Hello everybody! Watch this video to learn about top tools to recover data from ZFS drives. ZFS is a revolutionary file system that follows an absolutely different approach to administration of file systems while offering new features and advantages that no other file system can provide at the moment. ZFS is reliable, scalable, and easy to manage. ZFS moves away from conventional file system principles by dropping the concept of volumes. Instead, ZFS offers more complicated storage pools that consist of one or more data media. Such media can be added to the pool or removed from it, if and when necessary. File systems are then dynamically expanded or reduced without having to format specific media. ZFS ensures a format of disks that is constantly harmonized and cardimative. Such pattern guarantees that disk data is not overwritten for quite a long time, and all updates to the file system are made at the lowest level. However, just as any other file system, ZFS is not perfect, and it sometimes suffers from crashes and data loss. In today's video, we are going to test top tools able to recover such data from this file system. For starters, let's explore the ZFS structure. It is divided into seven main elements. SPA, storage pool allocator, DSL, data and snapshot layer, DMU, data management unit, ZAP, ZFS attribute processor, ZPL, ZFS post-exlayer, ZIL, ZFS intent log, and ZVOL, which stands for ZFS volume. ZFS pools are built as combinations of virtual devices of two types. Physical and logical virtual devices. Physical VDFs or virtual devices are writable block devices, for example hard disks, while logical VDFs are combined groups of physical disks. All VDFs create a tree, the leaves of which are represented by physical devices. All pools have a special logical VDF, which is the root of such tree. All branches of the root VDF are known as top-level virtual devices. Every physical virtual device contains a structure of 256 kilobytes known as VDF label. It contains information about this device and all virtual devices with which it shares at top-level VDF. The label comprises four parts, 8 kilobytes of blank space, 8 kilobytes of boot header, 112 kilobytes of name or value pairs, and 128 kilobytes of space occupied by 1 kilobyte overblock structures. Unlike other final systems, ZFS does not have such a thing as superblock, but it has a VDF label instead. In the structure, there are four of them, each occupying 256 kilobyte of space. This is where they are located. Level 0 and label 1 at the beginning of the disk. The second and the third are positioned similarly, but at the end of the disk. Inside VDF labels, there are uberblocks that contain links to data. If one of VDF labels is erased, a data-recover tool may have some difficulty in searching for information on the disk. In today's video, we are going to show you how to recover deleted data from a ZFS drive and how to recover data if a part of the file's system structure is gone. In a Linux operating system, I created a ZFS pool, wrote some data to the disk, a few folders containing photos, videos and documents, and then removed some of them. For our benchmarking assessment, we have selected several popular data recovery tools – Hetman RAID Recovery, Recleamy, UFS Explorer, Disk Drill, Wondershare Recovery, and RSAVER. Alright, let's get down to testing. Let's connect the ZFS disk. Users can't recognize this file system, and when the drive is connected, the operating system suggests formatting it, so that the disk can be used. However, in fact, there is no need to format anything – start Hetman RAID Recovery and scan the disk. You can see that the program can recognize the disk, detect its file system, and display its name and size properly. To view the contents and find the deleted files, right-click on the disk and choose Open. In this case, a fast scan should be enough. This type of analysis will scan the disk quickly and display the results. You can see them on the screen. In this scenario, the tool has no difficulty in finding the files deleted in such a way, and it displays them marked with a red cross. Full analysis and signature search are not required for this case. Considering they take much longer to complete, it saved us quite a lot of time. The contents of all files can be checked with the preview feature, and you can search files by name, which helps you find the necessary data even quicker. Now all the files have been recovered. What is more, the disk structure is retained, so all files and folders can be found where they used to be, and it makes searching for lost data extremely easy. In a very short time and with little effort, the program was able to find and recover the data previously removed from a ZFS disk. Let's try another candidate, EFS Explorer. It shows the disk name, capacity, and ZFS partition below. When you view the contents of this directory, only the files which are still on the disk are displayed, but you can't see the ones that have been deleted. Let's run a quick scan. The result is similar. Now, let's start searching for lost files. Unchecking necessary options? If you don't do that, the search will take longer. This is a disadvantage for novice users who are unlikely to notice and disable all those options. Searching for lost files on a relatively small 15-gigabyte drive took over 15 minutes. Scanning a disk of larger capacity will certainly require much more time. As a result, the program has found the deleted data. It is marked with a different color, but only photos can be previewed. This is another drawback, because we cannot understand if they could be recovered in the end and if they are going to be damaged or not. Also, it is very inconvenient to know so little about your chances of recovery before you actually buy the tool. Let's try another candidate, Reclaiming. The initial screen doesn't show the disks. At first, you need to set up a proxy server, then skip the registration window, and then configure disk scan options. After that, the program will start analyzing connected hard disks and then display their list on the screen, which also takes some time. The program reads service information, identifies the file system, names and so on. When the process is over, we can see the list of recognized devices. Here is the test disk, and when we expand it, you can see a ZFS partition. Select it and start the scan. In the next window, you can choose the scan type. We leave the recommended option as it is. Uncheck unnecessary file system options. The program has identified the file system, but nevertheless, all file system variants are activated. If all variants are selected, the scan will take much longer, so that's why we choose to uncheck the unnecessary ones and then click start. As a result, the program has found some files. Only the contents of a raw folder can be previewed, and other files are not displayed. The deleted files are not shown either, their names are not preserved, the disk structure is damaged and the program couldn't find any documents. Most likely a deeper scan is required to find the deleted files, so let's click resume to start. The deep scan of a 15-gigabyte drive took over 30 minutes. When scanning, this program uses a signature search. You can tell it by how the files are sorted. When dealing with the drive of big capacity, the process can be really long. As a result, documents are not available for preview and some of the photos we have found are damaged. The same happened to video files, some of them got damaged and can't be played properly. The structure and file names are lost, many files are damaged and will not be recovered completely. The next one on the list is disk grill. The program can see the storage device, its name and capacity, but the file system is not recognized. Quick scan is not available for this disk, as the program was unable to identify its file system, so all you can do is to use a deeper scan. Click search for lost data. With such scan, the program also looks for files but there are signatures. In this case, file names and disk structure are not preserved and the scan takes a pretty long time to complete. It turned out to be longer than with the other tools. As file names are not preserved, it's difficult to understand which of them were removed and it's also hard to tell how effective the final result should be. In the preview, we can see that some photos and videos are damaged. The documents can't be previewed. The program did manage to find some of the deleted data, but it lacks the quick scan feature. Deleted files are not marked in any way, all files are sorted into folders by type and it is difficult to find the ones you need. Also, file search takes quite a long time, taking into account the results demonstrated by its rivals is better to choose a different tool. One more program to test is Wondershare Recovered. One can see the test disk, but it can't identify its naming file system. Also, you can't choose scan type of this file system. When you try to open the disk, the full scan starts immediately. While scanning, the program uses signature search. Just as with the previous recovery tools, files are sorted by type. When the scan is over, we can see that the program managed to find the files, some photos are damaged, video previews are limited to 10 seconds, so it is hard to tell if the program can recover such files in full. In documents, you can only view the first page and the rest should be available only after you purchase the full version of this tool. In the end, we can say that this program does support ZFS, but some files get damaged, and it is difficult to evaluate the result properly as we can't see which of the files are the ones that have been deleted before the scan. The next one on the list is RSAVA. It can see the disk, but the format is unknown for this tool, as it can't identify the file system. You couldn't open the disk without scanning, so the deeper scan begins. In the end, the program found some files. It shows deleted photos in the root folder, and their contents can be previewed. Documents are not displayed. The videos that remained on the disk and the videos that we have removed could not be found, and there is not a single folder with photos. Videos are not displayed in preview. However, the disk structure is preserved, but one folder is still missing. That's a good result for a free tool, but you shouldn't rely on it too much, as most of the information was not recovered. For the second test, I'm going to erase the main VDAV label. Then I'll save the result to a disk image. It will be used in all recovery operations. On further tests, we'll only involve the programs that manage to recover all data and preserve the disk structure. And there, Hetman RAID Recovery and UFS Explorer. As to the others, we already know with more or less certainty what results should be expected. All right, let's start Hetman RAID Recovery. As you can see, even in this case, the program can identify the disk, its name and file system. Even the fast scan option is available. Finally, it shows the same result as in the previous test without erasing elements. All photos, documents and videos are displayed, and the deleted ones are marked accordingly with their names and disk structure preserved, and not a single file is damaged. Their contents can be viewed without any limitations, and it means you can be 100% sure that these files will be recovered in full. Let's try another candidate, UFS Explorer. There is no quick scan option either, so let's look for deleted data. The result is also similar to the previous test. The program has found the deleted files and marked them with a different color. However, previews are only available for photos. This is a serious disadvantage, as we don't know if the program can recover them in full, and to check it, all you can do is to buy the full version. That's why we can't be sure if the recovery works as expected. This is another drawback, because we cannot understand if they could be recovered in the end and if they are going to be damaged. Also, it's very inconvenient to know so little about your chances of recovery before you actually buy the tool. If we have a closer look at the photos, we can see that some photos are not