why they moved the line to the left or to the right, simply we look at the lines at the end and go, yeah, I guess roughly it's divided right, but we don't know what the motives are. That feels like a failing in terms of public engagement or oversight. Secondly, that this process, I think people wanted to be sure that it was not a negative or a conflict heavy such as was perceived last time. And people who do recall last time, it was conflict heavy because there again, the process was originally five people, the mayor and four city counselors, again, incumbents deciding things without the benefit of oversight. So I think that much like the last time, people who were paying attention feel like the public engagement was not taken seriously or certainly it wasn't valued because this process does not allow them to look at something and say, yes, I think that was done fairly or yes, I think I'd like to see the lines adjusted left or right or any other form of interactive nature of the public being part of the process. So front loading it by the NPAs seem to suggest a way to make it look like public engagement was part of the plan, but people that I've talked to feel like that was not it. I tried to echo what I understood the writers of the resolution, what their intent was, was to sort of be more creative. And I don't find a whole lot of people who felt like the creative, just imagine what we are going to do has really been official to a true public engagement process. Does that help clarify? Yes, thank you. I appreciate that, Jim. Yeah. Okay, George. I guess I'd like to begin by asking what the status of the report that you're forming is, Diane, are you done with your data analysis and you're gonna do the write up at this point or is there time to do more data analysis? I have no data analysis. Okay. Is that from the survey? Is that what you mean? Just from everything collectively, one idea I had would be to, if it's, I'm not sure it's possible anymore, I just checked the previous meeting Zoom links, the recordings I think have expired, but if it was possible to get the transcripts from the public feedback and also all the written comments and create a, what's called a word or a tag cloud in which the words that come up most often are emphasized, you know, other than the and is and stuff. So that's one great way to just analyze a lot of written feedback. So that's one suggestion I have for the report is to go through a bunch of points that I feel like should be included in the report. There would be get rid of Ward 8, seemed like a pretty universal sentiment that people had would say that the way to get more effective feedback would be to show the public a set of maps and ask them to make a decision or at least to consider what different arrangements look like as a way to cut through the complexities of the issues of redistricting and really get to the core of what people care about more effectively. Committees that are volunteer based are expected to collect public feedback. We think that they should be provided with an effective public engagement and feedback network that they can utilize to put the public feedback gathering numbers seems like too much of a task for individuals. I know when the original timeline came out for this committee, I was hoping to do a lot more public engagement and ways the timeline changed. But if I was going to do it effectively, I think resources such as a canvassing team, graphic designer, a mail out printing and postage system, these would all be effective ways to engage the public and great resources to provide these ad hoc committees. If there is gonna continue to be this trend in creating an ad hoc committee to gather public input, then I think they should be provided with resources basically. I think we should more systematically address the at large versus ward only based representation question. This is one of the questions that I kind of regret falling out of the survey in the final shorter version where we just directly ask people, do you want at large representatives? Yes, no, I don't care. Something as simple as that. And another point I wanted to bring up, they're obligated to bring up since I was brought on to this committee. I committed to just making sure that this report included a concern from the public that much like Jim addressed that this committee, there it is or not can appear as a facade which the city council can point to and say, this map has gone through the public process. It's been approved by the public and they can point to this committee and say, we have gotten public feedback when that feedback might not be really that genuine because we've never shown them a map. So it really doesn't feel that effective, I guess. Which as I understand is simply a yes, no on a single map. On the personal note, in my experience with collecting public feedback being on this committee, I think that adding further complexities to the process of redistricting such as having a scheme where three representatives are in one ward and two are in another, I think this is gonna, if one of those schemes is presented to the public, it's gonna be very hard for them to accept and comprehend, it's already so hard to say that one system is more fair than another. So adding more complexities, I think just makes things more difficult. Pretty much all I have, I guess I just wanna mention that there's a good amount of material I collected in the drive that I have passed on to CEDO and could potentially be utilized by the whatever organization is going to do the actual mapping. Okay, thank you very much, George. Thank you, Greg Schupler, ward five. I sort of feel like quoting the Athenian philosopher Socrates who said, the more I know, the more I realize how little I know. And that's sort of what's become clear to me with this process a little bit. And of course we're embedded in it and you can just imagine how the regular people in the community are trying to grasp and understand this. And when we ask them for information and feedback, which of course is what our charge is. And it's real difficult to obtain that in an effective manner. And I think the real culprit here is the timeline. However, I do think that a couple of major themes did emerge, some of them have been indicated already. And so I'll just cover them quickly. And one is the problem with ward eight, something needs to be done with that. And secondly, the situation in terms of, there was some consensus I felt, although no one identified a magic number. I think there were some consensus that people felt that city council needed to be increased in size. For no other reason that they were overworked. It's complicated issues that they're dealing with and perhaps sharing that workload would make things easier. So by reducing the ward numbers, it would be important, I think, to certainly not reduce the number of city councilors. That would be a move that would seem to go against a grain that's one of the issues that I've heard. I think the third issue was one that George just touched upon. He referred it as a facade of public comment. I just think that I heard mostly and truthfully in my ward five NPA meetings, not as much in the public meetings. But I did mention it on several occasions in these meetings. And that is that there is sort of a lack of trust. And I don't mean to be disingenuous. I'm not saying that I feel that way, but those were some of the comments that people really felt that they didn't have a lot of check or a balance on this process that the city council was probably going to do what they wanted to do. And I just mentioned that in passing. And lastly, again, just to reiterate, I think with more time, we could have fulfilled our charge better. Thank you, Craig. Robert, is it okay that I'm just going around the room? Is that all right? Pardon me. Is it okay that I'm just going around the room? Is that all right? Yeah, that's fine with me. Any of which way? Okay, thank you. Okay, so I was going to leave it to other folks working on the survey and that was work that I didn't think that I was going to be very good at. The only engagement that I had with the public that was other than what we've been reading from the emails that came back to CEDAW and stuff is twice before this meeting, it was in front porch form. And then the previous meeting we had, I had also posted in the front porch form to everybody I could post it, which went all the way down to the West O&E front porch form. I basically warned them and I said, listen folks, if we go back to seven wards, what will happen for sure is that one of the new North End wards, either wards four or ward seven will go down at least as far as North Street and at least as far East as Champlain. And I'll have to go farther East or farther South, one way or another. It could go all the way down to Battery Park and stay West of Park Street or it could go all the way down to North Street and stay West of La Fountain Street. It will expand there. Those folks are gonna find themselves in another ward. I warned them. And I got one email from one woman in Lakeview Terrace that said she didn't wanna move up from ward three, which is what you might expect. There's probably a lot of people that don't know what's gonna happen, but they're gonna fight themselves in another ward. And for some reason, eight years ago or 10 years ago, there was more controversy. I know that there was a politician in the new North End that didn't really want those votes coming out of the old North End in a new North End ward. And there was some desire to not keep the old North End and the new North End put together in the same ward. That's nobody saying anything about that. So about eight years ago, I mean, the legislature approved it and the city voted for it and this council put it on the ballot. But a bad idea had to originate somewhere. And I just wanna say to everybody, my bad. So ward eight is, you know, clearly the people wanna get rid of ward eight. Nobody from ward three is squawking about the certainty that they're gonna end up in another ward. And that's if we keep- If we go to seven wards- We go to seven, but there's still- It will force ward four or seven to come down as far as North Street. But that's the other option is that we don't go to seven wards, right? There's still- Well, I mean, there's six wards, but then that's another crazy. Yeah, okay, but there's- But if we keep eight wards, which we're not gonna do because there's just absolutely zero that wanna keep eight wards, if we wouldn't have to do that, if we went to four big wards, we could keep them separate. But anything else, there will be a ward that straddles somewhere from the old North End or downtown all the way up, depending on what it is, but it'll go up where now ward four is. It'll go up the lake up to the North End. Can't be avoided. Other comments you wanna share? I wanna agree with Jim about that we should have had maps to show them people. And I drew a bunch of maps and I'm willing to show them to people, but I was told better not show the maps. I'm not ready for maps yet, but when this committee thing is over, I'm gonna act as a private citizen and I'm going to assert some maps to some people, including those on council, just whether they like them or not. That's all I can say, but we should have. Oh, I will say one thing. This is an idea that I wanted to bring, but maybe I should wait till later, but this is about the process. I still think that we could have an advisory vote. If maybe it's not the same ballot that goes in the ballot machine, maybe it'll be something that's handed in, but we could, on town meeting day, we could have present the voters of Burlington a large page of different maps or a collection of maps and an advisory ballot where they just approve or disapprove of either map. And the council could get an idea of what people are looking at, but I don't know, I mean, that's just an idea. Okay, thank you. Daniel? Yeah, I also particularly like that idea and part of it is because it's difficult to understand the trade-offs between the different structures and especially the number of wards and the district system and all of those things. So actually being able to offer multiple alternatives where it's quite clear, it's not just spoken in word, you could see it on the page where the trade-offs lie. So I tried to explain sort of that seven word trade-offs. So I lived in Ward three and it was quite clear looking at the way the districts were currently sized and where the deviations were that a change would need to be made. And as it's come up a number of times in previous meetings, there is that choke point between the New North End and the Old North End. And one of the large concerns that came out in the survey which to be fair, there's only 65 respondents and it's not immediately clear how representative of that that is of the entire city. And we could get into that more once we arrive at the survey, but one of the larger concerns was preserving neighborhood boundaries. And another thing that came up in the Ward two three NPA is the King Maple neighborhood. And I feel like that something is also something that should be addressed where people actually looking at the maps could even make comments. And that we already have a start here with all of the written comments that we received.  