I'm going to go ahead and at 327 I'll start to do the connection to YouTube, although I know we're still waiting for Jeff and Nathan and then Nina to return. Mm hmm. One thing that was great this weekend is the rain. Yes. Today is very beautiful out there. Hi everyone. Hi someone isanda Stephens. So, Eileen, could you start my video? Hello. How are you? Good. Hi Nina. Hi everybody. How do you know if members of the public are attending? I think as a panelist you can too if you open up your participant tab. And Eileen is managing those and letting folks who are presenting or members of the committee into the meeting as a panelist the rest of the public will stay as attendees to the meeting. And we'll have the ability to make public comments at each time on the agenda when that item is called. Now we have two members of the public in attendance. In addition to our panelists. And our committee members. There we go. Time is it. We got one more minute here. Looks like we're just missing Jeff, but when it's 330. Now you can go ahead and start the meeting if Eileen is ready. We already. Okay. And now we have a panelist meeting to order. Due to the provisions of the governor's executive order in 2520 and in 2920, which suspend certain requirements of the Brown act in order of the health officer of. Of the county of Sonoma to shelter in place to minimize the spread of COVID-19. The art and public places committee will be conducting today's meeting. In a virtual setting using zoom webinar. The committee members and staff are participating from the remote locations and practicing appropriate social distancing members of the public may view and listen. To the meeting as noted on the city's website and as noted on the agenda. Members of the public wishing to speak during item three public comment or during our public hearing items will be able to do so by utilizing the raised hand feature or pressing star nine on their phone. Then they will be giving the ability to address the committee. And then they will be able to speak during the meeting. And then they will be able to speak during the meeting. The reporting secretary will take roll call. Eileen. I mean, I think you're on mute. Sorry about that. No worries. Your code. For the record, all members are present with the exception of Jeff. Great. Thank you. Okay. For public. For public comments. If you wish to make a comment via zoom. Again, please select raise your hand. This is for the public. If you wish to make a comment via zoom, please select raise your hand. Each speaker has three minutes. A countdown timer will appear for the convenience of the speaker and the viewers. Please make sure to mute yourself when you're invited to do so. Your microphone will be muted at the end of the countdown. Do we have any public comments from the public who wished to make a comment on the art and public places items that are not on the agenda. Comments will be heard on specific agenda items at the time the meeting is adjourned. There are no hands raised at this time. Okay. Okay. Great. We'll move on to the next item approval of minutes. Copies of the November 2nd, 2020 meeting minutes have been distributed for your review. Are there any additional. Additions or corrections to the minutes. If not, do I have a motion to approve the minutes as written? I'll make the motion to approve the minutes as written. I second. Okay. All in favor. Hi. Minute meeting minutes approved as written. Moving on to 4.2 copies of November 9th, 2020 special meeting minutes have been distributed for your review. Are there any additions or corrections to the minutes? If not, do I have a motion to approve the minutes as written? I move that we. Accept the minutes as written. Do I have a second? I second. Okay. All in favor. Hi. Minute meetings approved as written. Moving on. To the next item on the agenda. Number five, 5.1. Imagine art in old courthouse square. Staff will present the recommended artists identified through a comprehensive selection process. The presentation will include background and information on project development, goals, timeline. Budget selection process. Selection criteria and community engagement. Community members, please hold any and all questions. Until the end of the presentation. Tara. Great. Thank you, Lisa. I'm actually going to have David Ward, our public art project manager, who's been the public, the project manager for this project. I'm sorry, there's too many words with P's in them. So David has been working on this project. Since he joined our team last December. So he's going to lead and start off the presentation. And I will chime in on certain background areas and answer any questions at the end of the presentation. So David, thank you and take it away. I'll run the. Thank you, Tara. I'll start us in a second. Great. Hello, art and public places committee. My name is David Ward. I'm the public art project manager for imagine art in old courthouse square. And today as a member of staff with the city of Santa Rosa public art team, we'll be presenting an overview of imagine art in old courthouse square and make a recommendation of the selected artist that the project selection panel is determined from the selection process. Next slide. Old courthouse square gets its name from the first courthouse on site dedicated by general Vallejo in 1884. The 1906 earthquake destroyed the building in much of Santa Rosa. Another courthouse was built on site in 1908. And served as accounting courthouse for another 58 years before being demolished in 1966. From 1967, the square was bisected by a major thoroughfare connecting Santa Rosa Avenue and Mendocino Avenue. Old courthouse square was reunified in 2017. The granite slabs that served as the steps of the 1908 courthouse were saved and incorporated to form the frame around the lawn, which is representative of the footprint of the original courthouse on the square. Reclaiming the public square in the center of downtown Santa Rosa was a statement by the community of its value on the importance of a communal public gathering space. It also offers a chance to make a statement about how art plays a specific role in reflecting the community's identity and in inspiring its aspirations for the future. Santa Rosa is the largest city in Sonoma County with an estimated population of 177,586. The city operates as a county seat and serves a wider population of 500,000. Next slide. Project development. Beginning in August of 2019, the city of Santa Rosa public art team formed an advisory committee to determine the project's criteria, goals, site considerations, selection