okay. Like providing a lift and stairs into the pool. And so staff is looking into that and that's going to be an ongoing conversation of that. So I just wanted to let you know. Okay, that's good. All right. The reason that Tracy's here, I think, is the GOL government organization, I don't know, legislation committee of the town council is reviewing snow removal bylaws. And we've always had an interest in that. And Tracy and I have had some back and forth. Tracy wrote a letter and essentially the bylaw isn't so bad. They might want to tweak it. What is in question for me and Tracy, I think, has a lot to do with the enforcement of the bylaw. I think Tracy has some ideas about the bylaw, which I don't know if we need to bring up here, but the issue of how the snow removal is enforced is a question that we want them to deal with. Because right now it's supposed to be the police. The police don't do it. And there's a lot of ice on the sidewalks. And there might be some good reasons that the police don't do it. And so it might be better for somebody else to do it. But it isn't getting done. And Tracy, do you want to add to that? We don't have a lot of time. So I thought I'd encapsulate the issue. Tracy should be able. Sorry, I'll do it one more time. Can you hear me now? Yes. Yes. Okay, great. Yeah, as Mara said, I mean, there were actually two items that I just wanted to just mention. I'm sorry. I didn't come in time for public comment. I was coming from another meeting. So I think what I understood with GOL is there were a few different questions. Is the police are the ones who have the authority under the current town bylaws to enforce the requirement that people shovel their walks? It's not really clear how often the police do it. I know I've contacted the police sometimes. I think I even brought this up at one of this committee's meetings. Last winter is that there really isn't any information on the town website to say if you have an issue about a neighbor not shoveling their sidewalk to contact the police. And so it actually took me a while to even track down who to contact. So I mean, there were questions. GOL had some questions about should it be under the police or not? Should it be under a different department such as the inspection department that deals a lot with the buildings? And the other thing that they were interested in reviewing is just the idea that, so as a courtesy, the DPW, they currently do have a list of sidewalks that they shovel. They do one pass of different sidewalks. There's a lot, a list of them based on places where people walk a lot, stay free to school and so on. But they will one only shovel those sidewalks if there's enough snow to bring out the plows. And two, they will only do those sidewalks once in a snow event. They won't do them multiple times. And then sometimes, you know, towards the end of a snow event or if there's melt or something like that, they don't go back out. And whether because the DPW has done this as a courtesy, whether some property owners, including newer property owners in town, don't realize that they actually are the ones responsible for shoveling the sidewalk in front of their streets. And so that was the one issue. And I actually learned too, I wasn't aware of this, but it's actually the property owners adjacent to a sidewalk are responsible for other sidewalk maintenance too, like including if there's grid or sand or things like that, it's supposed to be the property owners who take care of all those issues. So not just snow. And that was new to me as somebody who's lived in the town for 20 plus years, but then I don't have a sidewalk next to my house. So I guess the question is, do we, as the DAAC, want to weigh in on this in any way? Yes. I mean, that's so my right. So one thing is I asked, I said that if it got, it was the GOL was going to ask at the town council meeting on Monday for this bylaw to be referred back to the GOL for more substantive review. You know, they weren't interested in talking to the police. They were interested in talking to the inspection department. I did suggest that they also reach out to committees, like such as this committee, as well as like TAC and other committees.  I really don't, I think that it would be incomplete if they don't actually ask. Okay. I mean, disability access. We've written many letters. We've talked about it before. I mean, I know that I've, I have letters like I wrote 20 years ago saying the sidewalks need to be better shoveled, right? And so it's every year we send a letter to the town manager about it. So, I mean, I think, I mean, I, if, if GOL decides to send it back to the council without asking committees, I think people should say, you know, you need to get the input. If you're going to change the bylaw, you need to get the input of committees before a new version passes. I guess it's not clear to me what needs to change in the bylaw. Yeah. Just the enforcement is the problem. Well, and also maybe to just clarify this thing about how the DPW is shoveling, but that doesn't, right? So it's people's people still don't have the responsibility. Some of it is not the bylaw problem. Some of it is lack of information about the bylaw. So it seems to me that I mean, we have to do, I don't know if this committee needs to take a position about whether it's inspection services or the police who enforce it. What do you think? I don't think you have enough information to make a recommendation, to be honest. You don't know what the staffing level is and, you know, what that entails in the pros and cons of, of either department, to be honest. Okay. So I mean, for me, for me, I mean, I agree. I think that's why they were going to reach out to the departments, but also just to find out from the departments how many calls they even get, like how many people actually know to ask the police. So I think they need a public information campaign. But I don't know that we need to take a position because I for one don't have a position about who enforces it. I think we need it to be done. It's the town's job to decide who does it. And