All right, it's five o'clock, so I'd like to welcome everybody to the first meeting of the 21-22 Finance and Personnel Committee. We'll begin by taking a role in all the person that will be here, Feliki Pineski. Do we have anybody online? All the person for all? All the person actually? All the person probably. All right, we have four present. If you'll all join me in the Pledge of Allegiance. To the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. And then since this is our first meeting of the year, let's move on to 1.4, the introductions of committee members and staff. We'll just go around the room if you want to start with Barb on the end. Present, Betty Ackley, Alderperson for District 4. I am Troy Mitchell, committee chairman, Alderperson Desherkine, Todd Wolfe, city administrator. Gratia Perrilla, Alderford District 7. I'm Chad Pelliscik, the city planning and development director. I'm Yala Pertipillo, interim finance director. Chris Tomogalski, police chief. David Bebel, director of public works. Vicky Schneider, director of human resources. Eric Burschman, director of information technology. Chuck Adams, city attorney. And Roberta Follackie-Poneski, Alderperson, District 2. Then we'll move on to item 2.1, approval of the minutes. We have a motion from Alderperson Elby and a second from Alderperson Ackley. And is there any discussion? Seeing none, I'll allow some favor. Please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Any opposed? Aye. Chair votes aye. Motion passes. Moving on to item 3.1, arrow number 721-22. Submitting of petition, notice, and list of tax liens of Sheboygan County being foreclosed in the matter of the foreclosure of tax liens. Under Wisconsin statute 75-521 by Sheboygan County list of tax liens for 2014, 15, 16, and 17 Huck or who would like to take this one? So Sheboygan County forecloses on tax liens within the county and the properties that are listed in the highlighted in the document that's attached to this agreement are the properties that they're moving forward with for in-rem tax foreclosure, for property tax delinquencies. Typically what happens after they, some of them they settle before they get to that foreclosure but when the judge grants it, then you'll see these properties come on the market. The reason we're being notified is sometimes we have special assessments against these properties other times we might have loans against these properties from previous housing rehab things. So it's just to put us on notice that these are the ones they're moving forward with. Our action would be to receive and file. Okay, in that case, I'll take a motion to that effect. I think we need the first motion. Okay, I'll make the motion. I'll make the second. All right, we have a motion and a second. Elder Felde, please. My question. Thank you. I would need to know is the reason we're doing 14, 15, 16 and 17 because the courts were backed up because of the COVID or is this normal that we usually do that many years come together? First of all, we're not doing that. The county is doing it. The county treasurer's office is the person that's filed the action and it's basically, I would say it's probably related to the timing on there and I know they were a number of years behind prior to that. So I think they're just catching up and is the ones that they have delinquency have to have three years or more of back taxes before they can move through the foreclosure process. So I've been guessing that's why it's based on the three years of delinquency and them trying to catch up on the foreclosures. But this is really a county treasurer's action. Thank you. Any other questions? There's no other questions. We'll vote on the motion. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? Chair votes aye and the motion passes. Moving on to item 3.2, resolution 202-2021, a resolution authorizing the appropriate city officials to execute a cancellation agreement and mutual release in order to terminate the listing contract with CBRE Inc regarding South Point Enterprise. I can take that one, Chair. So this is a document that terminates the contract with the city and CBRE Inc. So last, a year ago, two years ago in January of 2019, a contract was executed with a Milwaukee firm to do the marketing and selling of lots in our new business center. It has, given that they're in Milwaukee at the time, the thought was is that they would give us leads to opportunities coming out of the Milwaukee market, but that was not the case. And we got very little leads out of the firm. So we actually were in discussions with them about the contract and trying to give us information on a more timely basis as to who they're reaching out to. And it was a communication struggle between the two organizations. So they came forward with a termination agreement because some of the staff that was originally gonna be working on this on their end had taken other jobs and they were having a staffing issue. So they were recommending canceling the agreement. The city staff is in support of it. I think we can do just as good a job at the local level, especially with our partners at the Economic Development Corporation and city staff on moving forward without a contract. Now, that does still give local brokers an opportunity that if they did get a lead, we would pay on the commission because we do have a policy in place for that, but we will not have to pay out any kind of commission to an entity that's not really involved in the process. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to expand a little bit more on the discussion that Director Pellecek talked about. Last year after I became city administrator, Chad and I did call them and kind of put them on the spot because of the fact that there hasn't been any activity. And we were asking them for their plans and steps moving forward. And that's when they were basically telling us about COVID and things like that. And then we recently followed up again and that's when they told us that they were stepping down from the contract. So we were very pleased to hear that because we didn't feel it was fair that in the contract, if the city actually had some leads, that they would still get their commission above and beyond that. So this is actually a good thing. We have some great resources like the SEDC and to me, this is a good thing that it's kind of a gift versus waiting for the contract to fully mature. So thank you. Sounds mutually beneficial to me. Do we have any questions from the committee? And move to accept the recommendation. All right, we have a motion. Do we have a second? And we have a second. All those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Chair votes aye and the ayes have it. Moving on to item 3.3, resolution number 4, 2021, a resolution authorizing the appropriate city officials to take three actions related to the new HVAC control system at Mead Public Library. One, in turn to an agreement with Manabek Mechanical LLC. Two, draw funds pursuant to the existing contract with quality control systems incorporated. And three, make a necessary budget adjustment and appropriation in the 2021 budget. We would like this one. What that is is we had a four year approved CIP project. We did all our HVAC in the last four years. So all the air conditioning, heating's all replaced. And then we found that the old controls weren't working very well with the new HVAC system. So what we did is we went out for bids and we had about $6,000, $8,000 a year that we needed to replace the HVAC each year. What happened is the first two years we actually re-put out to bid and it ended up being about half the cost. So what we're doing is asking that I can do year three and four this year and finish the control project seeing as we've had a savings of $60,000 over the last two years. And this will also save about $54,000 that can be redistributed to CIP next year. Thank you. Any questions from the committee? I'll take a motion at this time. Thank you. We have a motion. Do we have a second? All right. All those in favor? Please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? Chair votes aye and the motion passes. Moving on to item 3.4, a resolution authorizing the appropriate city officials to enter into the contract with Enterprise FM Trust and Enterprise Fleet Management Incorporated for the lease of vehicles, the disposal of vehicles and the maintenance of vehicles and authorizing the city administrator to administer the lease program to the extent funds are appropriated. Who would like this one? Thank you, Chair. This is basically just the review of the contract. The attorney's office has gone through it with a fine tooth comb and they've been working with Enterprise Legal. So this program, as soon as this contract is approved, we'll be able to start implementing it and get things on order yet this month. So this is to basically take our 60 to 70 light use vehicles, our cars and trucks, mainly from DPW and get this turned into a rotational program like we presented earlier in the year. So we recommend this highly and if there's additional questions, Director Bebel can also answer some of them. Do we have any