Yep. I just hit a go live. So we are all set. Okay. Good morning, everyone. We'll start with a roll call. Good morning. I'm here. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning. Present. Great. And good morning. Early morning. Commissioner. How are you? Good morning. I'm here. Good morning. For about an hour, hour and a half until the conference day starts here in Washington. Right. Well, I'm glad that you made it. I hadn't heard how delayed your flight ended up being, but it's good to see you that you got there and all set. So good morning. We're going to get started today is. April 28th, 2022. It is just after 10 a.m. And it's public meeting number 378. December 2nd. Certainly madam chair. There are two sets of minutes in the packet December 2nd of 21 and January 27th of 22. I would move. We approve the minutes from December 2nd, 2021 subject. Any necessary changes for typographical errors or other non-material matters. Second. Any. Addits or. Questions concerns. I'm all set to commissioner. Commissioner Hill. Hi. Commissioner Skinner. I'm going to abstain, please. Okay. And I'm a yes. So three yeses and one abstention. Thank you. And moving on to January 27th, 2022. I likewise move we approve those minutes again. Subject to any necessary changes for typographical errors or other non-material matters. Second. Thank you. Any. Addits. Concerns. I'll set. Commissioner O'Brien. Hi. Richard Hill. Hi. Richard Skinner. I'm staying. And I vote yes. So three yeses and one abstention. Thank you. And again, thank you to legal and commissioner O'Brien for. For getting those guns so well. Moving on then to our administrative update. Good morning. Karen, how are you? Good morning. Good morning, madam chair. Members of the commission for the administrative update. I'm going to turn it over to Bruce fans or assistant director of the IEB to give you a site casino update. Yes. Good morning, commissioners. Today our updates rat rather quickly. I'll start with a MGM. Starting this week. MGM opened up the. Costa bar and pizza counter. They. Fridays. They're starting the free music Fridays. In June. Tap out. Outdoor patio. We'll open up May 1st. And the hotel pool will be opening May. May 8th, even though that might be a little chilly. And I'd also like to congratulate on core for their five star rating. And anybody have any questions or. Or anything. Five star rating by whom? By which group? I believe it was. Forks. Forks or fortune. I think it was for. Thank you. And it's the hotel and casino. With a category. Can you remind us please? Yeah. It was for the hotel. And I believe the operations as well. Excellent. Really forward. I'm sure they'll cover that for us in their quarterly report next month. Yes. Yes. Congratulations to them. Any further questions for Bruce. Mr. Skinner. Mr. Hill. Also. Okay. That includes item number three. Okay. Thanks. Thanks. Then we'll move right on to. I need me, director. Lillios. Looking forward to your two reports today. Good morning, madam chair. Good morning, commissioners. I'm going to. For a item for a on the status of poker. I'm going to turn it right over to Bruce and in his team. Yes. To do the presentation today. I'm having a stroke. My compliance manager. Andrew Steffen, who is. The director. I'm going to turn it right over to Bruce. I'm going to turn it right over to Bruce and in his team. Yes. To do the presentation today. I'm having a stroke. I'm going to turn it right over to Bruce and in his team. Andrew Steffen, who is. In charge of operations at MGM. And Louis. Was on a, who's in charge of operations. At. On court. Present. The poker presentation because they're actually right there on site where we operate these things. I'll answer any questions that you have as well, but let's continue with the presentation here. Thank you. Thanks for joining me. My pleasure to see you all again. As Bruce said, just a quick reintroduction. My name is Andrew Stephan, one of the senior agents. And today along with fellow senior agent, Louis, and compliance manager, still carpenter, we would like to give a brief presentation on the status of poker within the Commonwealth. Specifically detailing on some information such as pre and post pandemic numbers, how a poker room actually makes money. And also how other nearby Northeast gaming jurisdictions are to all that information I'll quickly turn it over to Sterl who will help to find some poker terms you may see popping up throughout our presentation. Sterl, you're so muted. Sorry about that. So for our poker terms, rake is the scaled commission fee taken by a card room operating a poker game. It is generally 2.5 to 10 percent of the pot in each poker hand up to a predetermined maximum amount. Bad beat means a high-ranking poker hand that is beat by a higher ranking can. The bad beat jackpot is paid out when a minimum predetermined hand is beaten by a higher hand. A high hand is the best hand in any round of poker. Some casinos pay jackpots for hourly high hands meaning that the person who makes the best overall hand that hour wins the jackpot. And finally, a promotional fund or a reserve fund. This is a pool of money set aside for poker rooms to offer events and bad beat jackpots to the players playing there. Events like high hands are usually scheduled and bad beat jackpots when offered are valid when a pot reaches a certain predetermined amount of money. You will be seeing these be presented by Andrew and Lewis in the coming slides. Thank you, Sterl. As you all may remember, the casinos tentatively closed their doors on March 14th, 2020. However, prior to that date, the numbers you see before you are how each of the two licensees handled their poker rooms to start. I'll let Lewis touch on Angkor. Good morning, commissioners. Prior to closure, Angkor operated poker 24 hours a day, seven days a week with 74 poker tables. And to further add in respect to the poker term still previously presented, Angkor held 10% of the pot up to $6 and collected $1 to $2 per hand for the promotional fund. During operating hours when not running a high hand promotion, Angkor collected $1 per hand. And during promotional hours, Angkor collected $2 per hand. 75% of the collection went to the high hand promotion and 25% went to the bad beat. And slightly different from Angkor, MGM ran a smaller poker room with about 50 fewer tables. The rake and reserve fund information still defined earlier for you as well. And similar to Angkor, MGM also ran their poker room at 24 hours a day. Moving on to the reopening of the poker rooms now, MGM was the first to reopen in Massachusetts on Friday, October 29th, 2021. They initially opened their poker room with 13 tables and soon thereafter in February and it added one more table, bringing them to their current of 14 poker tables. MGM also slightly changed their rake and reserve fund. The only major change other than the number of tables is the current hours of operation with MGM running daily 11am to 3am. Angkor made the decision to reopen poker operations on Monday, January 31st with 12 poker tables and just recently added their 13th table on April 11th. Angkor made the decision to reopen poker Monday through Thursday, 10am to 8pm and changed the rake collection to 10% of the pot up to $10. And also Angkor no longer charges a $1 to $2 for the promo fund but players are still eligible to win the bad beat and high hand promotion. Thanks, Salos. We'll now go through a few slides showing some before and after pictures of the poker rooms. First for MGM, the biggest change in my eyes is the placement and amount of slot machines in the poker room. As you can see from these pre-pandemic photos, the poker was full of tables with a check in near the front of the room and as we moved to the reopening of the casinos, but prior to the poker room itself reopening MGM had removed all of their poker tables and it placed up to 92 slot machines throughout the room. Currently, even with 14 poker tables returning there are still 33 slot machines in their poker room. Angkor? So this slide displays a couple pictures of what the poker area looked like prior to the casino closure. These photos display the perimeter of the poker area that included 74 poker tables. Currently, these two specific photos now consist of slot machines. So now the poker location, it hasn't changed since initially opening in 2019 but as I previously mentioned the number of tables changed from 74 to 13. When the commission permitted the licensees to reopen casino operations in July of 2020, Angkor did not reopen poker but changed their business model several times and added a combination of gaming options which included blackjack, electronic cable games, slot machines, video poker, and a designated area for marketing to distribute complimentary gifts. During the last two years Angkor's business model continued to change and now the poker location consists of 12 poker tables, approximately 200 slot machines and a designated marketing area to distribute those complimentary gifts. Just some additional information on the poker rooms in Massachusetts, Angkor allows their poker players to earn $1 in comp points per hour while MGM Springfield allows their poker players to earn $2 in food credit per hour. Lastly, drinks are comped at both properties which should be noted that not all casinos offer free drinks to their poker players. From here we'll move on to how the poker rooms actually make money. How a poker room makes money? Poker earns money by taking a rig, a percentage of money from each pot. The amount a poker table makes is dependent on the number of hands dealt and the amount of each pot. High limit poker tables sometime use a timed method to charge their patrons a rig. An example of this would be at the end of a hand the patron wins a pot of $80. Of this, $8 goes into the rig drop box to the right of the dealer. The patron receives $72 of the total $80 for that hand. Let's move on to jurisdictions. And let's visit our neighbors to the north. So poker outside the Commonwealth. In New Hampshire, there are 10 poker rooms below the four largest. They are listed in size from highest to lowest. The Manchester poker room offers 30 tables. The Boston Billiards Club offers 20 tables. The brook has 18 tables and chasers has 15. They all offer the promotional fund with $2 except for the ones highlighted in red. The Manchester and the brook do not take these. Finally, these three of four also have either a draft king's sportsbook or advertised placing your sports wagers there. Let's move to our south, shall we? So the Mohegan Sun offers 23 tables. Foxwoods offers 35. The Sunday through Thursday hours at both places are very similar with Foxwoods being from 9 a.m. to 1 and Mohegan 10 to 2. Fridays and Saturday hours are extended. Mohegan has 10 to 4 a.m. while Foxwoods has 9 to 4 a.m. So where they differ is a rake. So they both keep a maximum of $5 and they both have a percentage of 10% from the pot. But where Foxwoods differ is on different games they vary the percentage but still only take the maximum of $5. They both offer sports wagering and Foxwoods also offers a promotional jackpot. When sports wagering became an effect in Connecticut, the Mohegan Sun partnership with Fandall while Foxwoods partnered with Draft Games. Both tribes offer free drinks and cups to their patrons. Now let's move to just to our south. So Rhode Island has 23 poker tables. Currently, Twin River doesn't have any of their poker rooms open and they presented to us that they received complaints about their poker room not being open frequently. New Jersey further south has five poker rooms. Two are currently closed. The largest being Bargada has 52 tables. They take a break of 10% up to $4. Further south is Maryland. We highlight live and National Harbor being their two largest. Live opens 30 poker tables while National Harbor opens 37. 10% is the rake and up to $5. And they both have a $2 drop for promos. They offer their patrons a dollar for a comp on a tiered while live while National Harbor offers $2. Let's turn it back over to Andrew. Thanks, Joe. The last item loose and I would like to touch on is the patron comments of complaints that the IAB received prior to and after the poker rooms reopening. Since the casinos closed in March 2020, the gaming agents at MGM received and responded to approximately 60 comments and complaints regarding MGM reopening their poker room. As a poker reopening last October at MGM, there have been no further comments or complaints. Close. And in respect to the patron comments related to Encore, IAB received approximately 160 comments and complaints. And these comments and complaints are all related to the number of poker tables, hours and days of operations and the change of rake and out. So here we have some numbers pre and post pandemic. So as you can see in the first two columns, we displayed the pre pandemic numbers for Encore in the post pandemic. Blue is table games and poker is gold. So before March 14, 2020, the Encore casino had 167 table games. And now at this time of January 31, 2022, they had 184. Prior in March, they had 72 poker tables and then post pandemic on January 31, 2022, they had 12. As Lewis stated earlier, they have now opened 13 in operation at Encore. Similarly at MGM, their numbers on table games went from 79 to 52. They went down and their poker room also went down starting at 22. Post pandemic numbers are now 13. They have now opened an additional one since October 29, 2021 to bring their total to 14 table games offered at MGM. Numbers on the slot machines have also dropped. So March 14, 2020, Encore had 2804. And now on January 31, 2022, they dropped to 2715. A similar drop at MGM from 1844 to 1582. These results are increased in spacing on the casino floor for social distancing. And the licensees at this time are not thinking of changing, keeping the distance in case measures had to return to again, pandemic levels. Their stadium games at Encore went from 40 to 54. And at Springfield, they went from 24 to 15. Does anybody have any questions? So this is such a great presentation. I hope it will be helpful for us to ask questions if you could. Sure. One more announcement that I received during the presentation is that Encore will be moving to 16 poker tables in the near future. Very timely. Yeah. I feel like someone's watching. Excellent. Thank you. And thank you so much, Andrew and Cheryl, for the presentation. It was very clear. I want to give commission, yes. Yes, I see Perk blotting. And the same for me. I want to give the commissioners an opportunity to ask questions. Commissioner Skinner, Commissioner Hill, why don't I start with either of you? No questions for me, Chair. Thank you. Okay. Great. Commissioner Hill. Well, first of all, I can't believe that those who presented knew that Lady Gaga even existed. And that was a nice ending to the presentation. I don't have any questions. I'll just have a statement to make that I'm a little disappointed in the numbers that I've seen going from 74 to 13. You know, I had hoped that that number maybe would have gone up by now. And I understand that the profit margins that these companies have, and I also understand with COVID some of the changes they've made, but that is a considerable drop. And quite frankly, out of all the phone calls that I get or the majority, it's about the poker rooms and the lack of poker tables throughout the whole of the two companies. I don't know as the commission, you know, what we can do or can't do in that regard, except to say I wish there were more. I understand, you know, by having slot machines, you're making a lot more money. And I appreciate that. But, you know, one of the things that I remember when we passed the gaming bill was that we were now going to be having these poker rooms right in our backyard. And a lot of people love to play this game. And