Hey, guys, what's going on? It's Andy Elliott. Today in this podcast, I'm with my man, Shannon, right now.  So we're going to talk about, like, some things that Shannon knows that is super cool. But he crushes it and kills it in business. His story, I promise you, if you listen consciously, it's going to change a lot of your lives, OK? So guys, get ready to meet Shannon. I promise you, the stories he's going to tell you today and how he's gotten to where he's gotten is mind blowing. And it's going to help you get to the next level in your life. Check it out. Yeah, I'm a train hard. Mistakes turned into learned scars to build a brickyard. It's one by one each bar. So build a tall, build a small. All right, guys, here we go. So obviously, we're on the 1%er podcast. Why do we call it that? Because it's about being a 1%er, OK? You got 100 people in a room. 99 people aren't doing anything. One person's crushing and killing it. By the way, we believe that that's you. So the information that we're going to give today is going to change your life. I don't believe that information is what you need to go to the next level. It is transformation. But this guy is going to tell you about how he's transformed his life. And I'm an underdog, guys. If anybody follows me, you guys know that I love an underdog story. I love people that come back. I love people that grind, that have core values that are badasses in life, that they don't fall prey to weakness. And this guy right here, Shannon, he's my brother. And he's kicking us. And we've done a lot of coaching together and cool stuff. But as I've gotten to know his story, man, him and his wife are super close. He's a great dad. He's a great leader to others. He kicks us, makes a lot of money. But you know what he really does?  And maybe you guys can decide, like, hey, what's the next story in your life? I know that he's just getting started in his journey, but up to this point, it's crazy. So Shannon, I'm glad you're here with us. We're in Scottsdale, Arizona. We're in the 1%er podcast room. And I want Shannon to go ahead and start, like, number one, where are you from? How old are you right now? And then let's just start breaking in some life lessons and some stuff you've gone through so everybody can get ready to grow. I'm 42 years old. I was born in Anchorage, Alaska. I grew up in Virginia Beach, some places in between. I left Virginia when I was about 19, 20-ish years old. And I lived in Washington state, Seattle area, pretty much since then. Cool. So growing up, how many brothers or sisters do you have? One sister, little sister. OK, one sister. Mom and dad still together? No. My biological father abandoned me when I was five. OK, so watch this. So number one, he said his dad left when he was five. Now watch this. My mom left when I was two. If you'll notice something, this guy's full of love.  What I've seen, at least from my experience, is what you don't have when you're a kid. You try to give to others as an adult. Does that make sense? That's correct. OK. People that have it easy as a kid always self-sabotage as adults.  But people that have not had a lot of love when they're younger, when they get older, what happens is that disappointment builds them into being a killer, and they crush it in business. But also, they're super loving to people, and they want to give people what they didn't have as a kid. So I've seen the way that you are. I've seen the way you carry yourself with lots of energy and love. So dad rolled out when you were young.  OK, you moved to Virginia Beach. Is that right? Yeah, when I was seven, I made it to Virginia Beach.  And then two years after my dad left, my grandmother, who I was staying with, said, hey, are you ready to go see your mom? And yeah, yeah, yeah, you know. So at seven years old, I make it to Virginia. And I see my mom. And I meet Kelvin, who is my dad. He's the one who raised me. And he's still with me today. He's your dad. He's my dad. Yeah, good. So anybody watching that right now, listen to me. I'm going to tell you this. What is a dad? Somebody that leads you. Someone that leads you. Yeah, someone who loves you unconditionally, right? Somebody who sets an example for you. And they may not be perfect, however they can try. And they'll tell you the truth. Yeah, and you know what?  Dude, listen, you'll choose your dad too, right? What you got to do is just show a massive amount of love. And I promise you, man, a lot of my guys that work for us, they say, man, you're like my dad, right? And what that means is just a loving figure that just shows people love. So I love that. So rock and roll here at 19 years old now, right? And let's get into the business world. So 19 years old, I make it to Washington. And at that point, I've already had experience in construction. I dropped out of high school in 11th grade. School is not for me. I did not do good in school.  But being an attention deficit is a gift, right?  I didn't want to sit at a desk. I was good at math, good at art. I could see things three-dimensionally. And I was always good with people. I had this instinct and intuition with people. And I kind of had to get that because I was a small blonde-headed blue-eyed kid named Shannon. I got picked on a lot. And that adversity is one of the things that I say is contributed to where I'm at today.  What you're saying to me doesn't work. I don't care. You're not going to hurt my feelings.  So hey, guys, what's going on? It's Andy. A lot of you leave comments telling me that you need help. Do me a favor. I'm going to tell you the best way to get a hold of me. Shoot me a text message right now,<PHONE_NUMBER>.<PHONE_NUMBER>. I'll help you with whatever you need.  Let's get back to the video. 19 years old in Washington, took a job at a grocery store, met some friends, doing my thing, trying to figure shit out. And then around 21, 22 years old, I met, no, 23 years old. Sorry, 23 years old. I met Sarri, my wife. And then when I met her, I worked at a car wash. I lived in a small room with my buddies, rented an apartment, and she just knew. She knew when she met me. She saw something in me. She believed in you. That's right. That's right. And that was 19 years ago. And we haven't given up. Yeah, yeah, she's the rock. Yeah, she's the baddest. So when did you get into Jiu-Jitsu and all that? I got into Jiu-Jitsu when I was 31, roughly. No, 30, 30 years old. OK, so what makes you an obviously today? Tell everybody watching what companies you own today. I own two construction companies, a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu school, and a few real estate properties. And you own the largest Jiu-Jitsu school, right? It's one of the largest. Yes, it has one of the most successful. I opened it not even two years ago, and we're over 400 students already. Most schools don't even have 400 students. So let's go through. Obviously, you own multiple businesses.  You do well financially. You didn't graduate school, but you knew that you wanted to get into the construction space some way shape or how. You love design. You got in that deal. You start crushing it. 31 years old. Why did you get into Jiu-Jitsu then? How'd that work out? I was actually addicted to drugs and pills for a little while. It's so unfortunate how easily that's just available. And not just on the streets, but in the pharmaceutical, whatever. But I got addicted to the pills because I was basically having panic attacks.  I had a construction company that just started. That was stressful enough as is. It was after around the 2008 when the economy went messy. So I was dealing with a lot. And panic attacks, calling 911 to come have a heart attack, and addicted to, you're lost. I was lost. It was 140 pounds of gorephobic. I wouldn't even leave the house, Andy, my wife. My wife, we had just gotten married and all this hit me. My wife did anything. She was working. And I was like, I had a construction company. We were trying to get it going. And then I'm not working. I'm terrified. I'm in a bad spot. And then she found this therapist. After multiple people I've gone and seen, she found this therapist that basically figured out what my problem was. He helped me wean off of the pills. Taught me cognitive behavior therapy. I remember saying to him, I was watching a video of two guys doing jujitsu. And I said, I was watching this video. I was thinking, I'll never be able to do that. And he said, Shannon, whoa, whoa, whoa. Will you just set yourself up right there? No, now you got to do it. Do you want me to walk through the doors of the gym with you? I was like, no, no. I did. I walked into a jujitsu school. Terrifying. My heart's beating. I'm like, showing us a breath. Like, what am I doing here? I should just leave, you know? And the next thing you know, I'm on the mats. A couple months go by. And I remember my instructor telling me, you're going to be really good at this. You're gifted. You're athletic. You're going to be really good at this. And so much discipline, so much work. But like anything, when you practice, you get better at it. You get more comfortable at it, you know? It's more fun. It's easier. So many people out there have so much to offer.   Yeah, guys, so everybody listen up for a minute. Now, obviously, you know, as we're talking to Shannon, right, he's saying a couple simple things here. He's on drugs, twisted. Wasn't the man he needed to be for his wife. It's very simple.  She went and found somebody. And by the way, I think this is a problem that people have. Whenever they have issues, they don't know that they can raise their hand and they can get help. And by the way, you know why I like making these podcasts where we talk about real life shit? See, everybody puts on social media all their best versions of themselves.  