criteria, and community engagement components. The project's first public survey was initiated to gather project goals, Santa Rosa values and use patterns of the square. These results created the project's request for qualifications and project plan, including the project's budget, which was approved by the APPC in November of 2019. Tara, is there anything else you wanted to add about them? No, the advisory committee was formed before you joined our team, David. And so I think we had talked about a little bit of background on the outreach we did with that group. It was essentially formed of various stakeholders, including arts and culture, institutions, professionals with arts backgrounds, businesses in the downtown and property owners in the downtown. As well as architect professionals. So there was a wide range of folks involved with that, really to exactly what you said, look at project goals, site considerations, and help us form the selection criteria for the project, as well as some of the public outreach components. So they were really a central part of the project development process and really tied it together. And brought a lot of value to that part of the development. So I just wanted to share a little bit more background on that. But please continue. Next slide. Data from survey one. That was the first public survey that was launched in fall of 2019. And it asked a variety of questions about the use of courthouse square and other elements that define the public view of courthouse square. Questions. There were eight questions and they involved. How often do you frequent. The square and the most popular answer to that question was a few times a week or once per week. Question two was. Which of the following have you ever heard of? Question two was. Which of the following have you participated at courthouse square and the most answered response was a special event such as Wednesday night market or to eat or meet up with friends. Question three asked participants to share what Santa Rosa means to you. Popular answers contain subjects and phrases like community, home, work, hometown. Also rural meets urban and center of wine country and rural meets urban and center of wine country. Question four was. Which of the following have you ever heard of? It was also described as with words as such as a potential and aspiring. Question four was what community values could be represented by this project. Top answers were number one was diversity. Second was excellence and originality. And third was playfulness. Question five. Question six. I can't say. Top answers were one to create a sense of place for courthouse square. Two was create a gathering space and three was create a visual landmark or gateway and all of those scored over 50% from our participants. Question six asked what the greatest benefits for a community for a community to gain from a centrally located public community. And the answer was access to cultural offerings and to help support the local economy. Question seven was, was to provide any additional comments about the planning project or planning for the project, I should say popular, popular results included responses on subject line of public utility and for interactive nature. Service and safety. And then the last question was, if participants lived within Santa Rosa city limits, which 85% of the survey participants did. Next slide, please. Project budget. The project's approved budget is set at $300,000. And that's the approved budget and $280,000 of the budget is selected for the selected artist, which is an all-inclusive of design. Construction along with any city costs such as artists, honorariums, marketing and outreach. Community engagement and site prep contingency. The project source of funding is the public art fund, a combination of the required 1% of construction. Budget for the square and in lieu fees from private development required to meet the city's public art in private development ordinance. Which these sources of funding can only be used for the purposes of public art. Next slide. The project timeline notes the different stages of the project's process. We have changed the timeline a few times. The RFQ was extended from its original deadline to support our submittable online submission system, which is a new submission system that helped us expand and open up an online submission form. Other things that affected our timeline or COVID-19 project hold, which held the project until July 1st when we officially resumed the project. Other extensions that we had to make for the project, other extensions that we had to make for this were to switch our public engagement timeline to accommodate for online surveys. We also extended for extended timeline for the RFP to be displayed online. And then also there were delays from the glass fire in fall of 2020. Next slide, please. The project goals of Imagine Art and Old Courthouse Square are to provide the entire Santa Rosa community with a prominent art piece or artistic symbol that reflects the uniquely Santa Rosa values of innovation and cultural inclusivity. This art installation should inspire people living in and visiting our city to reflect on what is special about our community and encourage them to gather downtown to experience it firsthand. The public art team selected for this project will create a dynamic public art installation that contributes to a vital thriving space to connect with each other and with the space. The public art should be forward thinking and express the innovation, diversity, and engagement of the community. The public art should help create a sense of place for Old Courthouse Square. Next slide. The program has received 148 submissions from across the U.S. This is by far the most responses the program has ever received for an RFQ and includes some of the nation's most international and most famous public artists. Approximately 60 of the 140 artists are from California and of those 14 from Sonoma County and 20 from New York. The remaining come from various parts of the country including Texas and Oregon. Next slide. For community engagement, as mentioned earlier, there have been several opportunities to allow the public to engage with the project's process and stay up to date with the project's status including to the city's website. The two public surveys helped determine the project's goals and development of criteria. The second public survey provided an opportunity for the public to view the finalist's proposals and voice their support for their favorite project and the best and most appropriate proposal