they're very disappointed, you know, that we only have, if I'm doing this right, 27 tables throughout the entire Commonwealth. So it's a statement more than a question. And I just don't know what as a commission we can do to see that number rise, which I would like to see. But just disappointed is all I can say at this point. I could just follow up with Commissioner Hill's question. Todd, I think we asked that earlier after the opening when we saw that there was some really pause on even table games opening up and not the same, the same number, particularly in Springfield. And then of course, both there was priority. We looked at whether or not it was anything with respect to the original application. I don't know if you want to comment on that on now. And then I want to first go to Commissioner Brown and they can reset back to Mr. Stinner. Sure. Thank you, Madam Chair and commissioners. Good morning. A little while back, we did look at that specific issue. It was tied to the representations made by the then applicant and their RFA2 application as to what their gaming operation would look like, which of course included poker. And they did make some statements relative to poker that the commission took a look at. And ultimately, you'll recall, there's a provision in Chapter 23K that requires essentially compliance with all representations made in the RFA2 application. So that is certainly one way that the commission has approached this issue in the past and could take another look at it, of course, in the coming weeks or months as well. But that's the way that it was approached in the past. Maybe it would be helpful, Todd, for us to receive the actual language. And you may have provided that earlier. I don't want to put you on the spot today. But to get the language, Commissioner Hill, from the original applications, the inquiry, and then their responses, that would probably be helpful. Sure. Okay. And Brad, I can come back to you as you think about the issues. Commissioner O'Brien? A couple of comments and one question. Starting with the question, and maybe I missed it, but the New Hampshire rooms, are they comping drinks? No. They're not comping drinks. So none of them. And then I just, I want to echo somewhat what Commissioner Hill just said in terms of the numbers. Because even when you convert those to percentages, it's MG, I'm not quite as starkly, or about 67% of their prior capacity. Encore markedly dropped. I mean, you're going about 18% of their opening capacity. And even with adding those few that came in during the meeting, you're at about 21%, that's a marked drop from the representations made in the application and opening. And I haven't been able to see the new room, but I have to say the photos of the pre and post for Encore, that's a completely different feel to that space.  They are supposed to be resort destination casinos that offer a number of amenities, poker being one of them. And one of the most striking things to me, above and beyond the numbers at Encore is it only goes till eight o'clock at night, which is odd to me. Given that you would think a number of people will want to go out at night and potentially be able to do this. And shutting everything down by 8 p.m. to me, I really don't understand the rationale for that. Would love to hear a rationale. I understand this. The first time I've heard some of the spacing and the drop in some of the numbers on the slots and the tables have to do with maintaining social distancing just in case. I appreciate that. That was news to me. So I appreciate getting that information today. But I wonder if any of you got any sort of rationale as to why, during what you would think would be prime client hours, they don't have poker. I believe that was more of a business decision on Encore part that I really couldn't answer for them. I think that would be a question you would have to address with Encore. Right. Commissioner O'Brien, I know that Commissioner Hill and I have visited the two conference rooms and it is a very, very different deal. I do wonder and perhaps we can ask this question when there's a presentation of quarterly report next month. A little bit more pointedly about the rationale. I have some guesses, but I don't want to put those out there unfairly. So I think if it makes sense to hold your question for them is an excellent suggestion on the part of Bruce. I guess probably a follow-up question and it may be one that Encore and MGM have to address again directly would be, I'd love to understand the shift in employee numbers. When you see the drop from 74 to now, we're hearing 16. I'd like to know what does that mean for jobs? I know that we've received some updates from you, Bruce, on that, but I think it would be great to have an understanding as to how many positions have been lost with that reduction in the poker games. I think your presentation did show that table games went up at Encore. Overall, Sterl, is that correct?  I don't think I appreciated that MGM declined on table games. Generally, I knew at one point as things were opening up, table games were quite reduced in numbers. I'm disappointed by that because, again, of the obligation to make sure that these resort destination category 1 licenses really do keep the full array of options. I think probably I'd like to understand if it's strictly around social distancing, if there's another factor. As the poker presentation tried to point out, I guess we didn't hit this as the Twin River poker room is not open. What we're hearing from them is staffing. Encore is also struggling with staffing. We can't just look at this as pre-post pandemic numbers and business decisions, but as you're pointing out, we can ask our licensees. I'm guessing they're going to tell you that they are struggling with staffing as well. That's what I'm hearing as well. We're hearing that from MGM as well. Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. Well, it'll be interesting to find out the measures that are being taken to restore them. And I know that that's a real struggle with food and beverage. And it will be helpful to understand how it's also a struggle with the gaming positions in the table game and public group positions. Other questions? Thomas? Commissioner Hill, you're saying you're all set. Commissioner O'Brien, are you all set? Yeah, no, I'm all set. Thank you. I know I asked you for that. It was a quick turnaround. I appreciate it. Thank you. And can you push your scanner? Good team. Yes, and I should again, just for folks who didn't hear that clearly, Commissioner O'Brien had asked for this update. And it really was a very quick turnover. So thank you. And it's really helpful to have this before the quarterly report. So thank you. Commissioner Skinner, are you all set? Or do you have? Okay. Great. Then Director Lilios, thank you. And Andrew and Lewis and Sturrell, thank you. Great to see you. Thanks. Okay, thank you, Chair. I'll jump right in. And I'm going to tag team with Heather on this next item, which is a review of the IEB's Casino Non-Compliance penalties. If I could just set the stage to date since 2016, the IEB, in terms of civil administrative penalties or fines, has not issued many of them, has issued five of them, four of them to gaming licensees, and one of them to a vendor. And the dollar amounts ranged from $5,000 on the low end to $100,000 on the highest end. And all of those were agreed to dispositions, meaning that the IEB and the licensee agreed to all five of those dispositions. The public was informed of each of them at the time by way of press releases from our communications office, an IEB report in a public meeting or a combination of both. The authority of the IEB to issue enforcement measures, including fines, derives from 23K, specifically section 36. And the fine aspect is one really one tool in our toolbox of enforcement measures. And the fines really should be seen in conjunction with a set of all of the other measures that we utilize. And they are incremental in nature and create a continuum of enforcement measures. Under the statute, largely, we cannot issue a fine without first having provided written notice of noncompliance to the licensee and given them an opportunity to rectify the noncompliance. Only after the opportunity to rectify, if there's a repeated instance of similar noncompliance, can we issue a fine. To be more precise, there is the possibility in the statute of issuing a fine without prior notice. It would be in very narrow circumstances, almost where there's like some intentional act on the part of the casinos. We have not we have not seen that. We've developed a process for evaluating noncompliance matters and issuing enforcement measures, including fines. There's a memo in your packet that sets forth what the IEB process is. I have to say that drafting that memo was a really helpful exercise for me. The Bureau has SOPs. We have templates. We have our procedures. But setting the process out in that one document was helpful. I think it's a helpful orientation for any new members of the IEB. And I'm interested in, of course, any feedback that you have. Our process is guided by the overall objective of having the licensee achieve compliance. We took that approach early on with the guidance of the Commission. We wanted to be reasonable regulators. We did not want to adopt a gotcha kind of approach, like catching you in some bad action and you end up with a fine for it. We want to be reasonable regulators and help the casinos with our enforcement measures to reach compliance. We are, of course, fortunate that we have three world-class operators here. Nonetheless, they run very complicated operations. They have very dense internal controls. And sometimes there is non-compliance. And sometimes it can be repeated in nature. So there have been times where we've exercised our statutory authority to assess fines to address repeated and serious areas of non-compliance, again, as part of overall escalating measures. We do become aware of instances of non-compliance through a variety of sources. And not surprisingly, our gaming agents team is one of our main sources of information. They are on site 24-7, performing monitor reviews and their own audits. So it's not surprising that they are some of the first lines of information overall for the IEB. And, of course, we have our on-site GEU as well, which is a source of information. They're also on-site investigators from the Alcoholic Averages and Control Commission, ABCC. I also don't want to underestimate the importance of the licensees self-reporting to this process. They do have a duty to self-report to us instances of non-compliance in that self-reporting aspect is really a foundational aspect of gaming regulatory oversight. Through their own monitoring, their own audit procedures, they do identify areas where they're falling short, and they are under an obligation to self-report to the IEB. And we believe that our overall approach of the goal of achieving compliance fosters this self-reporting on the casino's part. We're open to other sources of information as well, media, intelligence information, and other channels, open to any channels of information. So consistent with our overall goal, we do make every effort to flag serious or recurring on compliance issues in their early stages. We flag issues to the licensees right away, because that's what gives them the opportunity to rectify matters by, for instance, additional employee training, adopting other remedial measures on an as-needed basis. And it's important to remember that if something rises to the level of an assessment of a fine, that does not come as a surprise to the licensee. There has been a documented history of communications with the IEB before anything would reach that stage. So the memo does set out the different steps in the, or the different incremental measures that lead up, could possibly lead to a fine. I would like to turn it over to Heather and have her quickly review those with you. Thanks, Loretta. Good morning, Chair and commissioners. So in terms of the escalating enforcement measures that Loretta just referred to, there are several that I want to touch base on this morning. And just to note that these measures can be either accelerated or condensed depending on the circumstances and the situations, you know, where serious violations occur, they may be accelerated or condensed. So I think as Loretta noted, the IEB does make every effort to communicate non-compliance matters with the licenseeer registrant when they identify the issue and they make every effort to do that as soon as possible. In addition, there's this every effort to implement enforcement measures in a timely manner. And these measures enhance the ability of the licenseeer to achieve compliance also in a timely manner. So with respect to the different levels, the first enforcement measure is the verbal notification by the gaming agent division, which the email follow-up as well. So in these instances, the gaming agent senior supervisor brings the non-compliance at issue to the attention of the relevant casino department director or in the case of a registrant to the relevant manager. The casino compliance representative is also then informed during a bi-weekly meetings, these are regular bi-weekly meetings that the gaming agent division has, and they're held with the management and supervision of the gaming agent division and also the compliance representative or representatives at the casino. And with respect to who's in attendance at those meetings from the IEB side of the fence is the chief of the gaming agent division, the gaming agent field manager, and the senior supervisors of the property, as well as the gaming agent compliance manager, several of whom we've just heard from in the prior presentation. Although, unfortunately, bi-participation does not have a musical component, so I'll have to see if I can make that a little better next time. So after those meetings, gaming agent supervision follows up on the nine compliance matters within email, which is obviously important to memorialize the non-compliance discussion in writing, and this also gives the and licensee the opportunity to understand and address the matter and the non-compliance issue and rectify them early on. And, you know, as Loretta noted, communication is critical, and it helps, you know, the IEB monitor the casino's efforts at addressing and correcting the measures in real time. Now, the second measure involves the issuance of a non-compliance form, also called an NCF, by the gaming agent division. So in circumstances where the non-compliance continues after the first measure has been implemented, the gaming agent division management may approve the issuance of this non-compliance form. So once it's approved, the senior supervising gaming agent delivers the non-compliance form to the licensee or registry via email, and the licensee is asked to acknowledge initial and date its receipt of the non-compliance form. That form also sets out a comment section where the licensee can explain the situation from their side of it, and it also has a corrective action section where the licensee can explain and discuss what steps they've taken to address the matter. And again, that communication, as well as the others, continues to be critical so that the licensee is clear about the expectations going forward. So the third measure is the notice of non-compliance that is issued from the Chief Enforcement Counsel's Office. So in instances where the NCF has not been successful, there is this more formal notice of non-compliance, and there are several components to that particular notice. It cites the relevant statutory and regulatory authority, as well as any internal controls that are applicable. There's a fact section, and in that fact section, it doesn't just have the facts