e same process is being used for the fire department and every other department talking about where each department is what their needs are how can we customize the conversation to the work of that department. So, I believe that the answer is yes, that we are doing both and the and part of some of the work is being handled by the town manager, the HR director and legal counsel, and the and part of the part of the question is being handled by the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. So, Paul, do you have any information in terms of the messaging from the leadership at the police department. I don't know what the chief has written to his staff I just know that he has been he and their leadership team have been working very closely with Pamela as have the other department heads. So it's not unique to the police department. We as a department head as a leadership team are committed to this. You know, we are blessed to have the leadership of Pamela who has knows how to do this work I trust her judgment on how to implement these things. This type of training and education and engagement with our employees. It's so I feel like we're on a really good path. And I hope that people would, you know, trust that we're moving this in a positive way. Because my last point would just be to, you know, to build to continue to build that trust and it would be transparency right to share that with the community. For us to know what the police chief is actually sharing to the is leadership and the rest of the police department in terms of actively building an anti racist department right which is, which is obviously going to leave. the vestiges for whoever the new police chief is going to be right. So, so I think, you know, if this is indeed happening, which I didn't know about until we now ask these questions. We need to know more about it right and it needs to be another languages needs to be shared in different modalities so that a community is understanding what's the work that's being taken place. Thank you, Deb. So, Councilor Walker I know this was your question initially I do see Miss Pat's hand is raised, and it may also be in relation to this. So I'm going to ask Miss Pat if she'd like to add to this and then we'll come back to you Councilor Walker and then to Councilor Pam. Actually, I have a positive comment to actually make since we're talking about anti race racism. And I think one of the ways also is to reach out to people that are hard to reach. And I want to illustrate an incident in March, where our time manager, the Cres director, and Jennifer Moisten, they came to Black Business Association of Armist. Needless to say that not only that the meeting was productive. I said, you know, I'm a member of that group. It was a big deal for some of our time residents to meet our town manager for the first time. Some of them don't know who he is. Same thing with our new Cres director. When we're talking about outreach, breaking down barriers, the way it should go is to have the people in power. Go into the community and meet those people at their own terms. Don't ask us to come to your office. Come to us. What a difference in made. I was hoping that the town manager will brag about that and put it in his report, but he didn't. But I think we appreciate three of you that were there. I also want to comment on some time counselors who have reached out. When I raised the concern about inequity in upper funds. I've been saying this for more than nine months now. The upper funds were supposed to help anyone in that has been impacted negatively by by pandemic. I raised this issue. Everybody knows that it has been in the media. The time console leadership didn't bother to bring it up. All the existing black owned businesses in our town did not receive a dime. Out of the $650,000. That was a mark for businesses. But I want to thank. Thank you, Pam. And Jennifer Tom for their private support. Which in that to me privately appreciate to a few. I also want to appreciate counselor Michelle Miller. Who, on behalf of his of her group, a RHA. They may be attending the next BBA. For listening session. No outreach from the council president. And the council vice president. The time console leadership. Even though we live in this town, we pay our taxes. We go to vote. And yet. When it comes to resources, we do not get it. And when we speak up. We have powerful people disparaging. Members of BBA. We have business improvement district. This party director. Gold. Disparaging to whether we're respected restaurant owner. In our town. So if we're talking about anti races or working on racism. There has to be. Strategic collaboration and engagement. In our own terms, many people of color. We need to lead you need to come to us. We need to tell you what we need. We need to work together. You can say. My door is open come to me. We've been oppressed already. Do you guys understand how difficult. It's not like we're not going to get it. We're not going to get it. We're not going to get it. We're not going to get it. Meetings like this as a person of color, no matter your age. But I just want to thank the time manager. For taking the courage to come. And I hope it was, you know, meaningful to you. Thank you. And yet we haven't received any money. We're legitimate group. Okay. We are five. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Nothing zip. Thank you, Miss Pat. Counselor Walker and, and then counselor Pam. Thank you. I'm going back. To a previous topic, but I did just really quickly. Want to emphasize and support. Miss. Concerned specifically regarding our best spending. For another time in terms of equitable spending of the ARPA funds. But I also just wanted to come back to the. Creating the anti racist. Department of at the PD. And talking about that this was a recommendation that came up in terms of like something that could be implemented. Immediately. To restore trust and to create safety for our BIPOC residents who still have to deal with the PD because no matter what, even when Cress is taking 911 calls, the police will still need to respond to some calls and they will still be responding and dealing with BIPOC residents. And so this is. Like immensely important. And I think that's getting very lost in translation here that like we're talking about the safety of black and brown people at the hands of the police. Like this is very serious. So that's one and that like, I'm not talking about training. And I don't know how much I have to emphasize that because I've said that before and I said that when I proposed the motion itself. But like. Training doesn't actually change anything that doesn't change the way the police are dealing with the public. It doesn't change what the policies are. It doesn't change what their protocols are. It doesn't change how they talk to each other. It doesn't change how they talk to people in the community. It doesn't change anything like I am talking about real. Tangible changes that we can measure that we can present to not just pay. We had a conversation about this. And now they're just doing what the same thing they were doing before. But they had a conversation about it first internally. Like that is not what I'm talking about when I'm saying creating an anti racist department. I think it's great. They're having conversations. I think everyone should continue to have these conversations, but that is not what I meant. When I proposed this motion and I thought I made that very clear that that was not what I was expecting. Oh, thank you. Thank you. Dorothy, you are up. I just want to let everyone here know that if you need to take a recess for any, any reason, you can always turn your camera off. You can also call a point of order and ask for a recess. So just in case folks weren't aware of that, I wanted to make sure everyone knew. Dorothy. Okay. I have a question and a comment. How long is this new police contract? Is it a one year? Is it three year? So typically contracts are three years. So I mean, to me, I'm sitting here in my spare time sometimes saying, what am I going to do in the weekends? To me, the summer is here. And I can see it's a, it's a long cycle and there's a lot of legal things and a lot of law, but they're going to be a contract and it will not have the new, whatever things in it. Okay. So that's a, that's a real delay. So I just want to say. A positive and then a suggestion. You have acted with incredible speed. With people who work for you in setting up. Crest, I mean, amazing. Okay. And it's, it's kudos not just to you, but to the whole town of Amherst and it's known nationally and setting up the, the department. But I think that you have been dragging your feet when it comes to people who don't work for you. And I mean, I understand that because you can't always tell what they're going to do. And sometimes they say things that you don't like or you don't agree with or you don't even think you're true. Okay. But I just want to say, I really do have a lot of trust in you. And I think I've shown that and I've said that. So I'm just one of the themes that I think we're coming up with here is, is for you to have a little more trust of some of the other people in town. And, and I think that we can cause I think we all agreed. We want to move on these things. We want to make some changes. We want to safer town. We don't all agree on things. For example, I don't totally agree with Miss Pat about no police in the school because if there's a shooter or something dangerous, I want our police department. To go in there fast and not be like of all the taxes. Okay. So I do and I really do see the need for a strong police department, but I think that what the kind of restructuring of public safety that's going on here is really good. And I'm really happy with it. But I just think we need to trust each other a little bit more. And it'll be, it will be mutual is what I'm thinking. I'm an optimist. I think it'll be a mutual increase in trust. Thank you. Thanks, Dorothy. I just wanted to clarify a point that was made about no ARPA funds being awarded to black businesses because we did receive a detailed list of businesses that were awarded. And out of that, just to give a few examples, M&M links, head games, global cuts, carefree, CACRE and white lion were given awarded the funds and from, and then 97% of the grants went to BIPOC, LGBTQ and women on businesses. And that being said, you know, no process is perfect. And I feel that if, you know, if people, if Ms. Onanabako has noticed that there's some ways that this process could be improved, I would really encourage sitting down with, with the committee, there's a committee. It's not the bid. That's my understanding is there's a committee that's made about diverse people who, you know, go through all the applications and then award, but if that process can be improved, which I'm sure any process can, that, that feedback should, I mean, I think I would be happy to sit in that meeting and find ways to improve that process. Thank you. Councillor Bauman. Ms. Pat. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your time. I'm going to go to the meeting and find ways to improve that process. Thank you. Councillor Bauman. Ms. Pat. That was fun. Actually. It's incorrect. And this is the narrative that it did. Has been spreading in the media. It's not true. None of existing black-owned businesses, regardless whether they're members of BBA or not, That document I requested and the finance director send it to me. Existing businesses, none of black business got that. I'm not talking about new businesses that are going to be opening up, that are renting from big landlords. I'm not talking about that. Existing business category, black home businesses, document don't lie. I have them and I requested that it be included in the packet for CSSJC meeting tonight, so the public can see.  I beg to disagree with Shawnee because it's not true. The so-called 90-something percent of marginalized are, it's all incorrect because the way it was put, white women were considered minority. Again, I don't have any problem of any business owner who received funding, but to put white women as minority or marginalized, to make up the percentage is very deceiving to the public. So the records are there. They should be on the town website, go to CSSJC and look at it and the public can make their judgment who is telling the truth tonight. Because I know what I'm talking about. Again, existing business category, no black home business received funding. However, new businesses like Capri received, and it's a member of BBA, she's going to be opening up in June, okay? Global cuts never receive a dime. And I'm going to let him know tomorrow because his business has been mentioned tonight where he did not receive any money for the upper fund. He did not. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Pat. And it sounds like maybe there's some clarification that's needed and maybe Paul and Sean will be able to provide that clarification and make that available to everyone. That would be great. Yes, Councilor Lopes. Yeah, so first I just, you know, want to thank everyone for participating in this meeting with CSSJC and the HRC and in particular to Elizabeth Haygood for calling out, calling attention to the importance of hearing the youth perspective directly from youth voices and particularly in spaces that decision-making spaces rather where they haven't been included as possible. But I do think that if we have a discussion and we're talking about the bid, we have discrepancy of information. The bid has shown clear facts that not just the second round, but the first round that there was money awarded to black businesses to BIPOC businesses and this conversation, if we're, you know, as if we're talking about businesses, I believe those business owners should be there, as well as Gabrielle Gould and whoever else is having that. So we can move forward because we are dealing with something where at the end of the day, if we're talking the state funding with state regulations, there is a process to how that money could be received and who. So to put it in a situation where it's about public opinion and who believes who, when it's something that we have all of these A's and B's and Hammerson having to do that, this is a situation where we can use facts where, you know, we can know what businesses received, why and why not. And I think if not, you know, we're being divisive because, you know, at the end of the day, the bid was the only organization throughout the pandemic that was out there and doing something calling attention to business. There were not other organizations were not out there publicly. And last, I think we want to be careful because if we're not all coming together around this issue, we're gonna be sending a message to youth that if you simply receive an I, you know, an LLC or register as a business, then that's gonna come with a virtual assistant or someone who will connect you to what funding or what not is available for you. When in actuality, as we all know, you may need to hire somebody to do that where you have to introduce yourselves as a new business so you can receive and be directed to that funding. So I think that if we are to carry this situation, we should really have all the stakeholders involved as we're talking about everything else, or bringing those stakeholders because if not there's a slander and this is hearsay and we're just risking the public coming to a conclusion when they don't have to or they could at least include clear facts of making that decision. Thank you. Thank you, Anika. I just miss Pat before I go to just want to confer with the chairs of the committees. So the chair of the town council and the chair of the two committees in terms of timing. So we have number four, five, six and seven to continue through is everyone good to keep moving ahead on these items? I'm just looking.  So what is this looking like? Yeah, I think that I respect and know that this conversation is definitely needs to be had. I do think that for the sake of everybody's time we may need to set aside a different meeting to have this conversation and have this go on. So I at least as far as for HRC and if any member thinks otherwise I think moving forward would make sense. Yeah, could we get another date on the books? I would suggest that we go through the other three items and if there are other items that are also important to various members of the group that that be collected and we look at what the appropriate venue is for the discussion of those other items and if additional data needs to be available for those. But we did set an agenda that was based on these seven items and I would prefer for us to finish those seven items and then look for other opportunities and other means to have the discussion about other issues. Thank you. Well, Lynn, respectfully there's four more items that we need to talk about. I don't wanna be rushed. I will stay on and I will talk then and we'll be in for midnight. So that's fine, but I'm not gonna be rushed. If you all wanna continue, fine but we will talk through all of them ad nauseam. Well, here's a suggestion. So I think in terms of the ARPA this is a really important conversation and of course, none of it can be disconnected. It's all interroled to what we're talking about. It does appear that we need to get some clarifying information and perhaps have some other folks who could join this conversation. So I as a counselor would like to ask the chair of the town council to work with Paul to figure out how we might, as you said, Lynn have a venue for that discussion. With respect to the four items that we have remaining I think we should continue on and if folks are good with that maybe do another check in at about 1030 and see where we're at because our brains will start to deteriorate here. And I just, I would like to, before we move on to number four check in with Ms. Pat and Alicia since their hands are both raised to see if that sounds like a plan we can move forward with. Okay, I just want to say to Anakar that I stand by everything that I said and the public will find out who is telling the truth. Being powerful is not good enough is for people to follow the facts. And I'm excited for the public to find out who is telling the truth. Is it me or is it Anakar and Shalini or the big director? The public will soon find out. That's all I can say. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Pat and Councilor Walker. Yeah, thank you, Michelle. I definitely think that it would be very wise to have another time to talk about ARPA funds and ARPA spending. I just really quickly wanted to add that I think part of like the challenges and the complications with ARPA funds is like one transparency. We don't do a very good job of reporting and tracking what is being used and where and the sheets that are available on the town website are very confusing because there are a lot of monies that have been allocated but have not yet been spent. And the way that those are identified on the website are very confusing. And I think it's also just the way that we chose to distribute the ARPA funds which were quite strange. And I really highly suggest you all looking at the way that other towns have done it might help provide some clarity specifically Springfield which gave millions of dollars to BIPOC owned businesses and nonprofits very different than the way that Amherst has and very different the way that they tracked it on their town website. And so I think looking at the way other towns have done it in comparison to how Amherst have done it might explain some of the frustration but I also am happy to have this conversation at another time. Thank you, Councilor Walker. Okay, so with that let's go ahead and move on to number four which has continued to develop protocols for Crest regarding active engagement by community responders and we'll follow the same process and Deb will get us started. All right, thank you. So for me with Crest and Ms. Pat I've already talked about it and I didn't know that it was only $20,000 that they were given additionally for this next fiscal year which again doesn't make sense to me and that the police department is getting hiring and so on and so forth. So Crest needs to be 24 seven, Crest needs to be fully staffed so that the police are not responding to anything that is non-violent which was what we had put in the CSWG and with Crest not being fully funded not having the staffing, not really having the way with all because they need the capacity you can't burn people out like even like Earl I mean, he's doing an extraordinary job but he's only one person in terms of the leader needs to be an assistant director that needs to be other kind of leaders put in place there to help out and so that's not gonna happen with an additional $20,000 because you can't burn people out because it's not sustainable for them to be able to do the work but yet the community needs for there to be something in place so that the police are not responding to non-violent incidents as what occurred in July 5th, right?  