that fits the project's goals. Tara, did you want to expand on any of those other public engagement? I think that the surveys, both surveys were a very important part of this process and were even more so important given the kind of conditions with COVID and not being able to do the in-person engagement activities we had planned. We used other city tools to make sure that the word was out there to take the surveys to learn about the artists who had final designs under consideration. So the city's connections newsletter, the city and out there, San Rosa social media handles. There were two press Democrat articles and of course our public places meetings are public meetings that the public can participate in. I think that's it. But the public comments we gathered through both surveys were tied in very closely with the development of the project and the final selection of the final artists. Thanks, Tara. If you want to move to the next slide. Selection process. So one of the first parts of the selection process was forming our selection panel. Selection panel members, we chose eight members to represent the Santa Rosa public. Leslie Graves, event producer and organizer in Santa Rosa and she's also a downtown resident. Jeff Nathanson, executive director of the museum of Sonoma County and also art and public places committee member. I'm going to talk about Santa Rosa based architect and professor at Santa Rosa junior college. Rob Sen. Santa Rosa based entertainment and creative industries business consultant. Charles Evans, a downtown property owner. Lisa went this city of Santa Rosa public art and place public places committee chair. Andrea ballast, a downtown business owner and CEO. Gloria Rubio, Santa Rosa based artisan and creative industries business consultant. And of these, the 10 highest scoring. RFQ submissions were identified by our selection panel for closer examination. And they were selected. That was, we were able to select the finalist for the RFP section of the project. The selection panel was formed. Representing arts professionals, downtown business and property owners, downtown residents and members of the APPC. Finalists were provided the data from the first public survey to aid in the development of the proposals. Next slide please. The selection process was developed based on the project goals and input from the advisory committee, public surveys, which created the artist qualifications portion of the project. Those sections are the artistic quality, originality and innovation as evidenced by representations of past work in photos provided, appropriateness of the artist medium and style for this project, experience developing artwork for public outdoor environments, experience, success and or interest in creating public outdoor environments. The selection process works in collaboration with an active stakeholder group including community outreach. And finally, experience with projects of similar scope and scale or comparable professional experience to handle the requirements of working in the public sector. And finally, availability to participate in the design, approval and implementation of the project and complete the project. And then, using those criteria, five finalists were identified to move on to the RFP portion of the project. First finalist was Laura Haddad and Tom Drugan based out of Seattle, Washington, their proposal titled Valley of the Moon. Next slide. Next was blessing Hancock based out of Tucson, California. Her proposal entitled Next slide. Next would be Gordon Cuthier based out of Napa, California. Project or proposal was called the dome. Next slide. Ned Khan, Sebastopol, California. Proposal named Air Arbor. Next slide. And then the final selection criteria was developed based on the project goals, advisory committee input and public survey for artwork proposals, artistic excellence, originality and innovation as evidenced by quality of proposal for this project. Appropriateness of the artist's medium or proposed medium style and project concepts demonstrated understanding and incorporation of the stated goals of the project. Proposed artwork should be suitable and permanent for outdoor placement and address durability, maintenance and public safety concerns. Proposed artwork should be an effective balance of size and scope of design and choice of materials to ensure that the finished installation is of sufficient prominence to capture the positive attention of the public. Proposal includes description of how collaboration with an active stakeholder group, including public outreach, might occur. Demonstrated sensitivity to address the potential impact of the project on public citizens and finally availability to participate in the design approval and implementation of the project and complete the installation by the deadline. Next slide, please. And that brings us to the second public survey that we launched. And that was spring of 2020. We received 752 total responses. And out of all those results, it seemed like the dome by Gordon Heuther and by blessing Hancock were the two highest participants in the project. And that was the survey from the public data across a few different categories. The questions were formulated using identified project goals. The questions included which design best reflects the Santa Rosa values of innovation and cultural inclusivity, which design most effectively brings life to courthouse square as a multi-purpose community, which design best acts as a visual landmark or gateway to Santa Rosa's downtown and artistic community, which design would encourage you to spend time, attend events and gather downtown. And then also we asked participants which design do you like the most with the follow-up question where they were able to leave a public comment about why a selection panel was important. And all this data collected was part of the final decision by the panel. The results were given to the selection panel to incorporate into their final decision. Next slide, please. The selection panel decided to have the top two artists respond to follow-up questions about elements that were required in their proposals. The two artists that were identified submitted their responses to the panel feedback using any method they felt appropriate of renderings, images or written responses that were necessary to further clarify their design components and process. The two final proposals included in these proposals, the selection panel was scored one last time by the selection panel to determine the selected artist. The selection panel met to confirm the selection as the