of the current non-compliance at hand. It also lays out and describes the prior relevant instances of non-compliance that have led up to the point where we're now at the stage of the notice of non-compliance from the Chief Enforcement Counsel's Office. There's also a time for correction for the licensee or registrant, and remedial measures are specified that the licensee or registrant are required to comply with. Once the licensee or registrant receives this notice of non-compliance form, they have an obligation to report back to the Gaming Agents Division and to the Chief Enforcement Counsel's Office on the measures that they put in place and the steps they've taken to ensure that the non-compliance does not occur again. And of note, it's important to kind of just point out that, again, notifying the licensee or registrant in advance is key. We try to keep the lines of communication open, so we do notify the compliance officer or relevant compliance representative before we send out these notices. And I think even more importantly, I want to know, or at least equally importantly, that we work very closely in the CDC's office with the Gaming Agents Division on these notices. They're not done in a vacuum. We have a lot of input from the Gaming Agents. And as Loretta said, not every instance of non-compliance comes to us through the Gaming Agents, but the vast majority of them do. So we have a really good working relationship with the Gaming Agents Division, and I just also want to say thank you to all of them for that very strong teamwork that we've been experiencing as we go through these different processes with the notices of non-compliance. So with respect to the final measure, which Loretta had talked about earlier, is the assessment of the Civil Administrative Penalty by the Chief Enforcement Counsel's Office. So in some circumstances, there are further instances of non-compliance. And as Loretta noted, there aren't that common, but they do happen. So in that case, there is this notice of intent to assess the Civil Administrative Penalty. And that's important because it's requirement of the statute, and it's a written document. And there are certain provisions that have to be set forth in that document. And the notice is sent to the compliance representative, so they have an understanding that the IEB attempts to issue a Civil Administrative Penalty. That document, the notice of intent, needs to contain a concise statement of the Allege Acts or emissions that form the basis for the Civil Administrative Penalty. It has to cite the law or regulations on the warrant order, which has not been complied with. And the amount of the fine that the IEB is seeking to assess. And there's also a statement on the right to an adjudicatory hearing with respect to the proposed assessment. There are also the requirements that the licensure registrant shall not comply, or that they shall comply with to avoid being deemed to have claimed the right to adjudicatory hearing. So the IEB's protocols do also call for the IEB director to approve all of the notices of intent to assess the Civil Administrative Penalty. And again, in the vein of the goal being compliance, this written notice of intent invites the licensee or registrant to inform the IEB whether there are any facts and dispute that are in the notice of intent. And it also invites the registrant or licensee to inform the IEB of any mitigating circumstances. This is really helpful at this juncture as part of the IEB's process, because there may be mitigating information. And there may be information that wasn't necessarily observable to the IEB previously. For example, the licensee or registrant, they have already taken proactive steps to implement additional employee training. They may have already disciplined the employees involved if it's a related matter. Or they may have already instituted changes in the process to address the non-compliance issue that the IEB may not have been aware. So this information sharing may lead to the IEB to adjust the amount of the penalty, or in some cases to conclude that a fine actually isn't warranted after all. It may also lead to the IEB and the licensee reaching an agreement as to the amount of the civil administrative penalty. And as Loretta noted, there have been five instances where the IEB has issued a civil administrative penalty. And with that, I will just note that I know there was some discussion. And if we have time, I could talk later about kind of what other or at least a sampling of what other jurisdictions do with respect to whether they publicly post their fines. But before that, it's why I will turn it back over to Loretta to discuss possible other outcomes in addition to what I've already described. Thanks, Heather. So I think it deserves a repeated mention now to what Heather alluded to, that is that adverse actions by the IEB like fines that licensees have the right to review. There's a right to review, a right to appeal involved in those. So we are very mindful of the standards involved in reviewing IEB decisions. And that aspect of the notice of intent that invites the IEB to, I'm sorry, invites the licensee to identify facts that might be in dispute, provide more information or mitigating information on matters or items that might not have been observable to us. Those are very important steps in the event that we ultimately have to comport with 38 standards or review rights standards. Essentially, these fine assessments, I think it's fair to say that they could go one of three ways. They could go where the IEB provides the licensee with the notice of intent and says, here's the facts that we found and here's the amount that we think is appropriate. And the licensee could say, okay, agree. We agree with everything. We're going to pay that fine and they pay the fine. And in that case, the licensee would have, by agreeing and paying the fine, waived any right to review. Another way it could go is that the IEB could file, provide the notice of intent to the licensee, invite those discussions about facts and mitigating information. And that could cause the IEB and the licensee to have a discussion if mitigating information, for example, were found, that could lead to an agreed amount of the fine, in which case the notice of intent, the amount may be adjusted by the IEB. And by agreeing and paying the fine that way, the licensee also waives any right to appellate review in an instance like that. The third instance, which we have not had yet, is where the IEB assesses a fine. The licensee disagrees with it and decides not to pay it within the 21-day period and instead seeks appellate review. An appeal of our gaming licensees involving our gaming licensees would go directly to the commission. Other kinds of licensees like vendors would go directly to a hearing officer with ultimate review on the papers to the commission. So we are mindful in these documents and in these discussions about these review rights at stake. We do, I hope we have made clear that we review all of these matters on an individualized basis and our notices and assessments are very fact-specific and set out all of the faxing and mitigating information in written documentation. And this type of treatment is designed to insulate the IEB's actions from challenges based on arbitrary or perpricious grounds or an allegation that the action lacks substantial evidence. Sort of one overriding principle from the SJC case law that guides us is that the SJC in reviewing agency decisions has stated where there is substantial evidence in the record to support the agency's decision, then it is not arbitrary or perpricious as a matter of law. And that's, you know, in addition to just wanting to be fair to the licensee and make sure we get it right, that attention to detail with the fax is also designed to address these these type of 30A standards. We do go through an exercise when we try to identify the appropriate dollar amount for the fine. Of course, that is troubleshooted by our discussion with the licensee about it. But even before that discussion to arrive at the appropriate amount, we start with the fax. You know, these are very fax specific and we look at the seriousness of the infraction, the potential impact on the integrity of gaming, public safety issues, the number of opportunities that the licensee had to identify it and correct it and didn't do so. You know, we look at that. We also look at what other jurisdictions do. You know, for years, we have maintained a paper file of fines from other jurisdictions. Bruce and his team are really helpful with providing us with up-to-date information on what other jurisdictions have done. And recently, Brittany Costello, our paralegal, has been transitioning us to electronic database of fines that will be accessible to us to be able to do that kind of troubleshooting. The memo addresses that at one point early on, we had discussed with the commission whether to adopt a schedule of fines. I'm not going to go through that analysis right now unless you want me to. I think it's laid out and explained what we went through pretty clearly in the memo. Suffice it to say right now that ultimately that approach of a schedule of fines like X amount for first offense, second offense, third offense, it was not favored for reasons discussed in the memo. There is a, in addition to the memo setting out our assessment process, there is a draft of an IED policy memo in your packet. You know, that really draws from the longer memo itself. I tried to pull the sort of high-level pieces, the policy pieces out in that memo. That policy memo is meant to be complemented by our day-to-day SOPs, templates, more protocol pieces, which are, you know, more living documents. But this policy memo, which I invite your guidance and feedback on, identified, you know, the high-level objectives of the enforcement measure aspect of our work, the importance of utilizing a prompt approach to this to give every opportunity for the licensee to take measures to correct matters, the importance of obtaining their input before we take any enforcement measures, how we consider dollar amounts, and so forth. We have the ability to track our metrics sort of separately, but I thought it was important on the policy memo to get some of these high-level pieces in there. As Heather mentioned, you know, we have notified the commission in the past with respect to any fines imposed and notified the public. Kathy, you and I have discussed whether it makes sense to more affirmatively have a placement on our MGC website where, you know, fines might be available to the public. You know, that is something I've talked to Tom Mills about, and it's something we certainly can do. Again, Brittany did some research about other jurisdictions, and some do affirmatively post information like that, and others do not. So I really think it's doable from the IEB standpoint. We have been transparent about those matters, you know, in the past, so I wouldn't, I'm not seeing any obstacle to doing that, and I think from an operational, mechanical point of view, Tom Mills thinks it's doable as well. So really that is our prepared discussion, you know, I'm interested in hearing any questions, thoughts, guidance that you may have. So thank you, Loretta. I had asked Director Lillios to address this, particularly as we had two new commissioners join us so that we could really understand the framework for IEB's both operations and decision making. As Loretta pointed out, the practice is for IEB to notify the commission of its, when it does issue, not to fine. We may or may not get advance notice, or much advance notice. And it has usually been accompanied, I think, maybe 100% accompanied with a press release. I do think that the function of these entities is core to the work of the gaming commission. And in some matter of transparency, one, we certainly should be informed, and then two, the public should be informed of these fines being issued. With that said, what has come through very clearly in Loretta's memo, which we think of both Loretta and Heather for, is that we are very fortunate that the three licensees continue to be not only cooperative, but collaborative in their efforts to be compliant. And they understand that this is a tool that needs to be used sometimes. But we do know that Bruce and team work very closely with the licensees to help them address these matters. With that said, I had identified an issue that came up about the website. I think one of our, I think it was our last interim communications director who asked about whether or not we should be publicizing it on the website, because there was maybe last, within the last six months, a fine was issued. Correct, Loretta? So the issue around- Please find the date of- Yeah. The issue about whether or not they should be publicized came up. It wasn't- So last May of the point you played out. It was May. And then, and so really it seems so funny that it was that long ago, Loretta. That's really interesting to me. Anyway, Loretta also points out that she has attached a draft policy. I think if Lawrence, now that we've had the presentation, I would recommend that the commission take a look at the policy before we take any formal action to see if with the presentation today it helps inform your thoughts on it. The other issue that I had asked about was whether or not there should be any guidelines with respect to the fine amount after 10 years. Would that be helpful? I hear that the past was really more of almost a scheduled amount versus new sentencing quote unquote guidelines. So that was another issue I'd identified that might be helpful for us. And then one thing that I think Loretta and team are going to work on is the timeline, you know, in terms of the time that Bruce and team might identify an issue to how it ultimately gets addressed. I think Loretta would say that that is a risk-based analysis and they figure out that. But I think Loretta, you're going to keep track of some metrics and that will inform your own operations. So those are the things that I had identified that might be helpful for you because I needed to be really educated about this process. So I'd like to turn first to Commissioner O'Brien because you're the most experienced with this and might want to chime in. So I've reviewed the policy. I also reviewed the memo. I do remember having a conversation with you, Chair, about that idea of should there be guidelines or not. I can see pros and cons, but I did know where Loretta pointed out the downfall or the negative potential impacts of having that where, you know, someone makes a business decision to say, well, I'm just going to go forward with this because it's not, you know, it's not worth it for us to do this. I have not, I don't recall an experience since I've been here where I've heard one of the agreed upon dispositions and then been so appalled one way or the other that I feel like, you know, I would absolutely want guidelines imposed. But Loretta, can you refresh my memory just on the max minimum that you talked about, the 5K versus the 100K? Briefly, what were the facts in terms of the 5 versus the 100? The 100 was fine in 2019 involving MGM, again an agreed upon amount for repeated non-compliance about minors and underage on the floor. So there were, had been a history since opening, you know, written notices in the past and then, you know, problems, achieving compliance and resulting in, I don't remember the number, but it was a handful, you know, five, six minors and, you know, minors are, listen, we've all been teenagers and we all know they're always going to try to get on the gaming floor. But this is where the repeated nature, the opportunities for casino personnel to have, you know, in some instances, multiple casino personnel coming into contact with the same minor and never asking