I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe we just need to wait to hear from them. But I agree with Maureen. We don't have enough information, but every year in October, we send the letter to the town manager about snow removal. I mean, we just do it. And maybe we should send it to the council. When I know too, when I wrote them, when I wrote the GOL members, I also suggested that they include like a clarification that, that there's also the responsibility for somebody to shovel like out the curb cut areas, you know, intersections and also the bus stops. I mean, I mentioned the bus stops in my letter. I'd still like to know who is responsible for those. And there is another section of the bylaw to you that deals with shoveling, like private properties. And one issue I've seen sometimes is that people have a commercial parking lot, for example, or even like a residential like apartment building complex parking lot. Sometimes when those lots are cleared with their private plows, that they'll plow into the sidewalks too. Yep. Like I know that happened. I know that happened. By the middle school, I always piled the snow up on the sidewalk at the edge of it. So I mean, there's a lot of work to do on this, but I'm not sure what the DAAC can do about it right now, except to reiterate to the town council that it's really important that people be made aware of their responsibilities. That's what it seems to me.  We want you to review them, but they were just reviewing a whole bunch in a row and just kind of checking off their lists. And I was like, but wait, don't do that with this particular bylaw, because I think it deserves additional consideration. Well, thank you for that. I mean, I'm sure we can wait to the next meeting plus our time is up. So minor, that other one I just wanted to mention quick is just about the street lights. I think we're at a time, Tracy. I understand, of course. So we're gonna move on, Tracy, but if you could email me so we can put that on the agenda for the next time. Yeah, I think what the issue is, just so people can think about it, is the town is turning off a lot of lights or at least they want to. No. To protect the birds and the blah, blah, blah. And there is a member of the town council who is supporting it, who has a light right outside her house. She's made that clear. It's not, I'm not speaking out of school. She's said that. But I think that's true. We should have brought this up. When are they gonna make this decision, Maureen? Do you know? I am not, I'm not clear on that. Okay. Because lighting on sidewalks is pretty critical for a lot of people. Yes. And there's not enough of it. Yeah, but we don't have enough lighting on our street either.  This is a mystery. Why don't you send me an email, Myra, and I'll look into it. And I can send out everyone an email. And you can let us know when they're gonna make their decision about this. Sure. Yeah, I can look into that. We might need to have an emergency meeting. This committee should weigh in on that. Not so much to snow that way. But okay. All right. The next meeting. Yeah, what? What was, what's going on with the north beach at Puffer's Pond? Oh, yeah, that was another, there was a, like the swimming pools, there was the access to the north beach is deteriorating. And so that needs to be corrected. So, so we were looking staff is looking into both items. Okay. Okay. And they're thinking about doing it. So, okay. But the lighting is an issue. We might need, I mean, I want everybody read up on it. See if you can find it. There are, there's a proposal by two town counselors. And they want to talk about turning off a lot of lights to save money and also because they want it to be better for people to sleep. And they want it to be better for birds. And, but I think a lot of it has to do with circadian rhythms and lights going in people's windows and stuff like that. For today, I just say there are blackout shades. I was going to say the same thing. All right. Well, so we are out of time. So the next meeting is, I guess, October. Jeez. So it'll be October 10th, 11th, actually, Sunday, Monday, 11th. You're right. All right. And if it, if we need to take a position earlier about the lights, we might need to have a really quick meeting or at least an email exchange. Okay. Thank you so much, everyone. All right. Thank you. Bye. Thanks, everybody. Bye.


and store and I wanted to show you guys that they're still 70% off of their items. It is everything here. This is crazy how much stuff they have left out for Christmas. My thing that I was going for and I have a few in my basket, you guessed it, more ribbon. So here is more ribbon here, all 70% off. This is all really awesome ribbon.  So you get this to say this one. This one is $9.99. I think it's like $3 for this, $3 in some change for this, but you get a whole bunch of it. They have these really huge rolls here too. I think these are $15 for these, but take 70% off of that. But this is crazy. This is my third Joanne fabrics I've been to. Just kind of happened to stumble across the back of the store and see it all here. So they have all of this left. You guys, if you I have a Joanne fabrics around you, I would definitely come and check it out. I have my cart full of stuff already. Last time I bought a whole bunch of ribbon. I think it was like under $35 and I have enough to last me a couple of years, but you know what for this price, I think I'm going to buy some more. They have like tablecloths. They have little decorations. They have everything here. They even have the stockings too, which I might actually pick up a few for next year. But this is crazy. If you guys love crafting and you love deals, definitely go out and check out Joanne fabrics. This is crazy. If you guys have any questions, please leave them down below. This is my first time doing a live view. So tell me how I did guys. Did I do okay with this? I'm kind of nervous, nervous doing this, talking in the store. But I want to show you guys this. So happy crafting everyone. Have a great holiday with the Valentine's coming up and hit Joanne fabrics if you haven't already. Bye guys.