recommended artist that is presented to you today. Next slide, please. And that brings us to the recommended artist, which is blessing Hancock. The selection panel was very thoughtful to include the public opinion gathered through the surveys and finally with the project selection criteria kept in mind. Next slide, please. More about the recommended artist, blessing Hancock. The description of her proposal, which is entitled unum, which is Latin for oneness, is a signature artwork that places emphasis on innovation, diversity and engagement as leading values of Santa Rosa. Inspired by the unified old courthouse square, the sculpture embraces themes of welcoming and inspiration while also relaying the Santa Rosa values of innovation and cultural inclusivity through its text which was collected in the early morning and evening hours. During the day this sculpture casts shadows of the words onto the square using sunlight whereas in the early mornings and evening hours it will be illuminated by LED light fixtures mounted within the sculpture creating a soft diffused glow within the structure's form. Next slide, please. This is an opportunity hopefully in collaboration with the APPC to identify the selected words that represent inherent values to Santa Rosa. The dimensions are approximately 12 feet in height and 15 feet in diameter. The materials used are water jet cut stainless steel and LED lights. Next slide. This is an opportunity to identify the particular budget, size and stakeholders as imagine art in old courthouse square. Blessing Hancock has works in Portland, Oregon, Tucson, Arizona, Florida, Colorado and Palo Alto, California. And some members of the selection panel were able to actually visit Palo Alto art of veterans hospital to view the project timeline. Next slide, please. The project timeline and next steps. The project timeline including today's meeting are on here. The timeline is subject to change and indicates our next steps and projected timeline. Next slide, please. And that brings us to the recommendation of the public art in old courthouse square's public art project. And thank you for your time. Staff is here to answer any clarifying questions. Thank you so much, David. Lisa, you are muted. I just realized that. Thank you. Thank you, David. Did you have anything else, Tara? No, I'm happy to chime in and answer questions as if the committee members would like to start there. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your questions for Tara, David. Regarding this item. If so, please. I'm, you know what? I will go ahead and. Go through all committee members that are here. And how about, and if you can pass, if you'd like, I'll start with Monica. You're on mute, Monica. I think it's a, it was a great presentation. And what good work everyone has done. Is it, is it just sitting on the ground? Or is there any kind of like. Thing. That is that it's on. I mean. It, uh, or, or how is it secured? Anyway, I just, um, Couldn't see that in the, in the pictures. But that's. Yeah, thank you for the question. Um, so her proposal does not go into elaborate detail on that. Pending the final design phase that we will work with her on once she's approved by the committee and we enter into an artist services agreement with her. At that point, we work with our, um, ADA access coordinators or risk management department, our other staff within the city to make sure that we are doing everything that's required for accessibility and safety. Um, and at that point, we would get more details on the actual, um, Um, um, Sighting or footing of the piece. Um, And those types of details can be shared back with the committee. Once they're solidified. Uh, but her design or her intention is for it to look like it is resting on the ground. But of course it would be done in a safe and secure way. Thank you. Thank you, Monica. Kristen. My, nope. Thank you, David and Tara, for a very thorough presentation on the process. I understand there were a couple of hiccups along the way to do with COVID and our ability to have these regular meetings. It can take quite a bit of coordination. So I appreciate your guys's hard work to put these meetings together and organize such a thorough overview of these art pieces and how they could impact the courthouse square. I don't have any questions at this point. Having sat on the other side of that selection panel process, I know the work that goes into it and want to appreciate staff. Thank you, Kirsten. Melanie? I do not have any questions. Thank you. Nina? Yes, I would also like to echo Kristen's comments. Great job. I do have three questions. One, I was curious. There were two finalists, Gordon Hoothor, being the other. And I looked at the notes that you had, where he got a lot of very high scores and in some cases higher than Blessing Hancock. I was curious if you could tell us a little bit about the questions that were asked to both of the final artists and what was it about Blessing's responses or lacking in Gordon's that led you towards selecting the one. Nina, are you talking about the survey? Because the survey Gordon did, the public survey, but not with the panelists. The panelists actually had Benjamin Ball and Blessing Hancock as the two finalists. Oh, OK. I guess I was like, yeah, just I was curious how we got to this point in the final analysis. OK. The survey, those answers and those comments are all, Tara does have a list of them. So I'm taking you referring to the panelists and the two, Benjamin Ball and Blessing Hancock. OK. Yeah. OK. So that is Tara. Did you want to? I'm happy to jump in. Yeah, I think I just want to clarify what it sounds like the question is how did the panelists narrow down the sorry, how did the panelists narrow down from the five finalists to the two Benjamin Ball and Blessing, or how did Blessing get chosen over Benjamin, which I'm just not sure what your second the second question. Yeah. OK. David, do you want to talk about the general conversation and the selection panel had weighing those two proposals? Sure. Yeah. Thanks for the question, Nina. And yes, I did I did mention the presentation and maybe I wasn't very clear about it. But the dome by Gordon Huther and Blessing Hancock's piece, Unum, were the highest scored in the public survey. But when it came down to selection panel and them filling out their rubrics and scoring each one of the proposals, it was Blessing Hancock in the tie that binds by LA artist Benjamin Ball that were identified. And those it was a I guess it was a consensus of some sort that they were the top two scoring artists and in