questions from the committee? I have a comment. All to person, Felicky Paneski. I think this is a great program and the sooner we can get it moving, the better off our financial picture will be. And hopefully it will work as intended and moving forward. I just think it's a great idea. So I will move that we accept the resolution. Do we have a motion? Do we have a second? And further discussion, other person Pirella? Since I was not here when this was discussed, it's just for my education or for our education. What does the 250,000 lease covers? Is that every year for how long? David, do you want me to take this or? Okay. What the 257,000 ish dollars is basically, we're taking our old fleet of between 60 to 70 vehicles and some of them are upwards of 20 years old and it's basically one ton and less from DPW. What is going to happen is enterprise will sell these vehicles on the market, take the value of those vehicles and we're going to turn it into a fund. And then we're going to replace all of these vehicles with brand new vehicles outfitted according to what we need. And then every two to five years, these vehicles will be rotated back in and sold and replaced again. And the way that the program works, the revenues that are developed from the sale of the vehicles will continuously fund the replenishment of the vehicles. So instead of the city of Sheboygan borrowing money on a geo debt, general obligation debt, which is a 10 year loan, we will not be borrowing money for vehicles anymore. We'll actually be able to have a fund that will be self-sufficient year over year. And then that allows us to use our geo debt for capital improvements versus vehicles. Thank you. Any other questions? Otherwise, I believe we already have our motion. So I'll ask it this time. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Chair votes aye and the motion passes. And then if it's okay with the committee, if we take item 3.6 and move it to the end since presentation will probably be a little longer. You need 3.5 first. We do. At the very bottom. Yeah. Nicole. But before that, item 3.5, director for all resolution 721-22, a resolution authorizing the continuation of the self-insured workers' compensation program. I'm guessing, but would you like to take this? Oh, there we go. Thank you. So this is a requirement from the department of workforce development that we authorize or have council authorized the renewal of our workers' compensation insurance for a self-insured entity. This was last renewed in 2018. So every three years, this is a requirement to go through for council approval. Any questions from the committee? I just had one high-level generalized question then. Just what is the major benefit to the city of having the self-insured program versus using an independent provider? So there is about a 10% to 15% savings in cost if we are as a self-insured entity to be able to provide the insurance on our own. We work with CIVMIC, which is our liability carrier, and they assist us with the investigations of any workers' comp claims, but as far as our ability to save and to be able to mitigate any other additional costs as far as administration, we're able to take that on ourselves. Thank you. Any other questions from the committee? Seeing none, we'll need a motion. Make a motion. All right. Second. In that case, all those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Aye. All opposed? Chair votes aye. The motion carries. Now, if it's okay with the committee, I'd like to move 3.6 down to the end. Seeing no objections, we will move on to item 4.1, which is an item for discussion only. The city development department's 2022-2026 capital improvement program requests with the director of planning and development, Chad Palschek. Thank you, Chair. So these are cap improvement requests that had gone to the cap improvements commission and will be coming back to the full council in the coming weeks from the Department of City Development. You can see on the attached spreadsheet that there's a number of projects, and I think the only project that is going to affect the 2022 capital improvement project is the potential purchase of Railroad Right-Away. We've talked about this project numerous times. This is the right-of-way adjacent to self-business drive from Pennsylvania down to Mead Avenue and then along Indiana Avenue. We've been in discussions for two or three years with the Railroad. Hopefully we're gonna get to an acceptable amount of money. The Railroad believes that the property is worth 1.2 and the city believes it's worth 875,000. So we've got a little bit of a difference that we're negotiating, but we've budgeted at 875, which we agree is probably no more than what we would wanna pay for that. So we'll see if we can get there and if we can, we would look for a closing sometime in 2022 and use capital improvement dollars to do so. Do we have any questions from the committee? All right, and this one was for discussion only, so we do not need a motion, is that correct? That is correct. All right, then we will move on to item 4.2, information technology and cable TV departments 2022, 2026 through 2026 capital improvements, program requests with the director of information technology, Eric Bushman. Thank you, Chair. We'll start with cable TV. In 2022, for cable TV, we have requested $25,000 for a new tricaster. That equipment is nearing its end of life, so it will need to be replaced next year. The next capital for the cable TV will be in 2025, and we'll be looking to replace the broadcast truck during that year. Are there any questions on cable TV? If not, I will move on to IT. I have a question. How old is the current cable TV production truck? 2003. Thank you. You're welcome. It looks like we're going to move on. Okay, moving on to information technology. So, within information technology, our core ERP package is a Windows-based system, which we've been on for a few years now. We still have a IBMI, or many people refer to it as an AS400, which runs a number of legacy applications. And our goal over the next few years is to retire that hardware platform and move everything to a Windows or cloud-based solution. So, in 2022, three, four, and five, you will see IBMI retirement software acquisitions. That is capital to support purchasing additional software to retire those legacy applications. Then in 2026, we'll see that the infrastructure upgrades that we did in 2018 and 19 to support the new city hall and the wastewater treatment will start to need to be upgraded again. So, that's what those monies are for. Any questions? Any questions from the committee? Thank you. All right, if not, thank you, Eric. Then we will jump back up to item 3.6. Direct referral number, arrow number 102122, submitting the internal controls assessment. City of Shebaugin benefits administration assessment dated April 19th, 2021, which was prepared by Christa Clifton-Larsen Allen, LLP, or CLA. And I will hand it off to our HR director and city administrator. Thank you, everyone. Can you hear me well enough with my mask? Yes, okay, awesome. Scott, can you, okay, thank you. Okay, for those who have been new to council, I wanted to just give an update on some history that we've gone through as a department in the last year. My screens weren't matching, so I apologize. So in late 2019, early 2020, Clifton-Larsen Allen performed an operational and organizational assessment for the city of Shebaugin for finance and human resources. And that presentation was given to council in May of 2020. One of their identified needs was that the human resources team needs sound, present, and ongoing leadership. And that was part of the reason that I came into the department. So I'm going to present to you a timeline of events that has happened since January of 2020. So when Clifton-Larsen Allen or CLA presented its report, there were a number of challenges that both departments were facing. As a timeline also of how the changes affected the personnel in both departments, I wanna share with you the comings and goings of the various departments so that you understand all the changes and ramifications that both departments have had. So Tara Dewey came on board in January of 2020 as the deputy director of finance. In February, the director of human resources and labor relations resigned at the end of that month. I came on board as an interim director in March of that same year. And the day after I started, Governor Tony Evers had declared a state of emergency regarding COVID. And COVID has been a tremendous burden on an already difficult year for our departments. Oops, sorry. Then in April of 2020, Daryl Hoffland as our city administrator announced his retirement. I was approved then as the director of human resources and labor relations in May by the council. In July, we had Daryl Hoffland's last day as the city administrator. And then on July 7th, Todd Wolfe took over as the city administrator. His first day was July, oops. I don't know why this isn't matching, sorry. Sorry, I apologize for that. So within the first week of Todd taking over of as the city administrator, the HR department knowing that it had challenges, we