When it starts counting, I'll open a meeting. Okay, it is 10.35 on Wednesday, August 7th, and I am calling the meeting of the governance, organization, and legislation committee to order because we have a quorum. I first want to thank Evan for taking over the meeting, running for a few meetings while I was away. And the next announcement I have is our first or second order of business on the agenda. The proposed resolution supporting an act establishing Medicare for All in Massachusetts will not be heard today. The counselor sponsor cannot be at the meeting. And so we will be postponing that until she can appear at the meeting per sort of our GOL guidelines of when we consider resolutions and other measures for clarity, consistency, and actionability. We always aim to have the sponsors of those measures in the room. And she is aware of that and has approved the postponement of this item. So that brings us to discussion and vote on revisions to town council rules of procedures regarding work groups. I had a nice conversation with Evan yesterday, so I understand what is in our packet is what was hard worked on at the last meeting along with a fellow counselor, Cathy Shane, who was sort of in the rules of procedure at hot committee, the proponent of this. And so how do people, I assume people have read this. Does anyone have any initial thoughts or comments on the current draft? You make it a lot easier for me if the answer is no. I am not seeing anything from anyone, so I have one. I have one. But I wanted to see if anyone else had anything first. Comment. I'll preface it with my understanding is there's a potential desire to send this to the council. I know two weeks ago when I was here I had moved to delete the section completely. I will not be doing that today. I'll have that fight at the council level. But the section D that has been changed to, I think it now reads the originating body shall appoint all work group members. I am concerned that that at least at a minimum as it relates to when the town council as a body forms a work group violates our charter that indicates that the president of the council shall be the appointing authority for all committees of the council. I do not see how even with a different name this group of people can be considered not a committee of the council. It is specifically indicated it is not a committee of the town. So that leaves it to be a committee of the council. So I think D as worded right now at least as it applies to town council created work groups violates the charter. So I would argue for some sort of revision to it at a minimum to address that. I'm not sure how to deal with essentially subcommittees of town council committees and how that relates to who appoints subcommittees of town council committees given our charter requirement with committees. But so that that's my one concern with the language that we've got here. Originally we were going to make it the cheer of the committee, right? You could say president and or chair, I mean do that way, but there was an argument to be made for the entire body being involved. I think the assumption was that the entire body would be involved, but originally I think we had it as the chair would appoint. Is that right? Evan? So my original draft of this had the chair appointing and we changed that at the last meeting at the very end of the meeting. And I was actually going to look to my colleague counselor Ryan for his memory of why we decided to change because I couldn't quite remember what the rationale was. I think this is an interpretation of what was being said, but there some I think have a maybe just a constitutional fear of a chair's power. I didn't find there was a particularly compelling reason other than just I guess a desire on the part of some, not necessarily my desire to ensure that whoever was appointed was appointed with sort of the agreement or consensus of the entire body. I think we've flourished and done quite well under the current system. So I don't have a problem with the chair making the appointments, but I got the sense that we made the change to accommodate a certain uneasiness I guess I would say on the part of some towards having one person making these appointments. I don't share that. I had no problem with the chair making the appointments. I think any decent chair makes appointments by consulting their colleagues and with their colleagues in mind. So I don't know if that helps Evan, but I don't, there wasn't a long or complicated argument, but for some reason I think largely due to uneasiness on some towards one person making that decision, I guess is the best way I could put it. Steve. So the way that I read this is when it says the body appoints, then the body uses whatever the culture is that they've established. So if it's a group that works by consensus, then it will do what George is describing, or if it's a group that works, not through consensus, but through consultation, then it will work and it will default to the president. So I have no problem with the way that it's worded because I think that it doesn't suggest that the body itself will vote on this. It just says that the body will make the appointment. So right now the president makes appointments for the body called town council. I guess I think there's a difference between something saying the body appoints and a person appoints. And when the body appoints, to me I read that as there is a vote of the entire membership on the appointment similar to how we do planning board and ZBA and other appointments like that right now, versus a president appointing, say, or a chair appointing where there is no vote of the body, there is just a, this is who's going to be on the committee. And I still, when you look at our charter, find the page, but at least as it applies to committees of the council, the president shall appoint members of and oversee all committees of the town council, whether standing or ad hoc. That uses the same word, appoint. And I just don't, I'm still having a problem, trouble reconciling the charter where this says the president shall appoint all members of committees of the council with this language here that says the originating body shall appoint all work group members. I think they conflict, Evan. So this is not one that I have terribly strong feelings on. I think, and again I'm trying to remember exactly what the argument was in our last meeting. The only note in the minutes from it is actually Kathy said trust the chair, work with the members, be collaborative, which is counter to the decision we ended up making. So I'm trying to piece this together. I think that one of the things we were thinking of is it permitted some flexibility for committees to decide. So I think we have three options. One is to leave it how it is right now and expect that perhaps there is a conflict. Two is to change it back to the chair with the expectation that chairs are elected by their committee and therefore should be working collaboratively with their committee and not trying to make their committee mad because they can always be replaced. And so there'll still be some openness. The other option is if the concern is a potential charter conflict, you could have the president appoint for work groups created by the council and council committees appoint for work groups created by committees. It's a little messier, but it at least maintain. All of our committees right now are five members, which is a manageable number. I am a little worried about figuring out the process of the full town council, all 13 appointing work group members. I could envision GOL working together to appoint work group members, but the full council might be tough. And it also because the full council meets only every other week, it might drag out the process. The chair or the president appointing could actually speed things up because they can do that on their own time as an individual, whereas the committee, if it's gonna do it as a committee, has to do it within a public meeting. So I think that I'm thinking work groups created by the town council should not be appointed by the full town council. It feels a little bit messy and wieldy and inefficient. I'm more okay with it for committees. The question becomes, do you wanna have a separate rule for each? Or do you wanna just say, you know what? The chair or whatever the body is appoints. That's on Evan's three options. George. Don't think we want to, I think we wanna resolve this here. If we can all at all possibly do it so that this can move forward. I think there's a sense that this is something that at least needs to be decided upon by the council. One way or the other fairly quickly. I think that's the sense I have. So I have no problem with the chair doing the appointments and the president would be the appropriate person to make the appointments for the full council. So if we could somewhat awkwardly put that into a single sentence, I would be satisfied with that. I don't know how the others feel. I don't know how the chair here feels. I guess I would ask the chair if she were to revise this, what would she suggest? Or what would she suggest? She may not wanna suggest anything. I think I'd suggest keeping it sort of the same structure for no matter what body is the originating body. So I'm not at this point in favor of if the originating body is the town council, it's one sort of rule. And if the originating body is a committee of the council, it's sort of another different type of rule. I think I'd try to keep them parallel. I guess, and I think it's cleaner if the purpose of a work group is to be able to move quickly, which I believe has been one of the arguments for this over say subcommittees or ad hoc committees. I think you move quicker if one person has that authority than if an entire body has that authority. So I would probably reword D to read the presiding officer of the originating body shall appoint all work group members. That language then tracks other places in the rules where we used when things dealt with both committees and the council as a whole, we used the word presiding officer instead of chair or president because they have different names. That strikes me as an elegant and simple solution. I don't know how the others feel, but you would simply read then the presiding officer of the originating body shall appoint all work group members. Still a fairly simple straightforward sentence. And I think presiding officer is a fairly clear descriptor. It would not satisfy anyone who was for whatever reason uneasy about putting too much power in the hands of one person, but that can only do so much. So it would change what we had come to an agreement on last time, but as Evan has pointed out, we're both struggling to remember why we made this change. And so I would suggest Mandy's solution is a simple and elegant one. I would endorse it. I would support that. And then we would probably want to also for consistency change 10.5e to be the presiding officer designate. Yeah, I was gonna make that same suggestion. Steve, I'm curious whether we need a vote or... I don't think I can say this. I support the direction. Okay. So that sounds like... The presiding officer shall... So that means by consensus we've reached that D will read the presiding officer of the originating body shall appoint all workgroup members and E will read the presiding officer or designee of the originating body shall preside over the workgroup until a chair is elected. So we've replaced the word chair in E, the first instance of chair in E with presiding officer for consistency with the rest of sort of the rules. So just if I may, so operationally, let's say that it is... Operationally, let's say it is decided that there should be a public art workgroup who decides who the originating body, maybe that's overthinking this. So what happens if three committees decided to have a public art workgroup? Then in theory there may be three public art workgroups the way this is written. Okay. So I thought about that because in theory the public art workgroup could come from finance or from CRC, right? Yeah, exactly. And the only real option would be that one of those committees would decide to not be the originating body. That's a little