a variety of categories, they some of them scored much higher than the other. And so the selection panel wanted to see the two artists respond more acutely at some of the needs of the project that maybe were overlooked or not fully considered in their proposals. So the process of generating questions that were specific to their proposals and how they fit the project's needs a little bit better were generated. And then we packaged those questions from the selection panel and Tarnai sent them directly to the artists. And they were given I believe it was about three weeks to respond to those questions. And I think if I have them up right here and I think it was about five or six questions for each artist, does that answer the question pretty well? I just want to add on to that. I think that the general conversation that took a lot of time for the selection panel to consider and to think through and look at from every angle was really looking at all the selection criteria. So I think that one artist might have scored higher than the other on one criteria, but then it was flip-flopped on the other criteria. So it was a conversation about weighing the importance of how it filled the space, the material, the scale, versus the concept, the meaning of the artwork, versus the community engagement components. And so there was a lot of conversation about the need for community engagement. And my sense from the selection panel on how they score things is Blessing's proposal included a very, very rigorous community engagement component by essentially committing to working with the public art program, with this committee, with other stakeholders, with artists locally in the community to gather the words that will be laser cut into the side of the piece. And to be honest with you, I don't think any of the other proposals came close to that type of community engagement. And I think that that was a major deciding factor, not the only, but a major deciding factor in the final decision. Thank you. I really appreciate having that information in case I'm asked, and it's a great piece, but I just was curious how you got to the final selection. Then, do you know about how many words or characters will be able to be in the text on there? That's a good question. I actually don't. We didn't calculate that with her. I think there's room for quite a bit. So I'm going to say in the hundreds, but I don't know exactly the right number to tell you. So it will be of sufficient size that it can be easily read. Yes, definitely. I think she has a preferred size, height of the lettering based on her past projects.  So small enough to not cause problems, but large enough to read. And so I think she talked about that. I can't remember the exact size. It's four inches, maybe, something like that. She's very thoughtful in her process for making sure that she has meaning in the process she uses to choose the words as well as the readability translation into other languages, if that's a part of our desire. So it will be quite a process to design that community engagement portion with her and others. So is it going to be all in English or other languages too? I believe there's an interest to see other languages as well. And what about maintenance and vandalism has that been discussed at all? Yes. You want to talk about that one, David? Yeah, let me see if I could find Rowan's report. Yeah, while he's looking for that, I can share that we had a part of the selection process was to have our contracted art conservator look at the finalist proposals and have her give essentially a report on her thoughts about materials, maintenance, safety, and cost estimates for taking care of them as a part of our permanent collection. And so there was discussion about the type of steel to be used, the lighting components, having access panels like hatches within the piece so that a conservator could unlock, it would essentially be invisible to the public, but a conservator would know where to unlock the hatch to get inside of it, to clean it out, and do other repairs. So there was definitely a conversation about that. David, do you want to add anything? I'm just looking through the maintenance notes that our conservator made during the presentations and noted potential things that will need to be addressed, including corrosion and like gray staining from on the powdery surface that could cause corrosion and then also replacing lamps from age and damage. LEDs tend to last longer, but there's consideration of that. And then I'm just trying to see, oh, yes. And then her total estimate was $4,812 per year for maintenance. And there's a full report too that she provided to us and the selection panel as well. And David, too, I just want to state to what I remember, her cost or the cost of that piece was relatively the same of all the others or even a slightly less than many of the others, correct? That is correct. Yeah, it's the same if not on the lower end of the five RFPs that we received. OK, thank you. So that's excellent that we had the conservator weigh in at the very beginning. It's great. So that money for ongoing maintenance doesn't come out of the project cost. That comes out of just the general budget for art and public places over the years. Correct. Great. OK, thank you very much. Thanks, Nina. Jeff? Thanks, Lisa. I was a member of the committee. I was a panelist, as you heard. And I will share that it was a rigorous process. And we saw a lot of good proposals. I was impressed with the number of sculptors, public artists who gave us their qualifications from around the country. And I'm familiar with a lot of them. And in the end, the five finalists included two who were very local, which I thought speaks well of our region, that we have makers of that caliber. But in the end, it really, I think, was clear to me that we had a very keen interest, as Tara was very correctly stating, that community engagement was a major component. And Blessing has a very strong track record of making durable public artworks that have a significant presence in the public spaces they occupy. But in addition to that, also has a track record of community engagement. And I've been fortunate to work on a number of projects over the years that have included language and community involvement and interaction in creating text or other kinds of language components. So I think it's an opportunity for Santa Rosa. This is the one artist out of all of them who actually proposed that we have this engagement process so that we can actually get community input and then the words are going to reflect that process. So