went right into strategic planning with the team. We had a lot of different changes and a lot of different goals for the department. We did strategic planning. As I just said, we've had the retirement of various personnel in the finance department. We were adjusting some of the responsibilities. We had some shared positions that we wanted to clarify. The auditor analyst position had been changed to be noted as an accountant too. We created a new position of an administrative services clerk too, and that position was hired again in July. And we had admin services clerk one who had been released in about the same timeframe. We also noted that there were concerns within the payroll processing system that we had included BACOR as a firm to be a consultant to look at those processes and determine what could we do to improve that. And with that, we looked at our PCN process, which is how we acknowledge changes that affect any employee and to create those processes within Munis. So we were doing a lot of the things that we needed to do through those assessments and with city administrator Todd Wolf support. Again, we had some changes in our personnel department, our HR generalist position. That person was released at the beginning of August. We brought on Jessica Hust as an accountant three in the department for the finance department. Denise Clark came in as a new generalist in October, as well as Chris Trecker as the admin services clerk one. In November, Michael Herman was brought on board as an accountant one. The finance director resigned mid November and Daniel Tanner Partipillo was brought on board as the interim finance director. In December, the middle of December, our benefits administrator was suspended with pay. And by the end of the month, we had released her from her position. So in January of 2021 was really challenging for our department. It was a very difficult transition. I do want to commend Sandy Halverson, our payroll administrator for just her outstanding leadership and that she helped us navigate all the things that we didn't know or needed to know as far as reporting or payroll and all of those pieces. So she was incredibly important to the successful transition of our team through those months. In February, our accountant two retired and in March, CLA was chosen to do this benefits administrative audit. We were in the discovery mode in January of 2021 after the benefits administrator was released that we were discovering other items that were addressed in the audit. In April of this year, we've continued to still have staffing changes that our administrative services clerk one was released. We are in the process of recruiting for that position and Christina Leptow, who was the clerk two in the HR department was promoted into the finance department. And so she will be an accountant two in that department and is very capable and we're very excited about that. Tara Dewey as the deputy director just announced her resignation and she will be leaving the city as of next Friday, May 21st. We have anticipated start dates for the finance director, the HR generalist and the HR administrative assistant. And we are excited to have a new team that we feel very strongly about that we feel is good. Okay, so what I would like to do at this point is to that was a lot of the timeline of all the changes and we've gone through a tremendous amount of change in the two departments, both HR and finance. What I wanted to be very clear about and it's a very difficult report to share with you the CLA audit that both administrator Wolf has been extremely supportive and myself, we're on the same page about how we want to approach this. And when we found the discrepancies in the department and in some of the practices that we were the team that came forward to say that we wanted to have an audit done to make sure that we weren't missing anything, that we wanted to have the complete picture. So what was discovered was our short-term and long-term disability insurance practices were being administered inappropriately. And this was the triggering event. This was the event that caused issues in mid-December for us as a team. We discovered that the spousal surcharge waivers which helped support, again, cost savings to the city were not done appropriately. There were inappropriate payments in the past to retirees. There were manual overrides of prescription drug benefits. The administration of short-term disability benefits was not handled appropriately. There are questions about whether there were purchases using chamber bucks or cash benefits, gift cards and such things. The police and fire sick bank management is also a question of concern for the city. And we have had and have are mitigating the inconsistent application of policies and procedures and practices. So with all of that, and there's a lot, there's a lot in the report. Again, as I said, it's a very difficult report to share with you, but I want to assure you and Administrator Wolfe will be able to say as well that we are on the same page regarding transparency and the expectations of what is appropriate and what is expected going forward. We wanted to present this audit to you so that you can be assured that we are trying and are being as transparent as possible with the difficult news and items that we discovered. We have created an immediate separation of duties which was noted in the report with Administrator Wolfe becoming the comptroller with council approval. Banking controls are being clarified and implemented within the finance department between the deputy director and the city administrator. We are separating the payroll function and access from human resources based on our software program that we use Munis so that there's going to be different permissions and different access points so that there cannot be any question about who has access and the ability to do what. Sandy Halverson, our payroll administrator now reports directly to the city administrator. And we are working on a payroll project with Baycore which is again to separate completely the responsibilities from the payroll process from the human resource process and function. Our insurance brokers, our USI, they have been extremely helpful to us through this process. Our brokers have been very helpful in giving advice and in assisting us with making sure that we have policies in place to mitigate any future overrides or anything else that could put the city at risk as a self-insured agency. Our employee handbook is in its final stages of a total rewrite to be compliant and to have clear expectations for all employees. A code of conduct will be embedded in the new handbook which will be required for all employees to sign off and understand. We will institute a whistleblower program. We're working with Civic right now. Again, our liability insurance carrier to make sure that those pieces are in place. Basically, we've had 100% turnover of the human resources department since January of 2020. And my thought and my expectation is that we are putting in place a really strong, a really good team so that you can be assured that this will never happen again. Checks and balances are being implemented between the human resources and finance departments. And then the implementation and utilization of Munis which is again our software ERP system for benefits administration will be expected. This was again another flaw in that it could allow information to be circumvented without an audit trail using in the Munis software system. So I'm gonna end with our mission. We had a strategic planning day for the team in March of this year as well. And as a team, we created a mission statement for ourselves. And I think it's very important for you as council members to understand that we are looking at this as something that is very serious, that we know that we need to earn trust back. And so as a team that we want to be those trusted professionals and that we will serve as a strategic and operational partner, this is something that the city has needed and this is something that the city is going to need in the future. And we are very dedicated and proud to be able to serve in that way. Thank you, Vicki. I just wanted to add a few comments and we also have Ray Emery on this online. If anybody has additional questions, Ray is from CLA. But I wanted to just kind of point out, as Vicki had said, we've had a lot of change and change is good, but we are in control. We know what's going on. We brought this forward. We are being transparent. We have nothing to hide. We want to fix things and you can only fix them as you find them. But we have good people. These are problems that have been going on for years and years and years and decades. So these aren't things that people necessarily see as a problem when you're doing it every day, right? When you're doing something every day, you don't really look at the actual process. We've broken it down and we're looking at it and saying, why are we doing this? And one of my, one thing I really don't like is when somebody says, well, I don't know, we've always done it this way. That's not acceptable. So please understand, in any company, things happen, things do go sideways. We are addressing them as we find them. And a lot of it's just updating things, having proper policies, having separation of duties, having auditing that's actually audited with documentation showing what was audited.  