Just Ice-na-Bazzie HDK Man Caps One On One Our guest right now under the biggest, fastest most explosive wide receivers in the NFL He's also, I think, an aspiring actor Can't wait to talk to you about their iconic Fashion icon in the NFL And he's joining us right now Please welcome in Seattle C-Hogs All-Pros, Superstar Dk Man Per Specifically Hi What's up? How you doin'? I'm so good Now I saw your Instagram story dog that was in the car with you. That's why I wanted you to come on. I want to see that dog. She's at the house right now. I'm at the facility. Now you're at the facility, got it. Did you do anything for Halloween? Did you dress up? No, we had a little Halloween party up here, you know, for me and some of the players and the staff members, you know, in the building. It was a good turnout. What was the best costume you saw and who wore it? It was actually one of the equipment managers. He scared me when tapped me on my shoulder. I turned around and he was like the grim reaper. I couldn't see nothing but like a black cave and it was just it was it was a good outfit. You're like Miles Garrett, is that you? That's that is absolutely creepy. And to scare a 6-4 DK mat cap. It's not easy. It's all smiles for Seattle right now. I couldn't be happier and I couldn't be more apologetic that no one in the media myself included saw it coming or gave enough respect or love to this team. Another win this time over the Giants. He's this also powerhouse team. And in the game, you did a little acting to help your team get into the end zone. Take me through this play. All right, so I had a slant route and then I see Gino didn't throw the ball. So a door he kept following me. So I was like, let me see how far I can take it. So I was I ran and acted like, you know, threw me the ball through my hands up and you know, he he was chasing me and acted like he was trying to swap the ball down. So I was like, dang, I really got on the on the save route. But yeah, it was a it was a good little acting job. But that that running back that we have in the backfield is is doing an amazing job right now. Make the secret miss and, you know, taking taking the ball today. So did you plan on doing this or had you ever thought about it? Was this his improv on the spot? No, I used to do this in high school all the time because teams used to double me. And so I just had to make the game fun.  I was trying to act like I was catching the ball. We love seeing it. And there's acting that went into that in this game, plus a touchdown from you to help your squad. And I I didn't even think you were going to play. You looked good out there. You were questionable. How are you feeling? And how's the knee? My knee is great. I got a little rest last week. Did a lot of rehab, you know, at the facility and at the house. And it was just like around the clock rehab. But I'm just glad, you know, God bless me to be able to go out there and play and have full trust in my knee and faith in myself. I love that.  Is that where that came from? Because I know you even worked with Jerry Brockheimer on a project. Yeah, I actually had acting practice yesterday after our meetings. But yeah, I was in a film with Jerry Brockheimer on Wilson two off seasons ago and the movie released this off season. So it was just a great experience. Just a great experience just to be on set. Just see how a lot of actors and actresses, you know, take the job real serious how, you know, we as athletes take our job serious during the week and during the season. So if you were to cast yourself in the perfect situation for DK Metcalf in a movie, a series, a superhero villain, a comedy, who is DK Metcalf playing? Oh, I'm being myself a superhero. I will name my superhero. My pops calls me chaotic. Um, and I'll just be saving, saving a small town like Oxford, Mississippi or something like that. Hometown. Sounds like you've thought about this before DK. Yes, I have. Okay, we got to get a screenplay. We got to get you an agent. I know some guys over at CAA can get you hooked up. We'll figure this out. We'll make a movie in no time. But until, but until then, I know you're focused on your job and what your role is on that team at five and three with the lead in the NFC West. And I mentioned everybody counted you out. They really did before the season. So what moment has been most satisfying to you this year? Just seeing everybody, everybody's success and how we've just come together as like a brotherhood and not only as a team, just seeing Gino's success, you know, our defensive success. We had the pleasure of getting Chenan Wilson from the Chargers.  Tyler's doing great. Kim Walker, an amazing runner-back, amazing rookie, these rookies that we have on defense and offense.    And we don't like Tyler said, nobody cares who gets the credit.  A lot of people, I didn't like this. And I've, you know, a lot of people right away, add Russell Wilson to that Tyler Locker quote. What do you make of that? Because I don't think it's true. No, I mean, no, that was definitely not a shot at Russ. It was just like it just feels like a different vibe. Like we're a young team and that's just hungry. He was just more so speaking of everybody on the team in this moment and how we're just like unselfish with, you know, how we play the game and with how we care for each other. Russ was definitely not that type of person to me or anybody, you know, that I've seen him around. He was a great teammate to me. So it was Bobby Wagner and everybody that's, you know, been through this organization since I've been here. So no, that was definitely not a shot at anybody. Yeah. It seemed like Tyler Locker was talking about these young guys. Listen, Tariq Woollen blew my socks off when I had him on the show last week, getting to know him just a little bit the first time I ever talked about him. And now he's got a fan for life. Like I could not be, you know, more sort of like attracted to everything he's got going and the momentum and the mentality.  