displayed. Now, let's draw the bottom line. On the entire list of tested recovery tools, only two programs managed to find data with file names and disk structure preserved – Hetman RAID Recovery and UFS Explorer. However, UFS Explorer fails to display previews for documents and videos. Without saving the files, it is difficult to estimate if all of them can recover in full. And this is very inconvenient, because you have to buy the full version of the program to be able to save files and in the end, the files could be damaged and some documents or videos may never happen. On the other hand, Hetman RAID Recovery displays all files in the preview window and you can evaluate the program's effectiveness before actually paying for the full version license. The recovery process is very simple because of the convenient and intuitive interface that is easy to navigate even for beginners. This program lets you retain the folder structure and file names, which makes it easier to search for certain data and saves your time. The algorithm used in our product lets you recover data even if the entire structure of the file system is erased. And if the disk has at least some data left, Hetman RAID Recovery can restore it and display it to you due to using signature analysis. In addition, this tool supports recovery from raids of various levels, including RAID-Z, and it works with most file systems. It can also help you rebuild a damaged disk array and extract the lost information. And that is all for now. Hopefully, this video was useful. Remember to click the Like button and subscribe to our channel. To commence to ask questions, thank you for watching and good luck. While you're watching this video, civilians in Ukraine are dying from attacks in bombardments on the Russian Federation. Putin's insane regime has attacked a peaceful country in the very heart of Europe. Support the Ukrainian army by making a contribution to the font come back alive. 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Drills that are great for first touch, but just keeping your skills nice and sharp so when you're doing these drills I want you to focus on two things. I want you to focus on the speed of your footwork So what you're doing off the ball and the quality of every single pass Okay, so you're gonna be putting the ball back into your partner's hands With different parts of the body, but I want you to think about getting quality on every single pass So your partner shouldn't have to move if the passes if mark was playing the ball back to me with the inside of his foot should be right back in my hands. Okay, I shouldn't have to move here or jump there or come down here Okay, so can you have the quality to get every single pass back in your partner's hands? The other thing that I mentioned is the footwork. Okay, so here we're gonna work back from cone to cone So mark was gonna start here. Okay, just show him the footwork So here you're gonna be quick over there show him the footwork and back and back and back good Okay, so he's not just trotting. He's not just casual. Okay, it's quick footwork. It's quick footwork Okay, your legs are gonna start to get heavy by the end, but that's a good thing It's easy to have nice passes when you're fresh when you're not tired But in the game when your feet are heavy your lungs are starting to hurt. Okay, that's when the quality of your touches go So I want you to push yourself with the footwork Stay sharp when it gets to the end. Don't go slower. Go quicker and focus on the quality of those passes


The Equitable Life Assurance Society presents this is your FBI This is your FBI The official broadcast from the files of the Federal Bureau of Investigations Presented as a public service by the Equitable Life Assurance Society of the United States and the Equitable Society's representative in your community As anyone ever phoned you to check up on the radio program you've got tuned in it happens like this Yes, this is the radio checking bureau. Is your radio turned on now? Why yes, it is. What program are you listening to please? It's this is your FBI just starting. Do you know who sponsors that program? Oh sure I do. It's my good friends the Equitable Life Assurance Society The Equitable Society has a special life insurance plan for men and women on the way up That's one great life insurance plan So naturally I know that this is your FBI is sponsored by the Equitable Society and in just 15 minutes I'll give full information about the Equitable Society's plan for men and women on the way up tonight's FBI file The Henpecht Swindler There is nothing remarkable about the fact that there are various classes of criminals Because in any group of six million people there would have to be different shadings of character and mentalities Rated on top for bank robbers mob leaders and killers They are in the business of crime and they engage in their work for profit They're standing in the criminal community depends almost entirely on their degree of success But there is one type of criminal to whom everyone else in the crime world looks up because he or she Makes his living by his brain And that criminal is the Swindler The night FBI file opens aboard transcontinental train that is heading westward In the club car a distinguished looking gray haired man is sitting a tall cool drink The chair beside him an attractive young woman dressed in black is nervously twisting her kerchief I I beg your pardon. Yes Could you tell me the time? Well certainly it's Exactly 3 27 Is that central time? Oh, no mountain time. We've just entered the new zone That always confuses me. Well, that's very natural my dear This your first trip west. Oh, no. No, I lived in Colorado when I was a child I haven't been back in years. I'm sure you'll enjoy your return. It's a glorious country this Is not a pleasure trip. Oh Oh, good heavens, please forgive me dear child. I just noticed you were wearing more than quite all right Someone near and dear to your heart My father, I'm sorry You're returning to the funeral. No, no, no, he died back. I'm visiting his lawyer to settle the estate. I see I Sure wish I knew more about such things. Why my dear? What's your problem? Well, here's a letter I received from the lawyer. I can't make any sense out of this Here see if you can surely call that stuff there about options mining properties I just don't get it. Well, this is all quite clear Your father has the right to have the right to exercise his option on some rather valuable mining property But what's that stuff about $10,000? Well, that's what it will cost you if you care to exercise the option. Oh Hey, I see that this lawyers in Colorado Springs. Yes, that's where I'm going. Oh my I'm afraid I shall have to cut short this delightful chit-chat. Are you walking back this way? Well, I'll follow you a few paces. My compartment is in this car. I Think it's wonderful that we're both going to the same place. Indeed it is. I Hope I'll run into you there. I'll be at the central hotel I can be of any assistance to you give me a ring, but I don't know your name Heavens, that's right. We neglected to introduce ourselves. I'm Colonel Lansing. I'm Rose Dixon pleasure mystic. Thank you This is my compartment here. I'm afraid I shall have to say good day. Oh, well Good day, Colonel. I Will call you splendid greetings by love Where have you been? I have just had the most delightful experience. Well Little lady just tried to promote me out in the lounge Is that one of us I would play me for a sucker. I'm not surprised. What do you mean? Been so long since you've made a score yourself. You're beginning to look square now I thought you were going to sit in the lounge to do some promoting yourself I intended to but the little lady's technique you free for me Look, you'd better get intrigued with making a buck for us because I'm telling you right now If you don't get some action at Colorado Springs, I withdraw my financial support Edith, what a ghastly thing to say before dinner In the Denver field office of the FBI special agent Jim Taylor is reading a teletype that has just come in Oh, yes, we've just been given an assignment. Oh, what is it? Most of the stories right here in this teletype Let's go to the office here and review it right Well, what have we got a swindle Carl so far it's been worked exclusively on transcontinental trains Yeah, and briefly the operation is this a young woman dressed in morning clothes contacts victim on train Victim is usually gullible male naturally. She explains that she's on way to settle father's estate Flashes a letter which reveals that pop has an option on some valuable mining problems. I think that's all that happens on the train She and victim wind up in the same town She contacts victims as fathers only left her $5,000 and she needs $10,000 to exercise option Will victim put up the additional five now does her phony lawyer turn out? That's right Girl and victim each give lawyer their $5,000 and then swindling couple disappears I remember a simple operation when I worked out of Boston. I know it's pretty familiar pattern Carl But unfortunately it never is to the victim and what's our assignment there those people here in town? No, but they're on their way Chicago office in this teletype the couple boarded a train yesterday bound for here Any description on yes very complete. What do they do in? Hey their train arrives in half an hour. We should be getting down at the station right now Is that you Albert? Yeah Okay, where have you been? I've been worried about you. What did you get here about two hours ago? I thought you're gonna make me at the train.  Oh, well, how'd you do? Okay? You promoted a guy? Yeah, he's a very nice man. What's his name? Oh I Think it was Colonel Lansing. You think it was yeah, oh brother I've got a written down someplace. Would you show him the letter? Yeah, he go for it Well, he said I could call him where one of the hotels here which one I got that one written down, too Oh, how can anybody be this stupid? Please Albert don't start picking on me. Then why don't you tend to business? You didn't even remember the guy's name or where he lives I can't remember everything.  But I didn't that little bird brain of yours is sending us right to the cleaners Now don't start that. I can't help it. Oh rose. Will you cut it out when you stop being mean to me? Okay, okay Where's the paper with the guy's name and address in my purse? Well, get it. We're calling him right now Oh Sorry, I didn't know you were resting. What did you want? I just received a phone call What's exciting about that? It was from that young Dave who tried to promote me on the train How did she know where to find you? I told her I would be staying here. You mean you had the nerve out just a minute Let me explain. I'm familiar with a pitch. That's why I wanted her to call me Look, when are you going to work? I am working. You know what? Let me tell you this girl's proposition She's using the option swindler. We each put up $5,000. Give it to her lawyer. That old bromide Darling, I think we can put it to good use. What do you mean? Well, while she's so busy trying to get our 5,000 I think I know a way to get her that's very unethical. He does there's enough legit surround We don't have to clip anybody in our own business, but she approached us money You get that way never does any good. Look, you've been nagging me for weeks to get into action now that I've got a live proposition You're back down. I just don't like it $5,000 my dear a very tidy sum. Oh, I know they can have it my pockets before the day is over What makes you think it would be that easy? Oh They're completely vulnerable. We know their game. They don't even suspect us What's the setup the girl asked me to be there in front of her hotel She said that she would then take me to see a mr. Albert a lawyer He lives at the hotel too and when does all this happen one o'clock now. What do you say darling? Remember? I guarantee results you're to bring your own 5,000. That's right and who supplies that well You do my dear that I don't go for look. I merely use it to impress them They never get their hands on my money, but darling. This will be the quickest turnover. We've ever made Any luck Jim no, I'm afraid not call did you interview the conductor? Yes I described the girl to him. He said he remembered her very well, but she got off the train at Colorado Springs Well, how about the man who works with her the conductor didn't remember anyone answering to his description I don't imagine he was on the train anyway Why not well their pattern in the past has been for her to work to train alone and meet him It's whatever town they're using for the swindler. I see however the conductor did recall her talking to a very distinguished looking gray-haired man You victim could be call it looks as if we're going to have to take a quick trip to Colorado Springs There you are my dear I'm delighted to see you again miss Dixon. Thank you Well, are you ready to go see my lawyer? Oh, not just yet my dear Let's let's carry here this delightful garden for a few more moments. Okay Would you like to sit down? I'd love to Did you bring the money yes my dear I have it right here you think oh well, have you your five thousand? Oh sure right here in my purse. Look splendid.  