So if you see Ward eight, it often comes up with like gerrymandered. Like to give one example. And yeah, so that's basically all I had to say and just kind of cycling back to the survey like the number one concern that a lot of people had between one and two is one person, one vote minimizing the differences in between wards and something that I noticed on the previous two maps is they didn't do a good job of this. They were closer to 10% total deviation than 0% when they were drawn. The last map was actually quite good in deviation for the 2010 census was plus it was 8% I think overall deviation from the smallest biggest. So the issue was that the population changed in those 10 years, right? That's in 10 years later, it didn't look to That's what we're required to buy by law anyway, but I'm just saying that the courts will squawk if it's more than 10%, they could squawk if it's more than 10%, but I don't, the last map was pretty tight on the deviation. And sort of that's kind of like where I think the trade-offs come in like preserving neighborhood boundaries when it might be difficult to get close to that, you know, near zero is just another example of that. So that's all I wanted to say I'm in support of the idea of an advisory question and I hope that's something this committee could discuss. And I really wish we could have engaged the public more with that idea. Like this is in its sense just the first step. Like this is gonna be a long redistricting process and the idea that this ad hoc committee is just now over really makes me wonder what other opportunities for public input there will be or if this has just been the token example of that. Thank you. Anne. I just have a question for Daniel. You talked about 65 survey results. Which survey is that? The one that was posted on the front porch forum? Yes. Crusado. So we do have results. Okay, great, because the rest of us were unaware. Well, at least some of us were unaware of that. So let's make sure we covered that under the survey question. Okay. On the item, yeah. So I have some bullet points. So the first was that I had expected and hoped for greater participation in general, but maybe the survey will change that. I feel like a lot of the same people were present at the public input meetings, which is their right to do so, but not necessarily representative of broad public input. And I don't think it's anybody's fault. I think it's just the nature of the process, the short timeline and maybe the pandemic. So as the ward eight representative, the message came through loud and clear that there's a feeling that ward eight is gerrymandered and should be eliminated or at least the boundaries redrawn to return student housing south of Prospect Street to ward six. This was input not only from my ward eight neighbors, but also from other people in the city. And as ward eight residents, I was convinced by Keith Pillsbury's presentation and voting information put together by Jonathan Chappell Sokol that a student dominated ward also presents logistical challenges in addition to the ethical ones of so-called gerrymandered ward. The turnout is always at the bottom of the list. And although somebody has to be last, it's always ward eight and we're significantly below other wards, permanent residents who live there do not feel represented. And they are the ones who are most affected by the results of city elections since they live there year after year. The next is people want to preserve neighborhoods. I think that message came through pretty clear. The districts, so the next bullet points is the districts are not a popular concept. And mixed feedback on the councilor at large and I heard good arguments for both. I think there's a conundrum regarding representation for wards and seven, which if you look at voter turnout have consistently higher turnout than any of the downtown wards but actually have a fewer number of people overall. So the conundrum is how to preserve and respect their input since they have such a high voter turnout without giving them a more representation than they do. And the last bullet point was I was a little bit disturbed by the suggestion by from a couple of people that city council is not going to listen to these recommendations and that this is all simply window dressing. So I hope that we all stay involved. This goes through city council and we're back if it looks like they're not listening. That's it. And can you just repeat the next to last one about wards four and seven? I just didn't quite catch that. Four and seven? And that was that the before you? Yeah, the conundrum with the new North End is that they have consistently highest voter turnout but they have fewer people overall. What can be done in that situation? I just feel that the downtown wards have relatively low voter turnout and is it fair to have a fewer number of people representing the same number of city councilors than the new North End? Even though their overall numbers are lower, you have many more people voting. And I guess that is just one of the problems with a purely representative system. Can I address that? Yeah. So the conundrum is this, that all wards are roughly evenly divided at the point of redistricting. So in 2015, they were all equally, essentially equally divided. Now they have varied a little bit. The numbers will show that and that's why we have to do it again. However, when you talk about, so there is no inequality or by very much and inequality in terms of how much any resident has an opportunity to be represented, what you have is participation levels that differ. So in ward four and seven, two things. One is it's kind of a little bit more like a bedroom community, people who tend to live in that community a little bit longer. That doesn't mean that there aren't people who stay longer in any other portion, just percentage-wise it's likely. And so when people are in a community longer, perhaps they participate in their voting a little bit more. But it is about participation. There's nothing about inequality. Every person in this city has roughly the same opportunity to participate or not. So a non-participation is also a choice. And so the other piece, and I know that confuses some of it sometimes, but four and seven have very actively made at the work clerk for a long time. I'm not currently, but I had been. And we were very actively doing things to encourage participation. So there isn't a differential in potential representation. There's only a difference in how many people get out and vote with the one exception that board ate where it's predominantly students. That is a different dynamic, a different reasoning in which participation might not look very high. But it really isn't an inequality. And so there isn't anything unfair about the balance. And it would be helpful if we can educate people that representatives, it's part of when you're elected it's part of your job to reach out to the 4,800 roughly somewhere between 4,800, 5,200 people that you represent. And it's a, that I think is where the conundrum comes is people think that that vote of participation equals representation and that's just not the case. If you chose not to vote, that was part of your choice. I don't know if that helps or confuses. I wasn't suggesting that those words should get more or less representation based on participation. I just see that as a conundrum. And who's speaking? Oh, it's Jim from board four. So all I'm doing is trying to say that it's a conundrum and what I'd love to see is perhaps, I don't know if it fits within the scope of what we do around redistricting, but some resources that do encourage voter participation. I mean, it is discouraging that people have an opportunity to weigh in on the things that impact their lives. And some parts of the city weigh in more frequently than others and so the participation rate is somewhat of a conundrum, but I'm just meaning to be helpful in sharing being in this in the board for what I observe from having been a ward clerk and why people participate. Thank you. We haven't heard from Richard yet. Yep, that's where we're going now. That's all you have to say. If I could just add to that point briefly. I'm pretty sure the city attorney also just said it's not something we should consider like legally, you're not allowed to consider voter turnout in the redistricting process if I understood that correctly. Thank you. All right, Richard, sorry. I'm taking the mask off. So I don't necessarily completely agree with all that's people talking about as far as the process is concerned. So what I tried to do here is just put down the timelines and the sources that we've had as far as very, very parochial ward one. I was selected by the ward one NPA in early September. I think selected as American for roped in. And we went straight into launching a survey on the two front porch forum ward one neighborhoods which is old North and East, which I think is the still the biggest front porch forum neighborhood and Centennial. We got 33 responses there. Anne and I from ward one and ward eight both altogether had 40 minutes at the October NPA and the November NPA. Then plus the public meetings and then plus people sending us solicited or unsolicited emails. So I feel as if the people that want to comment have commented in that's insufficient numbers to give a broad enough cross section of opinion as far as ward one is concerned. So I'm just gonna go through one or two of the bullets from again, parochial ward one. People make a fuss about it, but it's true. Ward one has been certainly for the last 30 years been the most underrepresented ward. We've had the most people first city councilor. I'm not sure whether that makes any difference, but people feel strongly about it and coupling with Ward eight just made that worse because of being diluted with the UVM population which we weren't allowed to campaign at theoretically. One of our East district city councilors advocated for the, I thought this was significant, advocated for the elimination