Are we connected to Amherst TV? Yes, we're good to go now. Okay. Good evening. Governor Baker has allowed us through his March 12th order to suspend certain provisions of the open meeting law. This allows us to hold this virtual town council meeting. I'll call upon each councilor by name. At that time, they will unmute their mic and say present. This will indicate they can hear us and we can hear them. Please remember to mute your mic after saying present. This is also how we conduct councilor comments throughout the agenda in addition to using the raise the hand function. Given that we have a quorum of the council present on September 14th, 2020 and calling the meeting to order of the Amherst Town Council. This meeting includes audio video and is available live on Amherst Media. It was also being written. There's no chat room. Should we have any technical difficulties? We'll make note of that. Also, we may have to stop the meeting until we can make sure everybody has been able to reconnect. With that, I'm going to start by calling the meeting and you can take the announcement down of how to connect. Thank you. Shalini Balmil. Present. Alyssa Brewer. Present. Pat D'Angeles. Present. Darcy Dumont. Present. Lynn Griesper is present. Mandy Johanicki. Present. Dorothy Pam. Present. Evan Ross. Present. George Ryan. Present. Kathy Shane. Present. Steve Schreiber. Present. Andy Steinberg. Present. And Sarah Schwartz. Present. Great. We have a full complement of council here tonight. We are going to start our meeting with the announcements which are on your thing. I just want to draw attention to the council that we have a meeting next Monday night, the 21st. We do not have a meeting on the 28th, but we do have a meeting on the 29th, during which time we will have a primer at 6.30 on the master plan and a public forum at 7. I just want to note two things on your screen and that is the call-in number that we now have for COVID concerns, as well as the email. Both of these can be found on the town website in addition to that, we want to make you aware that the Community Preservation Act Committee has opened the call for proposals and that can be found on the website as well. They are due on by October 12th. More information can be found there. Thank you, you can take that down now. We have no hearings tonight and there will be only one public comment period and it will begin momentarily. And so I'm going to ask and just state residents are welcome to express their views. And I will let you know for how many minutes once I see how many people plan to speak and the discretion of the president based on the number, we will see how long you're allowed to speak. The council will not engage in a dialogue or comment on a matter raised during general public comment. And the instructions are on this. Please raise your hand if you would like to speak during public comment and I would like to see all hands at this time. Again, this is the only time we have public comment during the entire meeting. Okay, then I will start with Lisha Deshamasas, Deshames. And I totally apologize for mispronouncing your name. Please unmute and pronounce your name correctly and tell us where you live. Hey, Lynn, this is Serge. I'm just having a little bit of trouble with controlling the attention. If you know, would you mind taking over for a minute? I'm going to just come in and out of the meeting real quick. Please be patient. We're just having a little connectivity problem. But there is Alicia. Hi, my name is Alicia Deshamas. I am a resident of 180 Clark Hill Road in Amherst. I wanted to speak to the UMass Union's request for a letter of support. I'm a member of one of the UMass unions. I serve as a resident instructor on campus at UMass. I just wanted to encourage you all to consider signing the UMass, I know that the Amherst economy is already suffering because of so few students returning to campus this fall. My partner used to work downtown and we're definitely missing the income from the students because so few returned. I just wanted to ask, again, that you consider signing. UMass jobs are good for Amherst. UMass jobs bring money to the community. They allow us to spend time here to support local businesses, losing UMass jobs means losing income for the area of businesses in town that I know need it. So just as you read the letter of support and consider it, I would encourage you to sign not just because of my own interest, but because it's good for Amherst and I wanna see our town make it through the pandemic successfully. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. I'm gonna go to Jennifer Page. Hi, my name is Jennifer Page. I've been an Amherst resident for 11 years, a UMass employee for eight years and I'm currently an officer in the UMass Amherst Professional Staff Union. I'd like to urge the town council to vote to approve the letter of support for UMass Amherst Unions United, which is a coalition of unions representing faculty, staff, graduate students and student employees. The UMass Amherst administration has threatened to lay off staff members due to the financial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. No one doubts that the pandemic has impacted the university's operations, but the administration has not provided evidence that layoffs are necessary, nor have they agreed to investigate creative cost-saving measures that would prevent them from having to balance their books on the backs of employees. The Amherst economy is already suffering due to so few students returning to UMass this fall. If the university were to lay off workers or implement long-term furloughs, that would only make the situation worse for local businesses. On a personal note, I've been patronizing Amherst businesses during this pandemic. I'll get takeout from Buena Hissano or stop by Lime Red for a bubble tea. But if I were to get laid off, all that would stop. I wouldn't have enough money to pay my bills, let alone support local businesses. We're asking you to urge the university to provide the unions with irrelevant financial data and to bargain with the unions in good faith, both of which are required by law and according to our contracts, and to explore creative solutions to the current crisis. You all played an important role in getting the university to modify its reopening plan to protect the health of our community. Now we're asking you to get evolved again to urge UMass to do the right thing for the community and the Commonwealth. Thank you. Thank you for your comment, Jennifer. Ryan, go Blanc. Thank you, folks. I just, Ryan, go Blanc 220 North Pleasant Street. I just want to quickly just reiterate the comments of Alicia and Jennifer. I'm also an employee over at UMass. I'm also an alumnus of the campus. I graduated in 2016 and I've resided in Amherst now for three years and I just want to reiterate the sentiments that have been expressed, but also for the reason that the campus has become such a point of pride for the town of Amherst and really for the greater Pioneer Valley community over the years and just trying to understand that, yes, these are unforeseen times in our world, but really wouldn't appreciate your consideration and the letter of support for the unions as we navigate this really together as a campus, but also as a town. Really would appreciate your consideration on that matter. Thank you. Somebody by the name of Momenta, please identify yourself and tell us where you live. Hi, this is Britt Rue. I'm sorry, Momenta is my job's name, one of my jobs. I live at 315 Lincoln Avenue. I've been a resident of Amherst for 45 years and I wanted to speak to you today in support of the Percent for Art program. I work as the, I'm the director of Commonwealth murals. We do public art installations. I manage a mural festival, individual mural installations and muralist bidding for public art projects. A Percent for Art program for Amherst would significantly increase the available funding and allow Amherst to commission professional quality public art projects of which there is very, very little currently in Amherst. If you have a town or a city with Percent for Art program and regular new professional public art installations, it has been shown to, public art has been shown to be a driver of economic activity and new investment as well as improved perceptions by residents and visitors of the town. So there's a direct economic benefit to a Percent for Art program for businesses and property values and professional art installations also raise awareness and increase demand for public art for all artists, both professional and emerging or novice artists. So it is a benefit to local artists as well. So I really urge Amherst to consider this as a long-term investment both to the quality of life culture and economic viability for our city or our town. Thank you very much. Rick, thank you for your comments. Zoe Crabtree, State where you live and your name. Hi, my name is Zoe Crabtree. I'm a District 5 resident. I emailed all of you today. I just wanted to make sure that you could hear another voice in support of this as well. Unions are really, really important. I don't work at UMass. I'm not a member of this union personally, but I've seen how beneficial the grad student union has been for students, grad students at UMass in terms of advocating for their members. And I know that the unions on campus do that across the board for staff and faculty as well. I think that they're really, really important. So I'd really urge you to sign the letter in support. Thank you. Thank you. Demetrius Shabazz. Hello. Hello, Dee, how are you? Yes, I'm Demetrius Shabazz, as you said, of District 5. And I'm actually responding to a memo that was inserted into the packet. It looks like over the weekend entitled Community Safety and Amherst from the town manager. And first of all, I just want to thank the town manager and the council for considering at least parts of our input to the town manager goals that we submitted of Rational Equity Task Force. However, the current memo that was submitted and the next steps regarding community safety, I feel is misguided for the advisory group. The town manager proposes a study of the issue and to establish a working group which will include nine members appointed to the advisory group. And that that report would be due January 31st. We asked, however, for a community advisory group to be charged with the similar role but appointed by residents and not by the council or town manager. By the time such an advisory group is interviewed, selected, set up, there'll be little time to educate, deliberate and design policies and practices appropriate for our town. Therefore, such a proposed process will result, we feel, in a symbolic gesture without very little outcome. In addition, community members have seen far too many town-led town studies and appointments for committees which have not listened to or served the BIPOC members. And there are examples of ones that do such as the school equity task force which is not under the jurisdiction of a town manager or the energy and climate action committee working group. These groups are not under their jurisdiction and they operate without the open meeting law requirement. We feel something like that would be more appropriate for what we have in mind as a community. It's imperative participants have the ability for an advisory group to speak freely and honestly without fear of retribution. Thus having what is suggested the police chief or anyone from the police as a member of the advisory group does not engender such openness and honesty. The memo and proposal from the town manager is a start to dialogue, however, what remains of the other items detailed in our two page proposal as well as what shape such an advisory group might take. The town manager's memo is not a solution to what else is community, which is the ability for community members to feel more civically engaged and interact as real stakeholders. And so I just would like to refer you all to the open meeting law and bodies appointed by a public official solely for the purpose of advising the official on a decision that individual could make a loan or not public body subject to OML. So anyway, I sent it to you in a memo. I hope you all read it. And I hope at some point soon that we're all able to consider this and the town manager will meet with us as a body, the racial equity task force. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Shabazz, please state your full name and where you live. Yes, so Milka Shabazz, district five, happy and proud to be a resident of that district. I would just like to raise the, that I get the timeline and the reason that you're trying to get a report in sometime in January as the, in order to be able to impact budget deliberations and that whole cycle, you would need to have something coming out by then. I completely get that. But I would just raise that the workload that such a committee would have or such a working group would have is, impresses me as something really quite enormous. And yet you're tasking them with two projects, both of which are in and of themselves, quite enormous. I would recommend that whatever community advisory group or working group that has established two things. One, you might look at subdividing the work of that group into two different task force. One that would look at the issue of the work of the current evidence of the work of the Emmer's police department. What are the calls? What are the protocols? What are the actions they have been taking and looking toward what are some of those that could be divested into a civilian force and then to look at different models of this kind of transition that has occurred and then to develop a report, analyze that, make recommendations for what could be done in Emmer's and then write that up and get that out. That's one enormous task of itself. But then to separate that from one that would look at making a recommendation around some type of civilian review board or commission on police practices because that body is going to have a whole nother set of work to look at the internal affairs process of the police department, to look at the kinds of complaint structure. How do complaints currently operate? Where are they advertised? What is the procedure? How do they get followed up? We heard over the summer in our forum, People's Assembly with the Chief that ultimately the buck stops with him and it comes up to him. But again, to learn that full process to understand how it has operated for other complaints in the past for issues of racial profiling and other kinds of issues. That's an enormous piece of work that has to go on there. Then to look at different models of civilian review boards, different models of commissions on police practices to see what would work here and to adapt a recommendation to analyze those and then to adapt to create a, and to write up a report that makes recommendations about what the feeling is of the group that would work best here in Emmer's. I just think the two tasks are each quite enormous and to task one group with doing all of that work, even with the proviso I saw in the memo of there being some support to help support research and to the working group. I just think it's still quite a bit to task one working group with work on both those by the deadline that's been established. The final point to consider is again, a working group or community advisory group that is not subject to open meeting law. My experience in the past that if you want a group that can function nimbly, that can operate over email and passing back and forth information and commenting on that information to require that body to be under open meeting law with the constraints at place. I think, again, is to doom it to ineffectiveness or to making it very problematic that by that deadline, you're going