That is my question. So I think what I'd say is there's about 85 departments similar to what we do in the country. There's probably 20 or 30 that have the scope we have. There's maybe eight that have the kind of structural support we do, the independence we do. There's nobody that's a separate department. None of those much larger departments, Denver Star, Cahoots in Oregon have gone 24-7 yet. It is a tricky step on two levels. The call volume is much lower. So frankly, isn't a super attractive position. You're not gonna have much to do at the beginning. And the second piece is I think when we talk about adding a second shift, people think about maybe doubling the staffing. You're actually talking about closer to tripling the staffing to get to a third shift. You have to add a whole new leadership component. That leadership team needs to be as comfortable as I am. The one thing I am really concerned about is us taking steps before there's the kind of capacity. And then, I love the people I work with. I love my coworkers. I am fortunate to have my coworkers and I worry about adding a large group of people without a really kind of thoughtful understanding of what the work looks like, which we're still developing. I recognize that me telling you that we're the fastest in the country, we still don't feel fast enough for Amherst. And I lose sleep over that idea. Most of anything in my job that I wanna get this to where folks needed to be as quickly as I can. As far as the technical pieces of it, it takes folks quite a while to get up to speed on the approach. It's some of the work we do is counterintuitive to what folks think of as public safety. You're asking folks to go in the really challenging situations and at no point are they gonna have an ability to coerce the person. They're not gonna have an ability to deny them access to a thing. They're not gonna have the ability to take a thing away from them, to find them, to punish them. So getting people up to speed really, I think has turned out to be about a nine month process. So that's just on the technical end of things. I don't think that even if the resources, the exact amount of money to add folks was, we'd still be a year out from me feeling any sort of comfort with that overnight shift. And particularly Denver is going over nights this summer. And so I'm watching really closely how they're doing it, how they're approaching it, the infrastructure they're building, what looks very different. So on a technical end, I just think we're probably, I often think of Alicia in describing this of, I know I'm holding you guys as baby, the baby's out of the crib, but boy it ain't running yet. It is toddling along and we're still needing to develop some experience. That's the one thing I can't hire anybody who's experienced at this. The only way to get it is to do the job and to do it for a long enough period. So as far as the budget, that is a decision that's been made. On my end of things, I think we need to earn it. That is my philosophy to this is I think when you think about the kind of original sin of public safety is that the money has always followed people's fear. People were so afraid of black folks, they put money into the more violent aspects of policing. Whereas we have the opportunity to look at the work, to thoughtfully approach it, to ask for resources as we need them. And again, I think that's an unsatisfying answer. And I know that, but I would be doing a disservice to the work to say what we're doing is art. And if you rush art, you put people in a bad situation. Sorry if that was a weird answer. That's what I got. I have a follow up with that. So I guess we have two situations, right? So we have the community that is asking, especially the marginalized BIPOC community that is asking for there to be someone else, a different group of people, and obviously ideally Cress, to respond to these nonviolent matters as opposed to police. So we're talking nonviolent, alcohol, drugs, any type of resources, anything that community members are going through, because we know a lot of times when the police respond to that, those things will go awry as what happened, you know, exhibit A July 5th, right? And so we have that. And then I have you saying, I guess, right? So then I want to be clear then. So you're saying that Cress can't grow. Well, no, can't grow. That Cress is growing slowly, but surely you need the time, so on so forth. So you are content then, right? With the $20,000, you're content where you're at, and so on and so forth. I guess I just want to be clear in terms of what it is, because for me, my concern, obviously I love Cress and you all are doing a phenomenal job. And that's why, right? That's why I want it to be more, you know? And so my thinking is, hey, let me advocate to give you more so that the community can get what they want, which is no police response to, so that the police don't watch it out. But you're telling me, I think no. Is that what you're saying? No, at this point? What I'm telling you is we are moving faster than anyone in this country has ever done with this work. I recognize that that doesn't count the two years of time folks worked on this thing. I don't think there's anything Cress is incapable of. I just don't know that it's ready today. I think, you know, this is a thing that you're gonna have to make a decision as a community. If you're building this thing for a short run, we can do everything really quick. We can get everything running up and there will be big flaws in it. There will be big, big flaws in it. Or we can do this thing where we build it, we get a foundation, we really make sure, when we talk about anti-racism, that is a thing that we have to stop at every step and make sure it's still intact. Every time we make a move, we have to stop and make sure that we're not over-serving communities or under-serving communities. Have we talked to the community about how they feel about what we're doing? That sort of information gathering takes steps. So by no means am I saying that we won't ever get to that point. I think we will get there faster than anybody in the country ever has. That's the pace we've set. But, you know, functionally, we're eight months into deployment. I just, there's no, there's no evidence from the work around the country that at that point people are experienced enough that you can build the leadership team that can hold those things. I'm not saying that more resources wouldn't be great, but I am saying that there's a difference between building a thing for a short period and building it for the long haul and the long haul does require these, you know, again, I just want to say they feel slow and deliberate to us. When I talk to other municipalities, what they say is, how are you going so fast? There are 10 departments I'm aware of that trained for two years. So the speed in which we're going, there's no precedent for it. And so I also, you know, I don't, I'm afraid that if we take that big step that I won't be able to assure folks that my folks will be able to step up when the time is right. And that's, that would be dangerous for them. It would mean the policing to show up. It would mean them needing to show up in a much more fast way in a way that might lead people to not always be their best selves. So yeah, I guess the answer to your question is, I think we're going as fast as I can make it as I can imagine us going. And we would never turn down resources, but just, let's say tomorrow my budget got doubled, my job would then turn into a fiscal job. I would be spending funding so much that I wouldn't be able to do the on the ground supervision that the work requires right now. I wouldn't be able to spend the time molding folks into the responders they need to be. And that's, you know, there's nine people, that's nine different people who require real tailoring and understanding. So I'm sorry, again, I'm sorry. I know that I'm not living up to the highest dreams of folks. I'm just saying that as a human being, I don't know that those highest dreams are attainable where we are right now. So Earl, I mean, and I'm not about just, obviously CSWG when we made a recommendation for press, we want it to be long-term. We want it to be successful. We want it to have a strong foundation. We want it to have, you know, everything they needed to have for it to be something to go into the future, right? And that's why you have us to keep pressing the town. Because I understand the town saying, look, we've done all this great things and you all have done a lot of great things, but it's a lot because you have us as pressuring you to make sure that you're doing it. And we're going to continue with the pressure to make sure that you are doing it, right? So for me- I want to just put a plug in me and Deborah presenting at the Smith School of Social Work Conference this summer about this very thing. So this conversation is continuing in lots of different ways. Exactly. So I want it to be deliberate. I want it to be, you know, strong and foundational.  