I'm gonna tell you the man I know today, okay? Number one, amazing father, right? Amazing husband, kills it in business, isn't afraid of anything, savage when it comes to fighting. And dude, he literally is the most loving guy in the world, you'd never know, okay? Now, except if I can check his ears out and I know he's good at fighting because I look at his ears, right?    But I will tell you this though, as I see Shannon though, you know, I just would never think that you were addicted drugs, you were doing this. I think that that's what people don't understand is that, look dude, when you've been through the ringer and you've been through the grind and you really messed up, like dude, you're the most qualified. Like you're the greatest leader of all time when you're an overcomer in your own life. And then now you can help other people overcome their stuff in their life. Because when somebody comes to work now and they got a problem, like dude, like this is simple for you to be able to handle their stuff because you're like, dude, man, like, this is easy, man. Like dude, like when I was doing that and this and that, like that was hard. Like this is easy. This is nothing. We shouldn't worry about this. And then your anxiety. Like Shannon said that he had to beat his anxiety. Like maybe yours is an anxiety, but everybody's got a giant to slay. That's right. That's right. That's the truth.   And once you realize that it was stupid, right? And once you figured out how to handle it, you became dangerous. So you get in, the guy says you're gonna be good on the mat.  The more you get better at something, you know, the more obsessed you become with it, right? So then what happened? Like, would you start going to competitions and stuff or what?  And then be a teacher. So reverse engineer, I was able to open my school because of my credentials, right? My experience and my connection with the community. My business partner at the Jiu-Jitsu school, he had a couple other great Sibaha Jiu-Jitsu schools that he owned and he was looking for somebody to basically be the instructor and run the school. And then he heard about me, he knew about me and he was like, oh, there's no way I can ask Shannon. He's a busy dude, right? He runs a construction company, like whatever. And then he made the call anyways.  It's like, this is perfect. Yeah, I'll do it, let's do it. Then you love it, it makes you feel alive, right? Yes, you know, and it was a little bit of an investment. I mean, I guess it depends on what you consider a little bit, but I knew it was a win.  Dude, no, that's, you kidding me? That's it? Like, that sounds like a lot of money, but guys, let me explain something. But the brotherhood you've created inside that gym? The connections, the value add, the money, the passive income now. I call it passive income because I don't really work. The gym is like my hobby. I just go love on people and teach them something and I meet them where they're at and I relate to them and I just help them. I build people.  That's too great. Yeah.  Well, that's what life's all about. I mean, let's go back to the village days.  You put in the effort, you learn, you communicate. Everybody was just doing what they were good at, doing what they felt was right and they feel that it's right because they see it. They see it. That's the jujitsu community.   There's nothing more satisfying than knowing not only can you defend your family, provide for your family, educate, and show that as an example for other families. That's God's service, man. Yeah, it is. Yeah, and see, you said you were picked on a lot when you were a kid. It's funny how now you're training people to not get picked on. Remember what I just told you guys?  And dude, I'm telling you, it's the truth. Like I can take anyone in this world and I can see what they'll do right now, right? And I can understand why they behave, if I understand a little bit what they did as a kid and then what they're doing now. And I can tell people what their strongest and greatest deal will be. And the deal is, is that you teaching other people how to protect their family, right? Clearly, protection is important to you, right? Because there was a time that you felt like that you couldn't protect and now you can protect on a whole another level. Obviously, like abandonment, right? Like, betrayal is probably something that's, you know, something that you've dealt with. I always dealt with betrayal. I used to get very mad, very quick when I felt like somebody was betraying me, right?  I just need to make sure that I put myself around people who won't betray me. And then I started to build a circle of community and trust and I built a brotherhood around me and I don't have to worry about that stuff no more. You know, like I learned how to control a lot of this stuff.  The question is, how do you get there? It's easy by becoming somebody different along the way. And every day, yeah, who you gotta be. That's right, West Watson said it best. It's like, not how, not what do I have to do? Who, who do you have to be? That's just like any athlete, football player, basketball player. It's not like how do I hit the ball with a fence? No, who do I have to be? Then I need to practice. That's the key. Yes. Yeah, Jim Rohn always said, it's not about who you are, it's about who you're becoming. So if you're watching this, you know, tell us about your businesses right now. Like, so what do they do? Exactly. So the construction, so my primary construction company is based out of Sammamish, Washington, New Seattle.  I do residential remodeling. I do build additions, remodel bathrooms, kitchens, hire in, good quality work. The most, however, the most important thing for me is being able to recognize who my customer is. If I try to just take on any client that comes my way, I'm gonna hurt myself and her others, right? Knowing when to say no, knowing who not to chase. Well, you know your remodel range that you wanna do business with, right? Like you don't do $30,000 remodels. Not really, not often, no. That would be a one-off, like it would have to be really worth it. Like your stuff's a quarter of a million at least on remodeling. Yes, average job's a quarter of a million, yeah. Yeah, so I wanna say that, like, guys, you gotta go through a season of saying no when you wanna grow. What I learned is that there was a guy who said yes to everything and then he ended up taking on the wrong clients, the right ones, and then what he ended up doing is having to tell the right ones no, and then he was trying to force the wrong ones to do what he wanted them to do, and he went out of business because he wasn't niched down to his audience or what he wants, and I think that a lot of people, like some people can sell what they have to everybody, but a lot of people, like, you'll find the sweet spot. There's a guy, a guy named Cody Sperberg, right? I was just on a podcast with him yesterday, and he's got a million and a half followers, and I go and do this podcast with him in Scottsdale, and his sweet spot is 18 million, 18 million a month, or a year, that's their goal, 18 million a year. He says he makes the most money at 18 million, okay? So he said he went to 30 million, they actually netted more money at 18 million. Percentage, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you know, it's like, it's like, my goal, my goal, I want a billion dollar company, okay, and under 300 employees. That's what I want.  I want 300. And anyway, so like, you gotta find your sweet spot, you gotta know what you want, and then you gotta build it. So you said your niche is, you said commercial, or residential, so you go into homes, it need to be remodeled, and basically, you make them bad, that's bad of the bone, do that deal. Now here's the cool thing, you said in the last five years, you said your business, you had a 15, but in the last five, you have 10 extra business, okay? All right, so what do you think really changed these last, like, five years? When my son was born. Okay, so to show you, so your why increased? My why quadrupled, if not more. Good, so you gotta fire in your belly like no other. Dude, I live for something greater than myself. My wife has always been my rock and my love, you know, however, when my son came. Yeah, game changer. Game changer, and I'm never, ever, ever, ever, ever going to do anything to jeopardize the livelihood of him. Yeah, I think everybody watching this, he's understand this, that what he said is that his business, you know, 10Xed when he became clear on what his why is, right? And by the way, look, dude, you're literally like, the why is like, why would I go harder today? Why would I do a good job doing this? Why would I train? Why would I pay attention? Why would I self-invest? Why would I do this? Well, the question is, why you would do it is because of your why, right?  But when you had your son, that was a new reason to go all in and recreate and become a new man.  Dude, that changes everything because once you realize that, you know, it means something to you that somebody's watching, dude, that's when you hold yourself to a whole another level of accountability. Like you would never do drugs again. Okay, but imagine that, but before it had might been an option, but now you're like, not a chance in hell because you never want him to see that stuff. You never want him to be ret, but see, but that's a level of accountability. Your why holds you accountable now. Yes. Super cool, man. So your son, and then what else, what else changed? Around the five year mark, so my son was born in 2015, December 24th, Christmas Eve. And then I hustled more. I also met a friend of mine who was in the construction industry who basically reached back out to me one day and said, hey, Shannon, just wanna get together and talk. And then he, you know, we just caught up and he was explaining what he was doing in his business and stuff. And then I started picking his brain and basically he became like a little bit of a mentor of mine. And he says, hey, if you ever need any help with anything, and he's 60 some years old, very experienced. If you ever need anything, help with anything, just hit me up.  