So we have good people and we're gonna continue to go from department to department and check things and audit things and make changes. But please have faith that we have the right people in place and that we're gonna continue to grow and improve things. Ray, is there anything you wanna add? Thank you. It was great recap. Vicki did a nice job. A lot going on there over the timeline. I would just say this that the bad things that happened, I would say it's tone at the top, but I think all the things that Vicki just laid out is how do you get the tone at the top where it should be? Very impressed with both Vicki and Todd to, I'll say step up to the plate, have this audit done, open it all up and be very transparent about it. And I think some of the things that Vicki laid out will help to shore off the tone at the top. These are the whistleblower, the new code of conduct, all of those things are gonna go a long way to bolstering the tone at the top. And I think you're on the right track. And again, there were some bad things that were going on and in those bad things, people are gonna get the message with the new tone at the top and obviously some of the turnover has made that point clear. So I applaud everything that these two are doing and I think it's all six steps in the right direction. So thank you for letting me chat about this. Thank you, Ray. Any questions from the committee? I have a question. Go ahead. You talked about rebuilding the trust and I appreciate that. I would also like to focus that there's rebuilding internal trust with our employees as well as rebuilding trust with the public. And I think both of those need very careful attention. And I remember when I heard the annual report from your office, Vicki, I thought, oh my gosh, how could you do all of that in one year? And I appreciate the 100% turnover in a year. And I hope that everyone has gotten the message that moving forward, there are things that won't be tolerated. And then I have two questions. Is there been any thought of remediation or anything that shortfall, shortcoming? You know, what kind of steps are we taking for any of that? Or is it line in the sand and we're moving forward? We have looked at all of that and to use your example, a line in the sand, we're moving forward with what we have found, there's no reason to go back and address those issues. We're moving forward in a positive way, putting in our policies, procedures, and updating everything, and then training will be put into place. Again, we're implementing a lot of technology improvements so that also forces certain approval processes and separation of duties. So, we are moving forward. Thank you. Any additional questions from the committee? Alderperson Porella. I want to thank Vicky and Todd for the sensible summary. I'm really, really impressed by the many changes. And so, I applaud that you went through all these changes in such a short time and with so many challenges. I'm really shocked by that. And I didn't know and I really appreciate your work on this. Just two questions. One is, if you can summarize for us again in two sentences, the root causes. And second, is there plan in your new policies and procedures for regular internal and external audits? So, I think the root cause is that there were not the appropriate policies or procedures or oversight in place that demanded audits or review that required that. There was a sense of, I will use the word negligence in the fact that what was okay to go ahead and no one was complaining, we can go ahead and just let things go as they were. But it is clearly a lack of policy, a lack of procedure, a lack of checks and balances that caused that. Going forward, having the right people in the right leadership roles is going to go a long way to make sure that this never does happen again. We are working diligently with the finance department as the HR department with the transitions that have happened with the bridges that are being built between the two departments. That hasn't always been the case where communication has been in place. There is an expectation that that will not only continue but will grow and we will be a strong team together, not just the HR team, but the finance and HR team together as well as the entire organization which helps support the city. Any additional questions? We also have Rianne Baudry from USI on the line if anybody has questions when it comes to the healthcare side of it. Again, we are looking out for best practices and we are looking to take care of our internal service as well as our external service. So it's very important. And one of the things that the human resource department believes in, as you saw in the new mission statement for the HR team is that they look at things very, very, very high and it's very important to be trusted and to be the service provider for our team. So any additional questions? Otherwise, we'll let everybody that's online. Thank you, Ray. Thank you, Rianne. Before we set off online, I do have a couple. I just want to make sure nobody else does. Well, first I want to thank both you, Tad and Vicky for seeing that thread that was hanging and deciding to pull it and see what happens instead of just pretending like you never saw it and moving on and also not heading for the hills once you did see what was behind it. And especially for looping us as the committee and the council and by extension the public in right away. The transparency is much appreciated. One thing that I saw repeated through the report a lot mentioned the contract with Fidelity as well as UMR and some employees having UHC coverage. Yes. Would you be able to explain a little more what that was about? So the city had gone with American Fidelity in 2019 to provide open enrollment services in exchange for those services. American Fidelity would then be allowed to sell their own ancillary products which could be cancer coverage or short-term and long-term disability. In 2019, there was a decision to continue with the standard as our short-term disability carrier and in 2020, American Fidelity wanted to go and have those products as well. So we had spent with American Fidelity for two years. The first year, we did not take all of their coverages. The second year in 2020, we took their entire package. And for that, that was an exchange that they would perform the duties of doing the open enrollment where they would meet with each employee to go through their insurance benefits packages. Through the course of discovery, when we were looking at the premiums that were coming out of employees paychecks and we were looking at the census from American Fidelity, what we did not find, we had some confusion about we were seeing deductions made that were not matching to American Fidelity's census and that caused us some great concern. What we discovered through that process was that there was an alternate insurance vendor, UHC, that had been kept on board and some of those products were being sold as additional products and or carried forward. I did not understand or did not know that at the time. And so we thought, as a team, that all of those were under the umbrella of American Fidelity and it was through our investigation that we discovered that that was not the case. So there was a separate group that was selling separate products. Thank you. Oh, the person, Corella, did you have another question? Okay. And then any other questions from the committee? Comments? All right, well, thank you everybody for letting us present this information. I know that many of you, just because it is obviously a hot topic in the community, you'll have questions that'll come to you. So if you do have additional questions in the future, please feel free to reach out to Vicki and myself and we'll do our due diligence to keep you guys updated. We will continue on a quarterly manner to bring the team up to date as we continue to make improvements and changes throughout the city, specifically in regards to this presentation. Thank you. Thank you. We have this listed as discussion on possible action, but our action just be moving this on to the council. It can be or you can take no action or you can move to file or refer back to council, however you want to do it. I'd like to let Dean know first, but would anybody like to make a motion that we recommend sending this to the committee of the whole? All right, we have a motion and a second. Can all those in, well, any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. All opposed? Chair votes aye and the motion passes. Last up, we have 5.1 just noting our next meeting date is May 24th, 2021. Does anybody know of any scheduling conflicts? We'll take silences now. In that case, I'm looking for a motion to adjourn. We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. All opposed? Seeing none, the ayes have it. Motion passes and we are adjourned. Thank you everybody.