messy, right? Because the chair of the originating body appoints and so there's power in that. So I don't know that there's a good solution to that. But right, so if it could be one of those things where whoever meets first is the originating body who creates it and then the other committee just goes along with it. And there's enough overlap like because we've had this discussion, this exact discussion. So Andy and Dorothy for example are both on finance and both on CRC so there's enough overlap that actually we have the chair of, right now we have the chair of finance so that discussion can happen but there might be another example where that's harder. Right, I mean so one of the reasons that we came to the brink of deleting this in its entirety two weeks ago was there's, I think that there are probably some flaws in the workgroup concept generally and that was one of the ones I struggled with using that exact example was well what if a workgroup's gonna come from two committees and I didn't have a good solution and so I sort of just let myself live with that flaw but if other people have an idea, I'm open to. You have to have an originating, originating body. A secondary originating body. I think that the, at least as I envisioned it, these are created because there's a felt need by a particular body, whatever that body may be whether it's the full council or CRC or whatever. There's a felt need to look in more detail at a specific issue and part of the description here says that you must spell out exactly what it is that you're looking at and what you expect to get from that workgroup. So I can envision a possibility where one committee on a particular topic like public art wants to look at X and another committee wants to look at Y and seems unlikely but it's not inconceivable that they both could create workgroups and that doesn't seem to me to be a problem as long as they follow the guidelines if they both end up describing it the same way and they both create a workgroup that has the same sort of focus and expected result then I think common sense would hopefully reign but it's unlikely this would happen but I don't see it as a problem because the whole purpose if this actually comes about is to assist a particular body in doing its work and it allows flexibility and it allows drawing on a larger pool and these are all good things and so I wouldn't worry too much about that problem I think. Isn't that part of our, isn't there somewhere in the, in Shalini's, we deleted the creativity one, didn't we? I did have one question about the role or place of staff and whether that's something that we would always expect or again do we just leave that to be determined by the originating body, would we always expect that there would be a staff member appointed or is it that we assume that often that will be the case but we're not going to make it actually part of the description? So I don't think for council committees you can ever expect a staff member to be appointed to assist because that is entirely up to our town manager on whether he believes it's worth it or not in some sense unless we were to appoint our own clerk of the council as a staff manager that those are the only two people we as a council sort of have any sort of authority to appoint to assist us. I see work groups as not really getting staff members if they're meant to assist the council and a committee of the council in getting something done I'm not necessarily envisioning staff members being liaisons to them separately from whatever staff might do for the committee as a whole. I mean we sit in GOL and I don't think we've really ever had any staff liaison in some sense. I wouldn't expect if we created a work group for some specific purpose that we would automatically get a staff member, Steve. So good point because CRC is staffed with the assistant town manager but you're absolutely right that we're the legislative body so we don't have the authority to commit time of anyone other than ourselves but we may wanna add a line that town staff may serve ex officio at the discretion of the town manager or something like that so that it doesn't preclude a staff member like if we wanna deal with an issue say dealing with marijuana it would make sense that the economic development director would be part of that work group but we can't appoint him but the town manager can so am I over complicated? Evan? So I think the most we can do for a council committee is say town manager or designee as our liaison. We can't, we don't have any control and we can't tell a non-town manager or clerk of council per our charter to do anything for us that's prohibited by the charter so we can't if it's a town committee we might have some authority but that would have to be at the sort of agreement of the manager our charter prohibits us from sort of delegating any work to town staff. Steve? Yes, if I may again so when the CRC was formed we all agreed that it will be five, five of us but then the town manager basically appointed the assistant town manager to be the liaison to that so that's nothing that's not a decision that anyone we ever made so and really what he does is he sits in and answers questions when asked or helps provide direction but so I think maybe I'm overthinking it that of course the town staff someone from the town manager's office can participate as useful. Evan or George? The other thing that I thought was attractive about work groups that this doesn't highlight but doesn't exclude and maybe that's fine the way it's stated is that it could include members of the public in other words and this simply says and maybe this is fine as it stands includes members who are not counselors and then may include counselors who are not members of the originating body. Does anyone else besides me feel the need to be more explicit about that or do you feel that this is fine as it stands? That's I guess my question. So our last meeting actually one of the recommended changes to language which came from Councillor Shane was for that sentence to say that includes members of the public staff and others or there's something like that as members of this committee know I don't particularly like example lists because they can feel exclusive even if they're not intended to be and then there are sort of a lot of we also had some questions about well like do they have to be residents of Amherst, right? To serve in a work group so we might not want to say residents members of the public though that sort of and so I actively chose to actually ignore that suggestion in place of something that cast in my opinion a wider net and just said it includes people who are not councillors and however that might be defined whoever falls into that so I intentionally left that a little bit vague but you know we can also I'm open to changing it but I personally prefer not to sort of try to list out the types of people who might serve on these work groups. Steve? So do we need a word? The work group is defined as a temporary group that includes members who are not councillors it may include councillors who are not members. So do we need a word may? So this suggests that there has to be a members that are not councillors. Evan? So again one of the issues I've had with work groups to begin with is what differentiates a work group from an ad hoc council committee and the answer I got specifically from Councillor Shane was that a work group will always have members of the public on it. So if it's a group that does not have anyone who's not a councillor then it's just an ad hoc town council committee and so the reason one has may and one doesn't is because the kind of general feeling from the last meeting was that for a to be a work group it by definition has to include people who are not councillors otherwise it's just an ad hoc committee. Steve? Except a work group that includes, like let's say we're struggling with an issue whether you want to include, we really feel that there should be a work group work group. So we include Councillor Shane on that, but she's not on this committee. So wouldn't that fit the definition? So it's a subgroup of this group plus Councillor Shane. Doesn't that make it a work group? Evan? I mean we're making this all up right? But this has been from the beginning my confusion of what differentiates an ad hoc committee from a work group. In my mind that would be an ad hoc council committee. I see. But that's because there literally just needs to be some delineation between the two and where we came from was. I'll just point out the obvious of we've got a council committee that has members of the public on it. So again, I think that's, that brings us to, it sounds like we're kind of set about on this wording as best as we as a committee can figure it out to take it to the council. I think what we're struggling with is, is this something that should go to the council or not? That's what we've struggled with for a while on this whole differentiation between ad hoc committees and work groups. What I'm struggling with as chair of this committee is what does our motion look like to bring this to the council if we want the council to make the decision on whether work groups should even be a part of our rules as we were in one sense asked to bring back language to the council because I'm okay with this language if it's adopted as a work group but I'm not in favor of adopting work groups because I don't, so I don't know what a motion that successfully moves it out of this committee to the council as a whole for decision looks like if there are more than, well frankly, if there are just one other person sitting here today that has sort of a similar opinion of me because I can't vote for a motion that says I recommend the council adopt this language because I don't favor the adoption of this language. But I can vote for a motion that says, but I don't know what it says that says I think the council needs to decide and here's the best language this committee can come up with and I think we're nearing the point where we've got the best language we as a committee can come up with if we were to adopt work groups and we're struggling with what do we send to? I could be summarizing that wrong but Evan George, who's ready? The motion doesn't have to be a recommendation it can just be we move to send the draft work group rules to the council. We're not necessarily, they asked us to draft rules for this section. We are now sending them draft language but it doesn't necessarily, the motion doesn't have to include a recommendation to adopt it can just be a motion to send these to the council. Even if it were a motion to recommend the vote could be four to one, right? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. So I'm not. We've got four people here but if one. Okay it's three to one. It would have to be three to one but if someone else joins me then that motion fails then that's my concern. I don't want to prevent it from going to the council at this point because I think that's where that decision is made. Then we could revisit we could, well we have two options one is revisit the language of that motion and make it simply as Evan suggested or we could just do as Evan suggested right from the start and just send it to them without a recommendation. And that might be the simplest. I still have, I still, I mean since it seems to be boiling down the difference seems to be boiling down to work groups include members of the public and ad hoc committees are simply bodies constitutive councilors. Why don't we make that clear in this paragraph? And so simply say a work group is defined as a temporary group that includes members of the public because that seems to be, now if people aren't comfortable with that or if we can talk about it some more but unless I'm missing something that seems to be the key defining characteristic of a work group. So why not just highlight it or make it quite explicit and then we could just go ahead and present this to the council without recommendation just saying, okay you asked us to revise this we've revised it and here it is. And then each of us can speak as individual counselors for or against it. So I'm wondering are people comfortable or are my fellow committee members comfortable with making this more explicit since that seems to be the key difference or am I missing something and maybe it's best to leave it somewhat less explicit. Evan is members of the public vague enough? I know Councillor Shane in particular was interested in which we sort of already discussed but the option of having staff. I don't know if we would conceptualize staff within that context of members of the public. Well staff I think it's been suggested to us we really can't demand or require, right? We can request staff help, correct? Just basically we don't have the authority to say okay you and this department has to be on this work group. But we are saying that we are going to put members of the public on work groups. Yeah, the charter reference I've been one of the references I've been referring to is section 2.3b that says interference with administration, neither the town council nor any individual member thereof shall give orders or directions either publicly or privately to any employee of the town not appointed by the town council. And so I don't think we can say you have to be on this committee. That's how I read that. So we could put the town manager on the committee and write it as town manager or designee and then he could be free to designate someone else. That's how we've done it in the past. Not as a formal member but more of a staff liaison position. I don't think having town staff on a committee as though on a work group is what is thought of is differentiating it from an ad hoc committee though. That's, I think it is members of the public. And part of the driving force behind this at least in my understanding and makes sense to me personally is to try and get, tap into the resources of the town to assist the council on its work. And so repeatedly that seems to be what I'm hearing as a major purpose of this and hence members of the public. Again seems to me to be an explicit acknowledgement of that characteristic of this sort of body. But I'm just throwing it out there. We can leave it as it is. I'm just wondering if it makes sense to make it explicit and I can live with it either way but. Evan? I'm fine with members of the public. By consensus that wording now says a work group is defined as a temporary group that includes members of the public and may include counselors who are not members of the originating body, blah, blah, blah. We'll have to look at the, I think we might have in the rules had counselors capitalized throughout. I'll have to look it up. Should we just say non-counselors? Because members of the public. That's what we just got rid of members who are not counselors to go to members of the public. So the question is, which is better? Are there any other desired revisions to this? If not, I am happy to entertain a motion regarding work groups. I'll move to recommend the current draft to the full council for adoption. I will second that. So if I have this right, the motion by Steve, seconded by George is to move to recommend the current draft of section 10.5 work groups to the council for adoption. Is that accurate? Yes. Is there any discussion? I'm not seeing any discussion. So I will call for a vote. All those in favor of the motion to recommend the current draft of section 10.5 work groups to the council for adoption. Raise your hand and say aye. Aye. That is three in favor. All those against, that is one. And we have one absent. That is George, Evan, Steve in favor. Against, and Pat, absent. Evan. So I voted for this because I want this to go in front of the council. I do still have concerns with work groups generally. And my request, and I can of course help with this, is that our report outline perhaps some of the concerns that we had, including involvement of staff, including a potential conflict of two committees want to appoint. Just because I want to make sure the council has an actual debate and considers that and doesn't just see, oh, they recommended this, so it's good. My recommendation comes with hesitation and I wanna make sure that's reflected in the report. That councilor Evan wants to especially note that he voted yes to put this in play for full discussion. Yep, Evan. The one other thing that came up last time, specifically from councilor Shane, was whether or not work groups are subject to open meeting law. And my feeling is that they are.  I said that I didn't know. My understanding was that the full rules of procedure did not go before the town attorney, but did at least go to the town clerk and town manager to identify any red flags. Do we want to get some type of review of this to see if it would be subject to open meeting law before we necessarily give it to the council? Probably should have remembered that before we voted, but. So 10.5 ethics explicitly states it will be. Work groups are subject to open meeting law. My understanding of open meeting law is that if a committee or a body that is subject to open meeting law creates a body of two or more people, it is automatically subject to open meeting law. And so if the council or a committee of the council, both of which are subject to open meeting law, creates a work group that has more than one person on it, by definition a group, it is automatically subject to open meeting law. So I personally see no need to send it on to the town attorney for an opinion. But if the majority of this body desires that, I can at least request. Yes, Steve? Yeah, I completely agree with your, any, especially since we capitalized work group. In other words, that this is an actual, this is a thing and because it's a thing, it has some power and because it has that power that it's open meeting. But you just gave me an idea to do a work group of just one person, a member of the public. You could do that, right? Yeah. You could do it with assigning. I could, as we did with some other things, say, George, you need to come back with, or we did it with Evan. Evan, you need to come back with language. He doesn't have to notice a meeting for the time he's going to work on that language. It's one person. It's when it becomes more than one person that it's subject to open meeting law. Yes, a group is more than one person. Okay, I'll give you a worker. So, okay, I've got the notes. The report that is written and forwarded to town council, to the, yeah, to the town council will include a hopefully robust discussion as to everything we talked about over three or four meetings. I will obviously need Evan's help for the meeting. I missed, but I will make sure to include it so that it complies with our rules that say we have to include dissenting and minority views and opinions. But just a one or two cents, that's correct. You don't want me to go on and on on the negative, George. I'm going to see this, it's going to be... I did one report in one page. This one won't be one page. It's just the dissent, I can imagine. I always attempt to be as even-handed as possible. For the record, she is in fact, quite even-handed. So, we will attempt that to say, my goal is always to have them not know where I stood unless they read where I voted, that you couldn't read the report to figure out what side I was on. So, not always that good, but it's always an attempt. So, that brings us to, we've got about an, oh, Evan, one more thing. So, this wasn't on the agenda, and so we don't have to discuss it, but I want to just reiterate my belief that we should take another look at 10.4 ad hoc council committees to make sure that we specify what differentiates them from a work group now that we have actual work group language. So, perhaps as a future agenda item. So, I will, I do not see us getting work groups in front of the council prior to the second reading of what is currently in front of the council for revisions. So, I will put that on next meeting's agenda and the potential for those changes to go together up to the council then would be possible. So, that brings us to our next agenda item, which is consideration, discussion of town council policy for resolutions, proclamations, commemorations, and citations. My understanding is that the continuation is really the beginning of a full thought on discussion. We've heard a little bit of reporting from George about his conversations with Alyssa, but that there hasn't really been any in-depth discussion yet as to what type of policy we may or may not create. Is that accurate or somewhat accurate? So, George, in our last meeting, presented us with some definitions he came up with. We talked briefly about the concept of how far in advance we need to get resolutions, proclamations, but not necessarily with any result. And our discussion was fairly limited to just timelines versus anything else. Could someone brief me on whether a decision was made on timelines or any type of sort of closeness to what timelines were being discussed in general? My memory is it was two weeks. Is that even sound right? Someone has the minutes in front of them. I think that one thought was just that, unfortunately, these do tend to come sometime, they seem to come, at least to me. Suddenly out of the blue, and there they are in front of us, and the question came, well, are we then gonna say, nope, sorry, gotta wait two weeks until we look at it. And maybe the answer is yes. In other words, we have a hard and fast rule that, or as this is suggested, in other words, whatever, we would like to see them in advance. I think that was a fair statement. And at least two weeks because we don't meet every week. So, but we also acknowledged or I thought it was acknowledged that sometimes these will come at the last minute and they'll be time sensitive or might be thought of by some as time sensitive. And would our rule be, whatever rule we created, would it be hard and fast? Wouldn't you say, no, sorry. You didn't make the two week deadline. We haven't had a chance to look at it. So you'll have to wait another two weeks or whatever. So that I think was, we did not resolve that, but that was my memory of the gist of the timeline issue. We would like to have it in advance. We would like to look at them and, but sometimes they do seem to come or it's often they seem to come all just there they are. And we haven't seen them. And do we wanna insist that we do see them? And I don't know the answer to that. Was there any talk of, I look at the definitions and those definitions are very helpful. And for me, some of them seem less important to come before for an action ability and clarity sort of review. I look at a citation, for example, where you're just praising an action. There's no sort of formal town council follow up to something like that or policy that we're adopting per se is something like that. And I go back to, is that necessary to go through a committee? Or is it going through the president to get put on an agenda sufficient? Whereas a resolution opinion potentially expressing or adopting a policy or saying we support a specific policy seems a little more necessary or logical to come through a committee in my mind, a commemoration to remember something not necessary in my mind. I know I think we in our draft charge that did not pass attempted to pull out some of these from GLL review. If we're setting up a policy, maybe that's where they come and get removed from GLL review. If that's the desire of a committee or maybe we do want to see everything just to have time to look at stuff instead of them being presented to us the day of a meeting under the 48 hour rule thoughts. I guess in theory I'd like to see everything. I'd like there to be an expectation that these would be vetted by this committee. It would probably not take us that much time but I think we also have to acknowledge that the 48 hour rule could easily take place. And then I think it's a decision of the council. The council have to decide whether it wants to act or whether they would like to refer it to GLL for further review. But I think we should be clear. I'm suggesting that we'd be clear that these sorts of things should come to us, they should come to us two weeks in advance. That's what we'd like to have for us to just look at them and sort of set that expectation, set that bar. Acknowledging that there will be times when it won't be followed and then it's a matter for the council to decide. If they really have concerns, then they can send it to us if they're willing to deal with it on the spot. So be it rather than trying to sort of go through this and pick out the ones we want to see and the ones we don't want to see. We define what they are and we ask that under normal circumstances, they be sent to us as a courtesy for us to look at for these three criteria and leave it, keep it that way. It's my thought. Steve. Well I was just gonna say that the president always sets the agenda, even the 48 hour agenda, right? So the only part that we could insert something, we don't really have a mechanism for changing the agenda. We don't vote on the agenda, which, so, and we should, but so the only place that we could insert this would be council comments, but then it's not actionable. So I mean, the only place that we could get around the agenda is for council comments, but then it's not actionable. But I agree with George that we should see everything. There's nothing, even the regular things that happen every year, there's virtually nothing that's an emergency. Yeah, virtually, there may be some exceptions.  