to get a really meaty report that can be convincing to you all as the town counselors and convincing to the town manager and convincing to the town at large. So those are my recommendations. Thank you for the opportunity. Thank you for your comment. There's two more hands up and we are going to stop public comment after those. Terry Mullen, please come forward, state your name and where you live. Hi, my name is Terry Mullen. I live at 58 Northeast Street, apartment 6-7. I am commenting today to push the council and the town manager to not only do research and to not only use data. And I'm saying that as a mathematician and someone who loves data. So get the data. But also, you collect data like your government. You have these things already. You can publish that data and it will be analyzed. Like this is a hot topic right now. There's crowdsource data analysis all over the internet. Just search ML and it's gonna machine learning and it will pop up for you. Like there's people from 13 to 99 who will do this just for fun. So I don't understand why it would take four months or six months to get that analysis done with the data that I'm sure is already available in town records and in arrest records. So I think really something that needs to be focused on is action. You have community leaders who are ready to start programs to do things. You have $80,000 set aside and I think though data is amazing and wonderful and hopefully will change all of your minds to believe the anecdotes that you're hearing in these meetings and hopefully will prove to you qualitatively that these stories aren't just stories that they're true and that we have a real problem here. But don't just wait for that to come in. Start something. You have $80,000 set aside. Do something. I know you can. I feel ready for it. I know you're ready for it. So hopefully we can move forward with that. Thank you. Isolda. Ortega, Bustamante. State your total name and where you live. So Bustamante, District Five resident. Thank you. I'm not prepared to comment on a document which was shared on a Monday morning for a Monday evening meeting. So I'm gonna focus instead on the process. I think Demetriana Milker Shabazz did an excellent job of talking about some of the content involved. And what I'd like to focus on is especially considering there's residents who don't get to hear every meeting at the August 31st meeting, the Racial Equity Task Force of Amherst provided and a document that was discussed and commented on by several residents that was input onto the town manager goals recommending that Racial Equity BLM will then throw out the goals and not only one goal at the end. We heard on August 31st, council's initial reactions to the input. And we did hear some positive support for the goals and in general support from Dumont, DeAngelis and from our District Five, Shalini, I'm sorry. And at the same time, we heard negative comments regarding how it was too difficult to weave goals in and there wasn't enough time. We were told that it was too late and that you had to go to the September 2nd DOL Committee. I think it's very difficult with the process for residents to follow what happened next at the DOL Committee. There are minutes available. And in that DOL September 2nd Committee, which you're free to clarify later, but it essentially reinforced that the Racial Equity goal would remain one goal, not be woven in. And it did feel like a lot of the input was shelved. I do understand that the town manager made an effort to reach out to individuals. And I understand that he was encouraged to reach out to a second wave of individuals. And you might appreciate on a personal level being included in individuals that had outreach. But I think that if you look at it institutionally and in the history of the United States and institutional racism, we really need to request a formal meeting with the task force. It's much more effective for people to have a conversation as a group and really look at proposals and goals. It's really very difficult to analyze a proposal on something as deep as a civilian review board on the same day that it's presented. The timeline is problematic for most residents. We really need a meeting with the task force for an open dialogue that doesn't rely on individual level relationships. In addition to our jobs, many of us are involved in other types of advocacy. And personally with other residents, we've been extremely concerned about essential workers in town. Still waiting for rental assistance. We've had great support from some quarters for that work, but it's still waiting. I won't go into it in detail here, except to say that we really need a more open and democratic process to really look at these proposals. There's a very large distance that was pointed out previously between a standing advisory council made up of BIPOC residents and a commission. There's been a history and amours of people who serve on committees having their names not public, which is different than the city of Northampton process. So there's just a lot of questions and regards, and I think we really need more time to look at the proposal as a whole, not just standing alone. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. Lydia Irons. Hello, my name is Lydia Irons. I live in district four. And I would like to echo what both the doctors Shabazz have said in this meeting about the needs for a civilian public safety review board to be appointed by town members and not the town manager of the town council and have the residents of the town be involved in that process. Recently, the Defund Four One Three Amours Group had a meeting with Mr. Backelman where we were able to provide interpretation for not just Spanish speakers, but also Mandarin speakers, as well as American Sign Language. And I think that having that be a part of these meetings, these town council meetings is not hard and something that could really help involve more people in our town. We have many members of the town that don't have English as a primary language. And even if they did, then having that as a part of these meetings is very important and is very doable. I also think want to echo what Azalda said about we need more time. It's really difficult to take all of these things into consideration and really get the word out to residents about coming to these meetings and making their voices heard when things are put up so last minute. And I would really hope that you will take the time to meet with the racial equity task force, whether it's just the town manager or the town council members individually or as a whole, because the work that they are doing in this area is really effective and important. And I also would really, really like to make sure that you hear that if there is going to be a public advisory board on public safety or a review commission, the police cannot be or should not be involved in that process. They are inherently bias. They are part of a long standing structurally racist system and having the police chief in that room and taking up that space will inherently make it ineffective and dangerous for members of the community. Thank you. Thank you for your comment. We're going to now move on to our agenda. Having exhausted all the people who wanted to make public comment. We have no consent agenda this time because there was only one set of minutes and there were not other items that could be placed on the consent agenda. And there are no resolutions and proclamations. So based on our agenda, we are now going to move to item eight C, which is the UMass request, UMass unions united request for a letter of support. And let me just say that we've looked at this in a couple of different ways. And therefore tonight, I will introduce the item based on what was originally in the packet. However, instead of beginning with that letter, we will begin with a letter submitted by Councilor Pat D'Angeles and her motion. Pat D'Angeles has submitted the attached replacement draft letter regarding the UMass layoffs. She has also submitted a motion. Based on that, I want to make sure that you understand the process for the agenda. So first and foremost, we did seek the attorney's advice. The attorney has said that because this is a non-binding resolution that can have no legal impact. It is her opinion that there are no legal impediments for the town council participating in the vote. Any financial impact would best be remote and speculative. She did think it makes sense in the spirit of transparency to file a disclosure or to disclose any affiliation on the record at the meeting. So having said that, some of you may want to state a disclosure unless you have filed something as well and we hope you have. If you want to recuse yourself, your vote will not count either way. For example, if three councillors recuse themselves, then there will be only 10 councillors voting. If you do not recuse yourself but wish to abstain, then your vote counts as a no. So for example, in that case, if there are 13 councillors voting and a majority vote for the motion seven and six councillors either vote against the motion or abstain, the motion passes by one vote. So based on this and also reminding you that individual councillors can certainly express their support in any number of ways that they want to, I want to ask if there is anybody who wishes to be recused, please raise your hand. Okay. I see one hand. I see two hands. I see three hands. No. No, okay. For those people that have a point. Point of order. Yes. Is it being, has it been recommended by the town attorney that we recute that anyone recuse themselves from this because of their UMass affiliation given that we vote on UMass water rates and no one recuse themselves from that? I've read, I read the town attorney's statement. Let me read it again. The town attorney stated that because this is a non-binding resolution that can have no legal impact. It is her opinion that there are no legal impediments for the town council participating in the vote. Any financial impact would it best be remote and speculative? She did think it makes sense in the spirit of transparency to file a disclosure or to disclose any affiliation on the record at the meeting. She did not state one way or the other around the issue of recusing but recusing can be done without stating a purpose. Okay. Have I answered your point of order? Okay. So I've seen two hands of people that want to recuse themselves. That is Councillor Steven Schreiber and Councillor Evan Ross. We are going to ask that those people be moved to the audience and they will be brought back when we complete the discussion. Okay. We are now 11 councillors. Is there anybody who at this point would like to make a statement of disclosure or shall we ball mill?  Do you wish to be recused? No, not recused. I just wanted to make the disclaimer that I've submitted a disclosure that my husband works at UMass and I've been a consultant from time to time and however this is not going to impact my ability to make a fair decision. Okay. Alyssa. I also have a four page disclosure on file associated with the fact that my husband is a faculty member and is therefore a union member, bargaining unit member of the Massachusetts Society of Professors and also a dues paying member. I also work part time for the Massachusetts Society of Professors which is one of the unions being discussed as one of the unions united. But as my disclosure and numerous campaign speeches have made clear I do not work on negotiations or on public positions of the union. I am merely a membership coordinator in terms of paperwork. So that is why my disclosure indicates that I also can act without any difficulty in this case and it's merely a disclosure of the appearance of a conflict. Okay. George. I too have submitted a disclosure. My wife, full-time employee is a faculty member at UMass but I feel that in this situation that I can still perform my official duties objectively and fairly and so I've made that statement in the disclosure. Okay. Is there anybody else? Garcy? Is this a disclosure? Yeah. I also filed a disclosure because my daughter works full-time for UMass and is a member of the professional staff union. Okay. Anybody else making a disclosure statement? Given that I will make mine and that is that up until two years ago I worked full-time for the University of Massachusetts for 31 years upon my retirement I continued to work as a consultant in a post-retirement basis with an organization which for a long for most of its existence was with the UMass president's office and has recently moved to the UMass Amherst campus. However, I continue to have I no longer have any reason that this should inhibit my making a sound judgment. Is there anything else? Anyone else who wishes to state their disclosure? Okay. Then we are going to proceed. So, Pat, that was a long way of getting to the point that we have you introduce your substitute letter and we're prepared to put that on the screen. Okay. Would you like to speak to it first? No, that's fine. I think the letter basically speaks for itself. I'm very concerned about the impact of potential layoffs at UMass on our community and surrounding communities. I will say right away, the letter has an error in the chancellor's name. I doubled the B, so that needs to be corrected. Okay. Serge, would you please put the letter on the screen? And we'll give people time to read it again if they have not. The letter has been in the file since this morning at about 10 o'clock, I think, maybe 11. Okay, Pat, with your agreement, we'll take the letter down and we may have to come back to it. That's fine. I do want to add one thing. The reason I am hoping that we don't refer this letter is the fact that on Wednesday, the UMass administration informed PSU and the USA that they had until Friday, this last Friday, 9-11, to accept the university city's most recent proposal or that layoff notices would be issued today. So I feel like it is imperative that we move this forward as quickly as we can. Okay, thank you. So I need a motion before we continue our discussion to suspend rule 8.4. So I need a motion and a second. I'm looking. So moved. I'm sorry. So moved. And a second. A second. That second came from, I'm sorry, who? Darcy. Darcy, thank you. I just didn't hear the voice loud enough. Thank you. Is there any further discussion about the motion to suspend rule 8.4? Dorothy, Darcy, or Shallonee, can I assume that that's not why your hand is up? That's right. Okay. All right. Then I want to quickly take a roll call vote starting with Brewer. Do you support spending the rule? Aye. Okay. DeAngelis? Yes. Dumont? Yes. Rees-Murr is yes. Anarchy? Yes. Pam? Yes. Ross is not in the room. Ryan? Yes. Shane? Yes. Schreiber is not in the room. Steinberg? Abstain. Schwartz? And Bellmohm? Yes. Okay. So of the 11 votes, 10 people voted to support, none voted against, one voted to abstain and two are recused. Did I get that right? Okay. So now we can move to the actual motion, Pat. Okay. I move to accept the amended town council statement in support of the University of Massachusetts Unions United and to forward said letter to the university chancellor directly. Is there a second? Second, Shalini. Okay. All right. And now we will begin our discussion. Dorothy? When I read Pat's letter and it mentioned a few possible programs which will employ some of the workers who would be or threatened with layoff, it really hit me with a shock that I find it absolutely shocking and amazing that UMass with its world famous food organization, with its buying food from many, many farms and cooking and making great food has not somehow with the use of state or federal funds become part of the feeding operation, not just for a local survival center in town but for larger areas in this area. And I just would really like to know from the university, has