I had hope that we'd meet again Hey Mr. Dixon Colonel. Yes Call me wrong. That would be a great privilege Incidentally of my given name is Frederick Rose let's have lunch before we go to see your lawyer. There's something I want to talk to you about Just a minute. Yes is your name mr. Albert. That's right.  Yes Have you got a client named Rose Dixon? I have Who are you? My name is Lansing I'm looking for my husband Colonel Lansing. I believe he had a date here with you earlier today He had a date all right, but he never showed up. What? Neither is my client. Wait a minute. What are you trying to pull pull? My husband came here with five grand. I tell you he never arrived. Look, you might as well know this now I'm happy to the fact you're running a store here. So is my husband. What are you talking about? We knew all about your swindle. That's our business too. Now, what did you do with them? Look for the last time lady. I tell you that the guy didn't show well, and where is he's got my five thousand Well, if it's any consolation to your roses got five thousand that belongs to me Yes, just a second Here, thanks Look, I want to lie at lady. I want to read this Gotta be from rose. She's the only one who knows I'm here That is from her Listen to this By the time you get this Colonel Lansing's wife will probably be at your place looking for him If she is there here is a message from me and the Colonel for both of you drop dead We will reopen tonight FBI file in just a moment Now a special message to men and women on the way up Imagine yourself leaving your boss's office walking on air. Thanks again, mr. Baldwin Arrays and a chance to go to the home office. Oh wait till I tell Peggy Yes, I'm talking to that one man in ten who has confidence in himself and in his future If you're that man then be sure to get life insurance that's designed to order for you Investigate the equitable society's special life insurance plan for men and women on the way up a Plan for people of all ages who expect to be earning more money three years from now than they are today You're talking my language mr. Keating I'd like life insurance to take my future success into consideration That's exactly what the equitable society plan for men on the way up does it gives you these three advantages First it provides you and your family with needed protection right now Second this equitable plan provides for readjustments in the future Five years from now when you're making more money You can make up your mind whether you want more protection or bigger cash values Or you may decide to work out a retirement program Third this equitable plan is flexible at all times can expand or contract as you see fit That sounds like the plan for me. I'd like to look into it Okay, identify yourself as a man on the way up by asking your equitable society representative for full information on this plan phone your equitable society representative soon or Send a postcard care of this station to the equitable society. That's eq ui TABLE the equitable life insurance society of the United States And now back to the FBI file the hen pecked swindler The victims of the swindle in tonight's case from the files of your FBI Could not go to the police and complain because they were criminals themselves But this case does point up an important object lesson to every law-abiding citizen in the country Every year Americans are swindled out of hundreds of thousands of dollars by various types of confidence men Confidence men who are more successful than they should be Because the great majority of their victims do not report the crime to their local police People who have been swindled keep the matter a personal secret Because they feel that to make it public would subject them to ridicule But those victims do not realize that by their silence They enable the swindler to carry on his career Though your FBI wishes to pass on this bit of advice If it should be your misfortune to become the victim of a swindle Immediately do your part in stopping the swindlers from working on anyone else Notify your local police Tonight's file continues in a hotel lobby in Colorado Springs Special agent Taylor is standing near the newsstand as his fellow agent Carl Mayward approaches Come up with something here. Yes, I've just spoken to the manager Carl I described the man we're looking for he recognized him as someone who checked in two days. I see this man described himself as a lawyer He engaged in the joining room for a girl who arrived last night. Did the manager see her? Yes She was wearing morning clothes. Well, it certainly sounds like we came to the right place Yes, and then this morning the so-called lawyer withdrew $5,000 that he'd been keeping the hotel safe If they're about to use the cash, then they're approaching the kill right where are they now they both out Too bad. We can't find out who the victim is I have an idea it's that man She was talking to on the train at least one of the bell hops saw the girl out in the garden this noon Talking to a distinguished looking gray-haired man, you know, Jim. They may be out permanently That may be in fact if they've already scored they may be on their way out of town Yes, I know Carl look you drive over to the railroad station.  Oh, where would he go when he got there any idea? Now look, this is important.  Wait a minute. Oh, I just remembered something We're not going to San Francisco Yes, not a bonbon. He's dying You know something my dear what I can't tell you how pleased I am about this I think I know what you mean. Nobody's picking on us.   Oh, Jim. Oh, hello, Carl. Where are you down at the railroad station? I searched this window's room. It looks like they've checked out. I found that out down here No, how the girl was here earlier today accompanied by a tall gray-haired man From his description it sounded more like the victim than the other swindler Yes, they bought two tickets for San Francisco over two hours ago I see about an hour later a male half of the swindling team turned up here The ticket seller said he was very anxious to find out about the girl And he acted quite upset when he heard it mister Carl did he buy a ticket to no Sort of looks like she's run out with a victim. Don't you think Jim? Well, he isn't exactly a victim What do you mean? I checked with the police gave them the gray-haired man's description hoping to save him from being taken They'd tell me he's an old-time swindler himself that they have a warrant for his arrest on an old charge So it looks like some sort of double crosses in the works, Carl. Yeah, look now that our original team is separated I think we should concentrate on tracking down the girl at least we know she's headed for San Francisco I shall have to change at Denver so I'll call our office and have them pick her up Tell that chauffeur to take it easy. Will you okay drive him he's up on the turn, will you? How much further to Denver? Oh, I'd say about another 20 miles How long did you rent this car for just for the day? Look, what makes you think that Rose and your husband will be in Denver? My husband is a creature of habit. He always follows the same pattern So so whenever he's been hot in the past He always bought a ticket to some far-off place and then he'd get off at the first stop along the way Supposing he still does that Denver's a big city. He'll still follow his pattern. He's always stops at the same hotel I know the one you'll go to in Denver. I hope so Look our happy little families will be reunited before the day is over Oh, Jim come on in call Hotel manager. Let me use his office. Did you get the call through our office? That's right. I've already gotten a reply And did they get the girl off the train? No, they were too late. Did you get on the San Francisco train? No That puts us right back where we started. I know but in as much as we've lost track of her I think we should concentrate now on the other half of the team. Oh, well, I have an idea curl. I here's what I think we should do Yes, well, how do you like your new quarters? Oh, this is a wonderful room. I'm just across the hall So you can always feel that I'm nearby well Oh No, not really. I'd like to get a good night's rest. So because I want to get up early and do lots of shopping I had the very same thing in mind Would you believe it either didn't buy me as much as a necktie in the past three years? Albert was just a stingy. Well, you can rest assured that we won't know that must be the drinks. I ordered just a moment Hello sucker either surprise. What are you doing here now? What do you think? Where's my wife? Why it's me rose your husband remember Oh golly, well get out of the way and let us in now now just a minute stand aside How did you know where we were?  Well, I well for openers.  Who are you a special agent of the FBI? What are you doing here? We've been looking for all four of you for months on charges of violating the National Stolen Property Act How did you know where to find it? I found you because of your husband I knew he was looking for you So I checked all means of transportation out of Colorado Springs when I found he had hired a car the rest was easy Well Albert, huh?  You All four suspects were sentenced to long terms in a federal prison for violating the National Stolen Property Act Tonight's case from the files of your FBI which closed the careers of all four notorious criminals Illustrates again the great value of the training received by every special agent before he becomes a qualified member of the Federal Bureau of Investigation During that period of training the potential special agent is taught how to evaluate bits of information and also taught that the second Investigation of any clue will often turn up some information that was not available the first time Because of that training and that diligence The Federal Bureau of Investigation has become one of the most successful law enforcement agencies in the world and that should make you proud Because this governmental organization belongs to you. It is your FBI In just a moment we will tell you about next week's exciting case from the files of your FBI If you're what President Thomas I Parkinson of the equitable society Describes as a man with faith in his own future and the future of America Then you'll surely want to learn more about the equitable society plan for men on the way up Exactly how much will this plan cost me the equitable man has the answer or how much protection does it give me right now? Your equitable representative can work that out in two minutes Does this plan offer me desirable options? You better does Your equitable man will be glad to give you further facts and figures on the equitable Society's plan for men and women on the way up Find him in the phone book or send a postcard care of this station to the equitable life-assuring society of the United States Next week we will bring you another colorful story from the files of the Federal Bureau of Investigation The wayward brothers The incidents used in tonight's equitable life assurance societies broadcasts are adapted from the files of the Federal Bureau of Investigation However, all names used are fictitious and any similarity thereof to the names of persons living or dead is accidental Tonight the music was composed and conducted by Frederick Steiner your narrator was Dean Carlton and special agent Taylor was played by Stacey Harris This is your FBI is a Jerry divine production This is Larry Keating speaking for the equitable life assurance society of the United States and the equitable society's representative in your community and Inviting you to tune in again next week at the same time when the equitable life assurance society Will bring you another thrilling story from the files of the Federal Bureau of Investigation the wayward brothers on This is your FBI Last week $4050 was won on break the bank Stay tuned as contestants try for another fabulous jackpot on break the bank. 