Quite a clarification. When we were using the words we, we were referring to this committee, GOL, right? Yes. And so the thought is, so right now our charge, we only see bylaws and resolutions. We were going to exclude commemoration citations and proclamations. The conversation we seem to be having now is about maybe including those, which is also not just a conversation about a policy for them, but also a revision to our, that would require a revision to our charge. Right, and so it's certainly possible that if we do go down that route, or we recommend a policy on resolutions, proclamations, citations, commemorations, we also might need to be recommending a revision to the charge. And so George, another clarification. When you were saying two weeks before they send it, two weeks before GOL sees it, or two weeks before the council's expected to vote on it? I would guess it would be two weeks before they expect, and two weeks before the council meeting at which they would want this to be acted upon, which hopefully would allow us enough time to look at it. And we could meet if we had to just to do that. So I guess the thought was two weeks before the actual council meeting at which this would be presented. Because that's probably what they'd be paying attention to if they're paying attention to anything would be the council meeting where this would be presented. So we would expect to have it two weeks in advance of that date. I think Evan raises a good point that having to change the charge yet again is not it. We haven't yet changed it. Okay, all right, so changing it. It's not, then I guess it just raises the question, which I think is a good one.  I think it's an open question and a fair question. I'm thinking that we should see everything, but Evan rightly points out that the charge actually limits it to bylaws and resolutions. So a strong case could be made for leaving it that way. And we've now defined or tried to define what else there could be. And those things simply would not be anything we'd look at. And we would confine ourselves to resolutions and bylaws. Steve. So the Massachusetts flag, that was a resolution. I don't want to change that. Yes. And we got pushback from that because we had two days notice or whatever, and we got pushback. So I think the two weeks, because I know that this is resolutions we've already more or less agreed on, I think. But I can see any of these having problems that we don't anticipate. So just put it out there for two weeks so that people can, that the public is at least aware that something's, like, what if we commemorate? We think we're commemorating. We're doing a good job commemorating something, but we haven't fully vetted it. Evan. So at the end of the day, I probably would prefer we see everything. I would argue at least three weeks. They should be submitting at least three weeks before they expect council vote, only because so if they submit it two weeks, I worry about a situation in which we have a very full agenda. And if they submit it two weeks, maybe even a month, to be honest. And the reason being, I don't want to put burden on people, but I also don't want a situation where we have a really full agenda and we have to get something and then all of a sudden we get a resolution and we have to do it in the next meeting. It'd be nice to have a little bit. Two weeks is very tight. There's also, in the month of July, we had actually a fairly big gap, I think, between our two meetings. And given where the council meetings fell in July and where our meetings are, I don't think two weeks actually would have been sufficient. So it might make sense to give ourselves a little more buffer. And I think that we would want the time, but we could also make exceptions when there's something time sensitive. So when we had the thing for the first Congressional Church, we had that resolution, that was very time sensitive because they were literally going the next day. And so that's something where you could waive it. But other things like the flag or those weren't super pressing and could have been put off another meeting. And so I think we understand that there's times when we would waive that, but I'd actually rather give ourselves a little more time than two weeks. So I think I support Evans more than two weeks. As chair, I'm thinking when we set up at least this year's meetings and eventually we'll set up the upcoming year's meetings, we pretty much meet two days after a council meeting. Council meetings are generally two weeks apart. So you could see it being presented to the president or submitted to the president, say, on a Monday of a council meeting for hearing at the next council meeting two weeks there. Our agenda is already posted by that time for a GOL meeting and it is generally the only GOL meeting that happens between council meetings. So I can see if we require only two weeks requiring hearing resolutions a lot on the 48-hour portion of our agenda or scheduling a separate meeting just for those items. And that also, in theory, potentially requires the president to continue referring them under her referral authority under our rules, her ability to refer because they are not substantive type referrals, I'm not sure what the wording and the rules are, where the last resolution was referred to us by the ROACT, the same mechanism she referred that one to. That works OK if we as GOL continue to maintain only a clarity consistency and actionability resolution review, there is potential in the future given what other things we were looking at that that might not be the only review. And there might be a resolution that comes up where the council doesn't want just a GOL review. It wants a review on substance maybe. And a two week time frame doesn't give the council the time to be able to refer it to whatever committee might be proper for a substantive review if the council desires a substantive review of a resolution thinking potentially of the 100% renewable resolution that was at town meeting at some point, where it's not just adopting or supporting a state act that Bill that's in the state house or something. So if we're going to write a policy for the council, I think four weeks might give us enough time to see it at a council meeting for a formal review and stuff and to not have to schedule lots of extra meetings. Steve? So maybe in support of even longer is I would love to seek committee meetings be once a month, which is actually across the river how they do committee meetings. So obviously some can't do that. But I think two weeks would then cause this body to have to meet every two weeks. But I think that your suggestion opens up to exactly allows for the possibility of less regular meetings. Steve? You understand Steve? Oh, sorry, George. He's alter ego. I wonder if, rather than getting into weeks and months and so on, we simply make it a policy that any resolution by law, and maybe we could add proclamation, citation or commemoration, be submitted to this committee before review before we submit to the council. Just make it just so when the president gets it, whenever she gets it, it goes to us. And if we're not meeting for a number of weeks, it's just the way it is. I mean, we could conceivably call a meeting if we wanted to. But the normal expectation simply would be that if you do submit a resolution, it goes to GOL. And we'll get to it when we get to it. We'll try to be timely. And in theory, we could call a meeting if we felt so if the chair desired it so. But most likely, it wouldn't happen until our next meeting whenever that was. And if it were something that were time sensitive, then the president of the council could simply bring it. And the council would have to decide what to do with it. Would that be a simpler solution to this? In other words, rather than trying to come up with a particular time, X number of weeks, whatever, before some date, we simply say that policy is that these sorts of things should always come to GOL before they go to the council. It is a simple solution in that respect, but for someone who has a time by which they want something passed, it does not necessarily give them guidance as to how early it needs submitted to be heard at the council meeting. It would need to be heard at in order to get it, say, adopted by the time they need. Say there's some event, like Juneteenth or something where they want to be able to present it there, saying, well, any resolution needs referred to GOL gives the public no guidance on, well, how early do I have to get it to the council in order to get it adopted after June 9th meeting so that we can present it at Juneteenth, for example. So while it's a simple solution, and that might be how we write or modify our rules of procedure, writing a separate policy that is helpful to guide the public on this, I think would be better with some sort of time frame. And I was trying to look up the rule about, I think we've got a rule that bylaws can't be considered by the council until the council shall not vote on any proposed bylaw until it has been considered by the GOL committee. We could certainly modify the rules of procedure to say the council shall not vote on any proclamation resolution citation or commendation or bylaw until it has. That's an easy change of the rules, which we might want to do if this is what we adopt. But if we're going to have a separate sort of page policy for the public, I think we need a time frame. So the public page might simply say something to the fact that since any resolution proclamation bylaw must be reviewed in advance by GOL, it's strongly recommended that the proposer submit their resolution citation. No later than, and then yes, you could insert three weeks, four weeks, whatever you felt was reasonable. So maybe the distinction, as you suggested, Mandy, is that there are the rules that we're going to adopt. And then there's the public, to the public policy, would be to note that rule and then say that any proposer should then submit their resolution or whatever. No later than X weeks. Yeah. I have a problem with that. So the four weeks would be sort of a guideline for if you're aiming for a specific adoption deadline. But rule, it's 8.6, could be easily modified to say to include all these other ones, including bylaws. I think given our experience to date, of course, we don't have anything out there for the public. But I do get the feeling that these are sort of just somebody comes up with an idea, they write it up, and then they bring it. And maybe over time, we can change that. But we may be fighting against human nature here that these sorts of things tend to just mush them up. And we're not trying to beat them down. We're not trying to create obstacles for people to present things to us. So I don't want it to come across as a barrier. But maybe others don't share that concern. But at the same time, we do really want to look at these things and think about them. We just don't want it. Because we've had the feeling, a number of us, that we've sort of been given something. And at that night, we have to sort of just make a decision. And we're not comfortable with that. So we do want an advance. We do want the public to know that. We don't want to create the sense that somehow we're erecting barriers to make it difficult or impossible. So there will be our rules. There will be our public policy statement that we strongly urge. But there will be the reality that maybe more times than not, people will simply not be aware of it or ignore it or just feel like, well, their cause is so important that. And 48 hours, it'll just be there on our desk.  