If that, but I just want a clarity around that. But the other part though is this need from the community, right? So I think though the town needs to have a plan and again, tap us, CS SJC and whomever else to figure out a plan for what do we do with the fact that press at this point can't respond to all non-violent. So what are we going to do? Because obviously with the fact that you all are not looking at safety protocols at APD, APD is not an anti-racist department. I'm very afraid in terms of APD continuing to respond to these non-violent concerns. I appreciate you Deb. As soon as we can get there, we're going to get there. Michelle may interrupt. Of course. Yeah, please. I just want to let people know that Pamela is going to have to leave in a few minutes. If there are any specific questions for Pamela, we should pose those now. She has a time limit. So just want to put that on your radar. And if not, that's fine. She will leave when she has to leave. So can I just ask everyone who has their hand up to put it down just for a moment? I'm keeping track of the order. And if you have a question specifically for Pamela on any of these topics, the ones that we've covered or the ones that we have yet to cover, please raise your hand. Okay, I'm going to go to Deb and then Councilor Pam. I guess for me, the only thing that I would have to say for Pamela would be around the, because we talked about some of the other ones just to kind of reiterate around the youth empowerment. And I'll say this again, I guess, you know, Paul and everything, that, you know, in your rapport, the town manager is forming a working group to explore youth empowerment and, you know, all these different family outreach, center, high school, middle school administration, not youth, but administration. And then rec, finance, community participation, offices, DEI, Crescent, so on and so forth. I didn't hear youth. So for me, like I said before, youth need to be front and center in terms of creating a youth empowerment. Center, it needs to be their voice. They're the ones that need to be, the working group needs to be them, not a bunch of adults that are going to tell the youth what they need. You know what I'm saying? The youth are the ones that should be driving the youth empowerment to say what they need, where it should be located, what's the parameters, and so on and so forth. I learn every day from youth. They are the savviest people on this earth, okay? And so youth empowerment should be all them. And I'm definitely with Liz, when she was saying about having youth in all other stratospheres of the town management and the input too. But youth empowerment needs to be them. So I hope there's going to be changes to that. So that's just whole kind of suggestion that you all made for youth empowerment because right now, if you all continue down that path, that's going to be a mess. And the youth empowerment needs to happen also very quickly. If CSWG had already put a model in place, so we don't need to start from ground zero. And it seems like over here, it's kind of gathering input, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. No, that's delay. It's talk to the youth and let's stop putting these things in place. Thanks Deb. Pamela, would you like to respond to Deb's comments? So I think that the town manager will respond to the first part of the comment about putting together the working group because that's not my initiative. The second part of that discussion deals with the collaboration that Press and the DEI department has in place to actually work with youth in the fall. And our plan is to share an AmeriCorps member to lead that work. So it is our plan and our objective to begin working with youth in the fall with the help of an AmeriCorps member. So I'm working on the active programming parts of those initiatives. Thank you, Pamela. And it sounds like there's a question for Paul in there, but given your time constraints, Pamela, I'm gonna move on and we'll come back to that. And I'm gonna go to Ms. Pat and then I'm going to go to Councillor Pam, Councillor Devlin-Goughier and Councillor Walker. So I just want to remind all of us that CSWG through 7GEN did their research, they talked to youth of diverse backgrounds that are most impacted by APD. And one of the recommendations that came up is actually having a youth center. And I know the Tank Council has capital priorities. Where does the youth center fits into all this? Where are we going to get a youth empowerment center? And I know that there is APA funds that were set aside for youth. What happened to that? And the last thing is why are we doing research again? 7GEN already talked to youth. It's just delaying too much. That's all I have to say. Me, why youth are suffering? I'm very confused about the whole process, honestly. So again, I think that that is a question for the town manager and the section of the youth empowerment discussion and the report that I wrote really bills upon and looks to the work that was already done and envisions having someone in place to put that into practice. So obviously, I don't have the budget to create a building, a structure for youth empowerment center. The goal that I have and that I share with Earl and Press is to have a point person to work with youth to do the direct programming activities, initiatives that were envisioned in that report, which mentioned training on legal rights, career development, exposure to colleges. So all of those things are things that we hope that the AmeriCorps member and have expectations that the AmeriCorps member working with our two departments would do beginning in the fall. I mean, that's all great. And I'm not disputing that, but what location in our school building when school building can satisfy some of the kids? So I get all that. I'm not questioning the programming, but where would it happen? Is that the dedicated space for youth to do this? I have to use existing spaces in town or other resources that we might be able to share from community partners, but I don't have a building in place. So my best option is to start the programming while other folks are working on creating a building. I don't wanna wait until the building is in place to start the programming. So I'm trying to start programming now using existing buildings and existing partnerships in order to do that because I don't have a building and I can't create one between now in the beginning of the school year, but I can start to provide programming in the existing structures that we have. And I acknowledge your statement that those structures may not be ideal, but the reality is that is what I have to work with. So I can only work with what I have. My last comment, I apologize. Nothing personally against you, but why is there that anything that benefits BIPOC community, our town council, our town government, our finance committee, there is no money, tight budget. You know, it's so tough, but we will have money for other stuff that powerful people want in this town. So I don't get it. What message are we sending to our youth? Again, I don't think that that's a question that I am in a position to answer. I understand. Yeah. Yeah, I get it. So the youth empowerment is next on our list. So I'm just looking to the counselors that have their hands raised if they have specific questions to Pamela before she has to leave on any of the topics. Otherwise, we'll come back to the youth empowerment shortly. So I'm going to go to counsel Pam. So it's very useful what she just said that number one, she's not putting together the working group, but that she is DEI will start the programs while the building, you know, because that is obviously at this moment down the road. So that is very useful to me. My question is, when are we going to have, I would, I really do want to talk about the youth center. And I think that tonight's getting late. I would like to have, I have, I like the ideas that came with Seaswag and Seven Gen, but I have some other ideas that I think are very important, which go along with youth and leadership and some programs I think which would be extremely wonderful for the community. So my simple question to you right now, Pamela, is what do you need from us now? So what I need right now is just a little bit of time to start the programming and ideas for programming. You know, there are wonderful ideas for programming in the community safety working group report. Dr. Rhodes also has a wonderful program that I guess he's going to start this summer around entrepreneurship. So I think there's lots of possibilities for programming for youth. I think there's also good opportunities to collaborate with Amherst College, Hampshire College and UMass for additional opportunities. So I am excited about the possibility of having an AmeriCorps member to work with Cress and DEI to pull those initiatives and programs together.  