of the district of the districts and district reps. And as he said, even if he's talking himself out of a job, the councilor was spread too thin and residents can't get adequate response. I thought that was significant. I don't know whether other district city councilors would admit that, but I thought that was significant. And this is the city councilor that participates a lot as far as our public meetings are concerned. I thought that was a good observation. That's also a ward eight being, no one has been supportive either in public meetings or in surveys for ward eight, so we'll just move on to that. But I do think that the Keith Pillsbury's paper should be entered in testimony and I've got it. I've got some of it in hard copy, but I don't have it in electronically and it's got my scribble all over it. But I do think that was an important document. I don't know whether you do. And we ought to try and get it. Owners occupiers, it may speak to the voting conundrum that Anne talked about, but I imagine that owner occupiers throughout the city, as if institutionally they're underrepresented. Owners occupiers tend not to be transient and tend to be more invested in their neighborhoods. There was support in ward one for small awards, offering the option perhaps of one rep for 13 or 14 or 15 small awards. People felt that issues were sufficiently important for smaller neighborhoods and that district counselors, for instance, or perhaps at large counselors wouldn't have their finger on the pulse of an issue that may concern a dozen blocks or something like that. I do think one of the things that people spoke about in the survey, because we had asked if there was support for at large, not large option. There was some support for at large, about 30%. About 30% were for districts as well. I suspect that one or two of those may have overlapped. The message there was more for wards and less for districts. But I do think that there is a, there certainly is a well of support for at large representation. I think it ought to be part of whatever we include in the final option. Some support, we asked about, do you prefer an odd number of counselors? Most people felt didn't care, but about 35 to 40% supported an odd number of counselors. I think that's sort of a little bit secondary, but it's as far as what we're doing, I thought it was significant. And also, there was a question as to whether like-size we've, anyone's from the city has looked at the configurations that are like-sized cities have in terms of their council configurations. There was a couple of comments about term limits for city counselors and the mandatory retirement age of 75, which sort of eliminates me from running for the city council if I ever become a citizen. And also an option, it's been mentioned before, are the city counselors workloads overwhelming? And there are more committees than ever than fewer city counselors. And the district counselors in particular have to cover a wider swathe of the city. So what is the major theme to all that? It can be summed up by going back to the presentation that Negan and Dan made about the redistricting considerations in 2010. And if they were conformed to, instead of being flavorantly disregarded, I reckon we'd solve 80 to 90% of the issues. The only two things that I want to mention that I want to be, that I think it's important to be in the final paper, as far as ward eight is concerned, is one, we're talking about not just city counselors, we're also talking about school commissioners and the viability, administrative viability of a voting ward, once again, to Keith Bill's newspaper. And the fact that, and others are testified that there are only about 10 burning to school district students in ward eight. So that's previously undemocratic and never should be repeated. Also what shouldn't be repeated is that a ward is dominated by a landscape that is off limits to someone who's not invited on. So I think that's also a core democratic thing that needs to be considered whatever configuration we come at within the end. Lastly, I guess, it's been said before, but the city has got to ensure some transparency and integrity to the final configuration, whatever it is, whether we agree with it or not. Someone's got to say, we did this, we are responsible for it, paying for it when the charter change comes up instead of hiding in the weeds. And I'm gonna finish with my personal care-brained idea of to resolve the UVM issue or to have a go at it. Anyway, is to have a go at the seven wards, two city councillors each as at 1990 to 2010, except, sorry, George, one extra at large councillor across wards one and six and including eight, which would make 15 and all. So that would dilute where the student population is between wards one and ward six. And you've got to account for the population so you need an extra city councillor automatically and with a little bit of adjustment, that could possibly work. Anyway, one last thing I would say is that I appreciated the input from Sarah Carpenter and Jack Hanson and to a certain extent, John Shannon, all of who like to recognize that they participated at some stage because I think that what the city councillors think, even though not supposed to be part of this, I think that's pretty important and they are obviously gonna be influential what they come up with. Anyway, sorry to be long-winded, but that's what we've got. Thank you, Richard. So that was an enormous amount of information. In fact, free pages worth. So these things, certainly we heard over and over again, there's some little dissension here and there. In terms of where we go from here, the only thing I've put together so far is just a background about how we got to where we are, just to have some context for the memory of the city council. But in terms of the actual recommendations, I can certainly summarize what I heard today and some of it is contradictory, but I think that's what we heard was some contradiction. Yes, there wasn't clear, although I have to say the Ward 8 thing, I think was pretty clear. But I was also thinking about how many people participated, at least we're still gonna talk about the survey, but in the meetings at least, and Ethan and I came up with 40 distinct people. So some people came to more than one meeting, so we had 40 participants in that process. Obviously, you all have reached out way beyond that. So when you think about the population of Burlington, 42,000 or so, somebody's probably got a better number than me, but if we made to 1% of the folks in Burlington who actually were involved in this process or something, that's a lot. So I think one of the things I wanted to be sure we said was that this is what we heard, but recognizing this was that this is not the word of the residents of Burlington, right? But this is the people who are willing to come out and you get extra points for that in my book that you came out. But as we all said, we didn't have a lot of time to prepare, to market, to advertise, to let people know what we were doing. So that said, we can put forward what we heard, but I wouldn't want to necessarily say this is the definitive last thoughts of the residents. If that's a fair statement, I just wanted to put that out there and certainly willing to hear more about that. So in terms of actually making recommendations, it's difficult, right? Other than the couple of ones that came really clearly, because when I look back, it was funny when you mentioned about the multiple wards nine, 10, 11, and I was looking through all the comments, the 30 pages of comments, and we really do have everything. We have three or four wards up to 13 wards. People actually had all these different iterations with or without at large. And I think this goes back to not really having a visual, not being able to say, well, what does that look like? I mean, 13 wards, that sounds kind of nice. Have there been any maps drawn with 13 wards? I haven't seen any maps at all. I haven't myself. I have myself drawn a couple of 12 ward maps, being that was the existing number of counselors we have now. There's a problem. This is a simple mathematical problem, but when you're dealing with the percent deviation, when you're doing the percentages, the denominator. And if the denominator gets smaller, which means smaller wards, which is what happens with more wards, then adding or subtracting a census block causes a bigger percentage change. And so it's, all I can say about a 15 ward map is rots of ruck. It won't happen. You won't be able to get it within the deviation. A 12 ward map was what we would call a female dog. It was nasty, but I was able to crank out two of them that had the overall deviation small enough, but it's very hard to do, and also to make meaningful ward neighborhoods and stuff. I think the real issue is, do we want to just talk about what we heard, or do we want to analyze it? Well, I'm just, things were said, people said, there was just some suggestion about the 15 ward map. Yeah, and that was sort of an example of what I wanted to sort of get out there, that we heard lots of information. We as individuals or as a committee can make recommendations. I stayed away from that when I talked to city folks early on, because I felt like I just wasn't sure we were gonna get enough time for meaningful input and enough people to make it feel like we could make those recommendations. We'd have somebody who'd like some. Yeah, just come up to the microphone. Let me just say, so that's more about the charge says, tell us what you heard, right? But there's also Harvey's like, well, but do we want to do analysis? And I think that's really for me a big question on the memo, right? I mean, and it's your memo. I'm just helping you write it. So let's think about that and go back to it. And do you want to make a quick comment? Yes, Diane, JeffCobbs.org, seven. When I think about the challenge you're talking about in terms of formatting the presentation and the report, I would offer a suggestion that a lot of the things that the committee has collected feedback on actually go beyond the charge of the council's resolution. So in terms of format or structure, perhaps you could structure it such that you address all the comments and feedback that specifically address the charge in the council resolution and then create a separate section of comments and input that actually where, that go beyond, where people contributed ideas that actually go beyond the charge of the council, because I think as you go down the road with this process, that distinction is gonna be important. Okay, thank you, I appreciate it, yeah. So one of the things I did in this sort of document I started it was to list where all the information is available, right? I mean, that's important so they can actually go back to the original docs and see what people say. So I throw that out and I know I really actually would like to hear about the survey because I don't know anything. I tried to get information from CEDO and they didn't have anything and we got tripped all around. So I don't know how many folks have heard about this survey, the results. Am I the only one who hasn't or? I am. So a couple people have, no, okay. I've only read that attached document that was. So I would say this is Jim from four. Sorry. Sorry. So the hearing that there was a survey that actually made it out, the first time I heard about it was this morning when someone told me who someone who had seen some of the original work, their comment was what the heck happened to the good survey? Second, because whatever went out wasn't didn't match their analysis of the first one. But also that as a body meant to be helpful