And we'll have to deal with it. So I've got right now in my notes that whatever policy we're adopting would include the definitions that George has presented us. Would have a guideline for a timeframe to present it or submit it to the clerk and the president. Would modify, would propose a modification of our rules of procedure 8.6 about bylaws to include more. And would potentially include, would show that we want to see everything, obviously those two go together. That might require a modification of our revision of our charge. The question I now have is, do we want to put guidelines on what types of, say, citations say? And I start with that one because that's a formal public statement praising a person or persons for doing something that benefits the community, according to this definition. I guess it could be a citation for a group too. Do we want to talk about or put in, or propose rules that the town council adopt that say things like citations must relate to a person or a resident or a former resident of Amherst. I'm just making stuff up here or a group that is incorporated or doing business in Amherst or do we just want to leave it free for all? Do we want to put some limits on what types of resolutions, proclamations, citations, commemorations or some subset of that that the council is willing to consider? Steve. So one way to do that would be through action. So it simply comes to the GOL. Now this is a citation for someone in Hadley. We could just simply vote no. But GOL is not a substantive vote. Right, we could recommend that it's not actionable because they don't have any. So then. The current Amherst. Do we have any citations? We have had two citations. They were for the VFW as they were changing sort of their officers and both of the people that were leaving or two of the people that were being changed out whose terms were up were residents of Amherst. So they had requested citations for their service to the VFW. I think something along the lines that there must be evidence of a particular connection to Amherst. Well resolutions certainly don't. Some of them at least. Don't fit that description by any means. You don't have anything to do with her. So I don't think we can use it for resolutions. I think we could perhaps simply stretch action ability to use it as a vehicle for simply saying something does not seem appropriate to, it doesn't seem to apply to the town of Amherst or whatever. I mean we have a whole other debate about resolutions which perhaps is simply not even worth our time and trouble. But I think for the others, perhaps we can simply use our charge, the language of our charge as a way to deal with something that seems just not appropriate in the sense of rather than try and concoct a set of rules that could take us hours and hours and then almost certainly there'll be exceptions. Evan. So the first decision we have to make is whether we want the town council to literally vote on every resolution proclamation citation that's sent to us and then we just have an up and down vote and people can say, no, we're not gonna give a citation to, I don't know, right, who knows. Or do we want, and that's an option, right? We can just say the town council votes on everything and sometimes we vote them down. It's maybe not super efficient or a great use of our time to vote on anything even if it's ridiculous. But then the tricky question becomes how do you sort out what the town council votes on and what it doesn't? So a suggestion was made that perhaps GOL can help decide that. But that would be it, but maybe Joe brought up the fact that we're not substantive. So I think that if we were gonna do that, what we would need to do. So right now, we've defined actionable as a measure of we found actionable if it does not conflict with Massachusetts general law, the Amherst homeroom charter or any other law, by-law, or resolution applicable to the town of Amherst, right? We could develop a policy for resolutions, citations about what content the town council will consider and then amend our guidelines to add mass general law, homeroom charter, any other law, by-law, resolution or town council policy. And so we could then say we're considering something to be inactionable if it conflicts with an adopted policy of the town council. But that still requires us to create a policy. So I don't see GOL being able to say the town council can't vote on something because it's not actionable unless we, one, change what our guidelines are and two, I mean, obviously if it conflicts with the by-law or something, that's one thing. But if it's just something where like the town council shouldn't vote on this, we would need to amend both our guidelines but then also create a policy. And that can be tricky. So I don't necessarily know where I stand on that. I do like the idea is of if someone is going to decide whether or not the town council should vote on something, it rests better in a committee of five members than just the president because that's really tricky for her to have to figure out. But it puts us in a really delicate position because if, I'm gonna play Pat D'Angelo's because she's not here, but if some alt-right group came forward with a proclamation of white pride month, right, we don't wanna vote on that, right? Or I don't, but you can't say no, right? It puts us in a really delicate, it puts you in a free speech delicacy. Exactly, and so it might be wise to just say the town council votes on everything. So could we potentially have a policy here that says, you know, the charter allows a group of people to require a vote on a council item under article eight, I think it is. You need like 150 signatures or more to require a council action. Could we have a policy that might get us around this in terms of the free speech and it's not really getting around it, but a policy that says you need to have a counselor sponsor in order to have your resolution proclamation citation or commemoration heard by the council and referred to GOL by the president, say, or by whatever, that a counselor must sponsor it. And if a counselor is not sponsoring it, then your fallback is the charter article eight rules. Which is your group petition. Or the initiative, the group initiative that if you can't find one of 13 people to put their name on it, then you gotta find 150 or 250 residents to sign off to get us to vote on it. Is that a way to sort of deal with this? Well, it doesn't involve Amherst or it might involve Amherst or it's not a subject matter that necessarily, we don't wanna necessarily be seeing voting 013. I don't necessarily have a problem voting against a white pride month thing. If it's brought in front of the council, that vote might be 013. But maybe we want a policy that it needs a councilor sponsor. What are thoughts on that? Well, my initial response is very positive because one of the concerns I always have with this is that it just seems like anyone can just sort of come forward and present something to us. And somehow we're then expected to make a decision or judgment. This would at least place not a barrier, but just a reasonable requirement for council action that you have a councilor who is willing to put his or her name on it. And if that's not the case, there is another option which is in the charter that the individual can then pursue. I think in all the cases that we've dealt with to date, it's very likely there would have been a councilor who would have been willing to put their name on it. Perhaps even the flag. It wouldn't have been me, but that's not the point. And if there wasn't anyone, that would seem to be a reasonable check against wildly inappropriate or potentially frivolous actions. And they do have another option, which is to go out and get signatures of citizens, which is fine. So I find this an attractive suggestion. Evan? I would be supportive of this. I've actually, I think stated in the town council meeting that I think every measure before the town council should have a town council sponsor. And that the public should be using their district counselors if they're interested in getting something before the council. And that said, we would certainly, it does open up the perception of us erecting bureaucratic hurdles. Steve? Have there been measures that haven't had a sponsor other than the resolutions, commemorations? Has there been anything else that has not? I think what Evan might be referring to is the TMAC proposal that came in front of the council from a, because of the change over form of government, a defunct committee. I mean, part of the rationale for this is to help the council deal with its workload. And so it seems also quite reasonable from that perspective that things that we have to deal with should have some sort of council connection. It would also be an assist and a good argument for this requirement to help the council with its workload. Yes. Would this also then perhaps remove the need for or at least the immediate concern for creating a policy since the assumption would be that if a councilor were the sponsor that there would be at least some, I'm trying to choose the right word, some reasonable barrier has been passed. So that would remove from us the challenge of trying to construct a policy which would seem to be running into all kinds of questions and challenges about free speech and bureaucratic hurdles, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So I think what we're looking at in a way is potentially modifying rule eight of our rules of procedure. I'm looking at sort of even the first rule, 8.1, that says non-emergency measures proposed by laws and other measures shall be introduced in writing, be limited to one subject, which shall be clearly stated in the title, bear the name of the sponsor, be in the form necessary for final adoption. And then it goes on to say some other things. So we might, if we're looking at things like resolutions and all or potentially, as Evan said, or might argue for any measure needs a councilor sponsor. Obviously it might say bear the name of the councilor sponsor or comply with Charter Article 8 or whatever I think is Article 8, something like that. We might be really looking at modifying this legislative process rule to not just apply more logically to bylaws, but to sort of anything that comes to us. And then we might not need a separate policy versus just sort of a fact sheet for things like resolutions and things that members of the public are more likely to bring to us than other items. So it might just be creation of sort of a cheat sheet of if you're looking for a citation or this or that, here's your steps, find a councilor to sponsor it or comply with this sort of thing. And we recommend so many weeks in advance and we recommend this and sort of just a flowchart of that process, but maybe the solution is modifying this rule eight, looking closely at the legislative process and potentially modifying it to sort of work with what we've just discussed. And it might just not be rule eight that needs modified. I think we are realizing we might need to look at our charge, we might need to look at our own guidelines, we might need to look at a whole bunch of things, but doing it in that order, we've already got processes and rules and regulations in place, we might be able to fit it into that. So we've done, Georgia Definitions Force, we've talked about timeline, we've talked to some extent content and by which I mean how we can get around having to actually discuss content. Are there other aspects that we should be considering with regard to these measures? Are we agreed that we wanna see now in addition to resolutions and bylaws, do we wanna add these three proclamations, citations and commemorations, is that the