I can't create a building overnight, but I can start the programming and offer it in the interim. And that's what I'm trying to do. Okay. So if I have any ideas, I should write them up and then send them to you. Is that it? That will be great. Yeah. We'll do that then. Thank you. Anna. Thank you. I have two questions. So I'll ask one and then pause for a response if that's okay and then ask the second. So the first one is regarding the trainings that are the learning opportunities that are being offered. I'm curious if there's a framework or a model that you're utilizing to scaffold those trainings to support the development of an anti-racist culture both across the town staff, but within departments to Alicia's point. And as you also recognized, an anti-racist culture isn't developed in training but mostly partly in the application of what is learned. The training that you listed in your report is wonderful and especially for white folks, the identity exploration and the context of power and privilege is really an important first step. But I'd love to hear about how you're incorporating that into application, into the work intentionally. And I know that if you don't have a model right now to talk about that's okay, but I'd love to hear more about that if you don't have it top of mind right this moment. Sure. So I mean, I initially reached out to an organization that I'm very familiar with called the National Coalition Building Institute, which was a wonderful program that I'm actually trained in and went through, I would say now maybe 15 or 16 years ago, but it looks like they have disbanded or they're not as active in New England as they once were. So what Jennifer and I have been doing is meeting with each department head, designing our initial programming for that department. And then our plan is to go back to scaffold up. So I'll just use, for example, where the DPW was as far as their initial workshop is not the same as where we envision the fire department, I'll say, and we haven't done the fire department yet, that's coming up in May. The other thing that we're doing with our training is we're going back to each department head to have conversations with them. And this has not started yet. So this is our plan for May and June, have conversations with them about their DEI self-assessment. So each department was asked to do a self-assessment, to look at their staffing levels, to look at the constituencies that they serve, to think about ways in which we can embed equity policies and practices into their work. So the goal is to tie, well, to have the initial training and then to go back and tie the future trainings to that equity work. And of course, with each department, I'm sure there are probably dozens of things that we could be tackling, but we're really gonna try to be realistic about this and try to tackle like two to three things in each year because getting into the practice takes time. So if we can identify one or two practices, have people work to achieve equity, to review their policy on a specific practice and to work towards that and then go back in year two and repeat the process and expand it. I'd love to say that we're going to change every department, but we're overnight or within a short-term timeframe, but that's just unrealistic, especially given the fact that we are a department of two and we have a lot of departments both to work with and then repeat the cycle through. So at this point, I'll be quite honest and say, I had hoped that we would have done more trainings and more departments as we approach the first year anniversary. I had written into my sort of one-year vision that we would do a minimum of four and we're gonna make that goal, but primarily because we've already done two really large departments. We have a third large department coming up and then we have all of those departments in the bank center that we're gonna, which are all sort of, they share the fact that they're all outwardly facing. So veteran services, senior services, the health department on Crest, there is some commonality in how they approach their work with that group and so we can group them together. But when we start to look at the other departments, finance and accounting and clerk's office, it's gonna require a totally different way of grouping them together, even to bring them together for professional development and thinking about how we incorporate equity into their work. As you can imagine, everyone, no one wants to feel that their work is inequitable, right? From the perspective of members of the town staff, they are doing anti-racist work because they don't think that there are inequities in their work and no one openly says, oh, I'm a racist. The real challenge with having folks have these conversations is getting them to understand how their practices and policies, which may seem neutral on their face, have a disparate impact on certain communities. And that's not a conversation that you can just have once. It's a conversation that needs to be repeated. And although you need to start and have the conversation with some mutuality of respect. So it is not my approach to go in and condemn and to say, you're doing everything wrong. This is what you should do. It is my approach to talk about the narratives, to talk about the inequities and to talk about ways in which we can better the work that we do. I think the principle that explains my approach, the best is to think about universal design and how it works in the school system. Universal design benefits very targeted populations, but it also benefits everyone. And so when you start to have conversations about designs of your programs and policies that are equitable and universal, then you can bring more people along because they don't feel that they're being admonished or attacked or denigrated for work which they probably rightly so feel that they've been doing the very best of thinking. Even though that there is an opportunity, as someone said, there's always an opportunity for improvement. Thank you. I'm really interested down the road. This is not a tonight question, but down the road I'm really interested in learning if you're about your self-assessment in terms of whether you're using competencies that can be measured over time or what areas of focus that you have. And I appreciate you sharing more about that. My second question is actually about the next point, which is the communications plan. So one of the things that we've talked about today but that I was noting when I was reading is, are there alternate methods within a communication plan that are engaging directly in community to reach the populations that are not being reached by our current modes? The existing communication plan talks about putting out out on all of the typical methods, which is great. And as we've heard tonight, it'd be really great to see new modes of providing public access. The part that made me uncomfortable about the report was the phrasing of based on expressed need. Because if someone doesn't know how or where or when to express their need, we're not gonna hear it. And so, or they're not getting the message that we want them to express the need in the first place. So I'd really love to hear how you all plan and Pamela, I think this is part you but maybe it's more Paul actually. I'd really like to hear more about the process for engaging in community to reach the folks who aren't currently being reached. And I know that's kind of a tough scenario because how do you know, right? But we do know in a lot of ways. We've seen other aspects of community outreach. Crest has done a really great job at this. And so I'd like to hear what methods you're using to expand our modes of delivery to reach populations that are not currently being served by our existing practices. So I think that this is an area where the town really is in the beginning steps of trying to figure out how best to meet the needs. We know that translation services are needed. We're trying to figure out how to have those translation services on demand. We're trying to figure out how to have translation services without adding additional burdens or additional responsibilities to current staff who have specific language skills. I've done a little bit of research on this area and looked at some plans that were developed. Well, the plans that I looked at were on the federal side. There's also a group of DEI directors in the Commonwealth who've been talking about translations and access. So we're still in the gathering and trying to formulate a concrete plan. I think it will really vary by department how best we can communicate that. And then we have to have some agreement about some basics. And there have been challenges. We talked about how to have conversations with the joint meetings where there were translation services available. We posted a meeting and I got a request about whether we would be able to provide American Sign Language and had to try to scramble to see if I could pull together a list of resources. So there are definitely challenges in this area. And we're not nearly as far along as I think we would like to be, but I will be working with Brie and other department heads to address that. And so it is definitely very much a work in progress. I think the benefit is that we do have those earmark funds that can help us pull some pieces together. So the research that I've done, I looked at some federal plans that have developed translation and access protocols for various departments that have been very thorough. I looked at the and have conversations with a company that provides real-time translation services for the Massachusetts Port System. So a wide variety of languages. That company also can provide translation services of documents. I think it's a matter of getting everybody and by everybody, I mean myself and Brie and other department heads together and formulating a plan that we can then try to carry out. So it's very much a work in progress. Thank you. Thank you, Pamela. And thank you, Anna. And I'm gonna go to Councilor Walker. If I could just ask, I do hear some background noise. I'm not sure where it's coming from, but it might help for folks. So it's probably coming from my location. So I have been having connectivity issues. And so I'm actually in the kitchen of a friend of mine. Oh, okay. And there's a conversation going on in another... Oh, no problem. All right. So I do apologize for that. And I will apologize for having to leave the meeting a little bit earlier. So I'll just share that I have been ill the last couple of days. And so I've been really hanging in, but my medication is wearing off and I really can't stay much longer, but I welcome any additional questions.