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The great thinker C.S. Lewis dealt with many of the common objections against Christianity that are still heard today. Lewis once compared the atheist's arguments against God to an inmate in an asylum, writing the word darkness over and over on the wall. The arguments framed against God succeed in blotting him out to the same degree that the insane person's fixation on darkness shuts off the reality of the sun. In other words, one of the most common reasons that skeptics give for rejecting God or the Gospels relates to the problem of pain, evil and suffering in the world. Does the horribleness in this world mean there is no God? Hello, weirdos! I'm Pastor Darren. Welcome to The Church of the Undead. Here in The Church of the Undead, I can share ideas which are relevant to those who suffer with depression, need some encouragement, and for those who love or are just curious about the God of the Bible. And it doesn't matter if you are a weirdo in Christ or just a weirdo, everybody is welcome here at The Church of the Undead. And I use the word undead because here we are dead to sin and alive in Christ. If you want to join this weirdo congregation, just click that subscribe or follow button, and visit us online at WeirdDarkness.com slash church. Full disclosure, I might use the term pastor because I've branded this feature as a church, but I do not have a theology degree nor did I ever go to Bible college. I'm just a guy who gave his life to Christ in 1989 and has tried to walk the walk ever since and has stumbled a lot along the way. Because like everybody else, I am an imperfect, heavily flawed human being. So please don't take what I say as gospel, dig into God's Word yourself for confirmation, inspiration and revelation. That being said, welcome to The Church of the Undead. Writer Alex McFarland, who wrote the article on basing this week's message on, I'll link to it in the show notes, he personally interviewed dozens of atheists and agnostics over the years including recent luminaries of unbelief such as Christopher Hitchens, Michael Shermer, Bart Ehrman and others, and he heard the subjection raised in many ways. The problem of evil is often stated like this, if God were wise, good and powerful, the world would not be the way it is. But the world is full of violence, suffering, injustice and sickness, and very often those who suffer most are innocent victims. So the atheist reasons this world of deceit, danger and death would be different if God were truly real. Either he, one, doesn't know how to fix it, or perhaps, two, he is malicious and doesn't want to fix it, or maybe three, God wants to fix it but is unable to. Think about this, if the cause of evil is number one, that he doesn't know how to fix it, then God is not truly wise. If it's number two, that he's malicious and doesn't want to fix it, then God is not wholly good. If evil exists and persists because of number three, that God's not able to fix it, then he's not all-powerful. In any of those three cases, atheism assumes that a classically orthodox view of God cannot be maintained. Pain and suffering must prove God is not omniscient, omnibenevolent or omnipotent. Therefore, the skeptic says the biblical God must not exist. In order to respond to objections based on the problem of evil, we have to ask ourselves, how is it that we humans are able to judge anything as good or bad? Let's reign in the hubris and be honest here. Without an objective standard from which to measure, all we say about good or evil is mere oblivion. Erase God, the ultimate standard of good by which we measure, erase God from our logic tree, and can we meaningly recognize something as right or wrong? I don't think so. When we say one thing is good or another thing is bad, what we're really doing is assessing their value as it relates to something else. And that something else that we measure by is God. Deep down, we understand that God is the ultimate, the ultimate foundation of goodness, love, power, virtue, beauty, wisdom, mercy, holiness, etc. Put together every positive characteristic you can think of and multiply to the nth degree and that conglomeration of everything good is God. When we say that Mother Teresa was good and Osama bin Laden was bad, what we're really saying is this, her life and actions conformed more closely to any ultimate standard of good than did his. Think about these contrasts. It is better to care for orphans than to torture them. Or feeding the hungry is moral, whereas placing bets on how long it would take them to starve to death is immoral. We know that the first proposition conforms more closely to an ultimate standard of goodness than the second proposition, by a long shot. In a world without God, nothing could be beautiful or ugly. Each of us regularly makes value judgments about morals and aesthetics. We say, this was heroic or that was treasonous. We may observe this song is beautiful, whereas that jackhammer noise is horrid. We can only make such value judgments because there is an ultimate and unchanging standard against which we measure. Herein lies the problem for atheism. If there is no God, how can you legitimately praise the good and condemn the evil? The answer is, if you're honest, you can't. Not in any legitimate objective sense. Without God, all we are left with is a noisy room full of opinions and in that context, why is the atheist more valid than the Christian? If this is a world without objective values and all life arose from blind evolutionary chance, then why would we assume the atheists musings against God are any more coherent than the inflections of a barking dog? Without God is our reference point. There is no good or bad, only stuff. The most we could note is that things happen. Meaningful judgment beyond that is not possible. It takes humility and maturity to really accept this, but the evil in the world simply shows how desperately we need a Savior and Lord. Some people are honest and wise enough to accept this by the age of five or six. Others live eight or nine decades, never yielding to it. Because God is the ground of truth, goodness and beauty, we are able to discern and make sense of the world.  Because a pervasively righteous God does exist, each human possesses and may cultivate a moral conscience and aesthetic sensibilities. Our love and truth preferable over narcissism and wokeness would forcibly keeping the southern border open be morally just at the expense of the welfare of American citizens. Is the music of Brian Wilson or the Beatles objectively better than Drake, The Weeknd or Taylor Swift? Because God exists, we can actually know. And yes, that last example was a joke, so chill out. If you like what you heard, share this episode with others who you think might also like it. Maybe the person you share it with will want to join this weirdo congregation too. To join this weirdo family yourself, on Facebook, listen to previous messages, even find out how to join me in my daily Bible studies, visit WeirdDarkThis.com slash church. That's WeirdDarkThis.com slash church. You can find the sources I used for this week's message in the show notes. I'm Darren Marlar, thanks for joining me, Weirdos, and until next time, Jesus loves you and so do I. God bless.


hallownay. Everything that everyone has said, Sean that so appreciate your thinking out of the box, your kindness, you just made everyone feel so comfortable to ask even the stupidest of questions. You're gonna really miss here and we all wish you a very happy, successful career next step. Andy. Well, I've already had a opportunity to meet with Sean and express my feelings but I just for the public to know I really have enjoyed working with you. I was very sad when you left the first time when you left the schools. I was glad when you came back. I'm sad that you're leaving now. It is you've been a tremendous support for the finance committee. I don't know how the finance committee is gonna survive without your guidance and organizational skills and the knowledge that you provide but now we will do our best. And I wanna just therefore thank you. Also, I've relied on you for advice on other things that for example, my MMA fiscal policy committee meetings, you've been planting very good ideas that I've used during committee meetings and not giving you credit because I've taken them for myself as the committee member but in any event, thank you and best wishes for success at your new position and getting back to a school system and being able to work in one system that is not multiple towns and is an entire K-12. I can understand why it's a logical decision to make for you is sad for us. Thank you. Pam? I think he'll get bored with that simplicity and he'll come back following on Andy's cycle of events. I would say thank you, Sean, again for the plain language and for putting up with the pushing and pulling of people in the community who I think don't mean to be controversial but they're trying to grapple with something they're trying to understand the issues and they're trying to make their way through complex budgets that they feel so strongly about. So thank you for putting up with us and consider coming back when you get bored. We hope, Pat. Megathon. It's been a privilege to work with you. On so many levels, you're intelligent, you're ethical, you're creative. And more importantly in some ways to me is that you have gracefully done your job and sometimes in conditions that have been abusive or angry or stressful. And I think that takes a toll on everyone in this community. And your loss, it really brings me to tears because you are an incredible young man. Thank you for all the work you've done for us. Thank you, Pat. Anika. Yeah, so I echo all of the appreciation and I personally, I have learned a lot from you. I really appreciate how you have brought perspective and you take all viewpoints into consideration. I think you've broadened the perspective and possibilities for the entire council and what we can do. You set an example of the balanced and best practices and making sure that our entire town is represented. And I also really appreciate how you have brought forward a hope and possibility in ways that we are limited and there does not seem to be a way forward. So thank you for all of that and wish you the best of luck in everything that you do going forward. Thank you. So that was incredibly uncomfortable and I really appreciate what you all said.  