consensus here that, which would require a change to our charge. I think I heard Steve say essentially that. I initially said that thinking that, not understanding our charge very well. I'm wondering what the other councilors feel or other committee members feel. Is that also agreed that we would need, we want to include them as well, see everything? I think on these issues we might be consensus on. I think the revision to our charge needs to be careful. I'm thinking about financial orders and everything that goes through FINCOM. I'm not sure we as GOL want to see sort of that type of measure. So I'm not sure how to finagle stuff, but we could get better at defining what measures we do want to see. But I think we're looking at right now an attempt for next meeting a draft revision of rule eight in some sense based on what we discussed here, a draft revision of our GOL guidelines on clarity, consistency and actionability and how we review them and a draft revision to our GOL charge beyond what's already sitting out there as the draft revision that we've approved and sent to the council as a whole that then got tabled to re-look at that one. Am I missing any draft revisions that we're looking at for this issue? Could you go ahead and say so, charge, draft revision? The charge, the GOL charge, the GOL guidelines modify rule eight. And we've got multiple sort of sets of rules of procedure modifications going on at the same time right now. And the other thing I just thought of is some sort of creation of a sort of FAQ for the public on specifically resolutions, proclamations and all of that. That might be what contains definitions. You know, that sort of document. Yes Evan? So as you've been talking, I wrote down, I combined the definitions with the things we were talking about and I just put it in our packet just so that we could have something in front of us that summarizes that could either become an FAQ or the rules themselves, it depends. But I do really like the idea of having those definitions up top to clarify for people what they're actually submitting. But that's in our packet for today now. Awesome. Sounds like Evan's created the start of an FAQ. George. And I don't wanna take work from anyone, but since I started the process of the definitions and it would seem to be appropriate as part of the FAQ, I'd be willing to, if that's appropriate, to be to sort of at least take on that task of beginning to create the FAQ. But that's just an offer. So let's have George look at what Evan just created and everything and work on that to try and turn that into an FAQ for our next meeting. And then I think I'll try and tackle the rule eight, GLL guidelines and GLL charge again. As a group of three, what do they have to look like to try not to confuse however many different versions of these rules we're now in process of modifying to keep the tracking straight. So I will tackle the rest of that for the next meeting. Are there any other comments, things to do with regard to resolutions, proclamations, commemoration citations at this time? I am seeing none from people. I am going to move to item seven on our agenda right now, which is the adoption of the July 24 minutes. Everyone have a chance to look at them. They are the ones you created, George. Thank you for doing them. Do I have a motion for them? I move that we accept the minutes for the last meeting, which was July 24th. July 24th. Is there a second? I'll second that. Are there any comments, discussion? I wonder if we create a citation later in honor of the minutes taker. Is that possible? I think you'll need a sponsor in that. That's true, and I don't think I'll find it. Can I sponsor? I can sponsor my own citation. You might be able to sponsor your own citation. We haven't created a rule to prohibit that. Dush ends on this. I'll move to a vote. All those in favor of accepting the July 24th minutes. All those against, we have zero, and we have one abstain is myself and one absent. Do you know that you can vote here if you weren't there? I do, but I try not to vote if I wasn't there. I had a problem doing that, because I wasn't there. Okay, so that brings us to, figured I'd get that over with looking at our time. We have public comment. There is no public here, so there would be no public comment for no one to make. That leaves us with discussion of the revisions to the adopted public ways policy to advise on flag raisings and commemorative flags, and potentially items not anticipated by the chair. Does anyone have anything that falls under that bullet? Nope, so we are up to public ways policy on flag raisings and commemorative flags. We have approximately 15 minutes left, so I think I'm gonna use it to start that with no illusions that we will not finish that today. Has George, you were gonna talk to Alyson this matter too, and I might be remembering that wrong. Yes, I did, and I believe in the document folder on the same document that has the four definitions, there's just some basic information, which I believe is accurate, I hope is accurate, but should be corrected if it's not, on just what flags are flown and when, and so I don't know if people had a chance to look at that. And in talking to Alyssa, my notes aren't extensive, but questions that we talked about briefly, which flag should you fly for how long? There is, according to Alyssa, commemorative flag policy, which may simply mean the list I've given you or there's a policy simply as a list of the flags and when they're flown. I think that probably is a policy. And she feels it would be helpful if only for the sake of the person who must raise these flags at particular times and places, and that we'd be clear on what, it might be worth our time, it may not, to try and come up with a policy for what you have to do to get a flag flown. And I think the recent example of the rainbow flag being an example could be something we could use as an example in the future. How should that work? Because I don't think there is a clear policy. So I think this is something that does fall under, as you were going through that, I was thinking is this really a council thing or is this more of an executive thing? But I'm thinking the polls are on public, the public way. So I guess technically it is our thing because we're the keepers of the public way. So that sort of clarifies my question as to is this really something that belongs with the council or the manager? Yeah. What are people's thoughts on trying to create or I guess it would be to amend the public ways policy that the council has adopted to clarify or be more clear on flags. And thoughts on how that might look. I look at the, personally I look at this list of the flag polls, not the commemorative flags but the two polls that are out front of town hall and I think different ones in terms of DEF and H maybe. I was confused about G potentially but the Black History Month flag, the Tibetan independence flag, the LGTBQ pride flag and the Puerto Rican Heritage Day flag. Some of them came through I think as part of a resolution or a proclamation, we as a council have passed that maybe that it was included in that, others may not be in that. They might just be more of a traditional type thing. I don't know where the POW1 and the UN flag also come from versus just the US flag. So we could approach this similar to how we approach creating the public ways policy in and of itself or we could approach it differently. My guess is we'll start that approach whatever we decide next meeting by thoughts on how to approach potentially creating a policy. Evan. So as you said the polls are on the public way and so I think it's just something we incorporate into our policy regarding control and regulation of the public ways. Right now I'd argue it falls under 4A which is just where the keeper of the public way for any request not falling under any section of this policy. So I think that either, I actually don't think we have to do anything because I think it just automatically is that but it makes sense to have something there. Everything that we, our public way policy right now that was all about reservation, right? Reservation of commons, parking. So we'd probably just need to add probably section four would be section five and we'd add section four which is just flag raisings and then we just have to decide whether it's the council that decides or whether this is another thing that we just delegate to the town manager. George. I would think that this would be something that the council should weigh in on. And I don't know the history of this and perhaps I should. I'm assuming that the various flags that are flown were done through some kind of select board decision. It wasn't the town manager's decision to put up the Tibetan independence flag or the Black History Month flag. I have to believe, I could be wrong that he did this at the instruction of the select board. So, and I think the town manager would very much like to have these decisions made by someone other than him or herself, I would think. There was in my research and I think probably all of you are aware there was a 14 year dispute in this town over whether to fly commemorative flags, American flags on September 11th. That's another example of, that's an example of a contentious, say the least decision. Right, that in fact could be revisited if someone so desired to do. I assume that all of these could be revisited or added to or whatever. I don't know that there's any particular eagerness to do that at this time, but with any or all of these, but it does seem to me that this is something that should be decided by the council. Steve, do you have any comments at this time? So what I'm hearing is that we might want to add a section into our current public way policy, so a modification of what the council adopted to clarify that at this point what I'm hearing from people here is that to clarify that the town council for flag raisings, flag polls is continues to be the keeper of public way and then we can discuss how we want to maybe hear those requests of some sort as part of that policy, but we're looking at a modification for the council maintaining control over that. I think what we need to do is dig out the commemorative flag policy that Alyssa referred to. It might be a way to incorporate that into our public way policy. If it's something the council wants to adopt, we might want to relook at that policy itself and either add it into the public way policy or as a separate document completely to incorporate that one in. So one of us needs to dig it out. George, it looks like you might have dug it out. Well, I will check my email, but I believe that my request to Angela was for a policy and what I got back was a list, which led me to conclude perhaps falsely that there is no actual written policy that there's just a list. But I will go back, I will recheck and find out for certain, but in my initial inquiry, what I got back from Angela, which came from Paul, was actually just the list that you see in front of you. The information about the commemorative flags, I think actually got off the internet. But the list of current flags flying on our flag poles came from Angela and that came from Paul and I will double check my email, but I'm pretty sure I asked for the policy and this is what I got. So I'm guessing that there is no written policy, but I'll confirm that. And then the question arises, if there is no written policy, do we and shall we create one? But I'll look into that. I'll get back to you for sure if there is one or not.  I know Alyssa sent me a whole set of a list of town policies and I think they were hyperlinked. So I will look to see if that was part of the list. I'm trying to find that list, but I will do that too because it might be on there somewhere. And so then we will then revisit this next week with the public ways policy in front of us as part of the packet. If we can find commemorative flag policies, anything relating to that as part of the packet to try and maybe merge them and present a new modified policy up to the council. Does that sound like a plan? With that plan, I will entertain a motion to adjourn. Steve makes the motion. Evan seconds. All those in favor? That is four. Four, zero, 12, 25, 23 actually.