So I'm calling him and I'm like, hey man, I think my bank account is, I'm not getting ahead. So he's like, all right, bring me everything. And he's like, Shannon, you had to make $150,000 a year just to break even.  And I'm like, and dad, and this, that, and the other. And I was like, so I learned how to be a bad construction guy and start running a business or building a business, but I was suffering over here. So he just woke me up to that. And then I started reading leadership books. Hey guys, what's going on? It's Andy, a lot of you leave comments telling me that you need help. Do me a favor and take the best way to get a hold of me. Shoot me a text message right now,<PHONE_NUMBER>.<PHONE_NUMBER>, I'll help you with whatever you need.  Let's get back to the video. Starting immersing myself in basically business, leadership, how to communicate with people, how to utilize your strengths and say no to your weaknesses or give them to someone else. Building a team is very important without a team. I'm reading the book right now, Relentless by Tim Grover.  But he's very direct.  It's gonna come at you no matter what.  Life's coming, buckle up motherfucker, be ready for that. So I just immersed myself in areas that I could connect with and knew that would be better because I could be the greatest carpenter but I'm only one guy. Why not be the greatest builder of carpenters and supplier of opportunity?   And it's not even really about the money. Like, yeah, we all gotta make money but the money is going to come. Yeah, well, if you notice, so number one, you became crystal clear on what your why was, okay? And then you decided to find a mentor, okay? Mentors, yeah, yes. And then you started self-developing. And then when you started self-developing, you found a new version of you. You started to recreate and everything changed. Like guys, he just gave you the blueprint, okay? Like, it's that easy. Like everybody grab pen, grab piece of paper. Write down what your why is, okay?  Are you ready to go get it? Okay, if you are, you need to find a mentor. What does that mean? Find somebody who's gone where you wanna go. Right. And this guy, he had some hard talks with you. Okay, what does that mean? Get ready to have hard talks, okay? Get ready to talk to somebody about like, you don't wanna hear. Learn to set your feelings aside when it comes to receiving the truth. That's ego. Yeah, get that, get that, ball it up and put it over here and forget about it.  Yeah, you've become dangerous. You're going to be dangerous. Yeah. And I always tell people, I say, you're the problem, you're also the solution. That's right. And that's absolutely right. And the cool thing is, is that being able to find someone, this is truth, you gotta find somebody that you're willing to respect enough that when they do tell you the truth and they're straight with you, that you'll change. Kobe Bryant, you were talking about Tim Grover, but Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan, the reason why they did whatever Tim Grover said was because they knew that he had their best interest. And they told them what they wanted. They wanted to be 1% better every day.  But Tim Grover said, no, we're going to make a thousand shots a day. So he didn't let him count the shots. He made him count the hits. Like, dude, like there's a different standard and a different level a good coach will hold you to.  Yes, you gotta have the body. Yeah, but it's like we keep talking about it. Like, I need everybody to understand that this energy that's going to get us to the next level. Can I explain that a little bit? Yeah, go ahead. So let me say this, so first and foremost, like without the body, you have no mind. The body carries a mind. The brain is what makes it possible for me to talk, to be able to see, to think, right? To push the buttons, I need to push to make money. The brain receives information through the eyes, through the nose, through the ears, through the mouth, through the touch. That's how it receives information. And without a healthy body, you're not gonna have a healthy mind. And yeah, you can say there's people out there that do well with an unhealthy body, but imagine what they could do with a healthy body. Imagine waking up every day and feeling so good. It's not even funny. The hard part is taking this and going, let's make it happen. Execution, action. That's, and once you get past that, it's like walking in the door to do jujitsu. That's the hardest part.  And it's easy then. And it's fun. And you're helping people. Like people who say no to being better are selfish. And a lot of people don't even realize that. They're selfish. If they say no to, if they're complacent, fine. They love this, that and the other and they're cool with it.  However, you're capable of more. You may not believe it. You may not, you may not recognize it.  Yeah, I always tell people, there's nothing worse than dying without maxing out all your potential. Like that's the reason why I try to get to it so quick is because I just don't know when like my time's up. So like I'm just gonna act like it's up like tomorrow. So I just like go all in, I go psycho, I go obsessed. You know what I mean? And that's the key.  Like I've learned this about you. And this is something that I love about you is that you want right now success. You want right now life. You want right now energy. You want right now whatever you want. So you make right now decisions. Like that's what I love about you. You know, my wife and me together can make decisions this quick. And what I've learned is that a lot of people, they're not yet people, okay? There's right now people are not yet. Like so I'm like, hey, listen, let's go do this. And you're like, hey man, I wanna do it, but not yet. And these not yet people are the people that are literally sitting on the sidelines why right now people are playing the game. And that's what I like about you, you know what I mean? And as we do these podcasts, like I'm able to see why people have made it. And you know, and I love it. Like dude, like, you know, from your dad blowing out when you were a kid and then growing up. And you know, you literally are trying to find your way.  Then you let her down because you get all anxiety and you get on drugs and she probably should have left you, but she didn't. And you know, you're grateful. People told her to leave me.  Well, it's common sense to leave you, but common sense isn't something that people that are obsessed sometimes have. Like sometimes it's more than that. So my point is is that these people, they stuck by your side, which is why now your wife, she handles all your business stuff. She handles everything. She's the CFO. Yeah, she's the king in your business. You know what I mean? And it's just super cool that all these things, you know, you all decided to have a kid. You know, you decided to find a mentor. You know, now you got these construction businesses.  And then also you have your Jiditsu school, which is like your brotherhood, you know, like whether that ever paid a return on any money or it didn't, the coolest thing is that that's what keeps you alive, man. I think you coming in and see that sweat, that grind, that hustle here and those mats get hit, you know, here and everybody, you know, working together, seeing people gain and get results. Like to me, that's like your ultimate fulfillment. Is your son, is he in that? Yes. Okay, see, that's cool. So now he's getting a head start. Yes.  You know what I'm saying? Yes. That's super cool.  And that's why I always, you know, draw towards each other. And by the way, listen, I want everybody to know that.   I want this. Okay, cool. If you do this, I'll give it to you right now. Well, not yet. And that's why we keep dusting people, okay? Because people don't move as fast as you. Listen, man, there's people that are way smarter than us. Okay? Agreed. Yeah, and there's people that, you know, are way more qualified than us. But because we're prepared to do it right now, that's our secret. So we just gave it away on this call, man. The first two letters in the word goal is go. I learned that from a friend of mine. Who's a fiduciary, by the way? Great guy, family man as well. And like, when he told me that, I was like, Jesus Christ, that is amazing. The first two letters in the word goal is go. So many people think that, oh, I'm gonna do this one day, but not right now. It's gotta be perfect. Well, the goalpost is always moving, guys. You gotta start, you gotta start going. You gotta start practicing. You gotta implement some action. Because without action, no execution. And yeah, it's one thing to have a plan, right? But it's another thing to at least have a direction. That's like, if I don't know my plan is, well, I will get one. I'm gonna start moving in a direction. I know where my strengths are. I know where my, I know where my, the people that I wanna be around, I hang out in that area. Yeah, you're really good at emulating people. When you get around them, it's like, one of the greatest things about getting a coach is when you get around them, you can just emulate exactly, and it's not envy. It's emulate. You just emulate what they're doing, which goes back to the law of success. Find someone who's done what you wanna do and just study them. John Maxwell said it best. Someone came to him one day and said, hey, John, I wanna do what you do. And he says, okay, question is, do you wanna do what I did? That's it. That's it. And a lot of people don't wanna do that. And they can't overcome adversity. Now, remember, as I said at the beginning of this call, I said, you're going to learn some cool stories from you. Well, what have we learned? Number one, we've learned that you're an overcomer.  