So I really appreciate it all, especially emails that you all have sent. I've enjoyed working with all of you in various roles, different committees and everything I wrote about town staff and then the community is, I truly believe you have a great town staff and when I leave there's gonna be two people that are gonna step in and they're gonna keep everything moving forward and they've been serving the town for a long time. So I think the only thing I wanna say is just be proud of all the good work you've done in the last three years. If you look three years ago, I'm only using that because that's my frame of reference for when I started. The town has done a ton of amazing things across the board and all departments and the council is the one who, you approved all those things or set the goals to achieve those things. And sometimes I think we lose sight of all of our accomplishments and everything the town has done. So I would just say, keep that in mind. It doesn't mean we don't need to keep doing more and keep getting better and making improvements. But there has been a lot of good work done and thank you all. And I just wanna note that whenever you need to pick me up we'll be sending you a link to this tape so that you can see what we've all appreciated all these years. Only the last five minutes though, right? That's like. Yeah, right. Thank you, Sean. Thank you all. Have a good night. He's gone. All right, you can come to finance committee meeting and see him tomorrow. All right, we're done with this. No, we're going to be. So the charter requires that in every year ending in four that the charter be reviewed by a committee of residents not including no elect no presently seated elected officials. Okay. And that year is 2024. And so in order to get the ball rolling I spent some time drafting a charge. It is not perfect. I expect there to be lots of comments. I will tell you it was a pleasure to speak with Michael Ward from the Collins Institute who was a consultant to the charter commission. And he asked lots of questions about how things were going and is actually was willingly, willingly shared with me charges from other charter commissions and particularly the work that he's presently doing with Framingham, which is one year ahead of us but has the same requirement every year ending in three. And in fact, in drafting this charge, I drew heavily from it. One of the things I want to point out because I believe this is already a serious misunderstanding in our community, okay? This is a charter review commission committee and that is the name. That's what the charter says. Mass General Law 43B, section 10 is very clear. This review cannot change the composition, the mode of election or the appointment or the term of office of local legislative body, the mayor, the selectman, the city or town manager. So in other words, it cannot change the council, town manager, form of government we have. It cannot change the number of counselors we have and it cannot change the length of our terms. There are some people who believe it could lead to massive changes that would require a brand new charter commission. What this does is create a body who is first and foremost needs to understand the parameters of their job and that's number one under their job. And then after that, engage in extensive public dialogue that leads to finally coming to the council within the year of 2024 unless they ask for an extension. We've had to do that during COVID once and they make a recommendation to us at which point we either accept their recommendations or the council, the city council at that time either accepts the recommendations individually or collectively or whatever. And if there's any other massive changes that have to go to the legislature, then they do. But I wanna be again, very clear. This is to review the existing charter. It is not to create a new one. Okay, so with that, if you have the vote which we did take is refer this to GOL, they will come back to the council and they will come back to the council with a recommendation for changes to this charge. And if you have things you'd like them to think about now or in the future, please let them know. And I just wanna, in our motion. Then can I suggest that if counselors have questions for issues that they want GOL to look at that they send them directly to me and not to the full committee. Thank you. And also what you're sending is not recommendations for changes in the charter, but recommendations about changes to the charge for the charter committee. This, I'm trying to, I know we voted it but we voted it for that it must come back to the town council by October 2nd. Okay, with that, Michelle. Is this only being reviewed for clarity, consistency and actionability or is, so can I just, I just wanna make sure I understand the process. So Lynn, you developed a charge. I sold it, right? And we're, go ahead, sorry. And it's referred to GOL. GOL may have to look at issues regarding this to make it more clear, consistent and actionable. They may also have to look at it and say, we think the committee should do this or that. Lynn, yes. The motion that the council voted in consent was for a substantive review and a review of clarity, consistency and actionability. Perfect. Thank you. Sorry about that then. Thank you very much. Mandy Jo. I'll try to be brief since I sit on GOL. So I'll just talk about some general notes about the charge. I'm concerned that the proposal is that they use, if we even have them appointed by January 1, only 11 months of the required, the charters allowance of a year. The charter also allows the committee to request an extension. So I don't think we should, I think we should aim for a December 31 date for the final report and frankly, fully expect that they'll need an extension. And I don't like in the draft that there's all these interim dates. I think it sets the committee up for failure. So I would go to the charge part and really make it a little more succinct and not put dates in it. The same thing is I feel the charge part is too prescriptive. We should just say how many reports we want and where the feedback should be done and when it should be done. The abbreviation, this is really minor one, but the abbreviation of CRC 2024, I think is awful. I don't think we should abbreviate this committee's name at all. We should just refer to it as the Charter Review Committee. Otherwise, people are gonna be so confused. And then just another brief one is the appointment is suggested to be till December 31st, but I think we should actually leave it as through the presentation of the final report to the town council so that we don't have to reappoint them or go through anything when they ask for an extension of their report. I'll get it all to you, Pat, when I've got a bigger one, which means, Athena, can you send the council the Word document version so we can send and track changes? Thank you. Okay. Kathy. Mandy already covered one of mine, don't abbreviate the name. It was the first thing when I got to the end, I go, oh no. I don't know when GAO considers this, but I thought it was a very useful, Lynn, when you just went quickly through what this review does not include cannot change. So I think when this goes out and people are applying for it, it would be good to just do an addendum or something to it and say, by the way, the review can consider a lot of things, but it can't do the following ABCDs, just so people don't apply for it, thinking they're rewriting the whole larger thing. So however that can artfully be done, I don't have a good suggestion. And I do agree with the comments Mandy just made. Okay. Michelle. I have a question about who's eligible. So would somebody on this current council who is not going to be an elected official, either by vote or by choice, be eligible to apply? It seems like a former counselor would be a good person to have on this committee. So I'm just wondering in terms of the pool of people, would a person that's currently a counselor be able to apply to be on this commission, even if they're holding the elected office during the application process? The answer is if they're not going to serve during the term of the committee, they would be eligible to apply. I think one of the questions that we also have to wrestle with is when are we going to do these interviews and when are we going to come forward with an appointment slate? Okay. So just to follow up our, the end of our term here for these 13 counselors is prior to January. It's the end of our term is the day that the new council is sworn in. Which is January 2nd, right? 2024, yes. So if the term of appointment here is January 1st, would that mean to adjust that? We would adjust that. Okay, thank you. The charter states, Michelle, that the members of the committee shall be voters not holding elective office when appointed. So if the appointments occur before this council's term end, then a counselor wouldn't be eligible. Right. And one option that has been suggested to me from time to time is that this council appoint a certain number of the members and the new council appoint a certain number of the members. Oh, that makes sense. Okay, and would we need to, how would we formalize that such? Well, that's part of what CRC will, I mean, GL, I'm so sorry, what GL will now discuss. Does that make sense, Michelle? Answer your question. Okay, Mandy, Joe. So Michelle brings up a good point. And while I'm quite thankful that Lynn has drafted this and got the conversation started on this, the charter just requires that the town council provide for a review in every year ending before, which I interpret as meaning we need to at least create the committee and appoint the members sometime during 2024. The charter doesn't say the review has to be done by the end of 2024. It has the review being done within one year of the start. And so I think the question is, this council has to debate and deliberate on is should we be appointing any of the committee members at all, or should we just get the charge done and leave it to the next council to do the interviews and the appointments of the members themselves? Very good question. My goal was to get the conversation started. Thank you. All right, so we've already voted on the motion. Is there anything else that people want to talk about on this regard to this one?  I know you'll have a lot to say, but maybe not now. Okay, then we are going to, we've already voted to reschedule our meeting. And we are now on to topics not reasonably anticipated. So on sometime on Friday, the clerk of the council, clerk of the town received a resignation from Ben Harrington and that resignation from the school committee, which also means for any other committees he serves on is effective today. And the Charter's very clear and state law backs it up that we have basically 45 days to appoint his replacement. And this is something the first council had to do when Eric Nakajima decided to take a job elsewhere and the packet in your folder tonight, which we did not place in the folder till this morning, is the packet of all of the material that was generated through that time.  In this particular instance, because it was effective today, therefore, I did draft a proposed timeline, but this proposed timeline is based on the process laid out in this memo. And I hate the feeling of being rushed. I will say that the process in this memo did seem to go well, it's very comprehensive. But it also did mimic to some extent the process we were at that time using when we were appointing ZBA, planning board, et cetera, okay? So, and as you can see from the timeline, which literally begins with his resignation and the effective date, the hope is, and I don't even know for sure that the school committee is going to meet on August 29th, but that I would have a discussion with the school committee about this process. And we would then, even to the point by September 11th, be looking at draft questions with the idea. And this is where it gets really, really tough for all of us that we would be posting this, we would be soliciting the questions, we would get statements of interest back from people, and we would then move to actually interviewing in public the candidates that apply. And the tentative dates that we've set, we don't even know if the school committee is available or whether we have a form of the council. Again, this is a draft proposed timeline. I can't say that enough would be the last week of September because we have to complete this process by October 5th by our count, right? So we were meeting about this at eight o'clock this morning. So if I look a little tired, it's because it's been a long day. So I'd like any thoughts or feedback or questions that people have and a sense of that we're gonna move forward. Pam. What is the length of term for this person given that there are elections coming up anyway to fill this office? Right. The term would begin as soon as they're sworn in after we vote. And the latest we would vote according to this is at the end of September. They would serve until the second of January. I guess we're gonna, all town government will turn over that day. And just to be clear, they cannot be listed on the ballot as an incumbent. That's by state law and also charter. Excuse me, on the