in gathering public opinion, here again I would say that I don't know where but this survey fell, kind of fell apart as well. And so when we make our memo, I would hope that we also consider adding a few thoughts about that might be constructive as 2030 starts rolling around some variations that thoughts that I've heard from folks or even thoughts that I'd share myself. So that not only are we sharing what we've heard because they can watch the videos too which has always been my mantra throughout. I'm very disappointed in that. All I've been here is somebody who's just echoing what they can watch on video because I really expected we were doing redistricting and that's not what this committee turned into. But also that we voice that in such a way that when the council is charged with the responsibility of facing redistricting again that they can learn from the lessons here. And so that's my thought about some things I hope we get into the memo. Great, thanks Jim, appreciate that. Daniel, survey. Yeah, I don't know how I end up being one of the only people with access to this. It wasn't immediately clear the way that CEDO would be promoting the survey and I actually had no idea that it would actually just be the Google Forms link that I provided. Okay, and we're not criticizing you on this at all. In fact, I'm just really glad that something went out. So don't feel like, we were just kind of surprised because none of us could quite figure out. Yes, and what was difficult for me is I actually didn't attend the orientation meeting. I was initially an alternate for Ward 3 and I actually didn't even know I was nominated as an alternate at that NPA meeting. I had just moved to the ward a couple months earlier and had been participating in NPAs and felt it is one way to get involved and it is one way to have your voice heard. But now I'm just like thrown into this and I was hoping the city, CEDO, especially would be able to give more support because we're not a survey maker. I didn't at all sign up for this. So we appreciate it and thank you for doing that. And it would have been nice to have more time as a committee to work together on this type of thing. It was difficult not being able to speak via email. We were, I think, warned once by the city attorney about that and I figured I was better off keeping my hands off of this, doing the thing, you know, doing the charge of the committee, which was the public meetings where I hoped to learn more. And that's what we did and, you know, we did get the feedback that we received and we were moving on. I mean, I plan to stay involved in this and continue doing this work. But it did come as a surprise to me, some of this. All right, so you wanna tell us what you found out? I think. Oh, no, go ahead. So as I mentioned, there was 65 total responses and the one question on the survey was asking folks to rank their top 10 priorities among 12. And the number one priority, as I mentioned before, was one person, one vote, minimizing population differences in between words. So actually over half of people put that among their top three. There was a split decision on creating at-large seats for representatives. So about 17 out of 65 people marked that as their top choice. And I think that matches pretty closely with Roberts. Richard, sorry, Richard's Ward one and eight survey where that was sort of split. And at, well, I guess I could talk about NPAs that a lot of people were against the idea of at-large city counselors. And I think that's something that a lot of people here have voiced as well. No one seems to be super big on the idea of keeping the district system. So only a small fraction of people, about nine out of 65 marked that among their top three out of 12. And that matches pretty closely to, I think what we heard, no one seemed super psyched about the idea and especially regarding ideas of fairness. City counselors having different constituencies is an issue there. Preserving neighborhood boundaries also seemed to be something that was among people's top three or four. And that matches pretty closely, I feel, to the ideas that people have also heard and keeping wards compact as well as being another one that people very often mark this as their number two priorities after making sure that the districts or the wards essentially are equally represented. And I guess one thing that we've heard a lot about that is kind of matched in some of the comments or questions that people put is actually like feeling that there is equal representation. Something I saw come up in the email was the participation rates at the special election on December 7th and Ward 8 having about a three and a half percent participation rate and a lot of the thoughts about actually having ward clerks and people to staff the polls in Ward 8 as being something that's difficult. So that essentially sums up what I've gleaned from this and what I've heard and I hope like, sorry, I know CEDO like there's been other surveys regarding the use of the ARPA funds. That was a professionally done survey and I would like to think that there would be actual data analysis and there was outreach like posters would put up and people were made aware of this but there wasn't the resources to do that here and that's why I feel like we had such low participation and I just felt like it wasn't the kind of thing that I could get into and nor was it something that I had the capacity to do. Well, having said all that, will you send that along to CEDO when you post it on the website? Of course. The results, that would be great just cause we did do it so I'd like to at least make sure people know what we did find out. Yeah, and I accidentally just replied to Bridget the other day trying to get the survey out again when Lee asked for it. There was an email chain last week, five days ago that tried to clarify and put all the information in one place and now looking back, it only sent Bridget so I will make sure that gets the rest of the committee. Thank you. Appreciate that. Also, I want to just emphasize Richard and Dan's point about having access to the transient population that is students in Burlington and engaging them in the political process. I think there's some UVM policies that are a little anti-democratic and could probably be addressed at the city council level and I think that's a better solution than cracking up the students into different wards just because they don't engage in the elections. Yeah, I guess I think that question of engaging the transient population of Burlington needs to be better addressed and is a key part of the redistricting. Okay, Jim. Two things, one is, Lee has had her hand up for a while and then the other is, I just want to make you aware in the comments in the chat that someone mentioned there are maps that are on the website. So I would urge others who have proposed maps to also insert them there for their matter of record as well. So Robert, you may take note of that. There are proposed maps on a website? On the CEDAW website. That must be the comments we got. Maybe it's the historic one. It's in the comments. Yeah, so if you send the comments to the CEDAW front desk, they'll put them together and update that PDF, it's a PDF of comments and some of those people did put maps in there but there's no map from the map makers at the city. It looks like that way, right? Yeah, yeah, just to be clear on that. Barbara Henderson or something, she had some maps in her response and she had some good suggestions and things to watch out for. So Lee has had her hand up for a while, if you wouldn't mind. So we're just not gonna do a public comment. I need to go this tight. We only have like a half hour left and I need to get. I'd like to speak please the same way Jeff Comstock spoke. Yeah, and I probably shouldn't have done that. I apologize. Yes, but you did. And so I would please like to say something. And so a minute, Lee, you can- Absolutely. I've put some of the things in chat. Thank you for clarifying Barbara Hedrick's maps which are in the CEDAW comments that Bridget sent out to all the committee members. But the other comment I wanna make is you've gotta clarify between get rid of ward eight and stop gerrymandering. It's the gerrymandering of ward eight that people are objecting to. It's not whether we should have eight boards potentially. I don't think anybody said they didn't want eight wards or they didn't want six or whatever. It's that they didn't want a gerrymandered ward eight. Thank you, Lee. So let's go back to us. We have some survey results. We have our summaries of what we all heard. So what I can do is work on the memo from the sense of what we talked about tonight. In terms of, I did wanna say if people have recommendations individually that you'd like to make because we unfortunately don't have a meeting where we can actually hash some of this out which I think is too bad, right? So if there are individual things you feel strongly about because of all the input you've heard and the work that you've done, we can put that together and make that part of the memo as an addendum and I'm happy to do that. So if anyone wants to post the information that you talked about tonight or something separately, there's no reason we can't include that. So I wanna give you that opportunity if you'd like. Obviously it's time short but that can actually be added later, right? Because that's just sort of your individual that's not necessarily the committee needs to agree on. But are we nailing down the content of the body of the memo? Exactly, yeah. Can I be nailing that down now? Yeah, because I have to get something to people by next Wednesday. So can we say at least that the people are speaking against ward 8, they don't want ward 8, they don't want the district counselor level thing that several of the public have suggested going to seven wards. There hasn't been a peep hardly from the West old North end opposed to going back to seven wards and those are the folks that are gonna be affected. And so like President Josiah Bartlett said, policy is made by those who show up. And so I think we should be clear to the council about that. I would want us, because this is what Jim said, I think that we should suggest to the city council that they take advantage of this if since we're not gonna be voting on the actual map in town meeting day, that we should take advantage of that and have an advisory vote with several maps where people can either approve or disapprove and we can just get an advisory count about what people hate and what people don't. Maybe three levels, no comment, approve and then actively disapprove. I don't know, one's one zero and one and the other's minus one zero and one, I don't care. So I think the ward eight needing to be addressed, certainly, I think I heard from every one of you. I think that that's clear. I disagree with Lee. I think that it's absolutely clear that they want us to get rid of ward eight. That's clear. Is that fair, Anne? I think when they, that term get rid of ward eight means they want to get rid of a gerrymandered ward or they want to get rid of a student. I don't think they necessarily want, don't want eight wards. I think eight wards would be an option. All right. I think we've heard a lot of different when we've heard everything from the three to the 13, right? Does everybody agree with that? I think that there's several solid suggestions for having going back to seven wards. And I will find, I'll find that email, but whatever. All right. Do you want to say something? Well, Diane, I think. Oh, let's just do Greg and then we'll go to Richard, yeah. Yeah, I would agree with Anne's idea that, and Lee's idea