Suffering, adversity, loss of life. My best friend killed himself. My dad, my biological father who abandoned me many years later made amends with me and did anything and everything he could within his power, within his potential to stay in contact with me and I visit him. And he told me, he's sorry so many times and I love him and he passed away. I was three hours away from his house driving to go visit him. I hadn't seen him in five years. I was on the way to his house, three hours away, a three day drive. I got the call that he passed away. I was almost there. And then when I got there, it was a mess. God put me there because I needed to take care of that situation. I needed to orchestrate the funeral. I needed to keep everyone together. I needed to take care of some finances. I needed to just take action. I didn't go there to miss my dad. I went there to take care of him. He's gone.  Sorry, I cussed. No, no, I love it. I love you getting past shit, man.  Now I'll tell you this.  That's when the neat stuff comes in. What makes Shannon uncommon? Well, he plays with his heart. What does that mean? That means the guy's all heart. What we lack in skill, we own in heart.   Like you give to everybody. Most people wouldn't say that about their dad. You know what I'm saying? But you do, why? Because you give. And by the way, listen, I told you what you don't have as a kid, you go to give as an adult. So if anybody's watching this, man, no matter what your story is, we put on these podcasts so that we can just talk for a little bit. So if you can just find one little nugget, just one, just even if it's this big, okay? Then the 10, 20 minutes, 30 minutes that you watched it was definitely worth your time. And then it makes you dangerous to go to the next level. So Shannon, what if somebody wants to follow you on Instagram, right? How do they find you? If they want to connect with you. My Instagram page is pretty new. I just started it a few months ago and I'm working on building content and finding some people to help me out with it because tech is not my strong suit. But yeah, so my personal page is Professor Shannon H and my construction page is Higgison Homes. Good, I love it. Well guys, one thing that I'll tell you for sure is over the next two years you'll see Shannon a lot with us. He rolls with us. He's in the high inner circle coaching program that we run with. But the cool thing is is that dude like when he knows that he wants something, okay? And he can see it, then he replicates it.  Your wife supports you. You're obviously taking your family with you which is super cool. You're an example to everybody. You know, a lot of people, they have no idea who they could become if they just put all the excuses to the side, right? All of them. And then just went all in. I wanna help people with that too. That's one of my goals that I'm working towards is my team, we're building a playbook, a blueprint like you said, like we have 270 something line items on how to run a business. Yeah, from marketing to execution and helping people get out of their own way. Like be ready, it's coming. You know, we're going to be. Once you build it all and you let me know, we'll have a second podcast and you can give it to everybody and they can figure out how to get in touch with you and do it. But this is day one. So the cool thing is, is that I introduce you today, we'll do a podcast in a year from now.   I can't believe that's me. And that's the good stuff in life. So anyways, guys recreate in every day is what we live for. I'm an underdog. I love overcomer stories to me. It's everything. And Shannon, I love you, bro. Love you, buddy. Appreciate you being here.  If you need something to reach out, but if not, we'll see you on the next video. Hey guys, that's what I tell you. You're the true one percenters. You made it till the end of the video. Do me a favor, share it with the friend that wants to go to another level. Make sure you like the video, comment below so I know who you are. Set your notifications and then subscribe to the channel. We got daily sales training videos dropping. I'll see you soon.


The meeting is now being recorded. So this is our January 8, 2024, Valley Green Energy Working Group meeting. Welcome Marlena and Paul, we're happy to have you with us today. And I guess we'll just launch right in. I know we have minutes, but I think we should put those items for the agenda at the very end. After Paul and Marlene leave because I think that business we can just get to later so we don't waste our time with the two of you. And Paul, I guess we want to maybe start with the DPU hearing and then we can discuss the information you just sent that I forwarded it to everybody. Excellent. And if I may, I'll begin with one preliminary thing, which is to welcome Carol and her new role. It's a joy for us to be have the chance to work with Carol again. Me too. I wouldn't come to Northampton unless I could work with you guys. So yeah, so we'll start by talking about the DPU public hearing come coming up, which is just to provide a little context. This is required by statute. The DPU takes it very seriously for that reason. And it's pretty much a non event. So, you know, it's for not, you know, formal opportunity for the public to comment on the plan and we've published notices in the Boston Globe and other places. But it's very, very rare for anybody to comment other than the people who are directly involved. Number one, and number two, the DPU doesn't really rely on the comments in their decision. So there's not, it's important to do it and to treat it seriously, but also to recognize that it's in the scheme of things. It's a minor, it's a minor event. It is. Well, just to go over the logistics of it, it's conducted by zoom.  Speakers will be in a waiting room and then you'll be asked to join and you'll come in one at a time and you can give your remarks. There won't be any questions from the DPU they'll just, they'll just listen. I think it's helpful to have a few people come and speak and really to talk about, you know, I think key messages are, you know, communities have considered this carefully and there's been a lot of public participation, which is an area where your plan is really stellar. There's, you know, this working group with public members and you had far more, you know, commenters that you are the public meeting you hosted than any community ever as far as I know, but certainly quite a lot. And so because it's to say you've treated this carefully and seriously and you've taken public comment on it. And then you can talk about the goals for the plan. And the single most important thing is that you don't say that a goal is to save money. That's the one thing that that drives the DPU crazy so you don't you want to say in fact the affirmative that you understand that savings cannot be guaranteed. Our goals are this, you know, stable prices greener electricity, and we understand that savings can't be guaranteed. If you check those boxes. Perfect. Okay. So I wanted to actually Stephanie, I'm sorry. Can I just, I just saw an email from Tom's. Is that his name Tom from saying he's trying to get in. Okay, let me. All right, we've had this problem with him last time. I will very quickly say that if anyone has any questions for Paul right now, that's what I was going to open it up to just bear with me one second and I'm going to work on getting Tom in here. So how many speakers do you recommend that we have. I think it would be helpful to have one person from each community. And I don't think more than that would be would make would would create an incremental benefit I think three would be perfect one person from each if possible but even if it's just to two speakers that would be fun. Well that would be a pretty quick hearing. They are quick they take, you know it's they're long if they go 15 minutes. So I know you said that typically there aren't a lot of people that show up at these meetings but as you also noted that we had the most public engagement for information session and I think potentially that might be true for this hearing as well. I know that I've had an inquiry from the town manager I think the council president or the town manager were wondering if they should appear at this hearing. I mean again, obviously as you said it's not required. It's probably not necessary but is there an advantage to having maybe a staff person and an elected official speak. I'd answer that in two ways. One it's certainly true that if you have both that shows more of and you know more attention to the behalf of community towards the program so it's positive in that way. I don't know that it would make a difference though. Okay, that's good. It would be a fine thing but I'm not sure it would make a difference. And I guess, what if we're, should we not be repetitive should we be each because there's three communities involved in this particular application, should we maybe focus on different components of what they're looking for, or that we what we should touch on. I'd say in a perfect world, but I don't think that's essential as long as the remarks are brief. And that I should have said that earlier. You know the expectation is, or a good thing would be to speak for a couple of minutes, you know three minutes something like that to three minutes, you shouldn't speak for 10 minutes. They, you know they don't too strong to say they don't want to listen to you for 10 minutes but you can make the points in three minutes and that would be good concise as good. Okay, and welcome Tom, sorry you were stuck in the attendee room there. Yeah, I heard most of it actually I was here and Carol thank you