Greetings! I am Lieutenant General Thomas Gage, Commander-in-Chief of his Royal Majesty's Forces in North America. I came to these shores in 1755 as part of General Braddock's expeditionary force with the objective of expelling French troops from the Ohio country. In 1763, following the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Seven Years' War, known in the colonies as the French and Indian War, I was selected to replace General Amherst as Commander-in-Chief and made responsible for the administration of a territory that spanned the entirety of North America east of the Mississippi River. England had been pursuing their interest in these territories since the early 17th century. These vast spaces were seen as a practically inexhaustible source of raw materials, especially wood for the Royal Navy and merchant ships, a solution to the problem of excess population in English cities, a haven for the various groups of religious dissenters, and a steadily growing market for English manufactured goods. Of course, in order to preserve and protect our interests here, it became necessary to maintain a strong military presence on land and at sea to secure our borders and ports against the intrusion of French and Spanish settlers. In addition, there was the necessity of maintaining peaceful relations with the native peoples who were wary of our growing population. The colonies flourished as time went by, and colonial merchants were quick to take advantage of various European markets for their goods, a practice that England frowned upon as it deprived English businesses of the lion's share of profits. Legislation was introduced over time to restrict trade with non-English markets, which resulted, of course, in an ever-increasing habit of smuggling by colonial merchants. To make matters worse, the Seven Years' War had left England with a very great debt, which would have to be made up somehow. The traditional method of raising money was, of course, raising taxes, and it seemed only logical that since a great deal of England's war debt was the result of defending our colonial territories, that the citizens of those territories should contribute to the repayment of said debt. Various methods were implemented. The Stamp Act sought to raise money by the sale of official stamps, which were to be affixed to various paper goods and official documents, any and all of which had to be paid for in hard English currency and not in colonial paper money. The Stamp Act was so vigorously protested against that it was never actually put into practice. The Stamp Act was succeeded by the Townsend Acts, which sought to levy taxes on such imports as glass, lead, paint, paper, and tea. In addition to raising revenue, the Acts were to create a more effective means of enforcing compliance with trade regulations and punish the province of New York for failing to comply with the Quartery Act. The Acts established the precedent that the British Parliament had the right to tax the colonies. These Acts were equally unpopular with the colonists who responded by refusing to buy English imported goods. The colonial response to these Acts was even more vehement than the uproar over the Stamp Act, and protests eventually led to the so-called Boston Massacre and the tax on British ships, including the burning of the custom schooner gas pay. Eventually, the Townsend Acts were repealed with the exception of the Tax on Tea, which had been implemented to save the East India Company from bankruptcy. Colonial indignation over the Tea Tax was to lead to the infamous Boston Tea Party, which in turn led to the imposition of the coercive Acts that the Americans took to calling the Intolerable Acts. The coercive Acts consisted of the Boston Port Act, which closed the port of Boston until such time that restitution be made for the Tea that was thrown into the harbour. The Massachusetts Government Act, which took away Massachusetts Charter and placed it under direct control of the British Government. The Administration of Justice Act, which allowed trials of accused royal officials to take place in England as it was assumed they could not get a fair trial in the colonies. And the Quartering Act, which required the colonies to provide housing for British troops in occupied buildings, but not private homes, this was an effort to house troops closer to their areas of operation. At the time the coercive Acts were being considered by Parliament, I had returned to England in order to enroll my sons in proper English schools. News of the Boston Tea Party reached England during my visit. I was summoned by the King to deliver my assessment of our situation in the colonies. I told the King that I thought the colonists would be lions whilst we are lambs, but if we take the resolute part they will undoubtedly prove very meek. I told him that I thought that the four regiments he was planning to send to relieve as many regiments in America, if sent to Boston, would be sufficient to prevent any disturbances. I also said that the repeal of the Stamp Act has encouraged the Americans to increase their pretension to that thorough independency which one state has of another, but is quite subversive of the obedience which a colony owes to its mother country. Once the coercive Acts were passed I was ordered back to Boston immediately. By the time I arrived the Boston Port Act was already the talk of the town and would soon be fanning the flames of resistance throughout the colonies, eliciting resolutions calling for a Continental Congress and resolves in support of Boston. It being my duty to implement the coercive Acts I found it necessary to dissolve the Massachusetts Assembly as they had sent delegates to the so-called Continental Congress. I have concluded that democracy is too prevalent in America. In addition I withdrew the garrisons from New York City, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Halifax and Newfoundland and brought them to Boston along with a large naval presence under the command of Admiral Samuel Raves. We are currently making arrangements to begin confiscation of war-making materials. If force is to be used at length it must be a considerable one and foreign troops must be hired for to begin with small numbers will encourage resistance and not terrify and will in the end cost more blood and treasure. Gentlemen I am desired by the freeholders and other inhabitants of this town to enclose you an attested copy of their vote passed in town meeting legally assembled this day. The occasion of this meeting is most alarming. We have received a copy of an Act of the British Parliament which is also attached wherein it appears that the inhabitants of this town have been tried and condemned and are to be punished by the shutting up of the harbor and other ways without there having been called to answer for nay for ought that appears without there having been even accused of any crime committed by them for no such crime is alleged in the act. The town of Boston is now suffering the stroke of vengeance in the common cause of America. I hope they will sustain the blow with a becoming fortitude and that the effects of this cruel act intended to intimidate and so do the spirits of all America will by the joint efforts of all be frustrated. The people receive this edict with indignation it is expected by their enemies and feared by some of their friends that this town singly will not be able to support the cause under so severe a trial as the very being of every colony considered as a free people depends upon this event a thought so dishonorable to our brethren cannot be entertained is that this town will now be left to struggle alone. General Gage has arrived here with a commission to supersede Governor Hutchinson it is said that the town of Salem about 20 miles east of the metropolis is to be the seat of government that the commissioners of the customs and their numerous retinue are to remove to the town of Marblehead a town contiguous to Salem and that this if the general shall think proper is to be a garrison town reports are various and contradictory I haven't closed a copy of the town vote for each of the colonies southward of your province which I beg you to forward with all possible dispatch together with your own sentiments there on I am with very great regard gentlemen your humble servant Samuel Adams to the committee of correspondence for the city of Philadelphia


Hi guys. So are you applying as a transfer student to a four-year institution? This video is for you. I have been asked by many students to share kind of admissions tips for their essays when they are a transfer student. So that is you stick around. Hi, I'm Dr. Josie. This is Write Your Acceptance. Thank you so much for joining. We're going to be talking about that typical transfer essay that most students are writing that then you kind of adapt to the few or many schools that you are applying for admission as a transfer student. So that prompt is the typical transfer essay that kind of basically most school use, right? Please provide a statement that addresses your reasons for transferring and the objectives you hope to achieve. So depending on the school book, from the most part, it kind of ranges from 250 to 650 words. First, you kind of want to figure out how many other supplements that you have. If you are applying or if you're trying to transfer into the kind of more demanding, exclusive, difficult to get into universities, chances are you'll have multiple essays, right? So you want to kind of first survey how many essays and what are the questions that the other supplements are asking for each school. But this kind of essay tends to be pretty kind of recyclable in the sense of like most of it is the same. And then the last paragraph or so, you'll kind of be very school specific. And then you kind of swap that out for each school, right? So this is part personal, part why them in a more general way, especially if they have a why us essay and where you see yourself in the future. You want to break all this down because you really want to share why you want to transfer. If you are transferring from a community college, it is given that it is I'll give that you are kind of basically completing all of the academic training and preparation that they have available for you, right? So that's not kind of what I would say because everyone finishing their two years at a community college needs to move on for your institution if they want for the most part, if they want to complete a bachelor's. So you want to kind of say something different than just kind of I finished everything. Or if you are transferring from one four