Aloha and welcome to Cooper Union, what's happening with human rights around the world. Today we're looking at the universal periodic review of the United States. What's next in our neighborhood and nation? And today we have three amazing activists and advocates sharing their experience through this UPR process, third cycle. May 11th would be the one year anniversary. However, due to the COVID crisis, we, the UPR, the universal period for the United States was moved to November 9th. But we were busy preparing one year ago for this important review. Today we'll be speaking with three activists organizing to make sure that the review of the United States was very thorough, but also transformative. And we'll be looking at it from the human rights city approach, as well as all the way to the capital, as well as to global civil society. So it's an honor to welcome our three guests. I'd like to begin with Jackie Smith, who's a professor at FIT, but also really one of the founders to really mobilize the human rights city approach. And Jackie, could you share with us what it was like to organize this third cycle and how you were able to move from the second to the third? So I came to this work through my work as an organizer in the Human Rights City Initiative, which is a global initiative. And all I did, all I can claim responsibility for is getting people in Pittsburgh really organizing around it. And so we created a human rights city alliance in Pittsburgh and began talking with other cities about how can we bring human rights home? How can we take these great international treaties and laws and standards that we have for visioning human rights and make sure that our local officials implement them and organize to make that happen? And so we started talking with people in cities and communities around the country and trying to organize and strategize about how to do this. That led to a number of meetings in Washington, DC and a number of other places. But last, it was 2018, I think, in Atlanta in April. We were there. And Josh Cooper pointed out that in a year we would be doing the UPR review of the United States or over the next year. And so we began talking with folks there and envisioning a plan to do a UPR cities project where we would have tools and background and resources to help local organizers use the UPR process to review human rights in their communities and bring that story to the UN and then also bring that UPR report at the end. So this report that was to come out last May and bring it home and help local officials know what they're supposed to help us, the United States, do from their own communities. Because if things don't change in Pittsburgh, they're not going to change in the United States. And so bringing our folks in our communities into this project of implementing the UPR recommendations. So we had to learn and we had to help others learn. And that's what this is about. And we continue to do that, both locally but also across our cities and communities. That was exciting. I remember a meeting in Atlanta. It was getting together all of the human rights city and all the initiative around the country coming together to see how we can make sure that for the first time ever there'd be a UPR cities working group where all cities would work together to highlight the most important human rights issues and be able to then bring those to the global stage. And one of the exciting things, of course, is that's where we met Donna. And Donna joined that and has been on the UPR Task Force since and even really active for the last event where we're at the adoption in March 17th to make sure that we the people were able to have a voice there. Donna, could you share your experience with the UPR Task Force and UPR cities movement and what it lasts you? Yes, the Atlanta event was a life changing event for me. I actually met Joshua Cooper and Jackie Smith at that. And I was directed there because of going to the Sustainability Conference at the UN. And someone said to me, are you part of the human rights city in Atlanta? And of course, I had never heard of that. It was just the sustainability portion that had drawn me to the UN for that. And to find out it was something right there in my city that I could take advantage of, I immediately signed up to attend the conference, didn't know what to expect, and was blown away. I was blown away both by the local issues, some of which I didn't know anything about. And I thought I was connected. And the openness of all of the people traveling from different cities to support us. So I then spoke to what I was really passionate about. And that was artificial intelligence. And everybody kind of looked at me at that time. And I'm like, we're in a data-driven society. And we're working on all of our stories, all of our issues. However, no one is realizing how the data has been corrupted and the perception of our stories is being thwarted. And that needs to be something that is important. Jackie said, I would help you however I need to, Donna. You need to do a report on that. And Joshua says, yes, let's get an artificial intelligence working group. The reason that was so exciting to me is because the UN, when you hear anything related to that, there's this great mystique. It has to be all of these people that are untouchables. They are the iconic people in here. My voice was going to be heard. And that was something I was very passionate about is the individual stories of the individual people and making sure that the authenticity of that still remained in any document. And it also helped me to understand that many of us were landing up in the human rights arena. When the human rights is what we all start off with as one of our mutual friends, Robin Benton, reminded me today is that we all have those rights. However, we're working on governmental rights, declaration rights, treaty rights and different things. But there is one document that unifies the world. And that is the declaration of the human rights with those 30 articles. So I'm still excited. I'm still here. And that process is daunting. However, it is empowering. Thank you so much, Donna. And that does remind me about all the exciting work that we did organize from Atlanta, all the way through submission of those stakeholder reports where people were able to make sure that their questions were raised off the global scale and also their recommendations were put to the US at that level. And also when the UPR was delayed due to COVID, it was exciting to see how we organized around COVID and human rights and to look at it from that lens because there was no mention of it in the first US report. And then also a week later, Earth Day, all the indigenous peoples of the world also had a side event to tell the governments of the world what was most important and what's happening on the ground. So absolutely exciting for you to share from Atlanta to last April. And then that brings up really important issue that's been there since the beginning. And I remember being there in 2010 and Sex Workers Alliance and NGOs coming together to speak. And it's really exciting to make sure that that issue is still at the forefront, but unfortunately not enough actions been taken. So Mariah was gonna ask you, how can the US finally take meaningful steps to implement that historic recommendation 86 from the 2010 UPR, which stated, quote, ensure access to public services, paying attention to the special vulnerability of sex workers to violence and human rights abuse? Which the Obama administration accepts in the response, we agree that no one should face violence or discrimination and access to public service based on sexual orientation or their status as a person in prostitution. Could you maybe expand on what you see are the recommendations that must be taken one decade later and how we can turn that page in this new administration? Yeah, absolutely. And first, I wanna acknowledge the work of sex worker advocates, people who have experienced in the sex trades who were instrumental in making this recommendation happen and also the acceptance by the administration at the time in accepting this recommendation. So I would say on the state level, decriminalization of sex work is the most urgently needed and the administration, the current administration can support that by speaking out about the need for decriminalization. That's something that no administration has meaningfully done. Of course, the UPR recommendation 86 was historic, but no action was really taken by any administration since then in implementing the recommendations and their agreement to ensure that there's no discrimination in access to public services based on an individual working in the sex trade. So also creating opportunities, Donna was speaking to the importance of people with lived experience being at the table and having a voice in making sure that human rights are protected and that they're able to be involved in advising on any policy or law past it, whether that be the federal or the state or the local level.  