that been considered? Is there a problem? Is this something that would be entertained? Because it seems like such a natural fit. So that's my comment. Okay. Dorothy? I would just like to say that I strongly support the proposed letter to UMass and thank Pat for rewriting it so that it really underlines how UMass layoffs would affect the livelihoods of Amherst residents and the health of Amherst businesses. UMass is by far our largest employer. Our job as a town council is to protect Amherst residents and Amherst businesses and to advocate for them, especially considering that so many of those likely to lose income by these proposed layoffs are low wage earners and thus particularly vulnerable. I urge the council to act on this letter today and not refer it to the GOL committee. We don't need to turn it into a resolution and we don't need to refer it to GOL. We can and have before acted on a letter. This is time sensitive, as Pat said, and I'm convinced that nothing bad will happen if we vote to support it. The language of the request is very mild and reasonable. It's only asking us to do what the law already requires. It's nothing that will hurt our relationship with UMass and sending the letter may in fact gain us some respect and stature when bargaining with them in the future. It certainly appears that was the case with the town manager's letter regarding COVID-19 preparedness. The town manager set a laudable precedent by standing up for the town in order to protect the health of Amherst residents. This is a comparable situation and this instance we need to step up to urge UMass to protect our residents once again, but this time to protect their financial wellbeing. I see this matter simply as one where our constituents are asking us for help and in particular for help for low wage earners and I urged my colleagues to vote to accept the letter today. Shalini? Yeah, I speak with the utmost respect for our Chancellor Sibuswamy and I think we heard that sentiment echoed in a lot of the letters that were urging us to consider this, but it is a different time and we've seen the social crisis we're in, the economic crisis we're in and it's not a time for business as usual and we do need to bring an equity lens to every decision that we're making and I think this is an opportunity for us to nudge our partners and really, really encourage our partners at UMass leadership to use this opportunity to think of very curative solutions and we have the best minds on UMass with the different schools and research and amazing people. So this is really an opportunity to think outside the box, to pivot and to consider the most vulnerable people who are our residents as well and see the interconnectedness of how these decisions are impacting people, they're affecting their jobs, it's affecting the downtown businesses, housing, rents, health, all of that and we're all connected. So I really encourage our partners there, we encourage our counselors today to support this letter today. Andy. So I'm gonna take a different tact, a different view from my colleagues who've spoken so far. I'm not comfortable with the letter as it's written and the theme of the letter. I am concerned about the effect that this pandemic has had on our businesses and all of the people who work in town, including employees of the university, very much so, they are a large part of our community. But I'm very uncomfortable on three grounds. One is it injects council in union negotiations with bargaining units and I find it very uncomfortable for the council to be taking a position in negotiations that have a very formal and legal context and it just seems to me that it's inappropriate to do that. The second thing is that I don't think that it's fair to draw any conclusions or accuse any party of not negotiating in good faith and that is what the letter does. It is not a mild and reasonable or neutral letter when you look at the second page and we're not a labor relations board, we're not in position to take a position on whether there has been negotiating in good faith and it's not a statement of position that's encouraging both parties to work together to try and find a way to meet the university's needs and the employee's needs at the same time. It is very much written in one direction and I guess I'm not comfortable with that. If it was neutrally written, I would feel differently about it. And the final thing is that the town, this council, the town manager requested that the university not bring everybody back to town because we were concerned about the public health of our citizens and the university responded to that and whether it responded to that for the reason that of our letter solely, I doubt, but it certainly is logical and it was a factor. And as a consequence, there is not the need for as much in the way of food service and residence hall use as there might otherwise be and there's not the revenue that the university has and the university therefore has to make very difficult decisions. I too wish that there was a way that they could make a responsible decision that would help people, but I don't think that it's appropriate for this council to become involved in negotiations. The reason that I abstained on the prior vote was that I actually do believe that a letter could be written, but not this letter and I will not vote for this letter. I could vote for a letter, but without referral to a committee, we're not gonna rewrite a letter in this meeting, so. So. I move to amend the motion to remove the second to last paragraph that begins with the words you have not responded to these proposals or to requests. Is there a second to that motion? I second the motion. Okay, motion's been made and seconded. Would you please put it up on the screen again, Serge, so we can all see which paragraph we're talking about. Next page, continue, continue. I believe it's the one that begins with you have not responded to these proposals or to requests for relevant financial data, including the total of the system's reserves. We ask that you in the spirit of thoughtful collaboration, cooperation in this effort, supply them with all relevant financial data and be arrogant in good faith. That is the paragraph, correct, Alyssa? Correct. Motion's been made and seconded. Would you like to speak to the motion? Yes, I would please. So following up on what everybody else said and remembering again, as I've stated numerous times and put in writing, I work for a union, so this is all kinds of awkward. But I wanna make clear that a couple of things. One is I disagree with my colleague who stated that we asked UMass not to bring everybody back. I completely disagree with that. I know that's the feeling of some in the community. I wasn't aware it was the feeling of anyone on the town council because I believe that what we said was we don't believe you've planned effectively for bringing back the number of people you say you're bringing back. And most especially we were focused on how the off-campus student population was being served by testing quarantine and isolation. And we've seen some changes in that area and that's been terrific. But I absolutely refute the idea that we told them not to bring back a certain percentage of students because we did not do that. However, along with the lines of why did I make this motion? Because one, I don't think we told them to do that. But the other is because I don't, following up on what Andy said, I don't believe it is appropriate for the town council to tell any employer other than the town manager that they're not bargaining in good faith. It is completely inappropriate for the town council to tell any organization that they are not bargaining in good faith. We do not expect that our partner, as everyone said, the largest employee to tell the town how to manage negotiations with our unions. And perhaps since many of you had no involvement in town government prior to your recent service on town council, you are unaware. We have had some very difficult relationships with our unions here in town. And were UMass to weigh in on those saying, for example, why haven't you solved your problem with your police union yet? We've solved ours, would have been unhelpful if not damaging to our relationship. So we would not expect to do that, just as we do not expect them to say, why don't your hiring practices end up with more staff of color? We expect to have a relationship that is going to be challenging at times, but not because we are inserting ourselves in hiring practices or other practices. If you look at that paragraph, I don't believe the statement loses anything by not chastising the university for what is believed to be true. We were not there. We are not part of the negotiations. We will never be part of the negotiations. I absolutely believe people who have made these statements, but it is not appropriate for us to emphasize these statements. What is appropriate is what Pat added to the original statement, which I thought was fantastic, which is all the information about this impact on our community. In fact, at one point when there was talk of turning this into a resolution, I drafted such a resolution because I was looking at, what are the things we're trying to do as a community to support our employees and to support our businesses? And those things are important to state rather than just walking away from the whole thing, but I absolutely cannot support this letter with that paragraph in it because it is not appropriate. Are there other comments about the motion, the amendment to the motion? I'm looking at hands that are raised over here, and I want to know if those are hands to speak to the amendment. I have a question about the amendment. I'm sorry? I have a question about the amendment. It's just a clarifying, is it the entire paragraph that Alyssa's asking to remove? Yes, it is. Okay, that was my question about those. Okay, George, you have your hand up. Lynn, you can stop me and that'd be fine, but I find it difficult to separate the amendment from the larger issue of other language that I also find concerning in this letter. So maybe I should just leave that and come back to it later. But I agree with Alyssa and I support the amendment, but I think there's other language in this letter that also is problematic. Okay, let's stick to this particular paragraph at this point. Dorothy? I do understand the concern with a statement you have not bargained in good faith, but I do like the statement about show us the reserves. If you say you can't afford something that's going to destroy people's lives, please show me you can't afford it. It's like powerful people who just refuse to show their financial records. So I do like that sentence. Perhaps you could take out bargaining and you have not bargained in good faith, but to say that you can't afford something and you have to do it, you have to fire or furlough in definitely all these people without showing why I don't find that acceptable. Pat? Thank you. Some good points are being raised on both sides of the issue. I would like to, I'm thinking about the part about you have not responded to these proposals, but on how it might be restated, but I would like to clarify the last sentence of it. We ask that you in the spirit of thoughtful collaboration cooperate in this effort, supply them with all relevant financial data and continue to bargain in good faith. That's one thing that I see. The other thing that I just learned from Mara Keane, thank you Mara, is that Michael Ashland is Michael Ash, not Ashland. So that would have to be corrected if this letter were to go out. I am interested in hearing other comments and I'm willing to work on that last paragraph. I think Pat's amendment and or Dorothy's amendment to Alyssa's to just make sure we use the word of supply information about the reserves. And the only, my background in this is that I was hired years ago by the union at UMass to find the reserves and it took me weeks to find them. I did and in a very indirect way. And when I got really close to the dollar amount, I got called from the administration, said how on earth did you do that? Because it was right, but it was just knowing what is in the reserve account should be able to be disclosed. So I think there's, that we had two suggestions of ways of major modification. One was we asked you in thought for collaboration, cooperate and supply them with information about reserves and or with pets and continue to bargain in good faith without an assertion that they're not bargaining in good faith, but to amend that. So I don't know whether that addresses your concerns, Alyssa, but I think it would be hard in our town, in Amherst, we can find the reserves. There is something called the stabilization fund and reserves and I'm assuming that's pretty much it. And then each year we are adding to it in a university as system as large as ours is, I can find the salaries of everybody. And I did go on this morning to look at how many people are paid more than $300,000 who don't teach, who are in an administrative position and believe me, there are lots of them. So I think this is a modest request to just show us your reserves in the context. So that's, I would just take something that softens it and doesn't say that they haven't responded. So I'm just speaking to that, trying to modify that paragraph, but to show support that I think disclosing reserves. And then the last thing I would say is I used to hate it when I, this was years ago in a different world than a private employer, where I'd have to do a gotcha to go find reserves. I just would have been so much easier not to find another document that said, here's this big pot of money because it made people feel like there was something secret. I don't think UMass has a lot of reserves. It's not like Amherst College with an enormous endowment. So I think disclosing it would probably be in everybody's benefit. George. Again, two objections. The first is that we're injecting ourselves into negotiation and telling another party what we think they should do. And as we talked about this example given earlier, imagine we're negotiating with the police union and someone from UMass says, well, I think you should do this, you should do that. So I think that's just a problem that's hard to get around. The second, I think there's a deeper issue that I think everyone needs to think about. You can point to people who make $200,000 or $300,000 and I'm not sure what that's supposed to say. But the university has a concern for its long-term viability. And that's the most important thing for this community is that there be a university 20, 30, 40 years from now. So the reserves and the long-range planning are done by people, that's what they do and spend an enormous amount of time on. University's been very successful in the last 10 or 15 years in positioning itself in a very competitive market. So the idea that somehow we can just find some magical part of money at the university is concealing money from us. I understand that from one perspective negotiation-wise, but we're the town council. So I have a problem both with us telling them what we think they should do or shouldn't do. And I also have an issue with the idea that somehow there isn't a larger issue at play here. There's the short-term pain, which is real and the letter brings up very clearly and it distresses everyone. There's the longer-range issue of making sure that we have a university in five, 10, 15 years. And that is something that also needs to be considered and that's what the university is considering. So I don't see how tinkering with the language and the paragraph is going to help things. It either goes or it stays. So there is a motion on the floor. It has been made and seconded. There's amendment to remove that second-last paragraph that's been made and seconded. Mandy Jo, or, okay. Is there anybody else we would like to speak to the motion? We're on the amendment only. I'm sorry, to the amendment. All right, hearing nobody wanting to speak to the amendment, I'm going to go ahead and do a roll call. We'll start with- I need a clarification. We're voting on my amendment or Alyssa's- There's only one official amendment on the floor. The amendment on the floor is to remove the entire paragraph. Thank you. That's not what you want. Then you vote against it.  