So it seems like today We find ourselves in the cubicle and office site somewhere like that. Oh my god I can see Sonic lurking in the back.  All right, man. We're right on it. Okay. Oh, it has begun. I'm like it's so dark Okay, oh, I suppose this is the computer. Okay email it announcement. Please not opening suspicious email attachments. Okay, whatever Wait, oh, I saw Sonic in the back. What the heck? Okay? This is not good, bro. Okay email executive. Please finish the TPM typing reports by the end of the day We won't be asking you again. He's all right, man. Okay type the following codes pain. Oh my god We're in Spain without the s. All right a pain Staking pain staking. Oh, okay boots. Am I gonna get the boot? Okay? I think it's dropping hints It said mugged feel like we're about to get jumped or something. Okay, you win free cruise to okay I know we should open this but it goes nothing open error. Oh, that is not like Yo, what? What the heck was that? It was that a person? I? Think that was a person. Oh, is that Sonic? Oh that is on it.  What oh great? So we have Sonic chasing us and we have to type down all these things on the computer. Wow, isn't that marvelous, okay? Brother that one's broken. Okay, uh Awesome, no, I'm stuck with quick settings Dude, I don't know why my settings opened. Okay.  Okay? There's one right there. Oh my god. We have to come around. Okay taste the That was not tasty or that was scary. Okay, what is this open? Okay, we did it wait what's on it We're in Sonic school house apparently all right. Well, let's go have some fun back to school How fun can this be right? Okay, and here we go Hey, let's go to math class. Let's go do some quick math for real quick. Okay. Oh, what comes after zero negative zero I'm just kidding that is number one Okay, let's grab number one. Here it is. Hey, hopefully this is right. I'm really hoping this is oh Okay, nice. Okay. What comes before is that a three or an eight that is kind of confusing Okay, that's a three so that should be number two get over here. Oh my god They seem to just have a mind of their own to stop moving. I didn't grab it did I I Think I did okay. I think I grabbed two of them actually I don't know, but let's go place this number two back on the chalkboard. Hopefully it works Yes, I feel very smart. I have I feel like it. We are very big brain right now. Okay. Uh, what comes after before 49? Did not work. Oh The heck was that why did I hear the ruler clapping? Oh, no, please don't let it be the bald man. Oh It's Sonic. Okay, so Baldi is now Sonic as we can see while Sonic EXE to be more exact Oh my god, okay, go go. He didn't say let's go to some reading. So Let's go to reading class. Okay reading is next door Dude, he's He's right on me. What the he's quick and that is not fair.  What do we do here and see a lot of balloons, but okay find the astronaut. Okay, this is easy. Hey, there you go. Oh That one I think it was a doggy or a pig. I don't know what balloon it was asking for we see there a dog or a pig Hey, let's be careful because Yeah, the pig. Did I grab it? Okay. No, it's right here Your piggy piggy. Okay.  It seems fairly easy, but it does keep you on edge.  It's great. Oh my god. He's Right on us, dude Okay, I'm back for some more math.  Oh my god That's pretty messed up bro divide by by a ring I did see a door by the spawn and had like a had the ring symbol on it. So maybe that's it. Oh My god so alone. Yes, we are very oh my god. What happened to knuckles? Okay So this is a door. I was talking about there has to be rings back here, dude. What is he trying to jump scare us? Okay, I suppose we find the ring. Oh, there it is. Yes. This has to be it. Oh That is not like good what the Yo, it's a giant Sonic EXE. No, go go. Oh my god. That is so terrifying Dude, why is there a giant Sonic overlooking us? I don't know, but hopefully we don't die out here Okay, we have to go place this back over there.   Hey, it was not where was it? Oh math? It was here, right? Yes. It was Okay, yes divide by zero with this has to work if this doesn't work. I'm gonna lose my brains I'm gonna lose my brains man Let's do some spelling now. I gotta go back to spelling class. Okay.  What? All right. No, are you kidding me? This is prominent detention. Okay. He did say spelling awesome awesome open Please do something. Do we get away? Okay speedy sonic chili dog house Freddy's Okay Remember Hello Please don't jump scary dude. Okay. See you later Okay, press you to escape to leave Wait, so we're actually like changing the cameras All right, suppose we are Okay escape to leave So now what do we just survive? I am God. Oh my gosh. No, you're not you're just an animatronic to chill out It's not that you're not that godly Okay, um Downloading Sonic XC security great. Okay, so we have to survive for four minutes And we have so far survived one from what? From what it seems like Did I not press the button Did I press the button?  Okay, but now we got it All it took was a little restart and it seems to be working just perfectly fine. Oh Not today. Sorry animatronic get lost. I'm just gonna close them no matter what Okay, oh my god, it didn't want to close do 10 seconds. Come on. Come on. Come on. I'm just gonna click it I don't care. I'm gonna click it because I'm gonna prevent them from coming out Okay, five four imagine the door opens and he's right there three two one. No way Wait, we can we actually survive the four minutes What the heck is going on Okay, that was part of the game right because I wasn't able to move through this blood covering Except you know education. Oh, we made it Not gonna lie this game takes a little time for you to beat it It's not one of those just playing win. No, it takes it takes a lot of tries All right, so Wow, you're relieved But like I have a burden off of my shoulder now. All right, sure out is software executable Education, I really love the whole concept like I know there was mods of like Sonic and Baldy, but this one took a little different turn. It was like three game It was like a lot of games put into one Pretty insane. Hey, it's all my name up there, man. Oh Thanks for playing. Thank you for making the awesome game, man. All right, you guys well That is the end of Executional educational Executionable education by Shroudy software shout out to Shroudy one more time and awesome game And I gotta go because I'm gonna go poop Peace


The fan culture around Flaming Hot Cheetos has helped these fiery cheese pups gain widespread notoriety, survive school bands, media panic, and an origin story to buckle. Fans have imbued meaning and value into Flaming Hot Cheetos, and they've become ingrained in pop culture. Food nannies looking to snatch them from our hands don't stand a chance. They're the outlaw snack that may be more American than apple pie.  Tiersa Farrah started her cafe because she wanted to be her own boss. Her menu is inspired by her experience growing up in Los Angeles. An LA girl with Mexican roots, you know, so that's what you're going to find here is my take on the LA flavors and the Mexican scene growing up in a house that's literally divided. My dad was born in Mexico, and my mom is an LA native herself. One of the ingredients in Farrah's dishes, Flaming Hot Cheetos, which she sprinkles on a variety of dishes, from sopes to nachos to esquites, she first encountered the snack in high school.  And the only one you were going to get was Flaming Hot. It's just kind of this kooky tradition, even though we're like, why are we eating this? We just can't stop. Part of the lore around Flaming Hot Cheetos was the dynamic story of their self-proclaimed inventor, Richard Montanez. What would happen if I put chile on a cheeto? Montanez said he was working as a janitor at Frito-Lay when he said he dreamed up the idea of a spicy version of the company's famous cheese puffs. That led to a meeting with Frito-Lay's president, and that impulse decision would become a billion-dollar snack. The story went viral. Montanez, a Mexican-American, earned legend status, and was invited to give motivational speeches at corporate events for Walmart, Target, and Harvard. He became a hero in the Mexican-American community, and his rise was considered an example of the American dream fulfilled. Journalists repeated the story without bothering to investigate its veracity. Montanez chronicled his story in a 2021 book, and it's even being made into a movie by actress and producer Eva Longoria. Turns out that story probably isn't true. The Times quoted several former Frito-Lay employees as saying he had nothing to do with Flamin' Hot Cheetos and that the product was created by a team in 1989 based out of Texas. Montanez started taking credit for their creation in the early 2000s, almost two decades after they were invented. Montanez and his fans still maintained that he was the true inventor. The best way to destroy a positive message is to destroy the messenger. Never allow that to happen. So what if the Flamin' Hot Cheetos origin story is a fairy tale? It's part of the folklore. What's most