the potential for that, from my experience, is really tremendous. So I think we made a good choice. I hope you agree. And the one question that we really had, kind of a concern for me and a few other panelists, was the scale and its appropriateness to the space. And we resolved that. And I feel that it will have a significant presence. And if all goes according to plan, should barely be a great addition to Old Courthouse Square. So anyway, thank you. Thanks, Jeff. I'm going to go on to Nathan. And from there, Kristen didn't want to say something. So after Nathan, I'll go to Kristen and then go on to public comment. Nathan? Yeah, I don't have any questions. Thank you. OK. Thank you. Kristen, you're on mute. You're still on mute. Kristen, there you go. So I had a quick question. I know a couple of the selection panel committee representatives went to go see some of her works, Blessing Hancock's works in Palo Alto. And I wondered if any of them had shared with your committee, your team, about any words that kind of stuck out from the other projects that she had done there. I'm not sure if you guys, if anyone had visited. I'm looking at the really online. And it's quite powerful. Yeah, thanks, Lisa. You can share what you experienced in Palo Alto. But I wanted to chime in really quickly and state that for each of the projects Blessing has done like this with the words, there has been a separate and different explicit goal for the project and what the words are supposed to capture. And so each project isn't the same, essentially. For Santa Rosa, she would work with us to develop what the prompt is when asking for input from the community. So there's a lot of ways that that could go. But that is a big part of the next phase of working with her on this, is to figure out what we want to ask people when asking for what words should go on there, not just what words should go on there. I mean, I think it's like, looking to the future, what will Santa Rosa look like? Looking to the past, what's an important lesson to learn? I don't know what that prompt is, but those are the types of things we need to think about when moving forward with this.  But I know that Lisa was able to go see the ones in Palo Alto. Yes, yes, I did. I went down to the Palo Alto. It was the public library and then also the community center there where she had multiple pieces that lit up. And I went there during the day and at night to see what they looked like then. And the text consisted of many different languages. Some of them I recognized, some I didn't. And then the ones in front of the library were passages of some words from familiar books. I knew a few people around there did recognize the sentences that were on there that went all the way around to what books they were. I didn't unfortunately, but I thought that was great from in front of the library to have that. And there was some kind of interaction with it because you're reading them, you're looking all the way around them. And then I'm not sure what was being said in the other languages across the way by the community center. But it made the community center it made that area welcoming to everyone. I mean, it really just says, you are all welcome here by having just a variety of like that. And I really appreciated it being there and being surrounded by that. Monica, you have one more question?  I'm sorry. Yes, I am done. Thank you for making that in-person experience. Yes. I just am curious about the appearance of it in the pictures it looks sort of golden, but it's a stainless steel. And I'm wondering about it. I think that golden is just what the light is. There is, we're exploring the possibilities of having different color lights. And as the ones in Palo Alto have, they do have a button that you can push on them. And each time you push the button, it changes color, the light does. So we're looking into that with her at the moment. Tara, I'm not sure. Yeah, I was just going to add that the surface is stainless steel. So it would have a silver gray appearance. It will look very different in daylight versus at nighttime because at nighttime it would be illuminated from the inside with the light coming out through the laser cut words. And the images that she put in her proposal show a golden light. That's her favorite light. And she felt like that was a good fit for Santa Rosa, given our golden hills nearby. But she was open to the idea of different color lights or incorporating a button that the community members could push. Thank you, Monica. And right at this moment, I'm going to move on. And I'm going to move on to see if we have any public comments regarding this item. And it looks like Candace. Yes, and hold on just one moment. Excuse me, Candace, you raised your hand. Are you there? Hold on, Lisa. Hold on, Lisa. Eileen will facilitate that. She has to get the timing up. So just hold on a second. OK, yeah, no worries. No worries. Candace, please confirm that you can see the timer and choose to confirm your name if you so choose. I'm going to go. You are able to talk at this time. Hi, Eileen, thank you. I can see the timer. And this is Cadence Hinkle-Allinson. Good afternoon, Chair Puentes and members of the committee. I am the executive director of the Santa Rosa Downtown District, and I just wanted to express our support for the process and the work that went into the whole project. It was inclusive and thorough. And Tara and David provided many opportunities for engagement from the beginning of the process with the creation of the call for artists all the way through the selection. And we really appreciate the ability to participate in the discussion. As well as seeing how transparent and inclusive the project was. The district, we've been working really hard to bring the square and the downtown area to life. And this installation is going to be really critical to that work. So I just wanted to say thank you to all of you, to the committees involved, and especially to the staff for their hard work in bringing this project to fruition. Very excited to see it installed in the next couple of years. Thank you, Cadence. And I just want to apologize for mispronouncing your name the first time. Do we have any other public comments? No, we have no additional hands raised at this time. OK. Thank you, Eileen. So I'm going to go ahead and go on. Let's see. Is there a motion to approve this recommended artist? So moved. Monica, you're on mute. Sorry. I move that we accept this project. I approve of this project. OK. Do I have a second? Second. OK. The discussion is now opened. Committee members