that, you know, they're bothered by ward eight not because of it's the eighth ward, but because there's a perception that it's drawn wrong. And I don't know if people, and I don't mean that in any disrespect towards Robert. I know that you've apologized for that. You don't need to apologize for that. Okay, you did the work at that time that made sense. So please do not internalize that at all. I'm not trying to go, I'm actually trying to find it. You're doing good work right now. So you don't need to internalize that. We're not holding that against you. But I do believe that people, when they look at those maps, they see, and I'll just use Robert's phrase, that they see the salamander. I don't think that, you know, I mean, gerrymandering is the term, but I don't think that there was an intent to do that. So I agree with Anne's point that they don't necessarily want to get rid of eight wards, but just the way that it's drawn stands out by its shape. And I do like the idea, since I have the floor real quickly, I'll just indicate for a point of procedure, I know that we're time sensitive here. I do like the idea of breaking down our comments into two parts, one, the summation of what we've heard that addresses, as Jeff sort of talked about, the charge that we had. That's not gonna be compelling on its face because of the numbers and the lack of clarity in terms of the direction. I do think that the second part of that can be helpful to city council and that we can make recommendations. And we don't necessarily need to make recommendations as to what the wards are and things like that, but what we think that would help shepherd the process to a better point. And I think that Anne and others have mentioned the idea of an advisory vote on that. I think that would be an example of an opinion that would help again shepherd that process so that they can get the feedback that they would like. And then lastly, I agree with what Richard has said. Once we give them those ideas, we do need to stand up for it. We do need to, as Anne said, hold them accountable for that. We do need to speak on behalf of it and promote it. And I think Richard even used the word campaign on behalf of it because that's part of it. If we don't do that, then I think that it's a lost opportunity on our behalf. Thanks, Greg. Richard. The only thing I would say about Ward 8 is that it's nothing to do necessarily with eight wards or the eighth of eight wards. It's much more to do with its inherently undemocratic the way in which it's drawn at the moment. And so the solutions that I would look for ways in which that voting population can be structured or configured into the city in a way that it is democratic. At the moment, it's not, it violates anything that we see from anywhere in the country. And so one of the other things Robert mentioned was that people did not want the districts. And does everybody feel that that is real? That is what we heard? Yes. Is that, I feel like I heard both. I mean, there were some people who still like, I thought that there was some feedback there, but perhaps the majority were against it. So in the survey, we asked people to rank their priorities and preserving the Ward district system was not among the priorities. And what were the numbers again? So I think it was 10 out of 60 that it marked it among their top three. So it was a small. Although there have been comments against the district system overall. There's some people that want a two by X, whatever that number of Ward system is. So people seem to like the idea of having multiple representatives. And I think there are specific comments regarding that. So I think marking that idea that multiple representatives perhaps doing away with the district system could be a good summation. Yeah. What I find interesting is that you had actually 17 participants that voted that creating an at-large for city-wide representation was their number one priority. But then when you go to the district system question, it was all pretty mediocre responses. It's very low ranking. Well, the district system is not necessarily at large. Also just to point out, Rahm has got to stand up. Thank you. I'm sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. Did you say Rahm had his hand up? Yes. Okay. Yeah, I did have my hand up. And then we'll go to Richard. I just wanted to concur. I think it was Jim was saying that the issue with Ward eight is not so much that there are eight wards. The issue is more that it's a perceived and it really is a student population that is voting there. And this is so radically different from the rest of the population in the city. It feels like people just created a ward for them which helps them and hurts them. So I think that that is part of the disappointment that people have with Ward eight is that it is so clearly a ghetto of putting all of that population in one ward. Thanks, Rahm. Richard. This is just because I feel as if we talked about the public comment and something that came up quite strongly in the last two public meetings is that one of the arguments against districts and at large was a concern about organized campaigns and outside money, outside party money. And I just want to mention that only to make sure that it's captured in your, because I don't think any of us covered it. So what is the use for that? No, thank you. Okay, let's switch gears a little bit. I'm gonna put something together and you'll have an opportunity to tell me what you think. And if you feel strongly about anything in particular that you wanna make sure I've been there, I jotted these ones that Robert talked about and then we kind of discussed them. So they seem to be ones that are coming up, but there certainly was a lot of variability in what we heard for sure. I went through the public notes and I made notes to myself in the written comments and it was pretty funny because I sort of kept going and it would seem like they kept contradicting each other. Perhaps the nature of this, the way we're doing it, right, because we're not drawing those maps. So it's hard to relate. You're not getting the trade-offs per se. I just don't think we're gonna get good public comment without letting the public look at possible maps. That's what I'm saying, exactly. And that's perhaps what the city should do and I think that we should take advantage of town meeting day to get that input from the public. And we'll definitely make that recommendation. I don't know what is involved in doing that, but we'll certainly let them know that we think that's a priority moving forward. So for sure. The other thing to talk about is the presentation of the city council, which is supposed to be at the end of January or early February. I don't have a date yet and I also don't know how much time we have in the agenda. So I asked Max Tracy if he could give us a date and also some sense, are we talking 10 minutes or are we talking a half hour? Because that would be very, very different presentation, right? So I don't have an answer on that yet. Hopefully soon, because I feel like that's something that needs to be prepared for. January or February, that's the earliest. Yeah, earliest would be the end of January. That's what I was told. Then what I would just like to tell the other folks, the other people on the committee, if we want to have an effect, then we may have to speak to city council ourselves, just as private persons at the very next city council meeting, because there is a limit on, even if it's an advisory vote, there's a limit on what they can get put together for town meeting day. I know it's too late for a real vote, but that's not what we're asking for, is putting something on the ballot. But we need to get them to act on something otherwise that's a wasted opportunity. I think, hasn't that deadline passed already? For the legal binding vote then, for a charter change vote, yes. I mean, because they have to get it in process and then in January is this public comment period that is required by law, I believe, it's how we get charter changes. That's too late. Of course, there's no way that they can put that on the map, but on the ballot, but I can't see why it is impossible to get an advisory vote on this coming town meeting day in March. It's still more than two months away. It requires some planning, but it's not an official vote. It's an advisory vote. I think Dan said something, Dan Richardson said something about the Doyle survey. Do you all remember the Doyle survey? And that was something that would be a fact. I think it's in the fall election, there was somebody that had that on the way out. Yeah, you can fill it out and you stick it in a box and somebody comes around and counts them all in. And maybe that's something that we have to do, but it has to be done and it has to be at the polls. I think it will require something from the city council to do that. So you're thinking maps, copies of several different maps. Perhaps, yeah, yes, but where people will just say, I like this or I don't like this. And then the numbers go back to council and they decide they could throw it away. They could do whatever they want with it, but at least they would have some feedback. Do you want to add something? Well, I was only going to say that the date for questions on the ballot is usually around about the 25th of January. Yeah, but he hasn't won it on the ballot. No, I understand that, but. But there's a whole thing. For the 25th of January, there's a bunch of other stuff that has to be done. Because I think we're now in the public comment period on those questions on the ballot. Okay, so in terms of the presentation, what I wanted to find out was, is this something that you would like me to do? Would you like to get? Yeah, I just think it should be in our report. I think it should be in our city council. No, absolutely. I meant, I'm sorry. The presentation made to the city council in January. I think it was January, only February. Would you all like to be involved in this? Bless you. Do you want me to make that presentation? And I'm good with either. It's totally up to you. I want to make it. Yeah, if nobody does, I plan to, because I'm just saying that it's something that I, that I think that they should be, so that they can't claim that nobody brought it up. I want, I think somebody should. We're not talking about the same thing, I don't think, are we? No, I don't think so. So I'm going to write this memo to the city council. We have to make a presentation on that memo. Right. We have to present. That's too late. I know, but we have to do that. So the question is, yeah. I don't feel that I need to speak. I will try to be there. Okay, that's great. That's great. So Greg, and then we'll do Jim. I think it's important that all of us plan to be there and we'll just see what happens. Okay, Jim. Yeah, I would propose for Robert, since you're right about the order of when that is, you make that on a personal level, make that suggestion. It isn't part of our charge. Secondly, I would propose to this group that Diane do the presentation and we be present to answer any questions. Oh, yep, Greg. Just one thing to add to that is that if we were going to make a proposal about having something at town meeting, be it more like a Doyle survey, it might be helpful if all of us were at our polling places with maps we could just be there. And if people could have a sign that said something like redistricting information, you know, come and take this informal survey. They could, some maps would be at each of those polling stations. People could get some information. We could answer questions and they could sort of complete some sort of simple survey or give