interesting about these spicy cheese puffs aren't what actually happened at Frito-Lay, but how consumers reimagined a corporate snack with a Mexican twist into something uniquely American. Flamin' Hot Cheetos are in rap songs, YouTube and TikTok videos, clothing and jewelry, and a variety of dishes with roots all over the world. Even Katy Perry wore a Flamin' Hot Cheeto outfit with matching purse to a Halloween party. The fan culture around Flamin' Hot Cheetos has been perplexing to food nannies intent on controlling our consumption of artificial dyes and high-calorie cornmeal. The rise of Flamin' Hot Cheetos appeared on American store shelves in the early 90s. They came to symbolize the poor eating habits of America's youth. The panic intensified with the rise of social media. Flamin' Hot Cheetos now banned actually in many schools around the country. There were claims that kids were showing up at doctor's offices with heartburn and red stool. The ban just seems to make the snacks more tempting. Flamin' Hot Cheetos had already permeated pop culture. They love the spiciness, the crunch, the illicit nature of the snacks. Today YouTube creators unintentionally mock the calorie intake concerns of school administrators and dietitians. Here, Matt Stoney takes the 10,000 calorie Flamin' Hot Cheetos challenge. The snacks started appearing in places its creators never dreamt of. On Etsy there are Flamin' Hot Cheetos earrings, false eyelashes and nails, shoes, clothing, and even household items. I almost bought the leggings. There were some leggings I wanted. So bad. But I think they sold out or something. I'm still hopeful for their future. Their extreme spiciness is used as a metaphor for political convictions and expressions of individual power. This pin with Flamin' Hot Cheetos colors and style features the name chingona, Spanish slang for badass woman. The cultural remixing is also happening with food. It's not just a flavor. It's a memory. It's a, like, occasion.  We have an esquite, which is a corn that we call a miso corning. With the butter, the mayonnaise, the cotija cheese, lime chili powder, and then if you want to get Flamin' Hot, we put crushed Flamin' Hot right on top and it takes you to nostalgia heaven. I'm going to be eating hot chero sushi. I did make these my own. Not the sushi though, but like the hot chero on the sushi. Here YouTube creator Wendy from the Wendy's Eating Show channel is Mexicana eating a Japanese dish and taking part in a Korean trend on YouTube called a mukbang, a video where someone eats food and talks to the audience about it. You guys want to know why I picked these, these sushi rolls because they have cream cheese in the middle and hot cheetos and cream cheese also go together like peanut butter and jam, so. Eating hot cheetos are deeply American. They give us the opportunity to engage with cultures that are different from our own or allow us to define new, surprising, and dynamic ways to be. Love comes in all flavors and all, you know, it's just the different chip. The love story that I'm telling is you can be as different as you want to be or non-traditional as you want to be and still make delicious, yummy food.


Good morning from a snowy Texas at Snowde, just to show you it did snow. Check out the snow. By the way, we're ever at a sheet metal place because today, annoying car. Today we're going to cover up these things. Initially I was going to go with one giant plate to go over it, kind of, but the guy Jake here at the metal place is going to make one with the same holes. That way I can just bolt it in and go, put a little adhesive in there, bam. And then what I'm going to do is I'm going to cover the whole thing and rewrap the top part. It'll say, you know, something like YouTube, Jacks Austin, that kind of stuff. Anyways, let's go inside and see how they're going to make it. Jake just helped me out. We figured it all out. He's a smart guy. If you're going to do metal stuff, you should come to a metal shop and not try and do it yourself. Talk to the next person. But what do we have in the fridge? We have some Kielbasa, jalapeno and cheese, smoky den marks before they stop doing game. And this is deer? Deer sausage. Deer sausage. And then some fish that was caught in Port Aransas. All right. So you can pick some of that before it gets freezer burned. Sure. Whatever you want to give me is fine. We'll eat it tonight. That sounds good. Yeah, man. So a perk of working with small businesses, we're talking about deers hunting all kinds of stuff. He's like, hey, you want some food? We got some. I didn't know it was in the fridge right outside here in the workshop. By the way, this is the workshop. And that's Alice. Dude, thanks so much, man. Here, give it a little pound. Not a problem. All right. I just got off the phone with a school bus parts company. And I ordered this, they call it a lamp, a brake light lamp replacement. It's going to be the same exact thing here. And it actually has the name of the light right there, which oddly enough, I didn't even search for. Maybe I did in the past and it just didn't work out. But good news, it's going to be delivered here in a few days. So it looks like I'm going to be hanging out for a couple of days. We've got some clear skies. I'm going to do the oil change. We've done one before on the channel. We're not going to do another one together. I'll check back in a little bit. This is the aftermath. And unfortunately, I did spill a few drops under the school bus. Sorry about that, Alice. The oil filter kind of dropped out of my hands. It's a couple pounds when it's filled up with oil. So it is a little tricky and it kind of bounced out of the oil pan I had underneath. So I think I'm going to turn this into also tomorrow's video. Because I will be here for a few days, today's Friday. I'm going to be here for a few days waiting for... Well, the thing I have to wait for is this. It arrives on Tuesday. I paid $15 to the part and $18 for shipping, two-day shipping, which over the weekend ship a Friday. So Saturday and Sunday don't count. So Monday arrives Tuesday. That way, it'll be nice and bright back here. It'll be totally legal, although this does work. It has been working. And from my understanding, you just need two tail lights, but it is nice to have all of them working. I think I'm going to rip off these right now, make it look more like that. I'm going to get the sheet metal from Jake over at the sheet metal place.  And then eventually this will just say, YouTube forward slash Jack's Austin. That way people can see me coming and going. This whole thing is nice. I really do like the wrap. However, it is a bit busy and confusing. I often get asked what kind of food I serve in my food truck bus. Step, I did this one just to kind of test it. I will show you exactly how to replace and cover up the school bus lights here. So like I said, or maybe I didn't, I went and I had eight custom pieces of aluminum made at a metal shop. I very simply gave them the light caps, which these are square, but the exact same light caps that came off there, and they made little holes for holes to screw into. Cost me about 90 bucks for about eight of them. In my opinion, it's going to be a pretty easy job. All I'm doing is I'm using this here silicone. This is what it looks like when you remove the light. I'll be putting a silicone circle around there and then I'll just be screwing into the existing holes with the same diameter screw just a little bit shorter. Those just take your screws into the hardware store like this. And I got myself brand new ones just a little bit shorter. I dropped it there. So you see the difference?  It should be pretty self-explanatory why you use silicone, but I'm just going to put it right here in the middle of the black part going around the screw head. Well, you know what? You can put a little bit in there too if you want. It's really no big deal if a little bit of water comes in here. It's just to make it a little bit nicer, flush, secure, fit there. And then we'll just screw the plate on. I have one screw at the top. I'm just going to find the hole. Sometimes it is kind of hard to find the hole. There we go. And then I'll put the other ones in and tighten those down. All right, this is what it looks like when you're finished. And there's not one way to skin a cat. You can do this many different ways. Probably cheaper as well, but this happened to be a way that me and the guy at the metal shop figured to do it.  So this is the final product. All right, and that's what it looks like. Now if you are worried about water, you can put some silicone around the edges here for this particular application. You can see it is covered with a big vinyl sticker wrap. And the reason I removed them and replaced them with these plates here, these caps, these covers, is because I'm going to redo this back part of the bus with a different graphic. This is going to be like a big old YouTube thing, stuff like that. So hopefully this video helped you. Make sure to like, subscribe. I'll see you on the next upload.