wishing to comment, discuss, please physically raise your hand. OK. Nina. I was, when you talked about the lighting, it made me wonder. So it sounds like the sculpture will be lit from within. What's the ambient lighting like on the square at that location? Will there be exterior lighting provided by the city or what? There are already several light fixtures near the north end of the square. That area of the square has a certain amount of light in the evening. I think it will not diminish the internal light source from this piece. It will still glow, and you will see light emit from it. But I believe it will also have an environment where it will not be pitch black all the way around it. Given the lighting from within, we are not going to light it specifically with external lights. It is meant to be lit from within rather than externally. Great. Thank you, Nina. Kristen, I wanted to just comment on the internal lighting. So if Blessing Hancock shows the amber or the golden light as her preferred color, I just want to call out that there will be considering of this piece in relation to the already light installations in the square that are changing colors. So I want to be conscious of that when discussion goes forward about what color to illuminate the piece. I think that the golden would be a nice complement, but want to make sure that it's not too distracting from what's already there. Thanks. Kristen, I want to respond to that really briefly just by saying that the same programming software that those lights run through are probably what would be used for Blessings. And so there's actually the ability to combine them on one DMX programmer, which would allow for coordination of colors, not necessarily match syncing them up completely. But anyway, we're looking at making sure that that's a part of our consideration when working with her on designing the lighting. Great. Great. Thanks, Kristen. Thanks, Tara. Melanie. Is the current panel going to be continuing to work on the final installation? Will they continue to work on through with the artists? Or how does that work? That's a great question. We spoke about that at our last selection panel meeting, and I put it out there that I would welcome involvement by the members in some capacity when we work on the design process for the community engagement because they have an investment in the history, and they've invested a lot of time with looking at this proposal already. Of course, I would be asking for more of their time, but I would include and invite them to be a part of that for sure. Anything else, Melanie? Did I answer your question? I think so. OK. Thanks, Melanie. Jeff. Actually, I'll just add one other thing to what Tara just mentioned in addressing your question, Melanie, which is that I volunteered the museum to be engaged in that process of public outreach, and I don't know if we'll be able to gather. But certainly, if we were able to gather at some point during the process of getting people to contribute language words, that we would certainly host something like that and help get the word out. And I just think that with the APPC and members of the committee, and I know Kay didn't send the downtown group that she runs, plus outreach through schools and other organizations, I think we can really get a lot of people involved with talking about what words are going to be on the sculpture and how that reflects the community. So I think it's going to be a full court press by all of us to try to really make this the best process possible. Thank you, Jeff. Nathan, do you have any comments? You're on mute, Nathan. No, this all sounds good. Thank you. Thank you, Nathan. Do I have any more comments or Nina? Will there be any kind of survey to gather the words? Or how is it too early to ask how the community engagement will be facilitated for this? I think some of that was mentioned in the preview that David was going over. Yeah, it will be a process that we start early next year. So it will definitely involve a design process to really design the community engagement. So I think surveys are a useful tool. If we know what we're asking, I think that it's going to take some time to develop that and then to develop our outreach strategies. It would be lovely to be able to have in-person events where people can gather and participate in community in person. But if that is something that we still cannot do, then we will definitely be using surveys for some component of that. And you mentioned that the selection committee would be involved in helping review that will art and public places be involved? Yes, for sure. Art and public places will be involved. We will need, like Jeff said, we will need to cast a wide net to make sure we're touching as many parts of our community as possible through this process. So nonprofit partners, business partners, art and public places, partners, arts institutions, educational institutions. I mean, there's a service industry. There's a variety of contacts I believe we will need to make and ask for help in reaching, getting the input, getting words submitted from everybody. Thank you. All right. I have one other question, but I'm looking for the budget here. So the $20,000 that is not going to the artist is going for, let me find my thing. Yeah, that's a great question. I was going to clarify that when David went over that slide, just to specifically say that the difference of the approved budget and the artist budget is $20,000. And that budget goes towards things that are the city's responsibility. We've already paid out some of that through honorary and payments to finalists, artists. Some of it goes towards community engagement type cost, printing, marketing, things like that. Some of it would go towards some kind of an event if we could ever have an event, either for the community engagement part of it or for some kind of grand opening celebration. Other costs include site improvements that the city is responsible for to prepare the site for the artwork. So there's a fine line between the artist's responsibility for installing the art, but then certain things that the city is responsible for. So we budget all of that out. It also includes a contingency. So there's a variety of things that that will cover. So we can have a good marketing plan for the rollout of this project. I mean, there's money to do it. Yeah. Yes. Anything else, Melanie? That's it. OK. Thanks, Melanie. Appreciate it. So at this point, I would like to move on. And I would like to call a vote to approve the recommended artists and approve the artwork design as presented. All