We're going to start with DeAngelis. No. DuMont. No. Griezmer. Upstain. Hanneke. Yes. Pam. No. Ross is not voting. Ryan. Yes. Shane. No. Schreiber is not voting. Steinberg. Yes. Schwartz. Yes. Al-Milm. No. Brewer. Yes. I get to break the tie again. I move to remove it. All right, we're moving on. We've now removed that last, that one paragraph. Get these ties, but let's keep going. Are there other, George? Yes, I'm sorry, but in paragraph six, the statement in the second sentence, this paragraph begins to summarize 100 layoffs at UMass, et cetera. The second sentence says, in recent weeks, it has become clear that the administration is seeking to lay off 300 PSU members, 150 USA members, AFSU members, and temporary workers at the university. And apparently it's clear to some people, it's not clear to me. And so I've checked to that statement. What I've read in the paper is the university is looking and also there's this constant moving back and forth between furlough and layoff. And the university's been trying to find means to do furloughs and reduction work hours and negotiating with the union in that regard. That's been difficult and maybe it's failed, but that's what the strategy has been. So are we basically, is this what you're saying? We simply don't want any layoffs at all. Are we saying that we don't want any furloughs either? So there are two issues I have. That sentence I think is not neutral and I object to it. Maybe someone who's sponsoring this can help me see the air of my ways. And secondly, I'd like some clarity of the distinction between furlough and layoff. The university has been very hard trying to do furloughs rather than layoffs. It looks like there may be some layoffs coming, but their stated goal is to find reductions in work hours and furloughs rather than layoffs if at all possible. So I find the language here in that paragraph problematic and I have a problem with, it's mostly layoff, layoff, layoff, but in the first paragraph it's furloughs and layoffs. I'd like some clarity as to what exactly the letter is trying to say. Anybody who would like Pat, do you have your hand up to clarify, I assume? Clarity, huh? I want to say right away that the part of that paragraph to summarize 100 layoffs that UMass animals will likely lead to the overall disemployment of 140 workers else in Massachusetts. I don't think that is anything but true. The university has talked about furloughs, but from everything I understand what the employees, the union members, are also talking about furloughs and instead of full furloughs for shortening work hours and things like that. So that for me is why I'm insisting that both sides be willing to collaborate and it hasn't been clear that the university is willing to collaborate with the union because they're literally not responding to the requests or ideas put forward by the union members. So again, clarity, I wish I could offer it. I think it becomes very important to me as a working class person, although my circumstances are different now, that's my roots and I understand what it's like to live through being laid off. And what I see in what the workers or the employees are doing is saying, hey, there are things that we can do to save jobs. That would include saving money for the university by shortening work weeks and things like that. So I'm just less willing to go along with that withdrawal and I also want my last sentence back from the paragraph that got removed. But anyway, that's another argument. George, was that the form in the form of emotion? I also have to say writing, trying to rewrite this as a committee of a council is a little bit tense and difficult, George. I could make a motion that the second sentence of paragraph six be stricken. That would be my motion. George, would you please put the item up on the screen? So it would be the paragraph that begins to summarize. 100 layouts that UMass will likely lead to overall disemployment of 140 workers in Massachusetts. In recent weeks, it has become clear that the administration is seeking to lay off 300 PSU members, 150 USA members, AFSCME members, and temporary workers at the university. That is the paragraph, George. That is correct and that is the sentence that I have trouble with. So it's just the first sentence to summarize 100 layoffs that UMass Amherst will likely lead to the overall disemployment of 140 workers in Massachusetts. Is that the sentence? No, no, no, that sentence can stand. Pat is correct, that's probably true and it's terrible. It's the second sentence where it's alleging that the university is seeking to lay off people. And that's what I object to. Lynn, I can accept that as a friendly amendment I don't need if there may be other people who feel differently, but as the writer of the letter I can get rid of that second sentence. I believe we, since we're into a motion and vote we have to take it to a motion. So second the motion. Second, the Angeles. Is there any other comment or discussion? And we have to take this down in order for me to see hands. So we have removed, okay, Dorothy. Why don't we just say it seems as opposed to it has become clear. People who wrote that letter felt that that is what the actions seem to say, but of course we can't always be sure that that is true. So I think saying it seems rather than it has become clear, I think that you need to have the list of jobs and people who would lose their livelihood. That's the point. We're talking about a huge loss of work for people, a huge loss of income in the town and thus a huge loss of further loss of income to whatever businesses still remain. So I would keep the jobs, but you know it has become clear, that's an opinion, all right? So I would say it seems. The motion on the floor is to remove that second sentence. Not the first one. No, I would not want to remove the second sentence because the second sentence shows how serious it is. It's a very serious situation. Is there a second to the motion to remove that sentence? Mandy seconds. Okay, thank you. Is there further discussion? Dorothy, major point. Alyssa. I think people are conflating two concepts here. We are not talking about not supporting the workers. We are talking about not micromanaging our relationship with UMass. I understand that there is disagreement as to where that line is drawn. I believe that line is clearly being stepped over, which is why I asked that we remove the previous paragraph. And I also believe that we remove this one. It's wonderful if an individual person wants to help write letters to the editor or help support various staff members either directly through financial support or in other ways. I don't think it is the council's job to decide whether or not we have an accurate listing of the number of layoffs. Just like we have not sent to any other Amherst-based business, including Amherst College, Hampshire College, including any of our restaurants, to say, well, I don't know, the restaurant down the street managed to keep some of their employees on. I'm not sure why you're not keeping more of your employees on. This is inappropriate for us to insert ourselves as a town council. It's not about our values as individual human beings. There are further comments about the motion to amend. Dorothy. There's a difference between UMass and the store down the corner. UMass's taxpayer supported. Is there a further comment? Okay, then we're going to move to vote. And again, Serge, just please put that up so I can see the sentence so people know what sentence we're removing. Okay, the sentence we're removing is the second one in the top paragraph. It is the sentence. In recent weeks, it has become clear the administration is seeking to lay off 300 PSU members, 150 USA members, AFSCME members, and temporary workers at the university. Okay? We're going to start with Darcy. No. Reesmer is yes. Anarchy. Yes. Anarchy. No. Ross, not voting. Ryan. Yes. Dane. Yes. Driver, not voting. Steinberg. Yes. Schwartz. No. Balmille. Yes. Brewer. Yes. DeAngelis. Yes. Okay, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Eight yeses who re-knows, so that sentence is removed.  It was, sorry, that was leftover from before. Okay. Moving back to the original letter, would you please put the original letter back up again? It's important that people read it from beginning all the way through. Please note that the second sentence on that next, and that top paragraph is out of the letter. And the top paragraph here is out of the letter. Okay. Further comments, George. So I do very much want to send a message to both parties to make every effort to minimize layoffs, furloughs, whatever. But so I think I can come to support this, though I'm still uncomfortable about some specific things, but there is one small place in paragraph five, just in terms of clarity, and I apologize, but this is what GOL does. And I don't get the feeling people want to send this to GOL. Paragraph begins the details, then there is a parenthesis, and then depend upon the details. So I think the writer wanted something like the impact, either on the community or the town, right? Or just the impact depends upon specific details. So this is just for clarity's sake. But again, I think there's just confusion there, at least as I read it. So I don't know what the sponsor was trying to communicate. I think the intention was to say the specific impacts will depend upon details, or the impact will depend upon specific details, et cetera, et cetera. But as it stands, it simply says the details depend upon the details. So I think that just needs to clarify. At that point, and this is what we do at GOL, and I encourage you all to come in and join in the fun. But this is, I think just would help to be clear. And that's the only other comment I have. I'm laughing because George is absolutely right. I think we should strike the details and how much of and capitalize the impact will be borne by dependent. Depending on the specific details of the reduction, blah, blah, blah. Well, we'll depend. You need to verb there. Yes. Thank you. So with that, would you please read it as a motion? I'll see if I can get a second. Um, the, um, The impact will be born in communities adjacent to UMass Amherst or elsewhere in the Commonwealth. And will depend on this. And on the specific details of the reduction in contracting with vendors. For example, the reduction in wholesale food orders. Placed by dining services and on the share of lost wages and salaries that is offset by unemployment insurance. And other state and local support resources. Is there a second. Okay. Kathy has seconded it. Um, is there any further discussion? Does anybody need that item repeated? I would like to send red one last time. I apologize, but just for clarity's sake. If someone could read it. Thanks. Okay. Do you want me to read it again? If you would. The impact will be born in communities adjacent to UMass Amherst. Or elsewhere in the Commonwealth and depend and will depend on the specific details of the reduction in contracting with vendors. For example, the reduction in wholesale food orders placed by dining services. And on the share of lost wages and salaries that is offset by unemployment insurance and other state and local support resources. Thank you, Pat. You're welcome. Thank you. Is there any other questions on that? All right. Then we're going to move to a vote on that. And I believe Griezmer is first and I agree. Yes. Anarchy. Yes. Ma'am. Yes. Brian. Yes. Jane. Yes. Steinberg. Yes. Sports. Yes. Ball Mellon. Yes. Grower. Yes. The Angeles. Yes. Thank you. I'm sorry. DuMont. Yes. Okay. That one is unanimous. 11. Yes. Brian. Yes. Jane. Yes. Yes. Yes. That one is unanimous. 11. No. Are there any other comments? Andy. Andy. You're muted. Sorry. I have no comment. I thought that was a mistake. Okay. Yeah, I didn't speak at the very beginning on my strong support for sending a letter like this because I think it does a couple of things. It as Alyssa and others have noticed it. But I think I've heard about this. I've heard some areas that. Could be. The topics that would be accrue to both the university and the town's. A benefit in terms of alternatives to full layoffs. So I think that's useful because it's a public document. And when I first heard about these. I'm, I'm clearly not party to any of these negotiations. take the football team down from division one to division two because it's a big money loser every year for the university and it's a substantial saving so not a layoff but just reduce it so there are some areas that the whole university it's it's a big picture kind of item and one of the things I think everyone should know is we we heard we got a letter from Mindy and Joe in response to the unions asking for support saying they're going to do everything they can to try to do level budgeting for the university because they understand particularly in communities like Amherst major cuts are devastating not just to the university so I think that's the reason for going slowly is to really look at some big areas where there's less harm done and it's a savings so that's something that I've thought for a long time on there are areas that with a tough look and some colleges and universities have taken that kind of big budget look and that isn't about teaching but really what are we here to educate so I'm strongly in support of all of the letter because of the amount of information that's in it Andy Joe I'm getting closer to be able and being able to support this I I am in you know I I am in agreement with Andy and Alyssa's initial comments that we're skirting a line here I don't believe we should be injecting ourselves into negotiations and there's one more part of this letter that I think potentially does and it is the part on page two on the I guess it's the fourth paragraph of page 2 that the last sentence that starts these employee initiated proposals have included and then the list of proposals we are not at the negotiating table that list comes from people who may or may not be at the negotiating table I don't know I don't know who the Union negotiators are I don't know who was in the Union it is also a list that is very one-sided we don't know what the University itself has put on the table and to put into a memo that says please consider the impacts to the town which is where we might have a reason to say something what impacts the town to put into that memo something that implies we support the Union side of this does concern me because I don't I'm not at the table and so I think if that stays in I'm still not going to be able to sign to vote for the letter so I think I'm going to move to amend to remove the sentence that begins these employee initiated proposals have included and then everything that is numbered one two three four and five he's never second I would second that Ryan for the discussion Andy no yes you know I think I'm exactly where me and he is I had thought long and hard about the fact that this letter was really troubling to me and I had thought about whether I would do something I swore I would never do which is go to Charter section 2.10c and ask for a motion to postpone in order to force time to rewrite the letter but I think that if we make Mandy's change that I'll feel comfortable to vote for it and feel like we have done what we wanted what I was hoping that we would do by taking time to rewrite I hate this