for the ID, the minor spending extended time on the floor, not just the pass-through and involved, as I recall, some actual alcoholic beverage consumption and not just walking people, but actually gaming, sometimes at multiple locations. So that was the high end. There was a $5,000 amount to a vendor. That was the May 2021 amount to Reteli at Encore. And that was for, again, repeated non-compliance with the registration requirements for employees, despite our agents and our licensing division working with the vendor to achieve compliance there. And there are certain risks there because of the location of that property or that amenity near the floor. But that, as I think I explained in my public reporting, you know, that amount, one of the criteria in reaching that amount was the knowledge that, you know, this is a company that's never been involved in gaming. And, you know, it's a high bar, right, for a restaurant to have to manage that kind of registration process. There was a $10,000 amount early on to PPC for non-compliance with alcohol beverage storage and distribution requirements. Again, you know, repeated in nature and the prior measures were still having problems. There was a large amount PPC in 2017 to $65,000 amount for violations of minimum security staffing. I think you may recall issues around that security staffing and, you know, trying to get that and thankfully where, you know, they are at a much, you know, really good spot on that now. There was an $18,000 amount MGM again for some underage violations that followed several years after that big $100,000 amount. But they were more minimal in nature in terms of time on the floor and contact with casino personnel. So I think that I think I've summarized all of them. Okay. Yeah, I mean, I think, again, I having had some experience in one of my past jobs in terms of how to assess either sentencing recommendations, fines, that sort of thing. It's an art in terms of, you know, knowing who you're dealing with, who is on the receiving end, you know. I think the policy, I think they have standard operating procedures. We can certainly circumvent the policy. I'm satisfied with how things are present. The only thing would be to figure out if there is a certain situation that we as either a group or as individual commissioners felt was being one way or the other, how that would best be communicated to IEB just in terms of their decision making going forward. If there's a particular area of regulation or discipline or a particular set of facts, maybe we have to figure out how best to communicate that to each other and to IEB. That's really where I sort of my response to reaction to the presentation today. And some of your imagination is not necessarily the amount, but the factual situation that really would indicate our level of tolerance. Right. Just a reminder on our packet, in our packet page 46 and 47, the memo does help find the factors that IEB take into consideration as they set the amount. And from my perspective, I had wondered about the amounts, whether that would be helpful. And I'm very satisfied with the factors coming out in the memo for now. And perhaps I like the idea that we think about where our level of tolerance might require a more serious intervention, maybe even quick intervention. Commissioner Hill, Commissioner Skinner. I don't have anything to add. My thoughts were very similar to Commissioner O'Brien's, and she covered it very well, I think, on my behalf for sure. So I'm all set. Excellent report, by the way. Excellent report. Great. Commissioner Skinner. I think it was definitely an excellent report. Loretta, I agree with you that it was well written, and it details a well documented and well defined process that I think tracks the statute very, very closely. I wondered about the second fine that was issued to MGM. I think initially you said that they were issued $100,000 fine for service of alcohol to minors and then subsequently, I don't remember the amount, but there was a repeat violation. I wonder whether those factors that IEB considers should be almost not disregarded, but I think the fact that the $100,000 fine was issued, should that $100,000 fine serve as a minimum for any follow-up fines that might be assessed for the exact same violation? So what was the fine that was issued for the second set of alcohol to minors violation? I know exactly what you're getting at, Commissioner. So because the first one in 2019 was $100,000 and then 2021 is $18,000, so it could look to the eye like this whole idea of escalating measures. It wasn't escalated. It was like we gave less importance to it, but this really highlights the very fact specific nature of what we're doing. So first of all, that 2019 fine, that was when the fine issued, but it reflected some circumstances, following opening of the property in the early months of 2019. As a result, MGM implemented very significant changes to the perimeter of its gaming floor. I mean, after that fine, they really stepped up their measures with some redesigned work, very significant retraining of staff, and we went for a lengthy period with seeing minimal violations. There was a period then in early 2021. As I recall, they had some new security had a turnover in their security. They had some significant number of new security, and that fell off with a minimum number of new incidents that was not as broad by any means as that first incident, but nonetheless, given that they had had the large fine a few years earlier, we felt like anything short of fine penalty would not be appropriate. But it was an overall assessment of the overall facts. We did not feel it was appropriate to come in at 100,000 plus because of the attentiveness that they gave in responding to that, the first deficiencies. I don't know, Bruce, if you have anything you want to jump in on there, because you were at the center of both of those. I really think that the first deficiency fine was so egregious with the number and the alcohol, that that was why it was much harder. The second one wasn't as voluminous, but I do believe per individual case we find more in that second case, and as well, they were working much better with us in that second case. It was a brand new director of security at that point. A lot had changed in the property. I agree with what Loretta said. I think that was the reason that we went with that fine. Thank you. That's helpful. I just would suggest that we perhaps consider addressing that circumstance somewhere in the protocol where you have an additional violation, post-fine assessment. Even if it's just to say that the same factors are considered, I think it would be helpful to specify that in the papers. I'm with you 100%. Thank you. Further questions or comments for Director Lonell, Chief Enforcement Counsel Paul? This would be my suggestion, maybe because we do have such a robust agenda today, and I want to give or do really good due diligence to any kind of an excuse, an adoption of the policy. Could we reflect upon today's discussion and then bring the policy back to a future meeting for our more formal blessing? Does that make sense? If we could also consider, first off, I think Commissioner Skinner, your point, it is in sort of a second bullet but I like the idea that maybe there has to be some kind of in the fine itself recognition. This is a repeat and at least a certain amount is addressing that repeat of prior similar instances of non-compliance and maybe it's when you start with that amount and then you go on to all the other mitigating factors. Maybe you could figure out a way to reflect that a little bit in a more refined fashion. Then if we could give some thought as to whether or not this commission wants to have these penalties posted publicly or not. I think it's interesting that the five of us would not have been able to probably list off all of those and so we'd have to go back to IEB each time to understand the history of non-compliance. It's interesting but it doesn't necessarily give us any direction so perhaps we could reflect on that and I think as you say Loretta of Brittany is looking at other jurisdictions so we could get updated on that too as to which jurisdictions do and which don't. Does that make sense, commissioners? Does that make sense? Are you all right with that? And then as Loretta pointed out the SOPs are something that the IEB maintains without any kind of a formal adoption by us. Although she would share them with you I'm sure if you wanted to understand that more precisely. Really important exercise today Loretta for us to understand this important function of the IEB all the way through the entire bureau really. So thank you. Commissures are you all here? Thank you. Can I lose Commissioner Hill? Commissioner Hill can you wave? I'm even unable to up there we go. I wanted to make sure I wasn't missing him. He's right next door so I know he hasn't truly disappeared. Crystal, thanks. Interestingly most of us are all right next to each other doing this all virtually soon. We'll have that. There you are. Commissioner Hill I thought I was I had lost you and I wondered if it was on my end. Are you all set if we just decide to- You heard of Had a Little Hiccup so I'm back. And then you heard I don't know if you could hear but the policy we would we would just put that on for another. Okay excellent you'll give some thought as to whether or not we want to post these publicly or not and I think Loretta will follow up with some more information on that. All right if there's not further questions big thank you appreciate it very much excellent work and I'm glad Loretta you've found it to be a helpful exercise too. Thanks so much. Okay all right commissioners we at Crystal's kept us on a on a tight schedule we've run a little bit long. Does anybody need to have a break before we move right into community mitigation? All set. All righty. Good morning Chief Delaney. Good morning thank you Madam Chair and commissioners so today we have before you seven transportation planning grants as part of the community mitigation fund. Just as far as process I thought what we would do is review each one individually and take questions on each application and then take motions at the end of the presentation. If that works for you folks I can jump right in. Sounds perfect. Okay so the first application we have in front of you today is the city of Boston for the Sullivan Square Rutherford Avenue design. They are requesting $200,000 to assist in that effort and for those of you who have been around for a little while we have been giving the city of Boston grants. We've awarded them grants on this for the past several years. You know this is an exceptionally large construction project over $150 million about $11 million design fee and we've been providing them some funds each year. Last year we the city indicated to us that that would probably be the last year of this request but however in the interim after the 25% design plans were submitted to mass dot the T asked the city to go back to the drawing board a little bit to try to add center bus lanes to Rutherford Avenue from Sullivan Square all the way down to the North Washington Street bridge and in doing so that requires a fairly significant redesign of that section of the road. It's not just a matter of adding striping these center bus lanes have stations associated with them and kiosks and so on. So we certainly do agree that this is sort of a change in the scope here and it is probably appropriate to give them some more money towards that effort. Now of course we agree that there's an impact of the casino we are as about 70% of the traffic goes through Sullivan Square and onto Rutherford Ave or other points outside of Sullivan Square. So there certainly is a casino related impact and you know these improvements will mitigate those traffic related impacts and you know and given the fact that this will really leverage a significant federal state and other maybe local dollars we think it's certainly appropriate to do this. So I guess I will open this foot up for any questions. Fishers? Questions for John? Michelle Bryan? No, no questions. More is a comment that makes eminent sense. I mean this is it's a mammoth task so it makes sense to me. Commissioner Hill. Okay and I think we should just note too that Encore Boston Harbor has indicated support for this so it is really critical to the overall traffic considerations there. Yeah both Encore and MassDOT have their support for this. Okay and you'll continue on then. Okay so the next one we have up is Chelsea the city of Chelsea. They have requested $167,600 to do a study of multimodal improvements to Spruce Street in Chelsea and just if you'll recall we have given awarded Chelsea several grants for the Beecham and Williams Street Corridor which leads from Broadway in Everett through into Chelsea and quite a bit of casino related traffic uses that route. In fact Chelsea had done traffic counts both before and after Encore's opening to document how much traffic that road receives. So Spruce Street intersects with Beecham where Beecham turns into Williams Street which is actually the end of that Beecham Williams Corridor project which we went out and visited back last fall and so while traffic counts weren't done on Spruce Street itself their traffic engineers have sort of extrapolated those traffic numbers that they did before and certainly there is a significant amount of traffic that would use Spruce Street as it provides a direct connection from both Route 1 South and on to Route 1 North. This is one of those cases where Waze really has an impact sending people on this route if some of the other routes are clogged up. So you know clearly we do see an impact of the casino based on their earliest studies and some of the other information they presented in their application. They want to do this study to look at multimodal impacts or to multimodal improvements I should say to include pedestrians, bicycles, public transit and I think I should also mention that you know the Encore Neighborhood Runner that picks folks up at the Chelsea Sova Line stop actually uses this route to get to the casino so clearly there's some impact just associated with that alone. So again this is something both MassDOT and our licensee were in favor of this project and as a review team based on the impacts and what is being proposed here to mitigate those we agree that this is appropriate. So I will open this one up for any questions? comments questions no it's really helpful for me to learn that Spruce Street is right at that busy intersection that we observed on our tour and the fact that the Encore Shell does use that the impact is clear before we go on to your next presentation I just want to record to note that Commissioner Skinner has left our meeting if I'm correct she is attending a conference on the West Coast so we should just reflect that because I want to make sure that you understand I she hasn't just stepped out but we won't we won't expect her to come back for the best for me. All right thank you Joe. Okay so our next application is the Cities of Everett and Boston this is a joint transportation planning grant which is something that we really try to encourage multiple communities to work together. They are requesting $450,000 to complete the formation of the Lower Mystic Transportation Management Association and these funds would support the basic operational needs of the TMA during its first three years of operation essentially this is a kind of seed money to try to get this really up and running quickly. Just a little bit of background on this you know and again sort of relating to the casino impact you know the Encore Casino was certainly one of if not the largest traffic generator in this area in the sort of Charlestown, Everett area and as part of their original section 61 