So one of the things that I think of is different agencies have these consulting groups that focus on anti-trafficking. But we know that a lot of anti-trafficking legislation and policies at many different levels of government impact sex workers and at the present state have a very deleterious effect on sex workers. So there's these groups through the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Justice, the Department of State who brings together consultants who have expertise, lived experience and having been trafficked but are not inclusive of people who are supportive of decriminalization. They're actually barred from discussing decriminalization of sex work and conducting this work. So the government is being advised with only partial information. They're not being advised to actually work towards an approach to sex work that is inclusive of people's human rights and protecting their human rights. So that's something that I see as critical is that these opportunities to advise government agencies and to advise government staff and employees on this issue be inclusive of people who are in supportive decriminalization of the sex trade. I would also see that during this upcoming reauthorization of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act that efforts be made to remove any language that conflates sex work and trafficking. We see that trafficking is something that exists within the confines of the sex trade just as it does within any labor sector and that the conflation and the misconstruing of sex work as inherently harmful is not helpful towards the people who are involved in the sex trade and does nothing to protect the rights of people who are doing sex work, whether that be by choice circumstance or coercion. So that's something that we would see as critically needed at this time. Also at like local level, I know that Donna and Jackie have been speaking of what's happening at the city and local level. So district attorneys have a huge influence on protecting the rights of people involved in the sex trade. They can decide whether or not to actually prosecute the charges related to sex work. And we have seen that there's been a few leaders in these district attorney positions, one in Washington County in Michigan, who's actually made it policy to refuse prosecuting charges related to sex work that's both for sex workers and for their clients. And that comes to a critical point about protecting workers includes making sure that they can actually make an income. So their right to economic ability to do the work that they choose. And for sex workers, that includes being able to see clients in a safe way and not having that person be at risk of arrest. Thank you so much. And that really brings us to a couple of exciting points of what we were involved in. And Jackie, I remember in January and February, we were hosting events in Washington DC, as well as in New York city to meet with embassies of governments as well as UN missions. Can you share some of that experience with you and how that then moved us forward from the stakeholder reports to the interaction with those governments and how helpful that was at the city level. I remember you had everybody get on the bus and go for human rights. And that was one aspect of bringing human rights home. Can you share that experience? Yeah, so as part of our work on the UPR cities in Pittsburgh, we held a number of community forums over the months before the UPR submissions were due at the United Nations, which was I think October of 2019, was it? Yeah. And so that process got people to learn about the UPR and got them to think about what are the issues in our community that we need to work on. And it brought different groups together. And so then we pulled our report together and that was a collaborative process. And then we wanted to keep people's attention on it. So Josh organized an opportunity for us to go in lobby in Washington DC. And so I was able to reach out to one of our partners, Casa San Jose, which organizes immigrant rights issues. And they have a youth group that was really keen to go and speak on behalf of the issues that they were bringing to our work and they had a bus or a little van. And so we were able to bring a few different coalition partners there. And people were really excited to really see, meet some of the faces that are behind this UPR. The UN became real in this way and in a way that really energized some of our local activists and helped them understand how the UN and how human rights could be a real tool for us to push for the changes that we've long been working for in Pittsburgh and not making the progress that we need. So that was a really helpful learning process. So much Jackie and Donna, I remember you also being involved as we led up to the actual UPR on November 9th, the side events that we organized. Would you like to share some of the issues you're able to raise during the side event and the ability to interact with those governments in Geneva prior to the actual UPR? Yes, as everyone knows, there was a lot of anti-racism issues against black people and people of African descent. We had the George Floyd, we had the numbers of people dying from COVID and the number of people being infected by it and not getting hospitalization. And to be in a conversation where people were bringing forth not all of the issues that were feeding into this, whether it was climate change, whether it was pay, whether it was sex rights to do a profession that you wanted, all of these disparities actually led into a group understanding that all of this is interconnected. It all has a basis in one ism of one or the other. And it is all of them are violations of our human rights, our actual right to pursue our own individual happiness without disregard or disrespect to someone else's. So to look at being in a conversation where representation for five continents was present, that was powerful because we are all fighting for this thing right, the right to be human. Thank you so much, Donna. And that really does point out the essence of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that all human beings are born equal. And I really think that's the point of we're talking about here is this UPR was a process where everybody to know what their rights are, to demand their rights, and then to realize their rights through advocacy. And Mariah, can you share a little bit more around how sex workers rights are now being guaranteed and how the community is being able to coordinate campaigns through their creativity, as well as their compassion to make sure that the rights are realized. Yeah, absolutely. So we're seeing a number of state legislation come through that is either full decriminalization or repealing certain harmful laws. We've seen great success in New York state. So this year, during this current legislative session, the what is hopefully known as the walking while trans ban was repealed. So this is the loitering for the purposes of prostitution law. This is a very archaic law that led to significant profiling of black trans women as sex workers and being picked up for arrest and convictions. We see in the case of Leilene Polanco, the devastating effect this law has had.  She couldn't pay the bail of $500 and ended up dying in jail. It is absolutely devastating to see that this is happening. This is one high profile case, but we know that there's incidents that go on every day in jails across the United States where people who are trying to survive in a country that does not respect or protect their human rights to an income, to housing, to food, to healthcare, to a myriad of things that should be protected by this government, both at the federal and the state and the local level and they end up being imprisoned. We see this in efforts to address trafficking. And as I said earlier, the conflation of trafficking as synonymous with sex work is extremely harmful. And we see a number of local and law enforcement operations that happen where in the course of what they call anti-trafficking, they arrest people who are doing sex work, whether that be by choice or circumstance or perhaps they are experiencing exploitation, but law enforcement makes the excuse that they must arrest people in order to investigate these cases. So their right to freedom, their right to not be arbitrarily detained is being denied in order to supposedly protect their human rights. It doesn't make any actual logical sense and any law enforcement that says they must detain people in order to protect them or not doing their job. So we see this as a critical issue that anti-trafficking efforts must not be done in a way that actually denies people their human rights. People have a right to do the job that they choose. Sex work is work. And I think that it's really just a matter of a discomfort within this country on sexuality and sex and being able to talk about it honestly that far as this from having common sense legislation that allows people to do the work they need to do to survive in this country. Thank you so much, Mariah. And we know that COVID did delay the actual review. However, the civil study across the country joined forces for justice and freedom. And we really did focus and highlight on economic, social, and cultural rights.  