for, but I was actually in at that moment, and the goal is not to save money. I heard that loud and clear. Go ahead. It sounds like the fewer people who speak the better. And this isn't the time to show the depth of community support in terms of turning people out. And perhaps the same with our leadership. Seems to me there's more risk of misspeaking the more people, the farther out you go from, you know those of us have been most involved. But as a community member I'm advocating for limiting who we invite and encourage to come. I would second that and I was also not really looking for additional folks to speak just given that Paul's comments previously about this have indicated that less is in some ways more. So, I don't think it'll be a problem I mean I'm assuming if we can only have one person from, you know, each community I think makes the most sense. I would defer to the town manager and provide talking points if he or the he believes the council president should be the one but otherwise maybe you would take like a minute each. We'd sort of break up our comments and do it that way if you know if they really do want to have somebody but I don't it won't be more than that it'll it'll only be myself, and maybe one of those two. And so wondering, Pelham and Northampton Carol Tom, where are you guys at with who you think will speak on your community's behalf. Well, I'm going to defer to Bob a googly or the select chairperson. I thought he did a fine job last time and is the head of the community I think I'll defer to him. I'll find out from him if he wants to do that but that's I think he will. That's the mayor, but what she would like. But can I, I did have a question. I barely remember doing green fields way, like 10 years ago but if I remember the DP has like a truck full docket right and is it so it's like a full day and then we waited you guys are very lucky we had to go in there and wait for a very long time that part I remember. And so I think that's the other reason just keeping it short seems like a smart strategy right to just. Yes, that that's a very good point Carol I neglected to mention often the DP schedules a few communities on the same day and so they're they have an expectation about how long these are going to take so they can get the next one teed up so. I think that's a good point. To say I did note on the DPU notification that we need to give them a response as to who's speaking by I think it was the 19th. So we need to let them know if we plan on speaking. You know in that sort of DPU notice. It says how to contact them and let them know. So we could submit written comments as well I think it sounds like we don't really need to do that either we just need a few people to speak, but we do let them need to let them know we're planning to. Yes, that very good point Stephanie thank you for raising that and you can either let them know directly under the as using the procedure outlined in the notice there, or if it's easier for you even want me to do it you could just tell me either way is fun. Okay. Okay, that'd be great I mean in some ways I think it would be better if we just let you know when you just submit all the names at once. I think that would be easiest. And you just need to know that let's just say I mean they need to know by the 19th but let's say we need to let you know by the 18th. I don't think it should take us that long to figure this out but. Just say the 18th is the last day to let you know. Who's going to speak. Okay, so. Let's see what else. I don't think I have any other questions about this particular DPU hearing. Anybody else have anything before we move on. Carol. Forgive me if I miss this somewhere else but is that this is the final step to getting approved is that correct or no. It's a step along the way so the DPU has to have this public hearing before they issue the order. But there will be other steps not in person but they'll ask for sure they'll ask questions where they have asked some questions which will need to respond to. And then actually after that probably what will happen is they'll issue an order so it's near the last step. Okay. Did you say near the last step. Well, yes, but no guarantee how long it is between the steps. Right. Okay. I just, that kind of surprised me there. So, okay. Usually the sequence is you file the plan, you have the public hearing, the DPU asks some questions which are called information requests and we have some of those already and we can talk about those. And then they issue an order, but the period of time between those steps can be measured in years rather than minutes. So could has been in the past a long wait. I don't think it will be for you, but it has been. Okay, great. And Adele, you had a question about the contract and I think this might actually even relate to some of the. Requests that we just got from DPU. So maybe you want to ask your question first, and then we can have the discussion. I sent you all the information that Paul forwarded to me just before this meeting. I can share my screen or you all can follow along, but maybe you want to ask your question first. Thank you. I'm sorry. Ginger may I just say one last thing about the hearing which I neglected to mention. Absolutely. There's one thing that will happen, which is a tiny thing, but it sometimes it creates awkwardness because people don't know how to respond. It's the DPU's practice with at a public hearing to invite elected or appointed officials to speak first. This is from days when they had public hearings and there were lots and lots of people there so they let the, you know, elected and appointed people go first. At other meetings like this, we've, we've done recently two things happen. One, there's only a handful of people. So it doesn't really matter who goes first. But second, sometimes people are uncertain whether they're elected or appointed official or not like, you know, representative of the town energy committee. So sometimes they don't know. So sometimes they say they're appointed, but they're not really, there's not really a lot at stake for this in the answer to this question. I can't answer it wrong really, but it's someone's going to ask. So they're going to ask at the beginning if you're elected or appointed and you want to go first, you can go first. Okay. Good to know. Thank you. Okay, Adele. My question is, to what extent can we specify in the contract and or even in the RFP what kind of energy we we want. And in particular, what kind of energy do we want at times of peak demand. So can we specify, for example, that we don't want energy from dirty peaker plants at peak demand time, etc. So you can specify a lot with regard to the Rex. So, and that's the way, you know, it, it sort of counted what energy you're getting is really what Rex you're getting, in terms of the physical energy. That's really just gets dumped into a pool so it's, you can't really say who who's getting what. You can specify the Rex, but not the physical energy.  Okay, for example, we want X percent voluntary Rex, we want them to come from only from wind or solar, or we don't want them to come from biomass and all kinds of things you can specify there but it's over it's a wreck it's over the year it's not in a particular hour. What extent can we specify what we want in terms of supply that is aside from Rex. So, the way it works now or generally like in all programs into the current state of things is not really an easy way or maybe even not a way to specify the supply so you'll, you'll the way the programs work now now. We may evolve this program over time to take a more sophisticated approach so I'll just describe how it works now that doesn't mean it couldn't be better in the future but how it works now. The town, the town will sign a contract with an electricity supplier, it will obligate them to provide all the electricity you want whenever you want to use it. From there it's up to them to contract for the physical energy, and in many cases, they're, in fact, almost all cases, they're not buying electricity from a particular unit generating unit, they're just buying megawatt hours and there are middle people in between the generators and the retail companies that you would contract with so the sellers these middleman sellers they just sell blocks of megawatt hours at a certain time and it's just up to them to get them however they want and they're not promising it comes from a particular unit or not. And even the contracts with the sellers by and large the generators, a generator may contract to supply a certain number of megawatt hours to the market, but they're actually not obligated to provide them from their specific plant, if they, they can but they can't get them some other way they are they're free to do that so there isn't, there isn't much in the way of contracts specific specifying the source in a contract. And that's the way it typically works. That is the way it works now. There are some things coming along there are some efforts to create this kind of specificity and to create opportunities for towns to have it, or for buyers to have it but it's a, it's a new idea at the moment new, new in the new in the new in the market. I think we're good there there we did speak recently to a firm that was trying to put this together where they would, they would buy electricity from a particular generator and they were saying well we're going to put together the system where you could be, you getting a guarantee that that that electricity was going to come to you, but you would be getting a guarantee that that electricity was going to be put into your market, the market on your behalf so not just the Rex but also the electric supply. That's a very, that's a very new idea. As we talked about it nobody had done it yet. I do want out who was initially interested in it but once they