findings they were required to join a transportation management association which they did but this TMA was really involved more in downtown Boston and over Brighton than it really is in sort of Charlestown, Everett so the local groups felt that it would be more appropriate if there was if there was a local TMA that could support these areas you know there's significant development going on in Everett not only the Encore Casino but what's going to be going on across the street from the Encore Casino but there's lots of housing developments and and many many other things going on in Everett in Charlestown there's the the Shraft Center is being redeveloped is excuse me and there's a ton of other developments going on there residential commercial biotech and otherwise so having a TMA is really going to be hugely beneficial to all of these groups both of these communities so this TMA has been established they filed all their paperwork that they needed to to establish it with the Secretary of State's office and then they filed for it to be a 501c4 operation so that is all underway and they have actually signed up a number of entities to be part of this including Encore Boston Harbor which will right now is probably their largest member so you know the notion of this you know clearly there's this traffic related casino impact in the area and these TMAs I mean by their very design are there to try to mitigate traffic impacts try to reduce single occupancy vehicle use get people on public transit you know and in this vicinity we have Sullivan Square to the south we have the Chelsea Silver Line you know to the to the east and north we there are you know buses there's the proposed extension of the silver line so this is another sort of tool in that toolbox to try to get people off the road and into public transit and otherwise so you know based on that again licensee both Encore and Mastod are supportive of this application we think it's great that we can give them some of the seed money to really get this TMA up and running quickly these are things that usually have to slowly ramp up their effort and the thought here was we can make that happen faster here with these funds so the review team is was in total agreement that this really makes full sense mitigate impacts and and it's nice to see a project that's a little bit uh out of outside of the box that we're usually seeing so with that I'll open this one up for any questions questions very helpful presentation of course uh Commissioner Bryan and I had the benefit of a very thorough two by two yesterday um which we appreciate I know Commissioner Hill you've been working closely on the community mitigation grants but I I think that this um as you say it's refreshing to see this kind of innovation and the idea that it would be supporting over the first three years right yes 250,000 okay yeah and you know in that first three years after that you know once they get sort of to a critical mass of of companies joining it's definitely uh it becomes self-sufficient at that point right with a membership yeah okay you want to continue on okay um so the next one is the uh the city of Malden um they are asking for 115,000 dollars to do a citywide traffic signal inventory um and this is to sort of catalog and evaluate all of their traffic signal equipment to ultimately optimize their traffic operations you know they'll determine what kind of capital needs these uh these things have and so on um so you know in general uh you know we we like the notion of doing these kinds of traffic studies but of course we have to look at what the impact of the casino is associated with that and you know in doing so um you know Malden of course lies north of Everett and in the original uh traffic studies that were done as part of uh beyond core development it indicated that there certainly would be some local traffic going up through Everett into Malden specifically up the main street corridor and the Broadway corridors and then kind of splitting off into a couple of different spots in in Everett I mean excuse me in Malden um and then um and also there's uh uh you know the Fellsway roads are right on the edge of of of Malden as well as one on the other side which certainly would carry some traffic as well um you know in doing this evaluation you know we realized that well it said that you know about really about sort of four percent of the traffic would be uh from on core would be uh finding its way up through Malden and absent any newer information that's really all that we have to go on and when you look at sort of what the traffic generation numbers are at on core what this really comes down to is that this is really a pretty minimal amount of traffic that's going up into Malden and now of course you know any increase in traffic is certainly an impact you know we agree with that but the impact here is is pretty small um so the the review team was was a little bit uncomfortable saying that we we think that we should be funding a study of every traffic single in town we thought some of those sort of more major corridors the main street corridor I think uh on route 99 and ferry street were a couple of the others and and maybe the the Fellsway as well although that's a I believe a state-owned road but anyway and then there are some of these roads that kind of cut across the main roads is route 60 and this is a couple of other main sort of arterials that cut east west through Malden and so the the review team really felt it was probably more appropriate to just look at those sort of major corridors and and in the application they identified about 70 traffic signal installations in in the city and you know sort of rather than micromanaging this our recommendation is to provide a half of the funding on this project where it could look at sort of those major corridors and rather rather than maybe some of these traffic signals that really wouldn't have see any impact at all from the casino um so uh you know if the commission approves this reduced level of funding we will go back and as part of our contract documents and so on ask for sort of a revised scope on how you know they will fit their study into these funds um but so that is our recommendation at this point is that we provide 50 percent of those funds which would be uh 57,500 dollars so with that I would open that one up for questions oh and also licensee uh on core and mass dot did support this as well but you know obviously mass dots not looking particularly closely at what the impact of the casino is they're more looking at it from a traffic study standpoint than then sort of on a direct casino impact because I recommended the full funding. Commissioner O'Brien? So I I'm in agreement with what the team has said I guess them just looking for maybe a little more precision on the language in the recommendation from the memo which seems to while you've stated with the rationale for the 50 percent it it suggests um giving them 50 percent and simply asking them to resubmit a scope that then outlines which ones they would use can we give a little more guidance on that saying specifically that consistent with the findings that the scope we and we expect to see is the north south and possibly certain east west so that they don't say okay well we're going to do the 50 percent you didn't necessarily want and then I just feel like that might need whatever we're moving on if we're referring back to the memo I feel like should have a little more precision in the scope of what the 50 percent can be allotted toward. We could certainly do that but I think well firstly we have as staff has to approve every scope that's submitted to us so I guess you know we we already know what we want to see and I think we would trans translate that to to Malden by saying that you know these are the these are the things that we consider to be important and ask them to do that but if you wanted to do that yeah so I'm just thinking you could do that as well. Yeah so for us what we're voting on today to me I just want to see a little more clarity on what you guys have already expressed in the memo which is you know you don't want to micromanage them on the one hand but on the other hand the approval for the 50 percent is based on the north essentially the north south and possibly certain east west so as long as that's and it can be this conversation you and I are having right now if the other commissioner is okay with it I just want some clarity and direction in the record that that's what the funds are for so the scope has to come back with the funds we're giving them primarily dedicated to the north south. Yeah and I think that was the intent if it didn't if it didn't fully come across that way in the in the memo. Right right no that's why I when I read the two lines again that's I just highlighted it is something that for the record I want that clarity out there so there's no confusion on the grant recipients party there but that makes sense to me. Thank you Commissioner O'Brien any questions Commissioner Hill? No I'm okay with the suggestion from Commissioner O'Brien. Yeah I think she's she's mining up a nice motion for us so there we go. Oh no this is all this is all Commissioner Hill's motion. Commissioner Hill has certainly been through these discussions with us as part of our review team so he is in a very good position. Right and yeah exactly we appreciate all the efforts just again to note and Joe you made a quick reference to it is that MASTOT does recommend the full funding but they don't have the same parameters that we have with respect to having to consider the impact the level of impact not just an impact on on from the casino so yeah absolutely and that's you know that's something what we do talk with them about that and they do try to consider the casino related impact but it's you know obviously that's more of our focus than their focus you know honestly MASTOT usually if somebody's doing a study of traffic signals is going to approve traffic operations they're going to like it yeah and they're going to like it if we can help fund it and I appreciate all of that so exactly exactly your your recommendation makes a great deal sense thank you. Okay so the next one is also the the city of Malden they have requested uh $50,000 to to do a transit oriented development uh opportunity study in the area around the malden center MBTA station and you know just if you're if you're not really familiar with transit oriented development you know the state really encourages folks communities to look at development around tea stations in particular whether it's commuter rail or you know or the subway or or bus stations or whatever it is to try to allow you know higher density development without having too much of an impact on traffic so you know you know we obviously think these these things are a great idea you know commonwealth is behind them but in this case we we are not recommending this application for funding and I will go into the reasons why in just a moment so the applicant identified two impacts of on core that that they intend this application to address and the first one is the increase the increased use of malden center as a transportation hub now this notion of a transportation hub came out of the surrounding community agreements where both medford and malden were considered transportation hubs for the uh the buses the shuttle buses that on course providing for both patrons and employees from malden center and from wellington to uh the facility and you know as such um you know I mean this was this was sort of by design that these areas would be used and and the communities are compensated for that as part of their surrounding community agreements so I guess the the increase in in traffic in the malden center area associated with the casino I think was you could say was sort of an anticipated impact and then the second impact that they describe in the application is that those workers and visitors who are coming to on core and using malden center as their way to get there you know are not sort of taking advantage of the other things that malden has to offer but rather just using malden as a pass through and while you certainly could consider both of those as impacts on the community the other thing that we have to do is saying here's the identified impact and here is the proposed solution and how does that solution address the impact that was identified and so this transit oriented development study is really looking at economic development they're looking at what other things can we sort of build around malden center you know can we utilize the mbta parking lot and put housing there and or a parking garage and more housing or uh enter off a lot of this transit oriented development revolves around housing uh because you're saying let's let's provide housing at a tea station where someone won't need a car to get around so an awful lot of this typically is around housing although there's some ancillary usually commercial and and retail kinds of spaces that go along with that but but so you know this kind of study that's looking at economic development opportunities we're just having a really hard time trying to figure out how this would mitigate traffic in the area now we gave the malden a grant last year to do this transit action plan which was going to look at sort of revamping bus lanes and things around the malden center station and we could see how that certainly had you know connections to try to reduce traffic congestion and improve traffic flow in and around that but this study of economic development doesn't really seem to relate to to the existing issues associated with traffic and similarly um you know looking at economic development opportunities um we're not really sure how that would necessarily encourage patrons and employees of the casino to maybe explore malden center and see what it has to offer um you know so we just really it really came down to you know we think these kinds of studies are great and that every community that's around a tea station really should be looking at them because it's a it's a great idea for the community for the public transit system for everybody but we just don't see this as addressing an impact of the casino and that's where we we have the problem is if if we can't make that connection we can't really recommend uh giving out a grant for this you know it could this type of development might possibly be better under the community planning application but even then you know and and look the the community didn't argue that it should be in that category we asked the question and they indicated they felt it should be under the transportation planning category um you know even if it were under community planning I think there's still a lift there to make a real connection between this type of of study and and an impact of the casino so um so with that um you know essentially you know I think we go into a lot of this in a bit more detail in our memo um but you know for those reasons we really can't can't recommend it uh with that said you know Encore and MassDOT did recommend it and again MassDOT's looking at this from the perspective of hey we we love these developments around transit so we're not adding new cars to the road and so on but but again there's sort of this question of connection to the casino. If I could chime in Joe um I heard you say that it might be a heavy lift if it were shifted over to community planning um I I think I agree with you in terms of that that maybe Maldon missed it its mark by by making this a transportation putting it in the transportation bucket but that said the community planning I would be very interested in in in hearing from Maldon on this next year with respect to community planning because I do see that Encore and the casino and as a regulator we do look at Maldon center