We see now that the US had a record number of recommendations and we can see as we explore those actual recommendations issued to the US, there were 347. So what we can look at now is maybe how we plan to implement those recommendations to realize human rights in our communities, cities, and capital. If you look at the chart that was created by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, it's exciting to see how they linked it with what Donna was talking about earlier about the environment, that the sustainable development goals and global human rights are interconnected with one another. In that chart, it shows the breakdown of how most of those recommendations fall under SDG 16, but also cover the entire rainbow of rights that are essential with economic, social, and cultural rights. Jackie, can you share some of the exciting things you're doing in Pittsburgh with the youth forums and other ways to make sure that these recommendations don't just sit on a report as one of our good friends, Rob Robinson, loves to share about those recommendations when that report actually become policy and promote a better life to promote and protect the rights of all people. Yeah, so I got involved in this work because I realized that there were great reports that we as a human rights movement were not using to hold our public officials accountable. And as I've gotten more involved locally, we've seen that the local officials really know very little about the United Nations and they don't know what the UPR is. So we've been educating them and educating ourselves. And so getting community members and our coalition members involved in this process, we're now taking those recommendations and we're building a local report. So translating, what does it mean if the US is supposed to do these things? What do we have to do in Pittsburgh? And so there are some things that we can make recommendations relevant to local policy. But another thing that we're doing is also talking with our local officials about how we can work with them to push the United States government to do the things that would help us do the work that we need to do in Pittsburgh. Like one of the key things is strengthening human rights institutions at the national level. So that our local human rights institutions and these are our allies, they've been partners in this UPR work for the whole time, they need help. So we can help work with them. We can also work with our council members to say you need more money to do affordable housing and to do the projects that we're pushing you to do so we can work with you. We'll use the UPR, we're gonna push the federal government to do what it needs to do so the cities can do what they need to do. And that's how the UPR can really have an impact. So it's a long process, a lot of educating and really translating these ideas to the local. Thank you so much. And Donna, of course, I think our last time was really around the adoption and making sure that all those recommendations that were featured on that chart are actually then accepted by the government. And so they didn't accept a high percentage. Donna, what are some of the priorities you're working on from those recommendations right now in your community? Some of the priorities this top for me is healthcare. During this COVID pandemic and in my personal life there has been so many different illnesses and deaths that are coming about. And it crosses every socioeconomic group. So when we talk about racial disparities, the cultural practices that have also contributed to this, the distrust of many agencies, we see this with the vaccine rollout. But we also see that there is so little effort being put forth from a preventative perspective with knowledge and information. Everything is about response. And now trust me, all of a sudden, trust me. And so it is acclaiming my community with the consortium of other people through the Gap Girls and Gap Guys to educate them with all of these government agencies are what are the responsibilities to the people? For many black and brown people, we have thought of it as this mammoth organization and group of people that are not there for us. Many of us don't realize our tax dollars. There are many, many documents, policies, acts and things that protect us. So you don't have to fear. And I'm starting off with saying, no, don't look at just a law or policy that addresses one perspective. Start with your human rights, what you are entitled to and be empowered by that. Thank you so much, Donna. And moving to Mariah, I also remember one of the most exciting examples of local human rights advocacy was exactly what Urban Justice Center does. They actually create a report card for their county council members, I remember. Can you share a little bit about that? And then some of the priorities around sex workers rights that you also see that you'll be advocating for to realize these recommendations? So the report card was something that was before my time, but I know that it was something that was implemented in New York City to hold council members account to their agreements to support and protect people's human rights at a local level. But I think something that I would like to speak to is this human rights commission that we are helping to organize in Oregon. So this will be a historic event where sex workers from Oregon and also nationally and internationally will come together to speak to the human rights issues that they're seeing that are impacting them, both at a local, state, and national and international level. So we were going to convene this panel of experts both through lived experience and people from academia, government, a variety of different sectors to come together and discuss the human rights implications of criminalization of the sex trades and discuss the urgent need for decriminalization and the de-stigmatization of sex work. We see that many of the recommendations from this last UPR highlighted the extensive racism, xenophobia, police brutality, racial discrimination that is endemic in this country and sex worker rights and the sex worker rights movement is intersectional in that it will address all of those issues. So we see it as a critical piece to holding the United States to account to what they've agreed to in this last UPR cycle. Thank you so much. And really, if we do look at that chart, we can see that 52% of those recommendations were looking at these justice and strong institutions and that's what we're trying to do as Jackie and Mariah and Donna all shared. We're trying to make sure those city human rights commissions are actually strong and then reduced inequalities, 19% looking at that, 11% on gender equality and then 5% on good health and wellbeing and only 2% on those decent work economic growth. So we know that we've done a lot but we also know that the governments of the world are pretty set in what they focus on and what they concentrate on. So we know as we move forward going into the fourth cycle but also looking at the other opportunities that exist. We know there's already another letter to look at creating a commission of inquiry related to systemic racism and police brutality that'll be submitted to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. And we also know all these special procedures, the rapport tours, the working groups and independent experts all do country visits but also thematic reports. And I look forward to working with all of you as we move forward. Thank you for joining us as we're here. That would have been the one year anniversary of the third cycle of the UPR and it's been amazing to see all that's been able to be done in this time and look forward to the future as we make sure these recommendations become reality in people's lives across the country and around the world. So thank you so much for joining us and Mahalo.


Does introducing young children to peanut-containing products increase or decrease their chances of developing a peanut allergy? For years, parents have been told to keep their kids away from peanut products if there's a good chance of them developing an allergy, yet a British study is turning this conventional wisdom on its head. The Learning Early About Peanut Allergy trial, or LEAP for short, set out to measure the effect of exposing high-risk children to foods containing peanuts early on in their lives. They started out with 640 kids between the ages of 4 and 11 months who suffer from an egg allergy or severe eczema or both. They did this because these existing conditions suggest there's a reasonable chance of developing a peanut allergy as a child. Each of these children were then given a skin-prick test to see if their bodies were already primed to react to peanuts. 98 of the kids ended up in this especially high-risk group. Within each of the two groups, those that were highly likely to develop an allergy and those that were just somewhat likely, researchers randomly assigned children to either avoid peanut-containing products or to be fed them regularly each week, and this went on until the children were 5 years old. The results were quite startling. Take those children that were considered only somewhat likely to develop a peanut allergy. Out of those that ate peanut products every week, two out of every 100 of them ended up developing an allergy. That may sound high, but compare it to those that weren't exposed to peanut products. In this group, 14 kids out of every 100 developed an allergy. In other words, kids that were not exposed to peanuts were seven times more likely to develop a peanut allergy than those that were. This was in the lower-risk group of kids. In the higher-risk group, similar results were seen. Here the overall percentage of kids with an allergy at 5 years old was higher as you'd expect, but even in this group, if your child was not exposed to peanut products, they were three times more likely to develop an allergy than if they were. Following on from this research, the LEAP team have just published a follow-up study where the original participants avoided peanut-containing food for 12 months after the original trial. That included those that originally were exposed to peanut-containing products and those that weren't. They were then retested for peanut allergy. With results, there was no indication that avoiding peanut-containing products increased the chances of an allergy subsequently developing, suggesting that early childhood exposure may provide a degree of longer-term protection. There's still a lot we don't know about what causes peanut allergy, and it's important to note that even with early exposure, your child may still develop a serious allergic response. Yet the results from the LEAP study suggest that avoiding peanut products altogether at an early age can actually increase the risk of later allergy. Because of this, a number of professional organisations are now recommending that parents introduce peanut-containing products to their kids early on, with the proviso of course that some children will still develop an allergy, and professional advice should be sought wherever there's a high chance of this occurring. You can find more information on the LEAP study in the blurb below, and do check out the Reactions channel on YouTube who we're partnering with this week for more about peanut allergies and a whole bunch of other cool stuff.