On behalf of the City of Colombia and the Five Ponds Association, I want to welcome you all for being here today. My name is Sergio Aparichio and I work for the Office of Economic Development with the City, and we're here to celebrate 30 years of a business that has been here since 1992. Heather Burns is the owner of Ravente Luxury Resale, and we're here to celebrate business week, but in special this business that has been here for a long time in the Five Ponds District. So today, I'm going to welcome our Mayor Rickerman to say a few remarks about this place. Good afternoon, Brad. Exciting to be here, especially since I was here the day this opened up in 1992. Heather has been here since 2001, took over the shop, and now owns Ravente, which has been a staple in Five Points. And it's great as we celebrate openings all the time in Colombia over the last couple of weeks, celebrating an anniversary, especially a three decade anniversary is a really special thing. And excited that they continue to grow and expand and have really been part of the heartbeat in Five Points. So with that, Heather, I'm going to turn it over to you, and thank you very much for continuing to be here. I just wanted to thank everybody for coming and thank everyone for the continued support as we have grown and changed and kind of tweaked our process after the pandemic. This is a lot of our staff, and of course it wouldn't work without them. They make it all go seamlessly. And I think that's it. So thank everybody for shopping and consigning, and thank all of y'all for being here today. Alright, so we're going to cut the ribbon not as an opening, but the beginning of the next three decades of business.


Good glorious morning. We're waking up right on the ocean here with the dunes in the background Sun's starting to come up and I'm up first going out hunting So what me and Rob are gonna do is we're gonna kind of flip-flop filming each other's hunts So definitely go subscribe over there to Lunkers TV as well, and you can keep up with with both of our hunts So that's how we've decided to do it. It's gonna be the best way To just document both of these things and we are Yes, it is time for some tix bray Rob was graciously Or smart enough to bring this stuff right here. Look at we look like Cougi twins right now. Can you can you see a see us out here? And it's not very windy. It's currently like 41 degrees. I never would have thought it would be 41 degrees in Africa, but We're on the very southern tip of the continent of Africa like as far south basically as you can go right here on the ocean and It's kind of like New Zealand where The farther south you go the farther to the South Pole you are so it does get cold and this is their winter It's currently like a hundred degrees in Texas. So I can't wait. I'm so excited. We saw so many animals yesterday It's time to get the bow out and get after some animals. I don't know what exactly is gonna come out But big thing on my list is a water buck get a nice water buck a lot of ongulant animals roaming around these beautiful planes Right next to the sand dunes in the oceans It's amazing definitely Instagram worthy. How does this compare to your other? African not even comparable not even remotely even close This is the most beautiful part of Africa I've ever seen Hills grass your actual grass. I've actually fished this ocean once already for uh for gts There's literally great white sharks. There's deaths. That's a crazy He said there's a ton of bait out there in which I would assume there is I mean look at those This is amazing, man. Let's go get something on the ground. Hopefully we both get something on the ground today Started out Kevin man, Rob. It's coming in Rob channel six news coming in It's time First morning And we're ready. It's a little chilly. I'm gonna put some gloves on But I think we're gonna be mostly doing some spot stocking. It's been very windy here Makes it very very tough For uh shooting A bow me and robber bow hunting on this trip. I never would have thought that south africa was like this Definitely one of the most beautiful places I've ever been in my life. Hopefully we get something on the ground very soon You ready to be sneaky I'm ready. Look, I feel like channel six news. We got the big camera out for this trip rob brought The channel six camera so we can get some good zoom in shots for you guys There's just animals everywhere. There's giraffes walking over the trees. We've already seen two water bugs It's it's literally like every valley you come across there's animals So different than texas like they don't really get up until the sun comes up here Because they're bedded all night. They're Hiding from predators and they like to be born. So it's totally different than White tail hunting just through that. It's fresh bad. If I forgot my release wouldn't Happens often Nature happens, eh? Nature's tough and rough I'm doing a zigzag, but it's what we gotta do. I think that was like our Fifth or sixth stalk on the morning and it has been Incredible I cannot believe how many animals we have seen. We literally walked up on these giant giraffes We saw that baby giraffe that was really that was really sad, but it's just incredibly wild out here and we have So many opportunities.  He has got a nice impala this morning Going after some red hearted bees to know the things but the main two characters I'm trying to get with my bow are a water buck and a nyala And we actually have I've heard about a reed buck That is hanging around close by that. He might be an easy stalk. I mean nothing has been easy yet It's all been incredibly hard They have such good noses and they've already seen you most of the time driving the trucks around and things like that They'll spot you thousands of yards away. And then when you're walking up, you've got to hug the brush line It's just an incredibly Tough way to hunt with a bow in this open area. It's not like what you typically see hunting africa where you're sitting over a water hole And you're in a blind with a bow. This is literally Spot and stalk like elk hunting that's I've never been elk hunting, but just being here with rob That's how he's described it as Going on for these water bucks are about the same size You're you're going up and down hills and having to hug brush lines and really watching the wind constantly Very difficult y'all, but I love a good challenge and patrick. He's a really good guide He's kind of guiding us through all the scenarios that we might go through with a bow to try to get an animal. So I think we're gonna try this afternoon a little bit But how we're how me and rob are doing these videos is we're basically flip-flopping on on the camera So I'm I'm filming half a day with him. He's filming half a day with me and we're going back and forth So if you want to follow that action like right now We're actually going to go look for a sable for rob and that's going to be a whole another video So you can go subscribe down below to his channel and I'll be filming that so we're going to swap back and forth on that but It's an awesome adventure so far y'all I cannot believe the amazing place like again just the ocean right behind us There's literally great white sharks like the stuff you see on nat geo shark week sharks jumping out of the water That's right down here where we're at and we're hunting right in front of it. So absolutely incredible You guys stay tuned hit the like button for awesome safari magic And I'll see you right here on the next one