learned no one had done it yet and there was a premium cost for it. They, they stopped being they were no longer interested in it. So it's something that might develop but it's a pretty, pretty new and undeveloped thing right now. Thank you. Okay, are there any more questions pertaining to Adele's Carol. Not pertaining to Adele's I don't think. Okay, that's okay. Go ahead. Okay. In Paul's email from just earlier before the meeting, there was a mention, first of all, the letter with the request seems pretty straightforward so yay on that. And thanks for the introduction on all that but you mentioned something about the operational adder so I'm assuming that separate because I didn't see that in the letter. And I was wondering if you wouldn't mind addressing that please. Yeah, so that would be covered there's one of the, I think there are just three questions, which is a good thing because traditionally we've been getting how many Marlena like 30 questions in the recent past so 40, I think for some of them. So just three and two weeks to answer them. And the third one with the most general one says, amend your plan to bring it in line with the orders we've issued recently for other aggregation plans. And this came up very recently with regard to an order that was just issued. This was the other day for the town of Wayland, where they had listed potential uses for the operational adder that were pretty similar to what we've listed in your plan. And the DPU told them they had to scale that back a bit and limit the approved uses to municipal staff who would work on the program. So that's what we would need to do now in order to get the plan approved now. I'll also say though this is, this is an evolving area. Separately the DPU is kind of going down two tracks now one is, they're trying to approve plans. Much faster than they have been based on their current precedent that they've long established and that's what we're getting caught up with here on the adder in our plan. We put in uses that the DPU had been rejecting for a while, but we put it in hoping for a better answer. So far we didn't get that answer. That's one track. Separately, the DPU has been developing what they call new guidelines for aggregation programs which would replace a lot of their old precedent with a simpler set of rules. As part of that guidelines. Effort. Many are pushing the DPU to allow a lot more flexibility with regard to the use of the adder and there's a lot of support for that idea from a lot of sources. There's also some pushback on it from the attorney general, but there's a lot of support from it. So it's, it's a possible result that your plan will limit the uses of the adder, but within the reasonable number of months, there'll be guidelines that allow more uses. And it's the, the DPU has said it's their intent that if the guidelines are more liberal more allow more things than your somebody town specific approved plan has allows, you're allowed to follow the guidelines that you can do what's ever in the guidelines, even if your plan is more restrictive. So I think for us to get the plan approved. We will need to follow this directive, which is reduce what the plan says about adders, but we'll continue to work on these guidelines and hope we get a better answer there, which would then you would be able to benefit from. Thank you. Okay, I'm, you probably said quite a bit already. So I don't, I don't know if there are any other questions about the comments that we just received from DPU. Any other questions regarding those. I think I'm sorry. Go ahead Darcy. You're muted Darcy. I didn't really have time to digest the questions. It takes me a long time to think these things through. But I would like Paul to, to just explain a little further what he just said. That is, if we go the root of changing. Downsizing our request. In order to get a faster result. How will that work that we can still get under the more liberal and flexible guidelines. I understand that. Yes. Well, you're not the only one who's uncertain about how exactly that's going to work, but I can tell you what the, like where we are and what the DPU has said so where we are is that the DPU has an existing body of precedent about what aggregation plans can and can't do. And in particular in recent years, it's been that's become more and more restrictive. The DPU right now is trying to do two things simultaneously. One is clear out their backlog and approve plans faster and secondly develop these new guidelines. So, in order to approve plans faster they're having to use their existing rules and you would fall under that. They're also working on these guidelines and they've, they've quite explicitly said, if when the guidelines go into effect, you can follow the guidelines. So exactly what else you need to do, like whether you need to. Well, they said you don't have to file an amended plan either so exactly how it's going to work. I'm not sure but they've said, you can follow these guidelines so if your plan says you can only do a and B. But the guidelines say you could do ABC or D. You'll be allowed to do ABC or D. Oh. So that's good. If we get approved to do it a certain way, then we probably shouldn't get started doing it until we. Well, I just am wondering a little bit about the timing of how it'll actually play out. You know. Yes, it's a good question I don't because the. It may be the timing will line up that the guidelines will be in place before you would get started in the ordinary course anyway so that's an entirely possible result. Even if it isn't we could, we could, I think we'd be able to find a way to anticipate and find a, you know, preserve a path for the communities I mean it's, especially with regard to the adder. So the question is about what sorts of things you can spend the money on. Well, you can't spend the money until you have the money, and the money comes in slowly over time so it will be a while before you start spending anyway with with the program because you get a little bit of much not a little We get a little money every month and then it builds up and then you can start spending it so that's a that's a little bit that's a little bit down the. So the question to about to sort of follow up on what Darcy was asking. So if the guidelines are different from what we were currently allowed to do and they sort of expand upon that does that mean we have to amend the plan to reflect that, or it doesn't matter you just basically work with a new guidelines. Yeah, so it's not clear what you're going to have to do there the DPU has said, they're not going to require you to file an amended plan for approval with them. It might be have to amend your plan but you just, you know, you just amend your plan and send it to them for information or put it on the website or something. They really haven't worked out through the specifics of that. So stepping back, the reason for it is, there's something like 150 approved plans out there, all with slightly different rule, you know, plan requirements about what's allowed and what's not. The DPU cannot accommodate 150 amendment requests, it would overwhelm them, they don't want to see it. So they need a solution that works for all 150. If it were just you, then they could say okay you have to amend your plan, but since it's 150 they they can't say that that would be paralyzing so they need to come up with some other approach they just haven't quite articulated it. Personally, I don't think the approach, although, well, the approach might be. You don't have to worry about your plan anymore just follow the guidelines and that's good enough that's one possible approach and other possible approaches. If you don't change what you do, amend your, you know, revise your plan, but then just, you know, put it on your website or something you don't have to, you don't have to ask us for permission. Okay, anybody else. Okay, this is so helpful Paul and Marlene I think you both for everything that you've done to get us to this point it's really exciting, because it feels like it's moving maybe even faster than we anticipated. So we think it may be less than a year for approval. So the the DP was, yeah, I know I said it out loud but thank you.  But you know there's a new commissioners there and it took them a while to start paying attention to aggregation which was frustrating but they're paying attention to it now. I think the department approved like 10 plans between Christmas and New Year's they're just flying through them now and having you getting your information request so much more quickly than other towns did is an indication of how much is an indication of how much faster they're moving and I think it's a, it's a real priority for them and I think they've got a system in place now to move them through I think they've told me there's something like quadruple the number of staff working on aggregation cases they're they're putting a lot of resources in it to try to get out from this big backlog they have. So I'm, you know, I'm optimistic that we could get an approval, you know, within some, you know, within some number of months under certainly under six I think from here. One thing you will see I should say this so the next step for us is we have these information requests which mostly require plan they say just a manager plan to say x manager plan to say why and then a manager plan to be consistent with our recent orders. What you'll get back from us to look at is a is a red line version of the plan. There's going to be a lot of redlining on it because the most recent orders are really really detailed and persnickety about what you say where and move this from that this section to that section and you know, all sorts of minor things. But substantively there won't be much of a change the biggest other than the adder the biggest change is just to be more explicit