idea of trying to craft letters on the floor of the council it is a very awkward thing they have to do a very time-consuming but this would be the one additional piece that would make it urging both parties to get together to recognize the impact on the people who are affected in the town and to let us move forward so I support the motion that Mandy has made and I that's why I seconded it the further comments okay please put it up on the screen again search so we can see what we're eliminating so do we are eliminating everything from starting with the second sentence in this last paragraph that includes the number so it begins with the employee dash initiated proposals have included number one two three four and five okay I see no further hands let me check on that there any other hands up but this has her hand I'm sorry I had to school up thank you thank you so I think that this is going to be difficult in that I'm clearly hearing from some members of the council that they feel perfectly comfortable in telling UMass what to do and some of us don't feel comfortable doing that and based on her town council relationship not because of our other relationships I admit that taking this whole section out feels difficult when I was working on an alternate format in my mind of a resolution I was looking at you know trying to state some of the specific impacts like on you know the fact that the survival center serving so many more meals the fact that we have a seasonal homeless shelter that only accompanies that only accommodates individuals and will accommodate fewer individuals than ever before that we don't have the capacity to deal with the fallout of huge job losses at UMass that we simply don't have that you know we could give a little bit of our block grant money to some small businesses very small businesses we couldn't give in to UMass and so that our relationship is very complex I want to make clear although you know press releases don't really manage that much less coverage of town council meetings but if this if the council does not vote to take this out and therefore several of us feel like we have to vote against the proposal we are not voting against workers we are not voting against saving people's jobs what we are voting against is telling the university how to go about doing it I hear a counselor saying the university should open their books so that all the taxpayers can see what it says that's an opinion that I do not necessarily share and has is not what the actual question is before the town council at this time so I just want to be clear that if I vote no it will be because the section is not taken out and therefore it will look like oh Alyssa doesn't care about workers and that is the furthest thing from the truth it is simply about where the line is as to how we work and I am happy to send a message that makes it so clear how we are very tied together I think we all agree on that I think we just differ on the level of detail that we feel comfortable saying is the town council's role versus the average resident's role. Is there a further comment? I feel that the important thing is that we all actually share the same sentiment that we want to send a strong message to the university that we're all interconnected and I don't think we want to tell the university how to run their university but we just want to send that signal and if we can remove the details that would get the whole council to unanimously sign the letter I think that would be a much stronger letter than filling it with details and then not having the whole council supported. Are there further comments? Okay so the motion is to remove that second sentence in that pair Pat you have a hand up. You need to unmute Pat. You still need to. I've gotten some information from some of the union members and I'm comfortable removing the bullet points. Okay any further discussion? All right and we're going to vote on the motion. The motion is to remove everything from these employee initiated proposals have included one through five. All of that. We're going to start with Anakie. Yes. I'm sorry? Yes. Thank you. Sam? No. Ryan? Yes. Shane? Yes. Shriver's not here. Steinberg? Get done mute Andy. Yes. Wurtz? Yes. Falmell? Yes. Rower? Yes. DeAngeles? Yes. Humon? Yes. Griezmerzy yes. So it is I think it's 10 yeses and one no. Is that correct? That's what I have. Are there any other comments George? I'm sorry Lynn and I apologize my colleagues but this is a letter and it has to say something. I do feel that if you're going to leave and I think you should leave the sentence that precedes these employees initiated proposals you need another sentence that says something which would be something to the fact that we urge the university to take these you know suggestions seriously some kind of statement otherwise it's simply a statement of fact followed by nothing so it shouldn't be there at all. So what we have now is we understand the workers on campus have been attempting to collaborate on cost-saving measures to minimize harm to the most vulnerable employees and that's it then this end stops and that's the end of the paragraph. I think we need something that says we urge the university and maybe someone can wordsmith that's better than I in real time but I think you need something there otherwise what's the point of I mean we're just telling them something I already know. Pat you have your hand up is there a suggestion Pat you need to unmute. We can't hear you Pat. You need to unmute. I did not want to speak right now I'm sorry like please go to Alyssa or Mandy Joe. Thank you. Alyssa. Well you know we're all having fun trying to do this on the fly so if we look at the preceding paragraph which starts in addition to the impact of layoffs mentioned above which is a little bit strange now that we have less discussion about the actual impacts but putting that aside for a moment that paragraph that says in addition to the impacts of layoffs mentioned above has some really important information about disproportionate effects on low-income employees and people of color and residential life employees who literally won't have a place to live. I think that one thing we could do is the last sentence of that paragraph again we're doing this on the fly but the last sentence of that paragraph is already stated elsewhere it could be replaced where it says these layoffs will harm university employees and will harm our community that's true for every kind of layoff we could excise that sentence and then just move up we understand that the workers on campus have been attempting to collaborate to minimize harm to the most vulnerable employees then we've already deleted a whole bunch of other stuff and the final sentences we are depending on you and urge you to consider the needs of the full Amherst community in this difficult time. I agree it's a little choppier than we'd like but we could just move that sentence about cost-saving measures to minimize harm up to the previous paragraph that would leave just one sentence dangling by itself there at the end. So the the idea is in the paragraph that begins in addition to yes would eliminate the sentence that said these layoffs will harm university employees and will harm our community instead place move the sentence up from below that says we understand that the workers on campus have been attempting to collaborate on cost-saving measures to minimize harm to the most vulnerable employees would you go to the next page please and then it begins and then we eliminated the next and it says we are depending on you and urge you to consider the needs of the full Amherst community in this difficult time. Yes okay motion's been made George. I second that yes George. Any further conversation? All right, did you repeat that Lynn? I'm sorry. Did you repeat that change please? Absolutely. Would you please put it up against Surge. So in the sentence in the paragraph that begins in addition to the impact of layoffs mentioned above everything stays until you get to the very last sentence we eliminate the last sentence these layoffs will harm university employees and will harm our community and and what we do is we move our merge into that paragraph however the sentence that says we understand that the workers on campus have been attempting to collaborate on cost-saving measures to minimize harm to the most vulnerable employees and then the last sentence is very last sentence is on the next page and is still separate in a separate paragraph. Yes it's a gear closing statement. Any further questions? Yeah. What was the rationale of removing that sentence about hurting employees? I totally lost at this point. That's a statement that's made about any layoffs and so it's not a I think it's true though I mean is there going to be anything left you take off the teeth the claws I mean what is left except a little wagging tail I'm annoyed I understand the point behind some of these changes I really do but you're going too far. The motion's been made and seconded Pat for the comment. Yes I support this change and I don't think the letter is without teeth it is without biting but the teeth some teeth are still there I think that so I support the change. Any further comment? Okay so we're going to move to a vote and I believe we begin with Ryan. Sorry just clarification we're voting on the amendment to remove and replace this specific change. Thank you. The vote is yes. Shane. Yes. Steinberg. Yes. Schwartz. Yes. Shalini. Yes. Alyssa. Yes. Pat. Yes. Garcy. Yes. Rhysmer is a yes. Anarchy. Yes. I think we finished right. No we need Pam. Pam. I'm sorry Pam is what? No. Not voting. Abstaining. Whatever. Okay so it is pen in favor no opposition one abstention do not in the room. Okay I'd like to put the letter back up and I'll see whether I can get all of the changes as they've been made. First sent the first paragraph the second paragraph the third and the fourth remain unchanged. The fifth paragraph begins the impact will be born in communities adjacent to Amherst and elsewhere in the Commonwealth and will depend on the specific details of the reduction in contracting with vendors etc. Next. This paragraph includes to summarize 100 layoffs that UMass Amherst will likely lead to the overall disemployment of 140 workers in Massachusetts. The next sentence is eliminated. Averting these layoffs would preserve employment at UMass Amherst etc. That paragraph that sentence remains. The next paragraph stays except for the last sentences and that is these layoffs will harm university employees and will harm our community. That sentence is eliminated and the next sentence is we understand that workers on campus have been attempting to collaborate on cost saving measures to minimize harm to the most vulnerable employees. The whole next sentence and all of the numbers under it are eliminated. We go to the last page and that first paragraph is eliminated and it ends with we are depending on you and urge you to consider the needs of the full Amherst community in these difficult times. Sincerely the Amherst town council. Is there any other changes or comments? Yes, Alyssa. Just because we don't have the ability to edit it right on screen and you just did that very beautifully verbally but as Pat mentioned way back you know Siri or whatever had made Michael Ash into Michael Ashland and it's Michael Ash. So just to be clear when you sign that final version and you probably know that personally but that's a change that we made just a Scrivener's error. Thank you very much. Anything else? We're going to correct the spelling of the Chancellor's name. Thank you. Are there any other comments? Any other statements? I want to be very clear this is not a statement about whether you support people. It's not a statement about whether you support collective bargaining and bargaining in faith. It's a statement about what you want to say to the university. Okay. We will begin with Kathy Shane. Yes. I'm sorry. We are now voting on the full letter. Okay. And I'm voting and I support the full letter as amended. Steinberg. Yes. Fort. Yes. Thelma Elm. Yes. A brewer. Yes. The Angelus. Yes. Dumont. Yes. Griezmer is an abstain. Hanneke. Yes. Ryan. Yes. And Pam. Yes. I support sending a letter. Okay. So the vote is 10 for support zero against one abstention and two out of the room. The letter will be sent. Okay. With the changes as made. All right. Moving on. Would you please bring Steve and Evan back into the room? Would now be an acceptable time for a five-minute recess? It would be. Thank you. We'll take a five-minute recess and reconvene at 826. When you return, please unmute or actually take your, put your video, take your video off. Lynn, I got a text message from people who are waiting in the wings on things like percent for art on your best estimate and when they might come up. You're muted, Lynn. Thank you. I'm going to suggest, Cathy, that about 45 minutes at best. Okay. Thank you. And with the council's permission, I'll actually move the action item B up to A instead. Okay. In other words, we'll put percent for art before the single plastic, single-use plastic bag prohibition since there's nobody beyond the council that needs to be here for that one. Okay. Okay. I'm just, I'm seeing everybody very quickly. Left to right, George. I'm here. Lynn, yes. Dorothy? Yes. Dave? Here. Alyssa? Present. Kathy? Yes, here. Andy? Yes. Shalini? I'm here. Evan? Here. Darcy? Here. Mandy Jo? Sorry, here. There are Schwartz? Here. And Pat DeAngelis. Pat, are you back with us yet? I know she's coming. Pat, are you back? Yes. Can you hear us? Thank you. All right, Paul, we're going to go on to the community safety presentation and I just want to note that in your folder, in addition to Paul's presentation, is a memo to you from Pat DeAngelis that she had shared previously with the town manager and also a memo from the League of Women Voters of Amherst. Okay, Paul, please unmute. Don't worry. Oh, no, this is not the... We're doing the community safety. Yeah. And I'm not sure, do you want to show anything at this point, Paul? I don't have a slide deck for this. Why don't you just talk us through your proposal? Yeah, so this is a memo that the town council received Sunday and so I'm sure many of them have not had a chance to read it. So this is a first, I just want to make a verbal presentation with the expectation that the council will have more time to discuss it and digest the information over the next course of the next week. The charge I had from the town council was to hold off on filling two police officer positions to so the town could look into alternative forms of delivering those kind of services that have been delivered by police department, but maybe they could be delivered in a different way. And so, and again, this comes out of, you know, the tragic death of Mr. Floyd and other things that have been going on in our community in the country. And part of, as I thought about this is, you know, what everybody we've been talking about is to make sure that racial and social justice values are incorporated into our public safety responses. So what I am proposing is that there would be a committee. You've heard some public comment on this earlier today, earlier this evening. And one of the things that we have to do as we go down this road is to fully understand the nature of the problem by collecting data. And data can mean all sorts of things. It can mean actual data that's collected by the police department or people or the town, but it's also talking with people, doing surveys of people, oversampling people who might have higher level interactions with the police department, doing focus groups. That's all data as well. And so it's taking a relatively straightforward research approach to the challenge that we have in front of us. Online, computer world, obviously. We would, I'm sorry. So and we