income, they just can't be listed. They can't be somebody listed on the ballot for the school board already. A person who is applying, who is going to be on the ballot for the school committee or any other fund can apply, okay? But when the ballot is published, if that person is chosen and they're a candidate based on having turned in their papers and so forth, for the term beginning in January, on the ballot in November, they cannot be listed as an incumbent, even though they will have served for three months as a school committee member. Is that, that's a very critical, important question. Mandy Jo. So a couple of things. The last process we used, I think mimicked sort of our appointment process that we had at the time for planning board and CVA. We've since changed that process slightly. And not enough that I don't think we should be, I don't think we should be changing what we did last time for school committee this time, too much at all. But something like the statement of interest, I think instead of using what we used last time for the guidelines, we should just pull the requirements from our current policy so that it matches completely. And there's no confusion there. We just, we have a whole section on what's required in it. And we should just pull at the length, all of that. I am concerned about the Tuesday, Thursday, September 26, 28 timeline. We have till October 5. It might be worth, we have a council meeting on the second. One thing I don't like about the 26, 28 is splitting up the meetings. I don't think last time we needed to split them up. This time we, maybe we'll have more applicants. I don't know. But the 28th is a scheduled TSO meeting. And I think it's a scheduled TSO meeting from my calculations. And so, I would almost say the 26th, if we can get a quorum of all bodies, I don't know whether the school committee is scheduled to meet the 26th. I have not had. We should figure that out, right? And then, if the 26th, we can't finish, I would say finish up on our scheduled council meeting date the next Monday. And just to mention, that has to be a joint meeting. Yeah, so I would start the joint meeting at 6 p.m., something like that. But we definitely need to talk to the school committee to see what date the 26th or they might need to, if they have a meeting scheduled for then, we might have to go to the 3rd of October for that one. And I would, last time, we only noticed the first meeting for interviews and we actually did the selection at a second meeting according to the bulletin board notice. I don't remember doing it that way, but I would make sure that our bulletin board notice says the first meeting can be both. Right now, the notice we used last year doesn't say that. And the timeline- I just want to clarify. The notice would say that we can also hold the meeting as well as aside. Yes. And if we need to push the meeting to a different day, we could, but plan on the first meeting being both. It's what we do with other things. The draft timeline has Thursday, September 21st, as all statements of interest are due, but it does not indicate when the clerk must determine eligibility by. I think it has to be if we aim for a September 26th meeting, the clerk would have to determine eligibility by Friday, September 22nd, because that's when the meeting would need posted and all of the candidates' names would be listed on the posting. So that's one day, not the three we've used in the past. And so we might want to move the statement of interest deadline a little earlier to give the town clerk's office more time to determine eligibility. I can move it earlier if we hit the- You, the 21 days. Yeah. I was rereading the charter on that and the charter actually says 21 days in advance of the meeting we're going to vote, not 21 days before we close the applicant pool, which is a slight difference from our procedure. So I don't think we have to have it quote, open for 21 days. We do need to list the notice, although I get where you're going from, which is another reason to maybe push the meetings to October 3rd. I'll stop there for other people to comment for now. I would be more than glad to have the clerk of the council also send this in word to people that they want to provide feedback on the timeline. Yeah. There's no, yeah. I will then use the timeline and this model to also and the process that we now use for ZBA and planning board to update this. Okay. Kathy. Mandy hit several of my questions, but one of them is my memory and it could be faulty, but I did set through it last time, is that we both heard from the candidates and voted on the same night. So if you just, so what Mandy mentioned, so you've got it happening at two things. So just figure out, I don't know what the second one is, but the first is the 26. And the reason I'm raising that is unless we get a huge number of people, it feels very burdensome to have people have to come twice, you know, first talk to us and then come, whether it's two days or six days later to watch us vote on them. And so just to have a, you know, one hour, whatever. So that would just be my try to make that clearer so that we actually get some applicants for this. Otherwise it looks like it's a lot of work for us Pam said three months. And then the only final thing is we've all pointed this out that if someone is planning to run for school committee and that they want to apply for this, they understand they still have to run for school committee, you know, just make it really, really clear when we make this statement, this doesn't jump over that. So thanks. Kathy, good points all around. I remember us taking the vote that night, but I could be one. Okay, thank you. Michelle. Thank you. I have a question, a few questions actually. So in the description before I just comment on that, is that something that goes out in the release so that potential candidates receive the description to understand the role? Is that what that? It is. Okay, so I'm wondering given sort of the state of affairs and that it's probable that in the next three months, there would be more commitment. Sorry, Kathy. I know that sort of is oppositional to what you were saying. I agree we want to get people, but it may require more commitment than just the typical meetings. And so I wonder if we want to make that clear. I assume anybody following might have that hunch anyway, but and then the other thing is I see here, new members are expected to attend charting the course. I'm not sure if that workshop is something that's gonna be offered during the time period here that we're talking about and whether it makes sense for them to take that. And then the last comment I have is regarding the questions. I mean, it seems to me that there are a lot of questions here that are they're all really important, but that if it's only a three month gig, I just wonder if all of these questions are needed in order to screen somebody for eligibility and make a decision. Thank you. Thanks. All of those are good points. I think we need to assume first and foremost that anybody who puts themselves forth as a candidate understands the environment that they are stepping, proposing to step into. Second of all, I couldn't agree with you more. When we did this the first time, I think the election had just been that fall and Eric stepped down right after it. So it was like at least nine to 10 months of serving before, so the person had a much more serious ability to jump into the job. And the questions, I think, these are the questions from the previous one. They don't have to be the same questions. We will, I will solicit questions from each of you individually and compile them and we'll have a discussion about that at the meeting on the 11th, if not the 18th. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, yes, Anika. So excuse me, I think Kathy may have answered this question and I did not hear. Does anyone remember approximately how many applicants there were last time? It was my recollection was four. It's in the document, but it's also in the agenda. Thanks. Yes. Okay. Mandy, Joe, you have your end up. Yeah. Part of this timeline says that tonight we're gonna authorize you to modify and publish the notice of vacancy. Is that something we need to do tonight because we don't have a draft notice of vacancy at all and we don't have draft dates and we haven't done anything. But I understand the need to potentially do that if the goal is to publish on August 30th to ensure that the notice of vacancy is up 21 days before statements of interest are due. So what's the thoughts on that? I mean, and I discussed this earlier today. We talked about that this morning. The council didn't vote in 2020 when it went through this process to authorize the president to publish the notice of vacancy. I don't think we need to do it this time. We don't typically authorize the president to publish any notices. We just do them because they're required. So I don't see that as a requirement. I think it would be good to list the timeline and the notice of vacancy on the next agenda so that the council can look at it again before it's published like you do in CRC. You share that with the committee. There's no way to wait until the 11th. Oh, the deadline's before the 11th. Then I think we just need to figure out the dates and publish it. I don't think we need to authorize the president to do it because you don't have published it anyhow. Let me just say I've already drafted one and it has a huge number of blank dates, but it's almost identical to the one that's in your packet. I just, there's no sense bringing it forward until we had this first discussion. And it does have one other significant change which we didn't happen to realize when we did this the first time. The last one cited the wrong law. It cited the law according to Select Board because we built this upon the Select Board's policy and in the- The reference to MGL. The reference to the state law. We've already caught, I think it was already caught. And the reference to the voting requirements is incorrect too. I spoke with Lauren this morning and she confirmed that it's going to be a majority of the town council and the remaining members of the school committee present and voting. So I think what was in the memo from 2020 was incorrect and that was a carryover from what was copied from the Select Board process when it was Erin Nakajima. One of the other things is that the school committee has a requirement that they meet in person. But I believe they also allow virtual participation. But for this meeting, the council rules will apply for the joint meetings with them. So that if somebody has to be in Seattle, they can still participate remotely. Unless the school committee has a separate remote participation policy. I thought they voted to go back and maybe they allow remote. I don't know. I'll find out. Let me just say because this happened over this particular weekend and the availability of various people, I could only get it as far as I got it. The third answer is we'll publish the notice before the time line. So I don't think we'll have anything to take a vote on. Just to be very clear, the notice that I've- I used exactly what we have here. So if there's things in here you feel should be changed, let me know. There are. So I feel like I have some questions about some and that I'll make some comments on it. I think we also need to pull this council before you publish that about whether the council, counselors can make the dates that are being proposed. But I'll make my comments on the notice that was used last time in the third paragraph. Can you read? Which is the one of these pages are not numb. It's page eight of the memo from three years ago. It uses the phrase, if selected individual, if the selected individual also wishes to be on the November 2nd ballot for a two-year term, they must follow the same process as any other candidate. I don't know how relevant that is or it needs reworded because the statement of interest is due about the same date that you have to turn in papers to be on the ballot. So it's not a selected candidate needs to follow the rules. It's a potential candidate or something because papers need to be filed about, before we're doing interviews papers have to be