as an important part of the equation for transporting patrons and and and the employees and to the extent there's an opportunity loss there because they can't they don't have the the funding to do the proper economic development study um I think that community planning um how we were viewing community planning uh grants would maybe nicely fit there I would like for them the patrons and employees to take advantage of what Maldon offers when they when they are shifting um in their transportation and and to the extent that we could maybe help on that front uh do a study or work down the end I think at least I would be very interested in seeing that that kind of an application from I guess it would be for next year though right John there's no opportunity in between no at this point no there's no you know February 1st is our deadline so right right so um um to the extent that we can uh and I know Mary I don't think it's on but your team and you can again in in the uh outreach that you do for training around these grants I appreciate the fact that you you you did go through that enhancement on community planning this year and that we have continue to explain that that benefit that's for for next year I I welcome that Commissioner Hill, Commissioner O'Brien any comments or questions on this one no I agree I mean it's a great idea it's just finding whether it fits in what we have to offer it's a bigger challenge bigger challenge yeah we tried our best to to connect if we just couldn't do it yep I understand that I understand um it takes a lot of um human resources to to to do these grants and we appreciate Malden's interest here okay should we go on then to the next one okay so this is the last one I believe um so this is Medford um they want to do a uh study for a rail trail in the Wellington area um so they're requesting $70,000 in funds to study the feasibility of of utilizing an inactive freight rail right of way to construct a multi-use trail that would improve connectivity in the Wellington Glenwood neighborhood um um so on this one um you know so the the impact from the casino on on bike on bike paths in general you know making the connection to a casino related impact is is a little bit difficult but you know the what we have come down on in the past on on on bike paths is that you know closing these gaps in bike trails and creating this network that allows people to get to and from the casino and frankly to and from other locations without having to use an automobile you know takes automobiles off the road and sort of helps the whole area by mitigating traffic including the casino itself so in general we've been we've been in favour of these types of things so this um this trail is a little bit further away from from the casino than what we've been dealing with um so this this comes off of Rivers Edge Drive if you're familiar with Route 16 kind of goes past Wellington Rivers Edge Drive goes up north and then this peels off to the west off of Rivers Edge Drive um now uh and so there are existing bike paths along Rivers Edge Drive which lead you to Route 16 which has bike paths as well and then that takes you into either the northern strand or some of the bike paths that are being constructed now through the gateway park and through the gateway center and right to the casino so this again would close another gap and it provides some protected access for for those folks in that neighborhood particularly they would be able to cross the fellsway on this without having to cross you know there's an existing bridge the fellsway goes over this railroad track so that cuts out a big crossing that that folks would have to do at the surface so again we're generally in favour of these one of the concerns that we had uh in this was that the the applicant indicated that they believed to this to be an inactive freight right away and so initially we were we were going to propose that we sort of conditioned this on that but we did have a conversation with them yesterday afternoon to discuss this a little bit more and um and you know if you if you guys want to defer this decision till later you know till I could sort of write up this information be happy to do that but but basically they are asking for some of this money to actually do that research that they need to do to figure out exactly how this ownership structure works and just uh railroads um are are are fairly opaque business uh it's it's difficult to find your way through and in fact ownership is always not is not always abundantly clear there are often owners of the tracks but there are people who have uh rights of way over the tracks and so on and there can be multiple layers of of this stuff to to to get at who the owner is it's not just simply calling up uh you know uh the MBTA and saying hey we'd like to use an old piece of track and and and make it into a bike path and have them say okay this is a cumbersome process that actually requires a lot of legal work there's a lot of title searches and things of that nature so what what the um what Medford told us yesterday when we talked to them was that they would probably about $25,000 of this $70,000 effort is really that digging and doing legal research and so on and so forth and I guess what our thought was and we could just do this administratively I don't know I don't think we necessarily need to do it with with a motion per se but what we could do internally is just write a grant for the first $25,000 to get them started and if they get to the point where it's a thumbs up you know that they can move ahead we can then just modify the grant to give them the rest of the amount and then you know if it's thumbs down we just say all right well that's the end of the grant and and and we we don't give them the rest of the month so those are a couple of the thoughts that we had and again I know I'm springing this on you at the at the last minute so if you if you want to defer this until we can maybe till the next meeting or something you're welcome to do that or if you have if you're comfortable moving on it today we can do that as well I'm really glad you made that call Joe because that's what I suspected that they might be using some of this funding just to understand what you had outlined as a complex problem I I kind of like the idea that Joe's presenting Brown and and I mean to do so they can get started on the framework question what do you think Brad? I agree that's a great idea because why give them a full amount if they're not going to be able to use it could we defer this one for till the next meeting does everybody mind doing that? Would you prefer that it be that the recommendation be rewritten that way um otherwise um let me know that we could get a motion that could reflect that but do you want to paperwork to be revised? Okay that makes sense to me would you like to be comfortable with that? Yeah I'm comfortable today or or revising it um my limited exposure to rail lines and the authorities that have jurisdiction over them too is there is a possibility that at the end of this grant year they don't know definitively or they know what they need to do but the execution might not be doable so I guess the only question I would have is you're going to go back and rewrite it think of the timing of the grant is whether I'm assuming this was originally a submitted intended to be used this year so I don't know if it would revert back if they don't I mean I'm just wondering if we're sort of saying this is a great idea but for some reason they get to the end of the year they've expended the 25 and they either have determined if they've determined it's easily they're not quite done with the answer yet or they've determined it but the execution isn't going to happen such that they can roll right into finishing the monies whether there's a way to contemplate that as well. Well so I think what we suggested to them and and I guess what I would suggest to the commission is that we award the $70,000 or I should say authorize the award of $70,000 but I will change the write-up to reflect that we will give it to them in two tranches okay and you know and that you know we would give them the sort of the say the 25,000 first and then if they if if everything looks good we would then give them the rest of it to complete it and we suggested to them that they do this that they put out an RFP for the entire project with an ad alternate that you know so they would do they would they would contract the first 25,000 and then they would have an ad alternate later so that they would know you know they would have a price for what the additional work would be and then could just authorize that consultant to go right ahead if everything is okay so they wouldn't have to rebid it and then in terms of the use of the grant monies is it over necessarily the one year three years and then how did that work they technically have four years to use the money based on the contracts so so shouldn't be an issue okay Joe would you have to come back to us or can you do it administratively open that 10 percent rule whatever it is um well i think if you if you are we have the full amount we're just administratively going to give it out in two tranches we're just we're just going to say to you you can't have the second amount until you prove that the first amount until you prove to us that this this is a go and that'll be part of the revised recommendation which we'll then vote to approve on for the language okay we'll just roll that one over into the uh the next presentation yep yep okay so that concludes my my my presentations okay so um commissioners i think that we can act on this in some kind of comprehensive package in terms of you know manager i just had i just had a thought that uh in in in consideration of time what i could do is modify this memo to reflect that change in in fact the change that commissioner or brian suggested on the uh the traffic signal one and resubmit that and you could maybe do your vote at the beginning of my presentation in two weeks on the um the next tranche the issue is that we'd have to get commissioner skinner up to speed on everything so maybe we vote on the ones that are sort of clean up or down and defer the two that need to be tweaked yeah whatever way you'd like to do it um it's either or i just thought you know we could we could take care of that in the next couple weeks i know it's just a busy agenda that's all i'd like um if we could even do the the one that the tweaking seemed pretty pretty simple yeah commission yeah i was just going to have us refer to the discussion at the meeting today in terms of yeah now let's let's let's act on this today if you don't mind but i i do appreciate your thinking um innovatively with respect to our time joe um so commission commissioner brian um i think you've given some thought as to how we can comprehensively look at the recommendations um you make a motion then i would invite if anyone wants to separate out any of the items from uh commissioner brian's motion we can do that with an amendment um certainly i think what i was going to do is to have three one for approval one for deferral and one for denying that sounds good is that okay with you commissioner hill also yes so given that given the presentation madam chair i move that the commission approved the following applications for funding from the community mitigation funds and the amounts specified but the purpose is described and submitted applications and materials that were included in our packet today and for the reasons described during our discussion here today specifically one the city of boston for 200 000 second the city of chelsea for 167 thousand dollars third the cities of ebbard and boston in the amount of 450 thousand dollars and lastly the city of maldon the amount of 57 500 dollars uh subject to the further clarification that that money's be focused on the north south roots in their application um and further that the commission staff be authorized to execute the grant instruments commemorating these awards in accordance with 205 cmr 153.04 second excellent any any edits commissioner hill oh commissioner that looks like she knows the time in uh yeah just on the chelsea uh the amount is 167 600 600 okay thank you don't want to rip them off of that 600 dollars yeah no absolutely not so the motion will reflect that that edit commissioner hill i'll say yep thank you so the second i was with that amendment yep good thank you okay any for the discussion commissioner brian hi commissioner hill hi i thought yes so that's three zero all right um moving whether i don't know if i need to formally move but i i can madam chair that we defer adjudication of the request from the city of metford in terms of the rail trail for the reasons discussed here today i think that makes sense commissioner brian hi christian hill hi i thought yes three zero on that deferral and lastly madam chair i moved that the commission denied the application for funding from the community mitigation funding connection with a transit oriented development opportunity study presented by the city of malden as there does not appear to be a clear nexus between the use of the funds requested and the impacts created by the operation of the gaming establishment second thank you any edits on that we're all set commissioner brian hi commissioner hill hi but yes three eyes and we are all set with one deferred discussion we'll roll that over thank you so much on joe we appreciate the thoroughness of your presentation today and the uh good education you gave us yesterday too thank you thank you very much and i just like to thank my whole uh review team i won't go into all the names but uh a lot of help get from a lot of folks on this you know what at the end please do make sure you have a complete set of names and of course you've got mary and lily who are helping you along on the way but yeah we want to definitely give um and we want to shout out it's a lot of work but commissioner hill thank you okay so um you're all set then joe yes thank you very much thank you um then we i think we have time still to hear from um our cfo we're planning on about a half hour lunch break at 1230 commissioners if that works we have the infinite monitor coming in at one good good afternoon derek how are you i'm good thank you good afternoon madam chair and commissioners i'm joined today by members of the finance team agnes bolier douglas o'donnell noelle lowe and john skelly and we are here to present to you the third quarterly budget update of the fiscal year 22 gaming control fund budget the massachusetts gaming commission approved an f y 22 budget for the gaming control fund of 33.02 million composed of 27.12 million in regulatory costs and 5.9 million in statutory required costs the fund required an initial assessment of 29.3 million dollars on licensees after balancing forward f y 21 revenues the assessment was reduced to 27.26 million um and the commission also approved an additional five million dollar assessment on licensees for the public health trust fund the first two quarterly updates we increased spending projections in the fund by 54.6 thousand um we also increased revenue projections by 338.3 thousand um through the first two quarters uh sorry about that like duplicated the combination of spending increases and revenue increases resulted in a projected surplus of 20 283.6 thousand in this update the third quarterly update we recommend we are updating spending projections by 170.6 thousand and we're also increasing revenue projections by 463 thousand page two of your packet has a table which um we'll discuss some of the changes uh to the spending increases um we it's actually a combination of increases and decreases but an overall increase so we are increasing our turnover savings by another 125 000 which brings us closer to a total of 750 000 