also, and so to get to that point, I'm going to summarize this up briefly, is to create a working group that will be composed of nine members and that plus the police chief who would be a non-voting member or his designee to provide the expertise on how policing works in Amherst and could serve as a resource of primarily people of the BIPOC community and that this group would be the ones who would take on this task and then move it forward into make a recommendation to me because it's my job to report to make a recommendation to you. It's an enormous task, as you heard earlier, and I think that it's a challenge for to get it all completed, but Dr. Chavaz was right and he said when he said that this was trying to be timed to be in time for us to consider it in terms of the next budget and that that's why the timing is tight and I think the council had that in mind when you set that deadline. So what I'm calling it is the community safety working group and much of this is aligned with what Councillor DeAngelo has had submitted and really appreciate her thoughts on this as well, and other councillors and members of the public who I've talked with. So the idea on the community safety working group is to make recommendations on alternative ways of providing public safety services to the community and make recommendations on reforms to the current organizational and oversight structures of the Amherst Police Department. So the nine members that I have outlined is and I want to address who appoints under the town charter the town manager is the appointing authority and the appointments from the town manager go to the town council for its review and approval or disapproval. So there isn't you know this is the way these committees get formed. There would be no fewer than six members who shall represent Black Indigenous people of color or other historically marginalized communities of the nine and then the working group will appoint its own chair and vice chair and lay out its own work plan. We would want people on the committee who would have subject matter expertise project management skills human centered design knowledge community organizing experience and represent the groups are most most frequently impacted by police work um George so um hello yeah let me go ahead okay thank you um so the the the deliverables again by this group and I think you know Dr. Shavas had suggested creating two groups which was sort of an intriguing idea to me it's something that we but we I'd like to discuss with you because it is an enormous amount of work and maybe having two my initial thought on it was to have one group who would get his work done by January 3rd 31st and then since that group was already ramped up and knowledgeable about how we do things in Amerson the the whole area then they would then pivot and go to the next area I think his idea of saying two different groups acting um parallel has has some merit so we should think about that as well. So then the question became how do you appoint these people to this committee and it's you know you know we have a normal process for most of our normal committees and it goes through we have the residents advisory committee that advises if there's an a bank can see on a committee the staff person and the chair of the committee sit in on the interviews and then we pretty much always reach consensus on who would be the best fit for the committee um this is different and I'm proposing a different model for reviewing this because again the power structure this is looking at this is a committee that's going to look at power structures and having the town manager be the appointed authority which we can't get around made me think that there should be sort of an intervening group that's a little bit more robust than our normal interview process and so to that end I'm suggesting that we appoint a interview team that's bigger than normal this would include a member um from the residents advisory committee I'm thinking Kisha Dennis for that and she's agreeable to that the chair of the human rights commission Matthew Charity another member of the human rights commission and the abc house resident director Sid Ferrara a BIPOC public safety employee of the town or UMass who doesn't need to be an Amherst resident there's several people who would fit that bill a um an Amherst resident chosen by the racial equity task force an Amherst resident chosen by the Defund 413 group and an Amherst resident BIPOC consultant who has worked previously providing anti-racism training to town or school employees so this would be the people who would meet with the applicants uh and then say and there'd be consensus you typically these these working consensus format and say here are the people we think should serve on this committee timelines are very short we'd have to assemble this pretty quickly my goal would be to have the actual appointments to you by October 19th it would be a very high priority uh it would have to get through TSO as well so I think we would line it up to meet those those deadlines um you know we again we would be really racing to hit the January 31st deadline but I think we have you know there's a fair amount of work on some of these aspects already completed um we would draw on we have put the resources that the town has at the disposal of this committee we do have a budget you know the $80,000 that could support some of the work it won't be as this this group to hit the January 31 will be very specific but the work that that this this group or another group will be doing will continue and has to do a lot of community organizing connecting and building trust building relationships that's a whole different um um effort that's going to have to take place with people who know how to do that kind of work so in a nutshell um that's what the proposal is um established a committee and what and I I struggled with how to form the committee given the the constraints of the charter and this is the format that um that we've come up with so I'm here for questions and um suggestions things like that um first of all thank you Paul I do want to make sure people understand that we're not voting on this tonight uh and in fact it will be on our agenda next week uh and so it's really an opportunity to give Paul feedback uh and make additional comments and I I mentioned that particularly for the public as well because several of the public comments noted that it did not get into the folder until this morning and we recognize that um I know it's something that Paul has been working a lot on but uh this is just the first discussion okay um Mandy Joe thank you we've heard a lot of concern about the ex officio member you proposed to be on the committee which is the chief of police uh I will admit when I first read the makeup of the committee it made a lot of sense to me to put the chief on a committee that's looking at um policies of the police and that's the second half of the committees as proposed and also at um which calls the police should not handle but I after hearing comments from the public I have to express some concern with that um and so I'd like you to explore some other ways to potentially receive the feedback from the chief that does not involve the chief potentially sitting on the committee itself um and in the meetings of the committee thank you Kathy um you know Paul I when I read this as you know we we just got it today but I thought you did a very nice job in terms of thinking of the interview process on broadening it so one of the things I was thinking about as um staff staff involvement as this gets underway when we've talked about the cahoots programs and other programs that draw on public health or mental health could we um commit to at least some of the time of our our public health our our health director sitting there to hear thoughts you know and we've had questions we don't have social workers on staff we don't have community mental health workers on staff but you know be be thinking in terms of our service net or the training program out of holy oak that does mental health and things of mental health you know so that so that the committee itself doesn't have to do all the research but there's some people that are tapping into those networks so I I don't know exactly what I'm thinking so I'm not wanting to put them as another member of the committee itself but be on tap for the committee committee to bring them in to say um here are some ideas what do you think how could it work in our area um to bounce ideas off so that was one of my thoughts of we've got in our region some fantastic people to tap into and you know syd Ferrera and some of the people you've named will know some of those that same group so um just think in terms of an apparatus that won't have everyone out having to go and interview cahoots individually yeah I'm gonna add to the list Paul before I go on and including the senior center director who is also now working with the homeless side of our work as well um I'll just add to that is you know our finance tractors already been working into how these other agencies these fund cahoots and the albuquerque program thing so we've got multiple this is a pretty important project yes listen thank you trying not to repeat um to be fair we did get it the town council got it at 10 13 p.m last night which is way better than getting it at 4 p.m on Monday afternoon so thank you thank you thank you for getting it to us I'm sorry for the public that they couldn't see it but as we said this is our first discussion I also want to make sure it's clear that um Lynn mentioned we will not be voting on this tonight I would argue that we're not voting on this ever this is not something we're voting on this is the town manager is being a very partner like town manager in showing us what the charge looks like rather than having us yell at him later he's working with us now so that we can figure out if we agree with this I appreciate what Mandy Jo said about the police chief because I too was thinking well by making him be a non-voting member that means he has to show up like he always has to be there right as opposed to be called in when he's needed but hearing the public sentiment and if it and you know as we think about this over the course of the next week I also support the idea of maybe it makes more sense that it's just understood that he will frequently be called upon perhaps more frequently than the senior services director or finance director but that he will be called upon rather than being on the committee itself one of the things I wanted to thank us um thank Paul for doing is to look at how we're doing the interviews because that is certainly something that for example Northampton always gets brought up that they struggled with a good deal and that we talk about on all kinds of levels both for town council appointments and town manager appointments and his idea of expanding what's his usual process for doing that to really reflect how very unique this body will be I think it was really important and um in a conversation he and I had I encouraged him to name names like as as one of the other counselors mentioned you know here's a person who knows people and that's exactly what we wanted to see I think associated with the interviewing and so I think that's really important I think there are questions that we may want to talk about as a town council that aren't addressed in this memo associated with Pat's memo along the lines of who does outreach to encourage people to apply so the town manager decides who the interview team is can the rather than the interview team being the passive receptacle which is what it is now the interview team is always a passive receptacle at this time are we asking them as Pat has to do some some actual outreach to encourage people to apply and what other things can the cpo's do etc again to spread the word far and wide about how to apply for this particular body and then the other thing I just wanted to mention associated with the type of body that this is and I appreciate the town manager making it clear in both the memo and in his verbal presentation that this is the way the charter works the town manager makes appointments there has been certainly concern raised in the community that it could be done a different way I have said as some of you will recall I have said from the beginning of this conversation low these many months ago that I wanted it to be looked at as to whether or not it would make more sense for this body to be a body that worked just with the town manager therefore would not be subject to open meeting law or ethics constraints because they would not be a multiple member body and the ethics thing would be is less of an issue here but open meeting law is a huge issue both in terms of 48 hours notice and being nimble and it's also a huge issue associated with public interaction and being able to see what this committee is accomplishing in terms of the types of work that they're being expected to do I think one of the things that came up in public comment that maybe people aren't as clear on and maybe Paul can clarify for us tonight but the way I understood the memo was that in no way shape or form is he expecting that by next summer we will have in place some sort of ongoing community resident and I really liked the name the lead gave it now it's jumping out of my head advisory group that won't be ready yet but they will have made great progress in terms of identifying how it will work and it for example you know may or may not there may be other groups as this unfolds that can work very informally to advise the town manager but in this particular section at this particular moment I am leaning toward the idea of it being an official town committee with the understanding that that committee itself may recommend you know what I think it would make a lot of sense if the town manager actually met with this subgroup of people that are not on a committee and could have informal conversations in ways that he's been doing over the last several months and that will you know will delegate some work off to that working group that really informal working group that's not subject to open meeting law but again to be clear on the example that was given earlier it is perfectly fine to have a committee that advises the town manager on something the town manager does it is not fine to have a committee that advises something like the town council that doesn't that isn't subject to open meeting law so we could do it that way but at this time I'm not convinced that this type of work that's being done right now that's proposed to be done over the next two months to six month periods is the kind of work that should be done in private and I'm sorry that other people are feeling differently about that because they're feeling the most directly impacted but I'm trying to understand why that would be better and I'm not seeing how it would be better because I'm seeing this as something that actually would be visible to the public to show what is happening with how this is being developed through January and then through the next six month period shall we me yes I just want to say I really appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into preparing this report and I like the appreciate the composition of the initial like how do we form the committee and so I feel like you know just having someone from the racial equity task force having the defund four one three group be partners in this initiative is is I think a really good idea and I was wondering if the other stakeholders that are impact are going to be impacted by the work that we're doing here related to public safety like is like for example landlords or businesses or and I'm just putting it out there if you want to consider someone who brings in that perspective or should they be invited to