filed. So I think we need to modify some of that. The next paragraph again, is talks about serving on JCPC and budget coordinating groups since this is only basically a three-month term. I would just eliminate that thing completely because I don't think it'll apply versus last time it was a 15, 21-month term we were appointing for. JCPC, yes. We call the meeting where we do the fiscal interview, a JCI, budget coordinating meeting. Yeah, but there's particular members appointed to the BCG. So I mean, you can leave it in, but think about that one. The next paragraph says candidates must be physically present at the meeting in the town room in order to be considered. It's actually kind of an awkward requirement because we published that notice before COVID hit and then we had a fully virtual meeting, but right now we're in hybrid. So I think we need to think carefully whether we would require candidates to be here or whether candidates could attend virtually, just like committee members, counselors. I personally believe they should be allowed both options. So, but again, something in the one I'm looking at that needs looked at closely. And then just some minor things about days based on the timeline you presented. Okay. Alicia. Thank you, Lynn. I was just wondering if Athena could clarify what she meant when she said majority of the members present in voting and if that would apply to like overall people in the meeting jointly between the two committees or is that separately? Thank you for the question, Athena. It's a majority of the members of the town council and the remaining members of the school committee together. So it's the collective body. So there's 13 of us and presumably four of them. That means it could be as many as 17 people. And therefore the majority of 17 would be nine. That's just an example. Does that answer your question, Alicia? Yes. Is that the way that it was done last time as well? I'm sorry, I didn't. Yes. The memo that was included was incorrect, but I don't think it was done that way. I mean, it was... I think last time we did a poll and then a motion after a poll. Right. I remember asking the people from the school committee if they wanted to speak first because this was going to be their colleague and then counselors weighed in. So, yeah. Jennifer. I thought last time it had to be a majority of the council and a majority of the school board. If it was, it didn't... And the way the vote went, I don't think it mattered. I don't think so. I think we just counted the votes. I, Jennifer. We had the people... And I will say, I just want to mention, Athena has as recently as today checked with our legal counsel. And this is the read she got from our legal counsel for this time. Oh, it was done last time? It was specifically, it had to be a majority of each one, of each body. I don't remember. And the PDF. The charter, the memo that was included in the packet in 2020 was incorrect because it says abstentions and absences don't count. We can't hear you. The memo, the reference in the memo is incorrect from 2020 because it says that absences and abstentions don't count. The charter says roll call vote of the town council and remaining members of the board, committee or authority. Lauren's interpretation of the charter and the general law section doesn't speak to the number of votes required, but that it would be a majority vote of the town council and the remaining members of the school committee. So that if the council outvoted the school committee, that's just... It's a very unbalanced meeting. Which is one of the reasons why with the chair of the school committee, we agreed that I would ask for the opinions or comments from the school committee first because we were trying to give some recognition of the imbalance, but you're correct. The town council could outvote the school committee. There's no way around that. I'd have to do the math, Jennifer, to go back and check how many votes each one got and so on from 2020. But I believe the winning candidate had a... It was 10 votes and then the next highest was six, but the vote isn't broken down between school committee and councilors. So I'd have to, I just have to go back and do the math. The ultimate vote to elect was 16 to zero with one of those 10. My notes say that the winning candidate had three of the four school committee members and seven of the voting councilors. Thank you. Right, because I think they had to have a majority of each body, that's how they got the three. No, that's not what Lauren said. We definitely didn't, it was as is written here that we knew it had to add up to nine, you know, if we were all there, so whatever the source of the nine was, yeah. The legal reference that was in the memo in 2020 refers specifically to cities and the vote quantum is slightly different in that section of the law. So our charter governs this process for Amherst, the, that particular MGL reference outlines a different process for a select board, different timeline and everything. Alicia, I'm gonna skip to Anna, since she's not had a chance to ask any questions and then come back to you. It was actually just a quick comment on that, is that process that we just discussed and debated or tried to figure out kind of a call back to an earlier conversation, is that something that a Charter Review Commission might suggest changes on in the future? Would that be within the realm of? I think the way our charter is written is consistent with state law. So I'm, I don't know, but that certainly can be advanced to the Charter Review Commission Committee. Alicia. Thank you, my question is very similar to Anna's because I read the memo and so I'm slightly confused. And so it doesn't explicitly state in our charter that it needs to be this way or is there the ability to interpret it differently? When you say needs to be this way. Like does it explicitly say it needs to be a majority of only all or both committees combined or is that up for interpretation in terms of meaning that we could decide to do it by majority of the council and majority of the school committee? Athena. When our legal council and I spoke this morning, we reviewed relevant sections of the charter, including other sections that refer to the full council, sections of general law that referred to the cities that were cited in the previous memo and the section of the law that applies specifically to vacancies on school committee in cities. And she and I agreed that the reading of the charter that would be the most sound is that the number of votes that is required would be a majority of the two bodies, the remaining members of the school committee and the town council. I would strongly advise against trying to interpret the charter in a different way from what our legal council has advised us. Are there other questions, comments? Clearly there's a lot to follow up on this and I'll be doing that in the next couple of days. Okay. We do have a few more agenda items. I'm sorry. We have no appointments and so we're going to go on to committee and liaison reports, CRC, Mandy Jo. I don't think there's anything to report since our last meeting. Okay. Elementary school building committee, Kathy. Were you? We have a meeting this Friday. We had to reschedule it because we didn't have a quorum and the recent resignations actually affect our committee a lot, but anyway, we're at the point after we hear some design updates, we will be getting another round of cost estimates. It's part of this design detail. And so when we meet in September, at the end of September, we expect to have those if, unless we hit a snap of this Friday. Okay. And obviously one of those positions is superintendent. The other one is? Ben. Ben and so that will be filled by somebody of equal knowledge. And I, you know, Paul can, I don't know whether Ben can still come. He said he's there as a school committee slot technically you know, so, you know, I leave that to the town manager and you did it. Yes. So just Paul has to see it, but I've counted up and it looks like we have a quorum regardless of what I think the total is. Okay. Good. Finance committee, Andy. Finance committee meets tomorrow at 3.30 and the agenda is one less item than I'd reported at the last meeting, but we are going to review the last budget process and how it worked and make recommendations for the next budget process, which we wanted to do when Sean was still available because he was such an integral part of the budget process. Sean as report, as he reported, is going to give us some more detailed report on where the budget stands now with changes, including changes in appropriations estimates, which we now know are final numbers. So he's going to make that report. And then we principally will be discussing two referrals made at the last meeting, the policy on street lighting and the portions or the specific referral that was made regarding the rental registration. So that's principally what the agenda is with the usual additional things like public comment. Paul. And I really urge finance committee members to bring your calendars because we're going to have to schedule some other meetings in September. GOL, Pat. GOL hasn't met since our last report to the council, but we'll be meeting Wednesday, August 30th at 9.30. Jones Library Building Committee at Nico and Paul. Jones Library hasn't met for a while. I know the staff, the planning department and inspection services and fire met with the architects and their consultants today, which is a normal process that we do in terms of going through their project to make sure they understand where all the decision points are. It moves forward. Do you have anything to add to that? No, I did not. Thank you, Paul. Okay, TSO, Anika. Similar story. We have not met. Our next meeting will be August 31st at 7 p.m. AHA, Michelle? Well, clearly our report did not happen tonight. So I think it was supposed to be tonight. So I just have to speak with you, Lynn, to decide what is best, either the 11th or the 18th, depending on load for the agenda. Yeah. Okay. Any liaison reports? Dorothy? CSSJC would like to have its vacancies filled so it could have a quorum. Thank you. Okay, Jennifer? Yeah, I'm sorry. I wasn't able to be at the last Portable Housing Trust meeting, but they did vote that they will be appropriating some of their funds to the Ball Lane development. Okay, thank you. Any other committee reports? We've approved the minutes. The town managers report, Paul. Thanks, Lynn. So to answer Dorothy's comment, we are scheduled to be interviewed. I am scheduled to be interviewing with the chairs of both the CSSJC and HRC for membership, I think next week, are trying to get to the August 30th or 31st TSO committee meeting if we can accomplish that. And along the same lines, a question came earlier about the HRC bylaw. The HR Human Rights Commission has come up with recommended changes to its bylaw. The DEI director had and took it through her sort of legal lens and had some additional changes or different changes. So I've asked her to sort of chart those two different versions out on a chart that we can then present to the council for consideration for changes to the Human Rights Commission bylaw. After we looked through it with our town attorney, you were invited to a groundbreaking at the Centennial Water Treatment Facility that's been canceled. It's gonna be raining. It's a messy construction site and it's just wasn't gonna work out. So, and also both of our state representative wasn't going to be able to attend. It was a question of whether our state senator was gonna be able to make it back from Boston. So we are just canceling that at this point and we'll come up to present to the council at some point. It's an active construction site. Along the same lines, East Gables, which is the single room occupancy project at 132 North Hampton Road has their ribbon cutting on September 22nd, I believe at 1 p.m. The bid block party is on September 21st. That's right, I think we have these dates, right? Right on these dates. You're okay? Okay, let's see. The town common construction is now scheduled to begin on September 11th. You will see activity the week before as the town staff go in and remove some of the pertinent things that we own like the