on the year we continue to see um people moving in and out of the office as well as delays and hiring um we're decreasing our travel projections by 10 000 to date we have spent only 25 percent of our total um travel budget we do anticipate some people come in towards the end of the year with full year travel requests so that's why we're only reducing it by 10 000 uh we are decreasing our contract employees spending by 40 000 um we think that'll leave a small buffer through the end of the year in case we need our contracted civilian investigators to step up efforts throughout the last quarter of the year um fringing indirect is an assessment a percentage assessment of a and c so that just carries down from the savings of our contract employees and our full-time employees independent monitor expenses um our 505 000 and that reflects the invoices paid during january february and march it does not necessarily reflect the effort in january february and march as we operate on the cash base modified cash basis of accounting um we are decreasing msp straight time by 300 000 even though we're projecting additional um uh savings there because the team is down close to eight fte's um as you look at people coming in and out so we anticipate they'll need some of the savings that we're projecting for overtime at this time um in the plainville geu we are increasing their costs as a result of conversations with their town administrator and their chief that they had not been charging off the full cost of the geu to um the to us as the gaming commission we've given you a overview of some of these detailed costs in your two by twos um we can open it up for a further discussion at this point if you'd like to on the spending areas chief lennon if i think you just happened maybe i don't think it was purposely skipped over the 10 indirect just a reminder um that's not a very big amount there but overall it's over two million dollars in our in our full budget so per attachment a um in your packet have it up right now i'll i'll pull the oh wait i do sorry i keep getting lost on my computer here for attachment a in your budget um we pay a total of 2.26 or so million so it's 10 percent of all of the a c h j in you spending less the u o seven which are contract employees under um it so it is a big a big chunk of money um and the only reason it's only 20 000 here is because we have a lot of decreases in the a c and j but those are outpaced by the h consultant spending which threw the um the assessment up a little bit for indirect yeah can you on our list of to-dos have you circle back on indirect costs because i do think that's a continuing conversation we should have um in terms of advocating on our behalf there absolutely thank you in f y 22 licensing fees continue to stabilize um we're recommending a small overall fee projection um decrease which has to do with we're seeing just less billing um on the on the renewals for primary gaming vendors that's a good thing it means our team is getting much more efficient at what we're doing um and we're just seeing those fees go down a little bit compared to projections but we're seeing the employee licensing fees get back to where where we'd like to see them which means uh casinos are hiring and we're getting more people into those positions um the thought we are also increasing revenue projections by 505 000 to offset the independent monitoring expenses that we incurred during that period so it becomes a wash to all other licensees and the cost of baird um are borne solely by anchor boston harbour combination of the budget increases of 170.6 thousand and the revenue decreases of 463 thousand results in the gaming control fund having revised projection spending projections of 33.25 relying on revised revenue projections of 33.82 million this represents a projected surplus of approximately 576 000 in the gaming control fund at this point we're not recommending change in the assessment because any amount that we don't spend will be a credit to the licensees next year um funds at this point um if you have any questions um the whole team is here to answer them i will defer mainly to the team because of us as i've said many times i get the benefit of pulling the information together and reading while they've done all the um legwork behind the scenes any questions for Derek and his team no questions just an excellent report as usual good job of the whole staff and the meeting we had yesterday giving us an update was very very good thank you thank you yeah i would reiterate that the few questions that i did have um you know they they had the answers right at their fingertips and i was waiting for me to ask them so no questions thank you thank you excellent report i i um had the benefit of a very robust discussion and so thank you no questions that need to be addressed now but i do want to circle back on the indirect costs of that we that we paid um i think commissioner hill would be interested in that discussion as well uh given his past experiences of legislation all right it'll be good to have a john on our team too because he has the connections over at the comptrol's office for the discussion on um on indirect rates right you know what that that's absolutely true thank you uh we we knew you'd bring that experience to us directly and jay so thank you all right um we don't we don't vote on this today this is an update and uh next at the next um in june we'll have the the the budget to to vote on all right thank you they're excellent work thank you um john agnes dug in noel appreciate it okay and then i think what i'd like to be able to do um we have given notice to our legal team talk that um we might be able to get a bit more work done before our trial 30 break if that still works for folks are we okay all right commissioners thank you for hanging in there um we have um um the uh rewrecks for us to look at top good afternoon good afternoon we can go right over to kary who'll present these three for you she is good afternoon good afternoon madam chair and commissioners uh so we do have three regulations for you today first in your packet you have a draft of amendments to 205 cmr 133 this is the voluntary self-exclusion regulation uh along with a small business impact statement related to that regulation um the background on this is that director van der linden and his team have worked with it to develop an electronic app to be used submitting voluntary self-exclusion applications and maintaining the list as opposed to everything uh needing to be done on paper and these proposed changes update the regulation to include the use of that app so specifically the changes add language identifying the process for electronic submissions and maintenance of the voluntary self-exclusion list in addition to a couple of cleanup changes so um if you'd like i'm happy to walk through the red line um or director van der linden van der linden is also uh here if you have any specific questions so however you'd like to to handle this any questions on on this particular regulation no benefit benefit of the the discussions in um earlier um commissioner i heard no from commissioner hill and commissioner brian are you all set yeah the only question i had is more curiosity than anything else is when you redlined out problem and and and it's in replaced harm was there a legal reason for that or was that just more a word choice yeah i think go ahead i'm sorry okay um good afternoon um it's really just kind of updating the language it's a more commonly used term uh now so we are just kind of modernizing it okay thanks okay other questions just a statement that we had a hearing on this this morning and nobody um spoke uh for against the changes i think everybody's pretty cool with these moving forward as proposed apologies commissioner hill um the hearing was for the next two that i'll bring up i'm sorry uh this one is just um we'd be seeking approval to begin the promulgation process and then we'd have a hearing coming thank you care sorry about that i jumped up one so this right so this is going now to some public comment exactly yep this would be this is the first time you've seen it and then we begin the process and it will go through comment and we'll come back to you after after the hearing my apologies carry no no problem um i'm just looking when we do the public comment do we share we don't share the memo we just share the um the language right carrier do we share our memorandum as well i don't believe we have a memo for this one i mean no just the cover sheet oh the cover sheet um ordinarily we just post the regulation but we could certainly post the cover sheet as well if you like we don't have to but i do see this as an opportunity mark um and i just don't know the process well enough where um it's modern it's modernization of the language but there's reasoning behind it and Commissioner O'Brien raised a good point to the extent there is um a natural way to address that because it it does jump out at you right um there's an opportunity here if there's a mechanism for that opportunity okay well we've been speaking about the um the electronic version electronic app and and it's good to see the regulation now underway all right so we can move on to the next one or do we do you want us to act now or should we'll do at the end of all three commissioners um the motions i'm sorry uh chair just time the motions are slightly different for this first rig and the other two because of the where they are in the process that's right why don't we um why don't we do it one rig at a time do we have a motion commissioners hey i'll move that the commission approved the small business impact statement in version of 205 c mr 133 as included in the commissioner's packet and authorized staff to take all steps necessary to begin the promulgation process second okay where i'll set on comments and edits commissioner brian hi commissioner hill hi and i vote yes three zero carry thank you for that and thank you mark okay great so next in your packet you have a draft of 205 c mr 138.26 related to the licensees keys for dual locks along with an amended small business impact statement associate general counsel young brought this draft to you on march 3rd along with director van seniors supervising gaming agent tain and regulatory compliance manager carpenter and you voted at that time to begin the promulgation process a public hearing was held on this regulation this morning presided over by commissioner hill uh at which we received no public comment um and i can just take the second one as well if you'd like since they were handled together um the second one is a draft of 205 c mr 147 related to uniform standards of rules of the game along with an amended small business impact statement this was also brought to you on march 3rd at which you voted to begin the promulgation process and this was also part of the public hearing which was held this morning and we received no public comment so at this time we'd be seeking approval to finalize the promulgation process on these two regulations did everybody have a chance to remind themselves of this okay right and commissioner hill do you want to add your comment now uh there were no comments today pro or pro or con or con and um the physical inventory has increased to three up for the the keys file keys locking devices and we have bruce band here if we need any reminders as to why that was important as sterile i'll set commissioner uh go ahead bruce you want to up your unmute yeah not i have no additional comment really to add this was uh important to the industry uh in both cases yeah we're in good kick okay any questions for kerry all right so uh you commissioner brian christian held we can move on them separately or um together whichever is is fierce separate spine with me makes no two okay good so i will uh move that the commission approved the amended um small business impact statement inversion of 205 cmr 138.26 as included in the commissioner's packet and authorized staff to take all steps necessary to finalize the promulgation process second all right no questions at its commissioner brian hi mr hill hi and i vote yes three eyes thank you and i'm the last one i would move that the commission approved the amended small business impact statement inversion of 205 cmr 147 as included in the commissioner's packet and authorized staff to take all steps necessary to finalize the promulgation process second okay no edits all right commissioner brian hi commissioner hill hi i vote yes three eyes there we go um nice work uh to the legal team i know that judy's not here um recognizing her earlier work and kerry thank you for finishing it off thank you Todd um thank you thank you um so it is uh 1225 crystal i think that you let the uh racing division know that we probably would not be bringing up their matter before our lunch break um i would say that we reconvene in half an hour and our independent monitor will be joining us by that time we can probably even get started a couple minutes before one if they're all here does that make sense commissioners yeah karen is that does that make sense for your okay i got a thumbs up from her um you know thank you to everyone um who joined the meeting today uh so far it's we've covered a lot of territory and a lot of a lot of good work went into the preparation so that we could be swift today um and yet uh make meaningful decisions so thank you so much all right commissioners we'll see you um uh just about in the half an hour just five minutes of one and we'll get going again okay thank you i can't for not to leave the meeting thanks dave dave are we all set or do i need to do anything technically for you i think we should be good it looks like my screen has stopped sharing so sorry dave that was me oh okay i was gonna say i was like i didn't do anything but it looks like we're all set you guys are a team there we go um and i do see that the independent monitors team has arrived good afternoon everyone i'm going to um just remind the public that we are reconvening the gaming commission's public meeting number 378 today April 28th and because we are meeting virtually we'll do our roll call commissioner o'brien i am here commission of health present and we're all set and for those who are attending we are using the virtual format which is working ideally for today's meeting but the three of us are all actually sitting together so um ironically in front of our screens but it's nice to be in the the office with my fellow commissioners um good afternoon and we um are going to commence with the independent monitors resource and i'll turn to um um uh councillor montan nagrell alamonte uh to do the introductions hello alahandra how are you today doing very well um i'm sure how are you today well thank you and i think i see all of your team is here so i'll um i'll have you start with introductions and then we'll go right into your report um uh which i believe you have your power point and let us know if you need any assistance sharing there terrific thank you we will i think we we're prepared to navigate it but um should we have any technical difficulties uh we would definitely appreciate the support thank you so much it's wonderful to see you this afternoon um virtually again becoming our customary form of meeting but it is wonderful to at least be able to see you um i do want to introduce our team who i think you know are no no strangers to this to this audience but we have uh an sultan who's a colleague with me here at miller and chevalier as is katharine pappas nicole gochabye and alex volio and preston pew who is with curlin mooring and also a member of of our team so we look forward all to speaking with you today and presenting our our latest observations nice to see you preston alex if you wouldn't mind projecting the the slides and we'll get started so