about some things like if you want to say, we don't know what percentage percentage of voluntary Rex will be in our product. That's fine. You just have to now say, Well, this is how we're going to decide, and this is who's going to decide and this is our decision criteria, and the decision criteria can be something very general like, you know, based on consideration of cost and environmental benefit, and that that will be sufficient for them the sort of criteria you would use anyway, we just need to be more more explicit about things that were implied before but not not explicit. So it looks like this memo, January 6 is when responses are due. Will you, Paul be drafting responses for us to look at. I, I will be drafting responses for you to look at I think. Let me see what they have in for a deadline or January 26 though. Yes, I will be drafting responses. I will be drafting responses for you to look at or Marlene and I will be drafting responses for you. We obviously you have to get those back to DPU by the 26 so will you be able to get those to us before then. Yes, or we'll certainly going to do. We'll certainly make it work so that we get it to you and you have sufficient time to review before we file it. It's it's it's not it's sort of it's often customary to ask for additional time which is routinely granted. I don't like to do it because we like to keep momentum where we can. I will say though that we've, we have similar kinds of tasks for five other plans to do at the same time so it's it might strain our are just our internal resources a little bit, we're going to try for that January 26 schedule. It's not impossible we just won't physically be able to make it but we'll, we'll make sure that dead you will talk to you as we go and we'll make sure that the deadline is such that you have as much time as you want as you need to review and we file something that that you're all comfortable. Okay. That was pretty much my question as well so thanks Adele. Any other questions. Okay, so it sounds like at least in terms of the next thing for this group is that we need to determine who is going to speak from each community we need to get that to Paul by the 18th at the latest with the idea that we keep a brief and no more than two people from each and fewer if we can pull that off. So, however you all want to do that just, you know, I think maybe just send it to the whole you know send it to Paul and Marlena but copy me or the whole Valley Green Energy Working Group, just so we know who's speaking from each community. So, I think that's at least our next to do. In terms of the public. Does it matter how many people are in the audience. No, everyone's welcome. Everyone's welcome. And there's no, there's no, no reason for people not to be in the audience. And is it recorded. I, there's a stenographer. So we'll get a transcript. I don't know if there's an audio recording. Do you remember Marlena. I don't recall them saying this is being recorded. I yeah the court reporter is the thing that sticks out in my mind. And we'll get the transcript after and we can we can circulate that.  Sure. Absolutely. These are great questions. Thanks everybody. Okay, if we don't have anything else then I just want to give Paul and Marlena the opportunity to hear from us so that we can just continue our business with things like minutes. So, so Paul, I guess, obviously I'll hear from you if there's anything else we need to cover or I need to share with the group before the 22nd, but otherwise we'll just be hearing from us as to who's speaking. And looking forward to, you know, to getting that piece done. Excellent. Well, thank you. Thank you all for your time and questions today. Great. Thanks so much. Thanks Marlena. Thanks so much. Take care. Thank you. Okay. All right. Well that's exciting news. I did. Yeah, I did not anticipate that we would be moving along this quickly so that's really nice to know. I mean it's good I think that we're telling people longer because if it happens sooner than that's all the better. So I'm just going to, I'm sorry I'm opening up my files here so I can display the minutes. Let me see. I don't think, we don't have any attendees so we don't have anybody here for public comment. Just give me one moment. Okay give me more than a moment. Talk about your holidays. How much snow did you get up there? Oh, you're I keep forgetting where you are. I mean, it's not, it's never been snowing here. Yeah, we got like eight inches in Northampton, I think, or maybe a little they said 10 on the news. Beautiful snow. Yeah, it's lovely. The roads are clear and the sun's out today, which I love when it's sunny the next day. I kept my holiday decorations up so that there would be twinkly lights while the snow was in the background, but at least one weekend, because I felt so cheated. So, it was really lovely. All right, so minutes. I will share my screen. I don't know if folks have had folks had a chance to look at the minutes yet. Yes, I didn't. All good. That's okay. That's why I will share. Give me one second. Have you been seeing this space X launches Adele from where you are. Oh, you're muted. I don't know if you answered. There was, there was one yesterday that we were out walking and somebody said, oh, did you see the launch and we missed it. Oh, my sister was she's down in Delray and they were out trying to watch and, oh, it was overcast, I think. Right. Anyway. Yeah, it was, but wild. All right, the minutes are up chit chats over. So, so I'll just scroll through and give you a chance to sort of quickly. Read them and then we'll, I'll stop sharing and then we can do a vote. If I'm going too fast or slow, let me know Carol. It seems like there's been a lot of action since these minutes. Yes. Okay, good. You can, you can keep. It's more. I mean, and really it's more what Paul and Marlena are doing.  It's more what they've had to do. That's part of the reason they're my favorites. Yes, they're really, they've been so great. Really great to work with. They are awesome. And Paul's so knowledgeable. It's really, I know really wonderful to have him. I'm so glad things worked out the way they did. All right, you can. Is there much more? These were kind of a lot. There is a lot. You know what? Can I, I'll just abstain if you have a. Yeah, that's fine. You can abstain. Okay. And unless anybody else wants me to continue. If I don't hear someone affirm, but if you say affirmatively request that I continue, then I will stop sharing. Okay. And thank you. You're welcome. Okay. So the votes are just from the three community staff folks. So. Tom, you want to go ahead and make the motion to approve. Or I will make the motion to approve. Okay. I guess I'll second. Okay. And then the vote Tom. Approve. And I also say yes. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to approving the minutes and Carol. Is it okay to abstain? Yes, you can. Okay. Still, still pass. Thank you. What's, what's the date again, Stephanie? So these were the, this was the September 22nd. No, these are the September 22nd minutes. The August 11th still haven't been done yet. So I apologize. I'll have to get to those. You weren't around Darcy. For that meeting. I don't think or. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. It's on point. I'll get to those. Okay. So let's see. Did we have anything else on our agenda? I think that was. Pretty much. Just opening the agenda because I didn't have it open. Yeah. I think that was pretty much it. So. I think there was so much got this. I'm glad we recorded the session because there was so much. So I think that was really helpful. So. I mean, we have a few minutes. Sorry. Go ahead. Yeah. Could we schedule a meeting of. The. JPE working group, whatever that's called. And have a presentation from. Local energy advocates. We had a retreat. Yesterday with about 35 people. Attending for three hours. And it was really amazing that they stayed with it. It was. I guess to our credit that we planned it well. We had five speakers and. You would know all of them. I'm sure. Yeah. I heard it was great. I heard it was a great list of, I saw the list of speakers. They looked really great. So. Yeah, absolutely. Before we do that though. I just want to, one thing I was going to actually ask while we have everybody here. Is if there was any aspect of the. Sort of testimony for the public hearing that anybody. Wanted to specifically cover or. I mean, I know Paul sort of. Sounds like just keep it simple, but. Is there anything anyone. We wanted to break this up a little bit or does it matter if we all just sort of say what we want to say. Within two to three minutes. Any preference. No. You're just going to let Bob say whatever in two to three minutes. Yeah. Hopefully we'll give them the talking points, but yes. Yeah. I mean, there weren't those were not a lot of talking points. I mean, I feel like we could say what we need to say in. A minute even. I don't. There's not a lot to say. So. I have one suggestion. I meant to bring it up. Well. Given that the most. One of the unique aspects is that it's three communities. Somehow reflecting on. The degree of cooperation over the years. Among the three communities. Might be helpful. I think if I spoke, that was something I was certainly going to touch on if the town manager decides that. He's going to, or the council president is going to. In addition to me, I would definitely have brought that up. Just having been. You know, involved from the. Right out the gate. I feel like we've had quite a process. And it's been very thorough. So. I. I intended to sort of bring that up. Myself. So. It'll definitely get touched on, at least from me. I assume I don't think he would. As far as Amherst goes. I'm. I don't think he would. As far as Amherst goes. I'm sure that I would definitely be one of the. Folks to present. Or speak. Provide testimony for Amherst. So it's either going to be me and someone or just me. As my guess. So I will definitely bring that up. Anybody else have any. Strong feelings about anything. All right. And if anyone has any questions for me prior. You know, feel free to email. Call. Reach out. And we can touch base. So I'm just assuming that, you know, Andrew Darcy at LUL will be in attendance. Obviously. Yes. Probably. Others. I may not make it. Okay. Well, as they said, it will be recorded. So, you know, we'll definitely be posting it. On the website. So. So. I'm just assuming that, you know, Andrew Darcy at LUL will be in attendance. And we'll be posting it on the website. So. We'll make sure that everybody gets the. A copy of the proceedings. Carol. You have a question. I do. And I'm almost embarrassed to ask, but. I think I'll be following up with you afterward. But, um. On the 22nd. That's the hearing with TPU. Even though the letter from today says. The information is not due to the 26th. So this is our hearing. Period. Okay. Correct. Just wanted to confirm. That's an even better sign, I guess. The, their questions are such soft balls. I think. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, my only very good. Yeah. My only concern, although it's not even. Really a concern. Is just the getting our. Uh, Our plan to reflect. You know, what currently is allowed and on the basis of some of the most recent decisions or orders. Um, But I don't, I mean, to me, I just think it makes sense if, um. If that's just the only way we're going to get it approved quickly. And now then that's what we do. And assuming that the guidelines will be more expansive. Cause it just certainly seems like there's a lot of pressure for that. And it's not just us asking. So. Right. I think. Yeah. I am kind of a. Chill attitude, I guess. Because I've been through this before we were. Two years getting beat up. Because we were the first ones to really try to push. The aggregation to include. To make it a, you know, We got thrown out on the adder. So the fact that it's in there. It seems very promising. So I'll just say from my, you know, experience with. With this whole procedure. I have a good feeling that, that it's going to work out. And honestly, the toughest part has been, and it seems like it still is just determining what to do with that adder that. And so I'd say. Again. And the fact that it can be expanded afterwards. That's what I'm thinking. It sounds very reasonable is what's going to happen. So it all seems. So maybe that's my job. I'll be the one who sprinkles a little. Very dust around. I did say it was going to be six months, which was kind of a slip at our last. And I was like, Oh God, because you were like, it could be three years. I'm like, no, but we'll see. I'm going for six months. I'll take a bet. If anybody's up for it. I was, well, I was actually saying it had been, it had been three years. Yeah. We were anticipating about a year. I've, I've been pretty much saying a year that, you know, I don't, because I didn't think others three year experiences. We're going to be art. I didn't think ours was going to be that long. Um, especially given how much community support we had at the, at the comment session. I mean, it was long and thorough. So, um, and it's recorded. So I, you have it. If you haven't watched it or seen it, um, because it was a good session. It's a really good session. Great questions. And Paul even commented that we had really sophisticated, uh, attendees, public comments. So, um, you know, I think probably in part due to our advocates that are here. So anyway, great. Well, this is all really exciting. Um, so in that note, then we'll, we can schedule a JPE meeting. Um, it's, so that's not going to be this link. Um, in fact, this was a whole different link. Um, I just opted. I was having some issues with zoom. So I just decided to make a whole new link for today's meeting. And we can actually use this link going forward so that I can add meeting dates. Um, so for the valley green energy working group, this will be the link that we'll continue to use just as a heads up. I will, you'll probably get a notification for me after this meeting because I'll just add more dates. Um, so as far as the JPE, um, I guess we can look at our schedules. I'm going to be Carol and I actually will both be away at the end of next week at the MMA conference. So, um, I think we won't likely be able to do something before the DPU hearing. So maybe right after the DPU hearing to folks the week of the 29th, the folks have time either Monday, well, any day that week. So you're, you're saying you don't think that we'll be able to get it in on time? Get what in on time? So the, if the, if it's due on the 26th. Oh, I, well, I think, oh, so you, I didn't, I mean, I think we'll get comments, but I don't think we'll be able to have a meeting before then. I mean, if Paul and Marlena are able to give us feedback, I think what we would have to do is either just send me your feedback directly because we can't have an exchange. I seriously doubt there's going to be anything we're going to need to have a big conversation around, honestly. We're talking about the belly green energy working group. Yeah, we're talking about the JPE having a JPE meeting is what I'm talking about. But as far as those comments go, but you did bring that up Darcy and that is a good point, like that's a VGE meeting. So, and sorry, Carol, I know this might be confusing, but we were dividing these meetings up to focus on the valley green energy working group, which currently, actually, I think they both need to be posted now because we have an MOU. So, I think we, we were dividing our meetings up between the valley green energy, which is what we just had with Paul, we were having a separate joint powers entity meeting to sort of talk about moving that process forward. So they're kind of related, but they've been separate. So, or they started to be separate. I thought that until the JPE was formed, it wasn't a public entity, but can't hurt to post it. Well, we have an MOU and that's why I'm reluctant to just my understanding that was once we had the MOU signed that it was going to require us to post and I know that's true for. I mean, we knew that for certainly for the valley green energy, but we don't, I mean, I just think it would, it's always probably better to be safer than sorry. So Carol, the joint powers entity was given a name years ago of valley green alliance. So, we would have VGE working group and VGA working group. Yes, so just to confuse you. It doesn't take much. Well, all these letters, but exactly. I understand very little. And so I'm looking forward to learning more, but yeah. So, all right, so the, why don't we say the week of the 29th, let's focus just on valley green alliance right now, so that we can have the presentation from LEA. Local energy advocates, which is the advocacy group that Adele, Darcy and Andra formed and are. I guess the primary. The point for the board of that group. Okay. So. The week of the 29th. I just need folks to tell me what is possible for you right now. It's open for me. Open for me also. And I know Darcy, sometimes you've had conflicts on certain days. So. Yeah, on Mondays and Wednesdays. Basically. And there's no time on either of those days that would work for you. Of which days of Mondays and Wednesdays are just completely out. Well, I've moved today for this meeting. You know, I'd rather. Yeah, I could probably. Move it, but it would be better to do it on a Tuesday if we could is Tuesday. How does Tuesday work for you Adele and Andra? Later afternoon is better for me. Tuesday, the 30th. I usually babysit in the morning Tuesday. Thursday mornings are generally open. For me to accept that I'll be on the train that week. Although, I don't know, maybe I can be at the meeting on the train. I don't know. Tuesday for you, Tom. Tuesday is better than Monday for sure. Okay. So Tuesday, what time works for you, Tom? We're talking an hour. Yes. And probably in the afternoon. So. Two o'clock. Yeah. See, I have something too. So it would have to be like 330 for me. I don't know that I could do 330. I could do three. Tom would one o'clock or Andra, could you do one? One is probably better than three. I might not be able to stay the whole time. I can do one. Okay. Carol. Yep. Yes. Okay. So this is a Valley green alliance meeting. For Tuesday, January 30th at 1pm. Okay. Great. And I will send us a link for that meeting. And I do need to jump now. So. Me too. Great. Yes. Well, we are at 3 o'clock. So thank you all so much. Great meeting. Yeah, look forward to hearing from you all about Tom and Carol. Who's going to speak. I know you have Bob, but. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Or we can just have one spectacular speaker. Who just covers it up. I'm not kidding, but I am kind of, but, um, can I ask a favor on this VGA meeting? Yes. Would someone be willing to do like a quick intro and or. Purpose. I do have experience with municipal aggregation and. Uh, I just want to understand what the. Intention is better. And I can talk to you off, I could talk to you offline about that. And then if you wanted in the meeting, we could do more, but I can give you, I can bring you up to speed. Okay, great. If that would just be, if everyone's okay with that. So that we don't take meeting time with that. That's okay. Yeah. Thank you. So Carol, um, if I have a meeting right now, but. Yep. Yep. Not a problem. Thank you. You can share the plan with Carol. If you want to really overwhelm her. We hit, well, she's got everything I've seen that already. I just haven't read it thoroughly. Yeah. She's got everything. I'll just give her the cliff note version. So. Which is still lengthy. All right, everyone. Thanks so much. And I will, uh, see you soon. Bye.