You're setting the tone. You're talking to these guys. How impressed are you with this rookie class? Very. Kobe studies day in, day out. He's probably the first one to the facility and the last one to leave. Ken Walker works his butt off every day at practice. And when he gets to the game, he knows exactly who he is and what he has to do. Tariq Woollen. I mean, you see him catching pigs left and right.  And then, you know, the two tackles that we have, and Abe and Charles, that's holding, you know, the line down on the outside.  You know, there's hungry just for, you know, a chance to play, a chance to win, a chance to just not prove everybody else wrong, but, you know, just to prove ourselves right in every situation. So these rookies that we have, they motivate me every day at practice because, you know, they're trying to be great as well. They're trying to, you know, chase me, chase me down at practice or stop me at practice or stop Tyler.  And then you have, speaking of proving people wrong, do you know Smith? There's so much to get into. But what was the moment that he won this locker room over? I will say after the, after the Saints game, I will say he told us that we got to be better as an offense, better as a team, play together. And ever since then, like everybody's just gravitated towards him. You know, he's been a leader of the past five weeks. He's been leading us, you know, an offense, leading the team on the sideline. He's talking more. You can see how bad he wants to win, you know, during the game, at least taking off running, not running out of bounds, trying to lower his shoulder, get the first down. You can just see his competitive spirit just come out on Sundays.   And, you know, he's reaping the benefits of it now. Well, he said everyone wrote him off, but he didn't write back though, which is one of my favorite lines. I think in NFL history, I mean, that's when he won. That's the moment he won me over.  So that's, that was a beautiful moment after that Saints game.  And then there was this moment, the moment of 2022 with the clench walk. Okay, we just have to get into it. This was the bowel movement that shook the NFL DK. It's weak for, you know, it's again, I think it's against the Lions. Who cares? Who knows? You're carted off the field. Ari, let's start here. Were you surprised this was such big news and that this went viral? Yes, I'm very surprised that me being carted off to go to the bathroom was big news.  And I was not gonna make that walk by far. No, I was not gonna make it. Okay. So then here's the next question. What, like, what does Pete Carroll do? You obviously say, I have to go to the bathroom. Is there a signal that you give to everyone? Like, is there a hot? It just, you're just, I'm out. And that's how it goes. All right. So this is the full story. So this is the middle of the drive. And I come out for a play and I told my, my receivers coach, I was like, Hey, I got to go to the bathroom. He was like, you got to pee or do a number two. I got to do a number two. And then it went away for like 10 seconds. So I was like, all right, I'll go back in the game. And when I was back in the game, the feeling came back up. So we, we ended up scoring like two plays later. And so I run back to the sideline and they had a cart ready for so the head trainer was like, you got to go to the bathroom. I was like, yeah, he was like, it's a cart down there. I'm like, bro, I'm not taking part. So then equipment manager comes up and I was like, Hey, it's a cart down there. I think you should go ahead and go. Pete wanted me to do it on the sideline. I'm like, no, I got too much respect. So I can't, I can't do it on the sideline. And so I hopped on the car and went to the locker room. I was actually mic'd up that game too. So this is, this is like very. So NFL films has full pooping. Yeah. Yeah, they got, they got everything.  Exactly. So Pete, did you say that Pete Carroll, Pete Carroll wanted you to, Pete Carroll wanted you to poop on the sideline? Yes, because it was like the first week of the season, our special teams coaches Larry is up and he got a game ball for taking this shit on the sideline when he was with the Patriots. So Pete was like, if Larry can do it, then you can do it. And I'm like, I'm not like Larry. I don't want to be like Larry in that aspect. I'm not like Larry. I'm not like Larry. I can't believe that. And then, uh, okay, well, then there we go. Now, I don't even know what to say about that. I would just say this for us fans out there, we thought you were hurt. We thought something was wrong. So if you could give us some sort of signal, I don't know if it's like the bat thing, whatever. Next time anything like that happens, we just want to make sure that you are good. You know what I'm saying? I throw my thumbs up next time. Well, hopefully no more cards needed. DK, you're the best. We have one last question for you. Got the Cardinals this weekend.  You're also an alpha. You're, you're a top wide receiver in this business. How does that affect you seeing another wide receiver on another team perform well going into a matchup against them? Oh, I'd never like try to take any food off anybody's plate.  So it was going to be a good matchup. I know I had to go against them, you know, all training camp and every day of practice.  So it's going to be, it's going to be a tough matchup, but, you know, made the best man win. Amazing. DK Metcalf, you are the best. Always keeping it honest, always keeping it real, wishing you so much success and tell Turek Will and that his biggest fan says hi. Okay. All right, I will. Thank you. Thanks, DK. Good to see you as always. Big one between the Seattle Seahawks and those Cardinals this