us some ideas on which of these proposals. It would be something that would be, I don't want to say easy to do because it means that we would have a long day at those polling stations, but it might be something that would help, again, shepherd that process for. And are you all willing to do that? Okay, so we'd have to have to work. Oh, right. It would be like putting it together, copying it, getting it there, tabulating it. I mean, I assume the Doyle survey, I never thought about it, but I don't know that there was permission, right? I mean, did the C County? I don't have to if you have it outside. No, if only outside the polling place. Oh, yeah, just outside the rail is what the definition is. May I point out it is 1813, is the Doyle poll idea is a great one, but I don't want to, I feel like that is divergent from our specific thing that we need to do is settle out on what this, any questions around the memo. Agreed. Are there more questions around the memo? So here's my plan, and this is on the agenda in case you want to see it. This, the draft of the memo is due to city staff, and I would assume you all as well on the 22nd, which is a week from today. So it's a pretty quick turnaround here. The city reserves the right to make comments on that draft by the end of the year, 31st. From there, a final memo will go to the city council. I wrote city staff, but I think it's city staff and council on the 14th of January. And then hopefully the next city council meeting we would make in the presentation. But again, that's depends on what's going on at the city council. So I don't have an answer on that yet. So that's the schedule for the next, what month and a half. So there any questions on that or concerns or anything you want to raise? When is the very next city council meeting? I don't know, I'm sorry. You can look it up online though. Anybody know? When would that be a time? Sometimes they, when there's holidays. Is that a holiday? It's the 20th, it's next week. There'll be a city council meeting. On the 20th. On the 20th. Okay, there's one on Monday. Monday, December 20th. There's one on Monday night. Oh okay, all right. I just wanted to clarify. Yes, George. When would we get a chance to look it before? I will get it to you on the 22nd, next week, Wednesday. Maybe at the end of the day, Wednesday. But that's the whole thing. Diane. Yes, Jim. So may I ask that you forward, when you send to the city staff, you also forward to each of us yourself because there has been several breakdowns in that process of getting information to us. And I just want to be sure we do get it. Rather than going through CEDO, is that what you mean? Correct, I've lost confidence in that process. I'm sorry. I will do my best to do that. I'm gonna make myself a note because I wouldn't have done that. Diane, did I hear you correctly that the city reserves the right to make comments on the memo before it's released? Yes. The staff. What's that all about? The staff. CEDO staff. Oh, CEDO staff wants to make comment on it before it's released. What kind of comment? It said city staff and I took that to mean it went to CEDO. I actually don't. Yeah, it said city staff and I was thinking it was probably Megan Tuttle's department. Maybe Dan Richardson. Jay Appleton is the map guy. Yeah. What exactly does make comment mean? I don't know. That's what I was talking about. That's what I know. I have many details. Yeah, great. When you share the draft of the memo with us, I'm concerned about that process because we have been chastised in the past in terms of sharing thoughts in a non-public meeting, which I would encourage, first of all, part of that to be in the summary of our work itself. And I don't remember who mentioned it, but that has made the process extremely cumbersome. And someone with a law degree, I don't necessarily agree with the analysis of the public meeting law the way it was interpreted to us. It is a lawyer's job to make sure that you have an abundance of caution. And I think that that is the situation where they're coming from. But building meetings, addressing information that's relevant to agendas, that is not prohibited in terms of my reading from the Vermont League of Cities and Towns in terms of that law. But regardless, I think that it would be helpful for the city council to realize that if they form ad hoc committees, it's very tough to do things in a tight timeline when you can't talk by email. Okay. If we post the draft report, if that, on the website, if that somehow helps the process, I just don't, I'm not, I'm not familiar with what's allowed and what's not. So. Meet is a group. I mean, I wasn't planning on it anyway. We can send individual comments back to you. That's allowed, all right? And Greg, the advice was that setting agenda items, passing information, perhaps about scheduling or agenda items was suggested as something we can do. And I would imagine that just sending a report without us then reply all engaging in a conversation would also be fine. That information kind of came to us after we had already decided, well, maybe we better not use email, but Dan, I think that is the attorney did clarify that the things that you specified, Greg, were also appropriate. So you did try to clarify that for us. So do people feel comfortable with me sending you the memo and you can send me back individual comments, thoughts? You know. It seems. When does this committee cease to be a committee? Can I? I don't know, Robert. It seems to me that if communication about content, about influencing each other, if that is somehow verboten in the email following, at least now, this evening, we have to agree and vote on at least what I would say would be some bullet items. Okay, well, I heard. Otherwise, it's gonna be feedback after the fact and then that's what we're hearing is verboten. Yeah, I mean, I think the ones that we summarize, you actually summarize were the ones that I thought were sort of the top list, right? Was the issue of ward eight, primarily people are not supportive of districts, primarily, right? I mean, everything here is, right? And the number of wards range widely between three and, I don't know, or 13, 15, something like that. I haven't heard three, but I hope so. And that you highly, you recommend that there be an advisory vote at town meeting day using the maps reaching out to folks. So those were the- At least some selection amount. That's the, those are the big ones, right? Preserving neighborhoods. Um, you want me to put that in? Did that, did you guys get that? Preserving neighborhoods. And then, Greg, yeah, okay. Preserving neighborhoods. The one, the parameters. I know it sounds kind of funny, doesn't it? Preserving neighborhoods. Preserving neighborhoods. Preserving neighborhoods is going to be very, very hard. Within, yeah, I'm sorry. The parameters that you mentioned in terms of the number of wards. Yeah. I, like Robert said, I didn't hear the number three. I did hear the number one. And so I would suggest the parameter, well, people said at-large, a lot of you were- Completely at-large. So that's one district. So I would say, and there were people that, that did sort of, that were in favor of that. There were people from- People were also being at-large. There were people from my ward, Ward Five, and I've submitted those. I've read them into the last public meeting record, and I submitted them to CEDO. It was a very impassionate plea by saying that she felt disenfranchised by not having an opportunity to hold accountable people who were making decisions in the city. So I do think that be they a minority or be they anything else, I do think that there are people that feel that there is an argument, a democratic argument for that. And so if we have parameters, it should start with number one. Okay, great. I think, I think, I mean, that gives people a lot more room, right, to be able to look at what you do. I mean, you know, if we go in and say we want nine wards, and that's all we say, then there's not a lot of room for movement, right?  So by giving you a broader span, hopefully, yes, Daniel. I will say no one spoke against the idea of eight wards or any N number of wards apart from one. There were a lot of people against the idea about large districts, and there were fewer people against the idea of there being multiple size districts at all. So I feel, although the Ward One Six idea is a good compromise, right? To deal with the student issue in just the way these populations are distributed throughout the city. There are, that's a good chunk of people that are against that idea at all. Okay. Could I also say that, I would also say that we should put some context to simply say the choices were between one and 13 gives zero context that predominantly did we hear a more common area of agreement like in the six, seven, eight range? Perhaps some suggested one, some suggested 13, but I think it would be also helpful to put context. I don't know that I could qualify that with what that context is, but just to say one to 13 is not, does not, I don't think that would be informative if I were on the council reading them up. Okay. Now, obviously, you know, we'll talk, I'll talk about the other ones, even though maybe they're not as data. Bullet points there. Yeah, but then for the main ones, I think we'll talk a little bit about what we heard from the other ones, but not as the majority of people said X, but rather that these are other things we heard as well, but these are the things we heard that we felt were pretty consistent across everyone we heard from. And Diane, again, sorry, sorry to interrupt. Also, I think that agreeing, again, a failure, sort of a failure to the process, but agreeing to the bullet points this evening fails to account for the 24 or five pages that Bridget sent tonight and someone else mentioned, I think that's the comments from the website. Also, I'm sending 25 people's responses to survey and I know Richard had a good number of people from survey. So it would suggest to me that in your process, Diane, you would be reviewing those as well. So this body couldn't agree on bullet points and account for that. So I just think that if we're to continue this process of bullet points, that it's just not gonna be inclusive of the other people's participation that done it through online surveys. Okay, and I have read the comments online and these are not, what we talked about tonight is not in conflict with at least what I've read so far. There are more things coming. If I see something really egregious that it's just like not true, I will submit that, but I kind of feel like this is probably the bulk of the people that we've talked to so far have said these things are true. So if it just doesn't look like that, when I read the rest, if it's everything is completely different, obviously I will make you all aware of that when I've sent the memo out. This is not the final by any means, yeah. Okay, one other point that I would make, sort of a correction to math and I'll trust Robert to help me out with this. I think when you thought that they're perhaps were somewhere in the range of 40 plus a few, the other contacts that we've made, it's not, I don't believe the math is close to 1%. I think that's a little bit above 0.1%. I didn't say 1%. It's 0.001%. What is the population? Yeah, so let's not suggest 1% because 1% is a good survey. Well, it's still pretty weak for a survey, but let's at least make sure the math is accurate in that regard because that is part of the concern that our ability to really gauge the public's opinion for anything we're putting in a memo, the process has not afforded a very good sampling. So the fidelity of any of the data should be at least put into context of what the right math is. Okay, absolutely. Thank you for that. Oh, yes, George. Just to ensure you have the survey responses, I just get your emailing, yes, after this. Yes, absolutely. We'll do that. Absolutely. And we'll make sure it gets on the CETO website as well so other people can look at it too. Okay. Bridget, Bridget sent that around. I'm sorry. I say Bridget sent that around a little while ago. Oh, survey. Survey, yeah. Oh, okay. I haven't checked my email since I've been here, so. No, that's okay. And I added the survey that I had done prior to the point at which the committee had decided we were gonna do a committee only version of a survey. So the results I had gathered prior to that. So that should be added to what you reviewed, Diane, and I've asked Bridget to circulate it to all the members. Great, and we'll ask, since Ethan is here from CETO, we'll ask him to make sure all this gets posted and we'll get that to you, Ethan. Good, it's just about eight 30. So any other last comments, thoughts? I will say thank you all for participating. It's been a quick process, but a deep process, I believe. And thank you for taking your time out and we appreciate it. And I hope you will stay engaged as we move forward. Great. Yes, I'd like to say thank you, Diane, for keeping us organized. And I know that there's been some technical difficulties. You didn't get frustrated with that. You just sort of powered through it and with a sense of humor. I'm a little disappointed you didn't bring the chocolate at you, which you brought after the first meeting. I was hoping that that was gonna be a constant theme, but we all appreciate your efforts. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. Jim. I think you bring some main chocolates for us. I also wanted to include in the memo a request. I alluded to it earlier in this meeting that there be some consideration that this, either a very clear conclusion to the committee. So then people who wanna speak on an individual voice may or more preferably from my point of view anyway, is that perhaps this ad hoc committee serve as the public engagement tool in parallel with whatever other process goes on so that we may do the service of keeping our community informed along the way as part of the getting the message out and bringing feedback back into the process. So if something a paragraph or so could be added to the memo to suggest that we may serve those who want to or may want an alternate to jump in some way, but that perhaps we could serve utility all the way through the process as opposed to a clear conclusion. And if not the continuation, then let's make clear when that conclusion is so that those of us who wanna speak perhaps independently may do so without confusing the matters. Absolutely. And I think something else I would like to recommend is generally when I do these kind of processes, I have rules and responsibilities that I provide each of the members and they agree to those responsibilities. So it's really clear beginning and number of meetings that you need to solicit and work with the group that you're representing, et cetera, et cetera. And I think just having that clarity is really helpful for everyone. So everyone is really clear on what their role is in this process.  You know, what really is our role? What are we doing? So I would recommend that that just be something that city committees do, right? Just really clear. And how many meetings and what there is now, people are busy. So you need to know how many meetings you're gonna be at. What do you expect to do? What's the role of the alternates? When did they step in? When don't they, et cetera, et cetera. So I would definitely recommend, yes, Jim. If I may be snarky and a joke. So snarky and a joke. So I think that's an excellent idea. It's probably not the best timing to introduce the rules of the committee as a closing out of the committee's activity after the end of the process. But that's just me being snarky. Who would have liked the rules written in the front end? And as to honor the holiday season, here's your joke. Why did the squirrel cross the road? Why? Because he heard that the ballet was doing the nutcracker. Thank you for that, Jim. You're welcome. Thank you very much, Diane. You've kept us, you've navigated us very well. Thank you very much. All right, everyone, we are gonna sign off from City Hall. Good night. Thank you.


Alright, so here in the indices, you can see the document parser cloud API definition link. Now let's click on the first link, say I want to parse one sample PDF and want to extract out data in JSON. So this is the expected status error code, which we will get when we invoke the API. And this is the endpoint URL, which we're going to invoke in postman. And this is our sample template file, which we will use in the API for data extraction. To use this template file in the API, you need to upload this sample template over here using this URL. You can see here that the two sample template files are already uploaded. We will use this ID in the cloud API as input parameter. Now let's move on to the documentation part. Now before we invoke the API, you need to set your registration API key in the request header. And then you need to set the input parameter like URL, which is the sample PDF file from which we want to extract out the data. Now let me copy this URL and open the sample PDF file. So this is the sample file from which we want to extract out the data from our template. And then you need to specify the output format. You can get the output format in JSON, XML, CSV and YAML. And then you need to set this template ID, which is one in our case. And then rest of the parameters are optional. Now let me open the postman and let's see this API in action. All right, so here in the postman, I have already set the required input parameter like URL, which contain the sample PDF file from which we want to extract out the data. And then template ID, which is one in our case. And then output format. I want to get the output data in JSON. So I have set the JSON over here. And in the header, I have already set my registered API key. So now let me click on this send button to get the response. And here we get our API response in JSON format, which contain our extracted data like company name and invoice ID, and then debt issued and then total with its coordinate value, which is 6.58, which you can see in this PDF file over here. So this is how you can get the extracted data from the PDF using document parser cloud API. Document parser is constantly evolving tool. I hope you find this useful. The journey does not stop here. Though as there are billions of PDF files stored online, we at ByteScout aim to work on improving our tools continuously to streamline your document process. I hope you will take the time to work through the demos for yourself so you can see how all of this works. And with this we reached the end of the module. Hope you enjoy this course. Thank you for taking time and watching this video.


When asked what are the largest, heaviest, and indeed the once most difficult stones to ever have been cut, transported to, and precisely placed within the great structures of the Giza Plateau, we would have previously stated that the granite ceiling blocks found within the king's chamber in the Great Pyramid were the largest known, with some of these stones weighing as much as 100 tons. However, it turns out that there exist many other stones upon this mysteriously created plateau, which far exceed the Pyramid's inner megaliths. Unsurprisingly, these discoveries are rarely shared academically, or indeed to the many people who pay to visit the Giza Plateau each year. The Valley Temple is but one example of these other, less mentioned, marvelously enormous stones, eight of which are still present within the structure's ruin, the largest of which still being roughly 3x3x6 meters in size. Furthermore, the same similarly sized stones can also be found within the Kefren Pyramid Causeway Temple. The structure is also rarely discussed or shared by Egyptologists or archaeologists alike. It seems that academics who fear a loss of funding from particular bodies tend to merely ignore that which they are confronted with, which they simply cannot explain. Again, the same enigmatic megalithic blocks can be found in the Causeway Temple of the Miserinus Pyramid. One finds the same highly eroded, thus extremely ancient stones. It seems that these huge stones seemingly litter the Giza Complex, and amazingly, they are successfully ignored merely due to their controversy. Yet the largest to be found anywhere upon this man-made plateau are to be found hidden in plain sight. Overlooked for many millennia, the still remaining foundation stones upon which much of the east side of the Kefren Pyramid once stood were not lifted into place, but were indeed transported to this location and precisely placed into position. These stones are so massive and so perfectly dropped into the surrounding landscape that thousands of people have walked right over them every year without ever realizing what they were standing on. Although the true depth and thus complete scale of the block is currently unknown, if it is of a cubic shape, it would appear to be roughly three-quarters the weight of the pregnant woman of Baalbeck. She weighs around 1,001 tons, which would make our foundation stone anywhere from 500 to 750 tons in weight. Clearly, a controversial yet incredible discovery, one which takes our understandings of the sheer undertaking that was Giza, are still at an early stage. Nonetheless, such discoveries move us one step closer towards finally understanding just who could have built the Great Pyramid Complex of Egypt.  We have in the past covered a number of these structures, not only due to the astonishing detail displayed upon their stonework, but also many other compelling enigmatic details that to this day remain unexplained. A personal recommendation for an alternative archaeological researcher of Indian ruins is Praveen Mohan over at Phenomenal Travel Videos. Yet, due to the countless ancient anomalies that can be found within India, we rarely step on each other's proverbial feet. For example, during my own personal research, I have not only found that many of the hillside temples seemingly hewn from the bedrock of earth would even to this day be incredibly difficult to replicate if not impossible. With some of the most astonishing, not only attached to religious belief and historical rumor to a mountain in the Himalayas, a factor we have also previously covered with my personal observations regardless of the fact that many locals pertain to it being an ancient pyramid discovered noticeable evidence of the entire base of the mountain, once having been hewn into an artificial crescent. Also remains unclear is if the entire mountain is a man-made pyramid, disguised by the erosion of many millennia. The research team claimed, quote, the stratum is horizontal with the layers of stone slightly varying in color. The dividing lines show up clear and distinct, which gives the entire mountain the facade of having been built by giant hands of huge blocks of reddish stone, end quote. With the stone quarried out to create the astonishing temples and accepted artistic masterpiece, just like Yongyu Cave in China have never been found. Additionally, during my own pursuit for clues as to how and indeed who could have created such temples, I have identified signature tool marks in several areas that match that of many other ancient ruins, indeed such as Yangshan Quarry also in China. Providing strong