parking kiosks and the benches and other things that are there. Then the contractor will come in to coordinate off the area that they will be working. They'll use, so that means the parking lot will be out of commission effective September 11th. At least that's the schedule that we heard this morning. So that will impact a lot of things. And we're working through a lot of the different things that happen on the town common, including flag raisings and other events and we'll be making it in a merry maple, everything. We'll be working on different locations for all of those things. We put out a bid for additional roads for road paving and we have not seen those bids come back in yet, but there are about, I don't know, maybe a dozen roads that are listed in the town manager report that are up for being paved. They also put in extensive, there's some articles about dams given all the rain and I just want to give you a sort of a synopsis of what's already on our website about where we are with dams, including the four, that the water department's dams and then the one at Puffer's pond, which also is adjacent to a dyke. So again, we're losing Sean Mingano at the end of this week, very big shoes to fill. And I think he's gonna be a great loss. He's just taken on so many different things but you all had a lot of nice things to say for him which he hates, so thank you for doing that. And the last thing is the police chief search. So I went to start putting some dates down for folks as since that is now confirmed, we didn't want to do any of the outreach until after Labor Day, given that a lot of people are out during the academic year, during the summer. So on September, we have contracted with a consulting firm, GovHR, who specializes in this, they will have two consultants who will be in town on September 11th and 12th, and they will be meeting with lots of different constituent groups. They'll have two public forums that are be open to the public. They will be working with them to schedule target areas they wanna meet with young people and have a basically bring pizza and try to encourage young people. They really wanna hear from young people in just different groups on those two days. They will also be meeting with police officers and with department heads and different people in the community. Then on the following week, September 17th and 18th, I think it was the 18th and 19th, 18th and 19th, they will be scheduling one-on-one interviews for everyone on, if you're one too, you don't have to, everyone at the town council, everyone on the CSSJC, everyone on the Human Rights Commission, former members of the human rights of the CSSJC, we're gonna try and include as many people as possible in those one-on-one sessions. We think those are really important opportunities for people to say what they really want the consultants to hear. After that, the consultants will take that information, digest it, help us put together a profile or the new chief, then we will start the recruitment effort for that chief. I also need to be putting together basically a search committee. And we'll be putting out a request for people to apply to be on that search committee. And that's a requirement of the charter as well. So, and I want that committee to have some designated members, but also members of the public. So that will be open. And so we'll be working on that this week as well. There's a lot of, just so you know, our human resource department has been really, they're fully staffed now, which is good news, but they've really had a lot going on lately. So we're still plowing through all this, but we'll get it done within the next week or so. So, if there are questions on that, I think that's the big news item for us tonight. Oh, no. Oh, is that my, sorry. Is that my name? Beefy report. Dang, this was, it was great. I needed like chapters and stuff. Couple of questions, one, two, three, five questions. Okay. The report references a presentation from fellows and sustainability. Can you give us a little more information? It doesn't need to be right now, but it's that they gave their final presentation, the sustainability fellows, and I'm just curious what that was about and if they had recommendations or thoughts. Sure. So it was a presentation they made verbally to, I think they did, they did actually both did a PowerPoint so I can get those slides and share them for you. We just had staff come in and they did a presentation, but yeah, I can get that. Just mostly curious. So, okay, I've raised this question before and I'm almost hesitant to do it again because I know how tight these funds are, but I'd really like to know what consideration is given to modes of transportation when repaving existing roads. So we got in this beautiful list of roads that we're trying to get through all of them, but things like a painted shoulder or painted bike lane at least, it might be who of us to know rough cost estimates or feasibility considerations for that. I'd like to believe that it's less expensive to do that as we repave. I know that I'm sure Guilford would explain to me 17 reasons why I'm incorrect on that, but I know that we have a lot of requests come in through or maybe not a lot, but we have requests come in through JCPC or resident requests for bike lanes and sidewalks. Can we get a better understanding of what it would take to do that when we repave versus standalone projects? So we are scheduled to have a meeting in September at TSO where our kind of engineer will come in and talk about roads update. It's basically the same presentation we did last year, which I think a lot of counselors found valuable, but it gives you, there's a lot of discussions of roads since then, gives you the opportunity to talk to the county engineer directly into Guilford. So I did ask the question at that presentation last year. And so it'd be really great to get even just the like a list of considerations. I know that costs vary widely, but it'd be really helpful if that could be part of that presentation, knowing that it's coming. Can I ask the date of that TSO meeting? I don't think we've said it yet because we have two different groups coming in. We have trees coming in, the tree warden coming in and the roads and we haven't scheduled them yet, but there's two meetings in September that and we'll advertise that in advance to you. Thank you. Last, last two questions. It was only four, I cut one out. So the targeted outreach to specific community members, that I'm down to the police search, police captain search, chief search. That included staff and our staff are absolutely part of our community. I agree with that. And how will we ensure it's not just staff and then key staff are also listed in the one-on-one meetings. And so how are you ensuring balance in that? I'm open to whoever you think that they should be meeting with. We're just sort of pulling that together. So if you have suggestions of groups or individuals who really, you really like them to talk about, please send them. Yeah, I will. And then the last thing is you had said that you're hoping for as many opportunities for all of us, I believe, to meet one-on-one. Is that what you were saying with that? Okay. And so we'll be able to reach out and schedule those as needed. So yeah, so we'll reach out to you. It's the two days. It's the 18th and 19th. And so we'll have sort of, is that right? So during the course of the day, there'll be like 20-minute time slots or 15, whatever they do. Yeah, sure. And sort of like we'll ask you to sign up. It is the 18th and 19th. I think I got all of them in under my time with answers. So thanks. Thanks, Shalini. Do you have a sense of when we're gonna get the Donahue report for the Cres, Cresworth, they were gonna do it because some residents have been asking about that. And... I don't, but I'll find out. And the second one is, of course, the RFI, has that been sent for the waste hauler? Could you please speak to the mic so we can sure. Has the RFI... So I talked with Gilbert about that this morning because I knew that was coming up. And it has not gone from his desk to procurement, but he, I asked him to get that done today. I can confirm that it got done today or not. So it has not gone out. It has not gotten out for sure. Okay. Anything else, Shalini? Okay. Dorothy? Two quick comments. The first one is thank you so much for the rectangular rapid flashing beacon, or RF... I can't even actually do it. RRFB, that's gonna be at Amity and Lincoln to make that crosswalk safer because it does present a real problem. And I hope that it'll work. Obviously there's some tree pruning that will have to be done because one of the signs is nearly blocked with a tree. So that is gonna be something that the community will feel very happy because they've been asking for more safety crossing the street for a long time. The second one is on page five. And the answer may be something very simple and I may be just being totally stupid, but it says town staff are currently making adjustments to the configuration. In the near future, the town will be adding another downtown park and play area. So this is talking about, oh, you're not adding it down. You're saying you're adding Wi-Fi to another downtown play area park. Yes, okay. So, yes, grammatically, I read the sentence wrong. Okay, there is no new park. That's a surprise, but Wi-Fi will be available at yet another park. Well, that's good too. So I'll follow the one quick question. How about the public restroom at Kendrick Park? Sure. So we have brought in a part time limited capital projects person who's gonna help us move these projects forward. And that's one of the top projects on his list. And he's really a terrific person and wrote people are excited because he's actually gonna take these projects and move them to bid and then construction. So I don't have a timeframe for it, but it's ARPA money that we need to spend. Good. Thank you so much. Jennifer. I was surprised to see North Hadley Road. Little North Hadley Road is being repaved. And I was just wondering, part of the reason it has to be repaved because of the construction of Fieldstone? No, it was in bad condition before then. So it was an, it's actually gonna give us an opportunity to look at parking on that street as well. We might want to monetize some of the parking spaces on that street to get some of the revenue from people who might be willing to pay to be in proximity to the university. Okay, because I was gonna suggest maybe the university reimbursed for paving that street, but needed it before. Okay. Anika. Thank you. I had a question for the police chief search. Excuse me if this has been said before, my volume went out a bit. Was there a representation or is there a rather representation from UMass Amherst College and Hampshire College on the list? We will for sure have UMass and I have not thought about probably from Amherst College and not have thought about Hampshire, but we probably should include the, we might try to have one meeting with all the power institutes of higher education actually. So. Thank you. Mandy Jo. Yeah, a couple of meetings ago, I asked about the RFP for design guidelines and you said you'd get back to us on whether it was sent out and what the status of it is. It was funded like two and a half fiscal years ago. I don't know the answer. I'll have to stress on that.  I'll put it down. Thank you. All right. There is a very slim president's report. Are there any questions about it? Tatti. I don't have a question about the report, Lynn, but I do have a question about upcoming agendas. One of the items that was going to be on tonight. So just tell me when I should be asking that. We're going to move to that right now. Future agenda items. Okay, Kathy. We had, we Kathy and then a few others chimed in asked for a briefing on where we are with the library project. You had crafted questions and asked us from others. I know you were originally going to try to do it tonight and you said couldn't do it. So just an estimate on when you think that might happen. We're shooting for the 18th. Thank you. Okay. Sean's departure has kind of thrown a few things off. Okay. Any other councilor comments? Seeing none. Then I'm adjourning the meeting at 1029. Thank you.