represent that stakeholder group so that's one question and that I'd like the council to discuss and Paul to consider and the other thing about the police I think even though it seems counter to what we're doing here and I hear what residents are saying about their concerns I still feel that it's really important in the spirit of creating an inclusive community and working collaboratively we include the people who we're talking about especially if you want to buy in I think it really goes counter to the idea that we want to create the safe collaborative community and we create these you know come up with work we're doing that's affecting the police but not including them in that conversation and not having the experience and an opportunity for them to be a resource and also to be part of that dialogue so with respect to the fear that has been shared by so many people that if there's police representation in a committee like this people would not feel safe to speak up I think how I'm seeing this is that the committee would have it's the committee members when they go out and speak to different communities the police doesn't have to be part of that conversation so the police will be there within the main committee which will include certain people who are comfortable and confident in speaking and leading those conversations and those people are going to go out and speak to the Latino families or to immigrants or people of color and indigenous families so the police doesn't have to be involved over there and we will make sure and I'm hoping that the committee will make sure that that happens in a safe way but I think it's really important and having done a lot of organizational work and culture change that when you want something to be successful and you want you have to have the buy-in of the stakeholders who're going to be impacted otherwise it's coming in and saying you should do that rather than having those people be part of that conversation that's all for now okay Darcy you're muted Darcy Darcy you're muted okay sorry I want to thank both the town manager and Pat for coming up with memos on community safety and I have a few questions for the town manager and I'm hoping that there's going to be space for him to reply to all of our comments and questions after we've made them we're in a revised memo pardon either tonight or in a revised proposal next week oh okay I want to think about them and get some additional input okay well to the extent that he can answer them tonight that would be great but anyway I see that you consulted with a lot of people before coming up with this proposal meaning the town manager's proposal which is great did and I'm wondering if BIPOC residents participated in finalizing the proposal the final draft before you submitted it to us so that's one question I'm wondering if we can get the words racial equity into the name of the committee and I'm thinking of the name the acronym REPS R E P S racial equity in public safety um because I'm I'm this is why we're doing it in the first place and I and why we want to ensure that a majority of the people on the committee are BIPOC so I guess I just feel like why aren't we including those words also along those lines I look to see if in the charge there was there was sort of a mission in the purpose and it seemed like what needs to be added is that it needs to state something like the purpose of the committee is to further racial equity in public safety in the town of Amherst by and then a making recommendations and so on and b making recommendations on reforms to the current organizational and oversight structures so it you need we need to include that purpose of furthering racial equity um and um uh as always I would like to see a more open process of choosing the members uh which is not a requirement in the charter this is just something that the town manager could include um this current CAF process isn't transparent and that it doesn't allow the release of names of those who've applied or how many people have applied so how will residents how will the BIPOC residents know how to judge the choices made by the town manager if they cannot see who applied or how many people applied so that's that's a very big question and I saw that that was covered in Pat's memo um that she was calling for that um I do see a reason for trying to create some kind of structure that would avoid the onerous requirements of open meeting law um I I do see that this would be the residents that are participating are going to be passionate about their mission and they're going to not want to just come to a meeting every two weeks for two hours and sit there and not be able to talk or doing it do anything in between they're going to want to be involved um so to the extent that we can structure it so that they can have full involvement that would be good and finally I agree with Mandy Joe that I'd like you to explore ways that the police chief could receive input um from this committee without being an official member and being there every time the committee needs um so that there could be a freer um flow of of um suggestions about how things should change without worrying about you know offending anyone so anyway those are my comments Sarah so I just want to thank Paul for this tremendous amount of work because I think just even thinking about how we're going to tackle this just starts to make the brain start to freak out because it's a lot of work um one thing I want to address though is um open meeting law because I understand that even as town counselors when we were first elected a lot of people or a lot of counselors thought you know there's no way I can get good input or there's no way that I can you know really work with someone if you know I have to only talk to them during meetings um it's going to slow everything down but I think that we have to remember that open meeting law is something that as Alyssa said it it shows how a committee got to a certain decision and it may slow things down some but a committee doing such important work as this committee will I think it's really important to show step by step how they decided to do each thing because I think as counselors we know that when the public cannot see how we got to a decision they're really confused by it and it raises so many questions for the public about you know why this or why that and if you cannot show them in real time what you're doing then I think it it makes people feel more lost they don't have minutes to show them how something was reached and I I don't think it engenders um a lot of trust from the public so even though it would maybe make it the work of the committee slower I think it would be more genuine to the public. Evan? I'll try to be quick um so first of all second to everything that Sarah just said I think it's interesting to hear an argument to make the appointments process more transparent but then the deliberations of the committee less transparent so I think that we if we're if we're going for transparency we can't pick and choose where we want transparency and I think that this is so important an issue to the community that these deliberations need to happen in public they need to have public comment because there will be nine people on the committee as proposed but there are as we know on this council there are far more who are interested and so we need to make sure that this happens in public and that there's public space for it. I am speaking from my experience on ECAC which was a baby committee that got started that it takes time once a committee is is even as enthusiastic as people are it takes time to get their footing to figure out how you work together. If you all remember we initially charged ECAC with submitting climate action goals within 90 days ECAC quickly learned that that was an unreasonable timeline because they were starting from never having been a committee and I have some concerns about the timeline for this committee whether we are setting them up for failure to ask such a large task over such a short time for a group of people who have never worked together in a committee that's never existed what that might mean for this committee is very frequent meetings and if we're trying to include marginalized groups we might want to be careful about what the time commitment we're asking of people is. I'm very ECAC chose to meet twice a month. Other committees in town such as the Affordable Housing Trust meet once a month for a committee to take on this task. I worry about how often it will have to meet and whether that burden that time commitment may dissuade some people from signing up who would otherwise be good because they already have children or work jobs and so if we're really trying to recruit people who don't often get involved in town government I think we have to be cognizant of the fact that they might not be able to meet every other week and think about that and I don't know where you go with this but I think it's something that we have to recognize when we're trying to do this that we're not looking at no offense to my colleagues a bunch of retired folks who we're hoping will do this. We're looking at people who are part of these communities who are the people who are coming to speak at our council meetings who are already told us about the time commitment involved in coming to speak at these council meetings and so thinking about that and I think that's another reason why I think that I was intrigued by the idea of two committees but I also worry a little bit about the capacity of staff to have to manage two additional committees. We have a lot of committees in this town as we all know and then the last thing I want to say quickly is just echoing what shallony said about involving the police chief. One of the things I know from my experience on ecac was Darcy and I were often invaluable to that committee and I'm sure Sarah is now because we knew how the town council worked and we could give them information about what it's like to work through the process and I think that it's really important to have stakeholders at the table who understand that. I hear Mandy's concern and the concerns of the community and I think this is a really tricky one but I don't think we can not have the police someone from the police in the room because we do need someone in the conversations I've had with the police chief I've learned new information and I've found out things that I hadn't thought of before that were really important to me developing my opinions and so finding that balance is going to be tricky but I do think that there needs to be some law enforcement representation even if it's definitely not as a voting member but I do think that they need to be part of the conversation and need to be in the room when some of these conversations are happening. I agree that there needs to be some representation in a non-voting way of the police department but I'm thinking about someone who has policing experience but is either retired or no longer is not directly involved with the Amherst police department because I think that we can go to or the committee can go to the chief and ask questions about certain policies and procedures but if we have someone with some kinds of experience some kind of policing experience that will foster work on the committee and I think that person I mean I know several people in Amherst who are BIPOC community members who are also retired police officers so that it's something to think about the other thing that you that hasn't been brought up and I did bring up in my memo is if you were going to be recruiting and we want to reach out to the community we need to offer stipends for family care and transportation where it is needed because there are I can think of four or five incredibly intelligent women who have been part of creating the Amherst mobile market. Many of them would need a translator and but they also need transportation because they live on East Hadley Road or other places where transportation is very poor or takes hours they would also need family care another so we're we have to be careful that we're not bypassing incredible people in the community because we're not offering support that enables them to come. That's all right now. I understand Pat's point about support but this committee is going to get started very soon. I think the support that some of the people who might be on this committee need is technical support because the meetings are going to be held by Zoom I assume and so that I think so that we should we could just say support and then give the appropriate support depending upon the meeting type because today I went to the first meeting of the Amherst Women's Club since the shutdown. It was very small an awful lot of women who are members do not know how do not have the equipment cannot join a Zoom meeting. So this is a challenge that we have to deal with so I would say choose the people according to their ability to contribute to the committee and then it would be up to the town to provide the support needed technologically. I'd like to wrap up comments Alyssa. Thank you just following up on that yes normally I was going to say you know we're going to consider stipends for the first time we're going to look at family care thank you for saying that instead of child care and elder care and also transportation except like Dorothy just said we don't need any of that. This committee is going to be functioning in a Zoom world that's the reality. We're not going to suddenly start having in-person meetings. We're not going to suddenly start having small group gatherings where we do the really useful stuff we normally do which is feed people. Everyone loves to come to meetings where you feed people that's not going to happen. This is in too short of a time frame for these actions. I totally agree that one of the things that's going to come out of this committee is they're going to recommend that any ongoing work whether it's the some sort of oversight questionable word associated with this or other committees that might exist after this this time limit committee is done that that part of those recommendations would absolutely be to provide transportation to provide translation to provide things even more regularly than we do now which tend to be confined to like annual or semi-annual forums but looking at the reality we're in right now people need to be able to function on Zoom. If they can't function on Zoom then they can't be part of this committee and it's just really that simple that doesn't mean they're not going to be talked to that doesn't mean they're not important it means that to serve on this committee under the current conditions they need to be able to work on Zoom and then that committee that's doing that needs to figure out who else they need to talk to how else they can reach them in a pandemic world where they can't go and just sit on somebody's stoop and talk to them the way you might normally and then also how that affects the coming committees that are going to grow out of this and I just want to make also clear to the public that that part where we where the town manager talked specifically about who would be on the interview committee again that's an expanded interview committee that's not talking in detail about who's going to be on this committee itself and I think one of the things counselors should be thinking about is that it may turn out that some of the people on the interview committee are people that various segments of the community would like to see serve on this committee as well so that might be a little bit tricksy and so just to have that conversation because that's not normally an issue right when it's just RAC and a department head and a chair but when it's this larger of an interview committee I don't think there should be a way that we say oh but if you serve on the