year institution into another four year institution, you want to kind of think about what you want to share. So let's kind of break all that down. So step one, know the pillars and I've been sharing this in a couple of videos because I really want to think about or really want you guys to think about all of the different dimensions that you could be sharing about yourself. So those pillars are intellectual curiosity, community engagement, social awareness and identity. So are you hitting one or a couple of these in different aspects of your application so that when you put all of the essays and all of the application together, the activities section, the supplements, this main kind of transfer essay, do you see all of these four in some shape or form, right? You want to kind of think about first of all reasons for transferring, right? Reasons for transferring and kind of identity or intellectual curiosity kind of go hand in hand nicely for the first half of this essay. I would start with something very personal to you because a reason for transferring, yes, it's going to be personal, but the language, the way you couch that and frame that idea and kind of argument may sound similar to other people. And so if you start with something that is kind of, you know, story driven and personal in nature, something about your identity or reasons why you stayed home to study versus going away and now you are ready. And I'll have a brief example to share with you guys. So you start with a story that is image driven, that is personal to you. It's going to jump out naturally because it's going to be unique to you and different from the other essays that they're reading. And then you can go into the wide transferring. So let's think about if you are transferring from a community college, it's a given, right? Like I said, that you have maximized your educational opportunities there, you are finishing with your two years, you can say it, I wouldn't say it because it's a given. What you can do is focus on how you have taken advantage of learning and beyond the classroom opportunities at the community college, how you have made an impact, what you have learned, how you have, and this goes for both community college transfer and transferring for your institution. How have you give something kind of positive? How have you grown as a student, as a thinker in this last year or two years before you're making this transfer? So how are you a stronger kind of more competent student and thinker now today because of this home institution, whether that was a community college or for your institution. So give something positive first. How have you made an impact? How have you kind of grown and then go into what is missing or then go into how this transfer will kind of, you know, elevate your training and better prepare you for your academic and professional future. Too many students will share negatives right off the bat. I'm missing or I was forced to take this major or I can't take this specific class. And so I want to transfer. And so I kind of coach students to step off that gas pedal a little bit and show first make a case as to why you are a wiser, stronger student, why they would want you in and of itself, like you independently and then make a case as to why this transfer is going to benefit you as a student and your kind of personal and professional aspirations. So more way to what you will gain and how you have grown unless what has been missing right now. So kind of think about that balance as you are making that case. I'm going to share excerpts of a sample student that I worked with a couple cycles ago, a cycle ago, and kind of show you how these different ideals, the pillars and how this information is kind of like coming in and out of their essay. These are excerpts, but it should give you a good idea. So this is the intro and it starts with kind of like their identity, but also their role or their decision making with regards to college first and foremost. So it starts. My mommy always told me to work hard, keep my head down and not make too much noise. I have decided to do the exact opposite. Education has given me a voice and galvanized me into using it. I think about my relatives who live with undercurrent fear in Colombia and admire my single mom who brave the unknown a new country for a better life. So there's content missing there. From soccer to book clubs to student government, I found communities where I could anchor my belonging. After high school, I wasn't ready to leave the home I both inherited and helped create through community. Therefore, I decided to delve deeper into the cultural aspects of Miami and its people by enrolling in the Honors College at MDC. So notice how this intro paragraph has a little bit of everything. We hear kind of their immigration story, their families immigration story, the mom specifically. We hear a little bit of the kind of generational distance or differences in their approach to voice and building community and kind of making some noise. We hear that they're from Colombia. So we get a lot of information in just this one very image driven, sensorial and descriptive paragraph. And then we end with their brief why as to why they attended community college, the middle part of the essay. And so remember when I especially when you are kind of transferring from a community college, less important or less interesting is that you've maximized all the educational resources available. You can mention that, but I would say that very briefly if not at all because that's a given, but you can kind of focus on how you've made a difference and how you have shaped that college experience for yourself and for others. And so that's kind of what this student does in a very compelling way.  They were inadvertently silenced by their desire not to occupy space, which inspired me to cofound MDC United to present an advocate for DACA specifics needs to best prepare for my future diplomatic career. I am looking for an institution that values innovation, diversity, community and understands the benefits of the hyphens of the world. I believe in this middle part is where they kind of brought in school specific on detail. So I believe you would enter the school University of Michigan per due to the epitome of that place as a leader in service and research that embraces those unexpected connections. I plan to major in public policy, you would name the specific major as it's listed at that school, right, which at Georgetown means having the freedom to take courses beyond politics and international security to learn how these disciplines overlap with biology, feminist studies, computer science. They looked this up, right, that they could kind of basically tailor their courses and their curriculum to see these intersections and see how these disciplines combine. And so then they would go into very specific details why a section about that school. And so this section is what you would then lift for a different school. You would use everything else that's the same and you would bring in that school specific. So if you're applying to Georgetown, you would put the Georgetown info, then you would change that for Michigan. Then you would change that for Purdue. So you would kind of adapt that section, right. And it would be a class that you found interesting or student organization and maybe the connection with that student organization and what you've done in the past at your community college or your home institution right now. So ultimately you want to make a case as to how you would be taking full advantages of your resources on campus from day one, that it is not a disadvantage that you're coming in midway through your undergraduate career, let's say the concluding paragraph, you can kind of come back to that opening image that you started with yourself, right. Because ultimately this is that as close to a personal statement as possible.  And maybe that's, you know, coming back to that opening image with newfound wisdom or something about the school that relates to that opening image or something personal to you. So kind of think about how to land the plane in a way that is as personal to you as possible so that you make a case for you individually as a student. Are you writing these transfer essays? I know they come fast and they sneak up on you. So if you are looking for assistance or guidance, comment below. I'm happy to kind of share with you any details as you need. And I am still working with students. So if you'd like to kind of learn how I work with students, I can share my address if you comment below and we can start chatting then. So just to kind of overall, right, this student, we hit identity, right? We know that she's Colombian American. We know that she immigrated to the U.S., that she's a first generation student, that she chose community college as her first best option. We know a little bit about her ethnic and cultural background. Maybe that's not something that you want to share or share, but maybe there is something in your lived experience that has impacted your education in some way. Something about education or something about your kind of lived human experience may be interesting to use in the intro. It doesn't have to be cultural background if you don't want it to be. Then notice how we hit the kind of intellectual and academic goals. We mentioned the IR, international relations type, public policy major. We mentioned kind of where we created space for courses and student organizations and a little bit about the why us. So it's a balanced essay throughout. Hope this was helpful. If you guys want more transfer videos or school specific transfer videos, comment below so I know kind of what you're needing and we can start that dialogue. Take care. Thanks for watching. Bye.


Yeah, I sound like somebody's 13 year old son. I sound horrible Layla, do you want this? Young B on the mic. He like to rose in Why? This is a good no No, I still got a project to do tomorrow I Feel like everyone's gonna stay away from me today Young B on the mic, you feel me? That's what my friend, that's my rapper name. It's between that and B-Dizzle That's my chef name though, Chef B-Dizzle Here we go, Kel. Seat belt. No, sir. You tried it Mama! There we go. A little toasty in here Some little toasty in here. I was like, you know what? Here. I'm a celebrity and then turn this way and then do that Oh I caught none of that. We have eleven and they have seven Sub it. Sub it up. Isn't that an app? I'll take it off Sub it up That's over for work, yeah? Hey, white on three. One, two, three. White. I don't know. Who's on? One, one, two, three. White.