Hello and welcome to the International Daily Roundup by People's Dispatch where we bring you major news developments from around the world. Our headlines, Amnesty International hauls work in India alleging witch-hunt by Modi government. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to introduce anti-blockade bill to fight effects of US sanctions. Uruguay's former president Pepe Mujica announces retirement from electoral politics, women march in Mexico City demanding legal right to abortion and 15 people killed in separate instances in Afghanistan. In our first story, human rights organization Amnesty International has shut down operations in India alleging a witch-hunt by the Narendra Modi government. The government of India had earlier frozen the bank accounts of the organization. Authorities have been pursuing Amnesty for two years for alleged money laundering since 2018. A number of raids have been carried out on its offices and homes of its executives. Amnesty has denied all allegations of financial misconduct and said that it stood in full compliance with applicable Indian international laws. More charges have been filed against the organization. Amnesty claims that the Home Ministry of the Hindu Nationalist Narendra Modi government has been constantly harassing the organization and human rights activists. The organization feels that they are receiving under the Modi government's wrath due to several reports that were published by Amnesty that were critical of the government's human rights track record. Amnesty's withdrawal from India demonstrates the concerns raised by leftist groups and human rights organizations alike, over rising authoritarian tendencies of the nationalist government and the rising right-wing populism under Narendra Modi. Amnesty stands among a long list of dissidents including students, lawyers and professors who have faced crackdowns for criticizing the Modi government. In our next story on Sunday, Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro announced that he would be presenting an anti-blockade constitutional bill to the National Constituent Assembly. Maduro earlier hinted about this initiative to fight the arbitrary sanctions by the US during a meeting of the Presidential Commission for the control and prevention of COVID-19. Addressing the public on television, Maduro stated that the bill is an anti-blockade bill that has been created and studied with the help of international experts. He added that Venezuela has to protect itself urgently against so many attacks and to shield its economy and to undertake a financial, social and economic recovery. The bill is expected to be approved after a national debate. After it becomes a law, it will be possible for Venezuela to implement a set of measures to overcome the harmful effects of the sanctions. Vice President Delsi Rodriguez stressed that Venezuela is living in a historical moment that cannot be postponed and that it is time to reinforce the Bolivarian state's legal capacities to defend itself from the blockade. The United States has applied severe sanctions to oil, gold, mining and banking industries, as well as to companies, vessels and individuals who are linked in one way or another to Venezuela's government. She also stated that these sanctions are crimes against humanity and they have brought the case before the International Criminal Court to denounce the US government for suffocating the commercial and financial sectors of the country. Washington-based think tank, the Center for Economic Policy and Research had come out with an report in 2019 that claimed that 40,000 Venezuelans had lost their lives due to US sanctions on the country. In our next story on Sunday, Uruguay's former President Jose Muzica announced that he will leave his place in the Senate and retire from electoral politics due to health issues. Jose served as Uruguay's president between 2010 and 2015. He had earlier revealed that he had a chronic immune disease and that his difficulties to move anywhere and anytime would prevent him from being active in his duties as a senator and a political leader. In the mid-1960s, Muzica joined the National Liberation Movement to Camaros. During this time, he was prisoner of four times, faced brutal torture and spent 12 years in prison. In 1985, after the return of democracy to Uruguay, he created a movement of popular participation. He left his leader as minister of agriculture from 2005 to 2008 and later a senator. At the end of 2019, Uruguay and people elected him as the president. Although Muzica has said that he will not be a candidate in next year's election, there is some speculation that he resigned from the Senate so he can run for president again. In our next story on Monday, hundreds of women marched on the streets of Mexico City demanding legal rights to abortion all across the country. This was on the occasion of International Safe Abortion Day. Protests were called by a number of feminist groups in the country such as Ciudad Feminista and others. Some of the protesters clashed with the police who were trying to stop them from marching. The women dressed in black and carrying green bandanas, raised slogans demanding safe and legal right to abortion. They marched on the city's monument to the revolution towards Juarez to meet another group of protesters when they were stopped by the police. Abortion is illegal in most of the country. The capital, Mexico City and the southern state of Oaxaca legalized abortion only last year. In the rest of the country, abortion is only allowed under certain circumstances as pregnancy cost by rape. In the second week of September, some women groups in the country went on to occupy some of the government buildings in the capital. They temporarily converted one of those buildings into a shelter home for women victims of violence and femicide. The movement for a right to abortion and against rising cases of femicide in the country has picked up in recent years. Women groups have criticized President Andres Manuel López Obrador for his lackluster and socially conservative response to the demand of action against rising cases of femicide and other women-related issues in the country. The protesters accused that the president has taken an idealistic and vague position talking about the need for spiritual change in the country instead of taking any firm policy action against rising crimes against women. In our next story on Tuesday, at least 14 civilians were killed in a roadside bomb blast in Kajran district in central Daikondi province of Afghanistan. Among those data, seven women, five children and two men. In another incident on Tuesday, the insurgent Taliban attacked a security check post in Shreed Taghab district of the northwestern Faryab province. The first attack was launched with the parliamentary people's uprising, forces checkpoint in the area of Maimana, the capital of Faryab province, where security personnel were killed. Despite the ongoing intra-afghan peace talks being held in the Katharine capital Doha that are deemed vital for the stability of Afghanistan, the violence in the country has persisted. This has undermined people's faith in the intra-afghan dialogue. At least 130 people have been killed in over 100 wounded since the beginning of the peace talks. Last week, 57 security personnel of the Afghan forces were killed in different clashes in various parts of the country. According to the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, at least 1,293 civilians have lost their lives in the country in 80 incidents of violence during the first three months of 2020. That's all we have time for. We'll be back tomorrow with more news from the world. Until then, keep watching People's Dispatch.