interview committee there's no way you can get appointed to the committee but that'll they'll have to sort that out Melanie I think one of the things we could support the volunteer committee members is to offer them coupons from or from our local restaurants so the people who need additional support and that would also support the local businesses not everyone but at least people who do need that additional support could be offered those coupons and I also wanted to just bring up the idea I know this is it's not part of this committee's charge but I do want to just remind us that we want to at some point look at systemic racism I know this committee is focusing on just the public safety aspect of it but my hope is that maybe it's the same committee or this meeting goals each to continue to work issues to make them interim in the business youth environment and so forth um Paul we've thrown a lot at you my my two comments are basically find the balance between open meeting and making sure the people can still feel comfortable and the other one is find the balance between having resource people like the police chief there but not in a way that they inhibit the conversation are there comments you would like to make now or just think about this and come back next week I think you hit on a lot of them I think the you know I do look at the ECAC and their outreach efforts through the the contract we had with the consultant to the town which was very successful I think but it did not compromise it created trusted environment through this contracted work but ECAC maintained its public open meeting law ability to do that so I think there's ways to do for created trusted area for people to be in that that's I guess called community organizing I think and we need to get that that type of thing in there it is a big task you know I think I will I think we will look at this very specifically for you know the first you know to get to January for the budget is like what about non-police services can we do can we get something in place because there's a certain amount of urgency for this too and I think we want to have something in the budget maybe even in this fiscal year who knows but something happening now so that we can get something going with the bigger picture we can't let you know I think someone said that you know you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good I also do want to just say you know Pat having Pat's email to her memo to sort of generate the thought on this was really helpful and so thank you Pat for that because just structuring it the way it was I thought it was very helpful so you know and I've talked to a lot of other people and so lots of people contribute to this I think now that we have this out we'll send it out to get a lot other people to look at it contribute to it make comments on it so I think that would be real and welcome feedback on that get you something revised you know at the end of this week so you have more time to comment on it next week thank you let's move on then the next item which is the COVID-19 update and I understand that Jen Brown will be joining you as part of this yes and we have a slide presentation for this yes so are you here Jen yes you are okay so Jen Brown many of you haven't met her but she's been with the town for a number of years so we'll introduce her as our acting health director you want to introduce yourself Jen yeah so hi everybody it's good to see you I've been overlapping with many of you I think really maybe the first time was with Julie she gave the PowerPoint presentation the health department back in 2019 but you know I do want to just take this time to say I really am you know I'm honored to be here and to be serving in this role as acting manager and you know the bridge from Julie to the next appointed director but you know I hope that also I can bring some of my my expertise and my experience to the table you know during this really hard time so just quickly I've been a nurse for 36 years I've worked in emergency rooms and cardiac cath labs and 10 years ago I started thinking about how I could look at patients before they got sick so I really wanted to get into preventative health and I went back to school I got my masters and then some additional coursework from the School of Public Health and the College of Nursing here at UMass so I've been working in the the health department for eight years and here I am thanks Jen yeah so we're really fortunate to have Jen they have such a strong team available to step right in and you know you may not have seen her but she's been working you know relentlessly with Julie doing all the contact tracing organizing all that kind of legwork for the town as well so she's very intimate with the entire COVID-19 response and she's attending all of our core team meetings and department head meetings at this point in time too so I'm going to go to the next slide so these this will be looking very similar we'll race through some of these slides because they won't be new information next slide again the only thing the thing that we usually focus on on this one is the second bullet point nine current cases in Amherst and that was as of last Friday and Jen you have an update on that it's it's eight today and the 144 holes so you know sometimes that current case there'll be three up two down but it's really it's been coming down and steady since last Wednesday next slide again this is sort of the information that's available on the state's website you can see where we are we are still green we had feared that we'd be starting to change with all the testing that was going on in town but that's that has not been the case next slide similar information they have it as a map feature there are multiple more communities who are turning red but we have not been one of them next slide so again the three websites what is happening at the three institutions UMass is now at 14 positives so that's different than ours it means you know some of this positive cases at UMass may be town residents some of them may not so they may have other people there that they're tracking Amherst remains at three and they're still not at Hampshire college and so one of the things that we did since the last meeting was the community forum where over 200 people were participating either on zoom or live stream with the university we're hoping to schedule a second forum in October we'll talk more about that later this week with the university they have a very robust testing program really impressive set up over there they're doing the fourth largest number of tests in the state only Boston Worcester and Cambridge are doing more so and that's our that's a real credit to the university for the way they set up their testing and how they've engaged their community to come and be tested they've tested over 10 000 unique individuals and a very low positivity rate I think you know on that sheet you can see the cumulative positivity rate of 0.04 percent and there's only one one case this week whatever this was done September 12th 0.02 percent weekly positivity and then the big news for us has been that they while they welcomed all matriculated students to be tested when they returned to the area they're now opening up their testing facility to anybody who's a matriculated student at any time to come in and be tested they're not requiring it we'd like them to require it but they're opening up and I think the students have been very willing it's not a very they are eager to be tested it's not a big deal to them it's become kind of normalized for a lot of the students so that's a huge plus for the town in terms of managing and watching what's going on anything on testing jen that you want to add I don't think I'm okay next line so we want to give you a quick update the big thing here everything is going normal a big thing here is that our temporary health director jen who's who stepped in next slide our outreach continue to reach out to people in different ways trying to think of new ways to to connect with folks in a very relaxed atmosphere we have not restarted their live calling events but we will do a we will do a virtual community forum hopefully with you mass again and the Cup of Joe is on Friday September 25th and we're hoping to have our Bill Laramie and Kat Nguyen from our ambassador program to talk a little bit about what's going on let people call in and talk to them about the work that they're doing and yes next so we have this calling number which has been very very popular you know the next slide so we started August 30th when we when I put this together with 95 calls that does not include this weekend all calls will get a call unless someone is being anonymous and we probably get about probably about under 10 of those calls have been anonymous people don't leave a number aren't looking for a call back they just want to tell us something the if the Cpo's can't call them and you know we have Cpo's in here every Saturday and Sunday making you know returning calls to people and they'll get shifted to the inspection services or the health department or the police and the ambassadors it depends what it is I think if it's a nuisance house thing that's not doesn't rise to the level of a noise complaint it still goes to the police department and they put it on their list and they talk about who can go visit we'd like the ambassadors to be the ones that we're not quite there yet but having mostly ambassadors or students not all to go visit student houses to sort of help educate them if it's a smaller not a noise complaint issue most of the complaints that we get are about noise it's about gatherings too many people gathered together about people not wearing masks and then a lot of just sort of information questions about how do I get tested where do I go to get a test things like that people are using it for that function as well the gatherings one thing that's been interesting I'll come right back to that is that we have not seen very large gatherings most of the gatherings have been under 20 even they're still loud it seems but most we have not seen the very large gatherings that we've seen in the past I think the message has gotten out to students there are fewer students in town to begin with significantly fewer but the you know those big large gatherings that we used to see every fall just aren't happening this year which is really good news those were our worries for the you know recipe for spreading the virus next slide so I want to talk a little bit about the Amherst COVID ambassadors so so they work in teams I just before the meeting started there were two walking down the street they have little bags of masks and they have UMass masks if you're a UMass student they'll give you a cloth mask they have Amherst masks if you're not they'll give you an Amherst mask you know working very closely with the UMass off-camp office of off-campus students they provide we provide support through our town staff there is a lead ambassador who also works for the university and so that really cements the conversation that's going back and forth next slide so we so far we've hired six I think we've actually had more than that as of today this is through last weekend yeah so they were at the farmers market on Saturday so and that's pretty much they're out there walking around engaging with people if people are confrontational they're told to walk away and there's really they one out of ten might be sort of a negative reaction and but they they're documenting everything so there's a Google spreadsheet that they document all interactions next slide so some of the things you know you know Jen works very closely with our the university she's been very successful working with our school nurses earlier in the year to serve as contact tracers we're working to secure additional contact tracers just to have people online ready to go if we need that um the events that we're starting to talk about our Mary Maple Winterfest Halloween we're moving forward with the tree sale at Kendrick Park we're using the farmers market as a successful model that anybody who wants to use a facility would have to follow they'd have to have a game plan like the farmers market did we want to have that documented and signed off on and so we want to keep some of these things going if we can the things that we're really focused on now is day space for those who don't have a home right now and we're looking at different options for that and overnight accommodations and there's some really good work being done by create stores and on that front as well so we're sort of excited about some of the work that's being done there um the we uh Jen you might want to talk about the what you're doing for the outreaching to vulnerable populations and the when I talk about the preparing for the vaccine distribution at some point there will be a vaccine for COVID-19 and Jen is starting to think about well when that happens how do we start to work on that yeah yeah so just talking about flu shots and the outreach to the vulnerable populations you know for eight years um you know Julie really trained me this was for a vision when I came in that I my job would be to reach people that wouldn't normally you know have this access so where would these um you know spot speed that we could just you know help people um you know get the vaccine if they wanted the flu vaccine so I have been going to restaurants I go door to door and I'll vaccinate people in the restaurants um they go to the community the Unitarian Church at the community meal I've gone to Amherst Survival Center um other partners um I joined with Center for New Americans and the vaccine that I give is for uninsured or under underinsured adults only and typically it's about 100 vaccines per year so that's the flu um and then preparing for um a COVID vaccine you know it's something that you know if you tell public health nurses can you get you know a vaccine distributed you know typically the answers yes but this is obviously a very different circumstance really watching news you know what's going on for a safe and effective vaccine and I think you know we just have to be smart and really keep on top of this and be humble and really try to understand what's going on you know my understanding now is that the vaccines that are in that third phase you know the big phase most of them are going to be two doses um they're going to be going probably to the people who are at highest risk of being infected like the frontline workers and highest risk of getting sick so it's not going to be just to everybody in the first rollout but I think we'll have to be really thoughtful about how we communicate this vaccine to people um and get it right the first time so that's what i'm thinking about the last slide is just the um that's not the last slide second last slide um where again the the schools are preparing to reopen they have a pretty um you know they've worked very hard with their collective bargaining units and with parents and guardians and so it's not a really good job on that the big challenge coming up is going to be our local businesses especially the restaurants you know we've been very successful at you know expanding the footprint for many of the restaurants downtown by expanding their outdoor seating but as the weather starts to turn it becomes more and more challenging for the restaurants and so two things that we're doing along those fronts one is you know are we able to have heaters that are that are commercial rated heaters and their incredible demand right now the town has funds to purchase these for our restaurants and so we're actively looking at that um and the other thing is a campaign that the bid came up with to sort of um advertise the sitting inside that it's safe and and and healthy that that these the restaurants will certify to the publi