as you know we're here to report on our phase three what we call our phase three report um we're now two and a half years into the monitorship and have been consistent with the decision in order providing updates uh to the commission on at least an annual basis this time i think it's a little different we met an interim report um back in september and we look forward to providing an update from that interim report um to you today so if we start um with the agenda we're going to begin just to reorient ourselves with the goal of what um our phase three review was we're going to walk over uh an overview of some company changes that we've seen which you know typically uh in this case involve personnel changes we will summarize for you the review and testing activities that we conducted over this period will provide some overall observations both where we think things are going really well and where we continue to see opportunities of improvement for improvement and then we're going to go as we've done in the past we've high level um summaries of each of what we call the hallmarks right all of the elements the compliance program that we've been monitoring and testing um to give you an update on where on where those stand we'll conclude with general observations and though we have q and a listed here last we absolutely welcome questions and comments from you during the course of our presentation um it really does make it more enjoyable at least for us to be able to have a conversation on these important topics so if we can go to slide three our uh goal for this phase consistent with what we've done in other phases is of course to continue now to evaluate the company's implementation of recommendations that we've made in the last two annual reports um there have been a number of recommendations that have been made that have required a significant lift from the company um and we're you know happy to see the company making progress and implementing um really the majority of those of those recommendations at this point to remind everyone what it is that we consider the key elements and this is based of course on Department of Justice and other agency guidance on what constitutes an effective compliance program in this instance a human resources compliance program we start first with the culture of compliance and conduct at the top and that's evaluating board and executive management commitment not just by words but also by action to principles of an effective uh HR compliance program we also look at proper authority oversight and independence which goes to how the company demonstrates a commitment to the program through resourcing of the adequate of the appropriate functions that have oversight and responsibility into management implementation of the program and also critically important is independence to be effective the roles and uh the functions that have oversight of our compliance program really need to be independent for management to be able to really drive compliance in a manner that is effective policies and procedures the structure of the program where the company documents its expectations on compliance ethics its values and the procedures that it develops to help drive those policies forward third party relationships in this context of course extends to traditional third parties consultants attorneys other externals that the company engages to provide services and also as we raised in our baseline report we include in this category the company's relationships with its patrons its guests that frequent its properties training and guidance is how the company trains and educates its employees on its compliance expectations and their obligations as members of when the personnel is when to drive these policies and procedures forward internal reporting investigation central of course to some of the issues that the MGC reported on in its decision in order is ensuring that the company has in place an internal reporting mechanism that allows employees to raise allegations and concerns particularly in this instance related to harassment discrimination of all kinds and more importantly that it has an appropriately resourced and experienced investigation function different functions can play these these roles starting with employer relations in HR to timely and effectively investigate allegations that are raised incentives and discipline is a category that you know we see many many companies really try to understand is how to incentivize compliance when of course the expectations and employees are going to behave in an appropriate manner and then of course importantly to discipline in a way that is appropriate uniform consistent across the organization and critical for all compliance programs but of course in this instance is really understanding that no one is above discipline that policies and procedures apply to executives across and all employees and personnel across the organization risk-based reviews require companies to review its risk profiles around its compliance around compliance areas and then of course to monitor and test its program to ensure that the risks that are identified are properly mitigated and that its program is operating as it should and then lastly controls environment which in this case review as a combination of the policies and procedures that the company is developing to govern its HR issues and to oversee them and also corporate governance issues that really reflect how the executive management how leadership governs itself and how it holds itself accountable to the principles and values that it's setting forward in its HRC thing. We can go to the next slide so over the course of the monitor ship we've seen a lot of changes in business some organic some which of course we've all experienced as a result of a global pandemic that hopefully we're soon starting to come out of most notable in this phase we saw some ongoing changes to senior management we saw of course the departure of mathematics as one resort CEO we saw the addition of an executive director of global compliance or the replacement rather of that function critical to this role we have a new the company has a new president at EVH a new executive director of HR also at EVH a new executive director of security and investigations again at EVH so a lot of the leadership team that has been central to driving and managing this program we've seen a shift in in the Boston property and in Las Vegas a new president who's not new to the organization and not new to the property but of course Brian Goldbrands who left Boston to return to Vegas. I do want to pause you know it's a significant turnover a lot of the turnover has come in areas that are relevant to the HR function but I you know I do want to pause to comment on the departure of mathematics which of course was a significant change we spoke to many employees at all levels of the company and across both properties we had of course spoken with mr. Maddox quite a bit during the course of our of our monitor ship and you know we were quite pleased to hear employees at all levels say many positive things about mr. Maddox especially about his commitment to employee well-being during the pandemic and in fact many of the employees with whom we spoke especially in Vegas credited mr. Maddox with real cultural changes on issues related to corporate values that touch on the HR the HR program so of course we're quite interested to see that the commitment that grew under mr. Maddox continues to be reflected in the new leadership we have of course spoken to to Craig Billings the new CEO and are pleased to see that the commitment that we saw when we first started two and a half years ago we see that commitment reflected in conversations that we've had with mr. Billings so we look forward to seeing him continue to build upon what the changes that we're seeing in place the company has been actively recruiting at all levels of the organization and I think as many industries have seen there's been a lot of turnover and employees a lot of opportunities for hiring at both properties there's been a significant emphasis on ensuring that the numbers ramp back up to be able to to serve as fully operating properties we can go to slide five please Alex the type of activities that we engaged in during this phase again are similar to what you've seen in the past I do think numbers tell a story once just into the depth of the activity of the testing activity that we've undertaken and also to the cooperation that we've received from the company monitorships do require a lot of resource support from from the company being monitored and in this instance just in this last phase alone we've reviewed approximately 400 documents that were produced by various different departments within the company we were really pleased to be able to return in person to conduct some of the testing that we had to pause at least in person during the pandemic and we're able to conduct 37 on-site interviews um six virtual interviews you know one of the things that the pandemic has taught us is we can continue to to meet virtually and we were able to do that with personnel both in Boston and Vegas while we were on site at both properties we conducted a total of 44 employed focus groups and just to remind everyone that is a truly a random selection of employees across both properties grouped by functions that there is some similarity in their experience that allows us to have conversations with employees on how they are experiencing and perceiving the changes that the company's making to the program the focus groups take two parts one is a conversation that's facilitated by members of the monitor team focused on the areas that we report on in that we report to you and then there's also a confidential written survey that goes through the key aspects that we're interested in gleaning and we've now done two sets of focus groups as you've seen in the report we're able to start reflecting where there is movement where there is a movement across our areas of focus we were able this time finally to participate in a board a meeting of the board of directors we did so virtually but we're able to see board engagement rather management reporting to the board on some of the HR program aspects that we're interested in seeing in that you know we hope to see the board continue to receive information on and more importantly engage proactively on and we continue to observe compliance committee meetings and for both of these meetings we of course attend the portions of those meetings that are relevant to our to our program to our monitoring we had reported in the past on the internal audits risk assessment process and testing of the company's HRCP we're now in the second cycle the company's down the second cycle of that process and we were able to observe 11 we were able to shadow 11 interviews conducted by the company's chief audit officer as part of the as part of their HRCP assessment program so really valuable for us to be able to see how the testing how the company is testing its own program from an audit standpoint if we can go to slide six please so the overall I think the message you know over the past two years continues to be a positive one we have seen the company continue to make meaningful improvements in key areas of the HRCP and what's important for us is that we're seeing this progress both in regards to our recommendations and more recently we're encouraged to see the company taking ownership and developing their own initiatives to help continue to build to build the program and you know we really do think the company should feel quite proud of these efforts as should the commission of what the company is is accomplishing specifically we've seen the company strengthen its compliance committee which is an area that was of keen interest both to the commission and to us they've done that through the addition of a new member of the committee who comes with significant combination of HR and related corporate government experience we've seen this addition really enhance the committee's independence which is something that we commented on in our baseline report and really have already seen engagement on a deeper level on HRCP related issues I think that's a combination both of folks already on the committee having more experience with these issues but certainly the addition of a new committee member has helped bring a deeper focus on the core core aspects of the program the companies continue to make significant updates to its policies and procedures reflecting our recommendations we've seen the strength and preventing harassment discrimination policy and updated and enhanced internal investigations and procedures policy also importantly an update to the policy on employees interactions with guests in third parties we highlight these because they really are the policies that are at the core of addressing issues risks related to harassment discrimination and you know it's not just enough to update the policies we also want to make sure that employees are aware of the changes and the company as we'll discuss later has engaged in proactive rollout and communication through different ways of the changes to these policies they've expanded the company already had trainings on harassment and discrimination they've expanded on those trainings most finitely they've developed some focused trainings that address key risk areas that we've discussed before primarily interactions with guests and also around internal investigations focused on those groups that are responsible for responding to allegations and investigating them and then last and certainly not least we really have seen the company increase its proactive and I'll say organic communication on HRCP issues you know they've taken advantage of their expansive communication channels that they have with employees they've leveraged the we shifts which are the meetings that managers have and supervisors have with teams as they begin their shifts through those communications reinforcing HRCP messaging they've also creatively initially developed what they call pop-up compliance events and these are you really just pop up in back of house set up a table and showcase policies to bring incentive and awareness to core HRCP policies they do that through having quizzes and you know maybe giving a starbucks gift card you know just to really incentivize engagement on these issues and we've we've seen pictures and and they look quite lively if we can move on to slide seven and of course you know this continues to be a work in progress and you know I think you know in many ways the easier part of the exercises is nearing the close which is the design of the program now we really will be looking at the enhancement and maturing of the program what the company is building and more critically really testing that the program that the company is built is sustainable right so that the effort that it has put into the last couple of years survives not just the monitorship but you know the current leadership and really is able to operate on its own through succeeding leaderships and management teams so what do we mean by that and you know we turn back to the critical questions that we take from the doj guidance on compliance on evaluating an effective compliance program and in this space the doj really asks three questions the first one is the core it is is the corporations compliance program well designed it then goes on to ask is the program being applied earnestly and in good faith and the third question is does the corporations compliance work in practice the company's been working for the last two and a half years on that first question right they've been working to design the program we're now focused and the company should now be focused on the second and third prongs of the doj's criteria so really what that m