evidence that whoever was responsible for these ruins may have indeed been the same civilization, or as our Atlantean videos have postulated, were commanded to be constructed by a dominant civilization, sharing such technologies with the native populations, employing them to create such wonders. Thus, this would also explain the matching signatures of advanced stone cutting tool marks found on different continents. Like our research into the variation into ancient stone clamps, a method that was undeniably shared throughout the globe, yet the methods of creating such clamps and the resulting metallurgy varies from continent to continent. As we have previously stated on many occasions, whoever was responsible for these incredible ancient sites seemingly vanished at some point within antiquity, leaving many ancient quarries and temples unfinished. One of the temples that we used to link the tool marks with other sites around the world, Vetivon Coil, one of the precious abandoned sites that like so many other ancient advance ruins that were being built around the world, vitally shows the rough stone cutting signatures left by an advanced machinery that was once responsible for their initial cutting, this before the refinement of such structures carvings. With many other sites in India that due to their geographical positioning and thus protection from erosion still possesses these same signature tool marks. However, the purpose of today's video is probably one of the most peculiar anomalies in India and could be perceived by some as one of the most compelling pieces of evidence of advanced ancient machinery having once been responsible for these ancient structures, known as the Tanjore Brihadiswarar Temple, which was supposedly constructed by the Cholas. However, the temple possesses a characteristic which was not only out of the capabilities of the Cholas dynasty, but to me is compelling proof of a pre-Diluvian civilization having been responsible for its construction. As atop the temple, at a height of 216 feet above ground level, is a solid lump of granite carved with perfection, yet has been realized at an astonishing weight of 80 tons. To put that in perspective, according to academia, an ancient culture with no advanced technologies, especially lifting technologies, a dynasty well studied and explored by modern academia, the heartland of the Cholas was the fertile valley of the Kaveri River. Although their power was considerable and was probably complimented by such claimed of astonishing feats of architecture, regardless, the question remains, how did this civilization raise such an enormous stone? It seems to us that such claims were merely made to impress their enemies and allies, and the fact that academia is severely lacking any explanation as to how such a feat was accomplished, strongly supports my suspicion that the temple is in fact an anti-Diluvian ruin, and as such, highly compelling. The Neolithic Era, a mysterious, largely unknown, yet often aggressively debated age, which regardless of our planet's long history, is a group who could seemingly build stone trilithons weighing many hundreds, even in some places, megaliths, thousands of tons in weight. Largely claimed as our ancestral beginnings, with the only ever modern civilization that being our own, a seemingly immovable, non-negotiable reality, long attested and aggressively defended timeline, defended, funded, and supported by nearly every institutional and academic field of study the world over. The complexity, the precise alignments, the illogical efficiency, and the enormity of many stones, all often used in the creation of the dolmens, is all evidence of a far more capable group than currently claimed, specifically that of a site known as Gavranus, a site we have covered in the past, recognized as one of the largest Neolithic sites anywhere on Earth. Undeniable proof, we feel, among many others, which fit the same description. A group with far more advanced, oftentimes far more ingenious, weightlifting abilities than will ever be given mainstream credit for. Accomplishing feats of ancient engineering, whoever accomplished by, no matter how primitive in appearance, were built from gigantic, often stones, roofs, and walls cut from notoriously hard stones, allowing them their incredible longevity. Surviving long-lived architecture is thus still on display in many places worldwide. Lintels still set aloft many gateways. Each of giant proportions, yet the most incredible of these relics, we feel, is undoubtedly the largest of them all, the Dolmen of Menga. Successfully stifled from more mainstream acclaim, this undoubtedly due to the dolmen's incredibly large roof, with a capstone estimated to weigh far over 1,000 tons. Regardless of this reality, they are still continued to be argued as the creation of the first real permanently documented settlement of man, from a previously long-lived, torturous lifestyle of the nomads. And although they were oftentimes depicted as cavemen, the reality is far from the bone-wielding ape-like depictions currently pushed by mainstream academically funded institutions. With academia kept busy continuing to argue in support of this mainstream opinion, argued as reality no matter how illogical, these supposed stone-aged people also displayed an astonishing insight into astronomical precisions with alignments we are only beginning to decipher. Additionally, and in conclusion, any group or individual in a position of trust who continues to claim that these neolithic groups were not global is in support of a fallacy and an ignorant one at that. For overwhelming evidence suggests everywhere flying in the face of this clear lie. The likeness of neolithic sites, the sharing of patterning and artistic designs make the connections undeniable. Fortunately for truth-seekers, it is immortal and will always be there to find. As such, it is only reality that will stand up to the tests of time to resist against all scrutiny. For as one may already know, the facts don't lie. And the more we decipher regarding said sites, the more we learn about ourselves and each other. Who were the Neolithic? How did they accomplish such incredible feats of ancient engineering? We find their existence and past capabilities highly compelling.   Often aligned with such perfection, we still struggle to understand where this knowledge came from. Barrows, mounds, earthworks, and other structures built with such intent, we are only just beginning to unravel their true purpose. We have previously covered a number of these astonishing structures, mostly focused upon the gigantic megalithic blocks within their construction. Often concealed and protected under many tons of earth, that although, according to academia, were apparently constructed by primitive flint-wielding ancestors, display such precise alignments focused upon the winter solstice that the mystery surrounding their true origin is waiting to be unraveled. However, the most astonishing of all are undoubtedly found upon mainland England. A place which possesses four neolithic structures with such an astonishing characteristic, it simply defies modern understanding. The first two structures within this astonishing ancient message, being the West and East Kennetlong Barrows, enormous earthworks measuring at 350 feet long, 75 feet in width, and over 25 meters above ground level, with entrances guarded by standing stones over 12 feet in height, each of which many tons in weight. These stones somehow quarried and transported to the site, and precisely placed in their positions far back within antiquity. And although there are a number of other neolithic structures within the area, these four specific structures have been revealed thanks solely to modern satellite technology to contain an ancient geospatial awareness that is simply astounding. It seems, instead of a neolithic focus on solstice alignments, these four structures were instead devoted to the far more complex lunar orbit, showing a knowledge of the orbit of the moon far too accurate to be logically explained. The arc distance between the center points of the Long Barrows discovered to represent the value of days per lunar orbit, known as an astronomical constant. Both arcs present astronomical constants, days per lunar orbit, and days per lunar anomalistic period. These ancient people somehow knew about these complex orbits, so intrinsically, the geospatial alignment between the four monuments have been mathematically calculated to be so precise, they are exact down to the third decimal. Questions obviously arise from such an awareness of such complex knowledge. For example, if these ancient people had such an intimate knowledge of astronomical precisions, why were they only capable of constructing such primitive structures, which represent such accuracies? Secondly, if they were only capable of building such structures, who gave them this knowledge? Or indeed, where did it come from? Were they, as we have often postulated, a surviving remnant of a far more advanced civilization that experienced cataclysm upon our planet? Retaining such knowledge at that time, yet had lost their technology, slowly leading to a loss of this information over several generations of primitive life. Regardless of our postulations, the complexity within these alignments is undeniable, astonishing, and undoubtedly evidence of the past existence of superior ancient knowledge, and as such, incredibly compelling.


I think 4-H camp is like the best camp, my favorite camp I've ever been to. My favorite thing about summer camp was the activities. There's this huge swing and it's super fun. There's a pretty hop and air and you pull the pin, it goes right through. My favorite thing at 4-H camp this year has been the pool. I've also done the rock climbing wall. We're doing canoeing. It was really fun because we got a paddle. The people taught us about how to uncontroll the boat. You gotta play golf, put put, basketball, archery. I've done arts and crafts. Alabama the Great, survival. At 4-H camp I learned about animals. My favorite thing about 4-H is the food. The dorms are super nice. It's like a really fun environment. You can go at your own pace. Nobody cares about your parents or what you go through because everybody's the same and even if you don't know how to do something they'll teach you how to do it. Don't be nervous, you can meet new friends and you can play new things. You spend time with your friends and it's really fun. There's no bullies here, it's a place that you would want to come over and over again. New stuff every year, surprising things every year. I would come back next year because everything gets better and better. For the world then you should definitely come to 4-H camp.


In the meantime, the president has come to this proposed one day official visit to Zamfara State. The president traveled to the northwest state to condeal with the government and people of the state over the recent killing of 58 persons in Anka and Bukuyum local government areas. According to the governor, Billo Matoale, the president came to the visit due to poor weather condition. The president was, in Sokoto State Commission, a cement plant owned by Boer Group. He inaugurated a three million metric tons per random plant and 48 megawatts power plant, loading their company for believe-in in Niger and being the largest employer of labor in the northwest region of the country. The president pledged that his administration would continue to support serious investors to sector businesses. He recounted that in 1985, as the then head of state, he was at the same location to commission the second line of the facility.