in favor. Hi. Hi. Hi. Any opposed? None. So are we passing this unanimously? Looks like. All right, I just want to see. All right. Great job. Great. Yeah. Thank you very much, everyone. Thank you all for this. I think the city will love this. I do, too. I'm excited. OK, so let's see. Next item on the agenda. See, we got 5.2 project updates. Tara will present an update us on current projects. Besides this one, of course. Yes, I know after this, I don't have much to say. You can see where I've been spending my time. So I do have a few very brief updates just on some of the lingering open and out projects that you may have seen downtown. The open and out program has kind of morphed and transitioned into the winter lights or the winter themed installations that you can see downtown now. While public art funds from this committee weren't used farther than what I presented to you earlier this fall, there are still more art pieces that you can see downtown that have been added through the winter lights activities. So I encourage you to take a stroll down there at some point and check them out. There's also some of the open and out pieces that finally got installed that were kind of the last ones to be installed. And they include the pillars, the welcome Santa Rosa, or they just say downtown Santa Rosa, they're large pillars and pots, planting pots at the end of 4th Street at E Street. And then there's another set down at B Street and 4th Street. The tall ones are now painted by an artist Alex Cole with the kind of abstract landscape design. So that's a new addition since I presented last time. We also, through a partnership with the Snowman County Museum, we helped to hang some pieces by participating artists in open and out. They were given the opportunity to hang one piece in the window front display at the museum. So you can see that on the corner of 7th Street and B Street. There's a poster that talks about that they were part of open and out. So that I wanted to let you know about. And then I think last time, I can't remember if I shared our ongoing conservation and maintenance with our conservator preservation arts. They had worked on tuberosity in Olive Park and that piece is now freshly painted and cleaned up. And we are working on identifying the next round of pieces that they would start working on. Some of the pieces that they had on their list, we have had to kind of hold on given the activities with the road closures downtown, the open and out program and the outdoor dining spaces have kind of cramped some of the areas where they were going to work. So the next item on their list was the woman with water jug fountain, not the kind of near Russian River Brewery and on 4th Street. But there was too much activity there for them to be able to get their cleaning equipment in there and to have water access at this time. So we will do that soon. And I think that's really all I was gonna report on today. But if there's any questions that you have on other projects that you're curious about, I'm happy to try to answer. I just have a question on, since now we have this new shelter in place, will the outdoor eating areas where a lot of the artwork is currently visible, will those still stay in place or what's the plan there? Yeah, that's a good question. I don't know if the plan is to completely take them down or to leave some of them up for when it's allowed again. As you know, the current stay-at-home order goes through January 9th, I believe. So I have not, that's something that I can check on, working with Cadence and others in the downtown to see if there's a timeline for that. My sense is that most restaurants that can leave them up will leave them up. But that is, because right now we have an agreement to have that set up as is through the end of January, I believe. And so that may be the timeline at this point, but things change very quickly and we try to adapt and support as much as we can. Thank you, Smellany. All right, so we're gonna move on to the, Nina, you had a question? Okay. Yeah, I got the question from a community member today about what's Sartin Public Places Committee doing, approving new art when the Ruth Azawa fountain hasn't been reinstalled. So what kind of comment, what can you tell me about the status of that? I knew that was gonna come up today. So we are working on it, it is getting closer. I can provide a more detailed report to you. Actually, I have an item to bring to the committee at some point in the new year regarding the fountain. But the status is that we're working with our art conservators and art handlers to assess its condition and work on the best way to reinstall the piece on the fountain. We are trying to align our timing with the actual construction of the fountain, which has not started yet. So there was private funding secured and kind of a donation from Hugh Frutrell Corporation to build the fountain. And so there's still an agreement being processed within the city for that work. And there's not quite, I believe, a timeline for when that construction will begin, but it should be soon. And we are hoping to make sure the artwork is put back on the fountain safely in an appropriate timeline. So it's in process, it's making progress, but it's not to a point where I can give you any dates at this point. So I know you can't give any dates, but can you give an off-the-cuff estimate of do you think that this new sculpture will be installed before the fountain? I actually think the fountain will be built before the new sculpture is installed. Yay! I don't know if the art panels will go back up, but the fountain will be built. There's two components to the project. So the fountain has to be built, the art panels have to go up. I think we're on a good timeline to see both the art panels and the fountain be built before the new artwork goes in in early 2022. That gives us essentially a whole year to work on that, but a lot of those components are out of my control. So I cannot promise. It should just put up an informational sandwich right there in that spot. So that people that are curious can go there and look and see what's happening. Kristen. I had a follow-up question to Melanie's about the open and out program. I'm interested on when, I know that was extended, but I'm wondering about where to find more information about it potentially being voted on again or what committee would be having that discussion? So yeah, the downtown subcommittee gets regular updates from cadence at their monthly meetings, which are the first Thursday of the month. I believe they're at 830 a.m. on Zoom. That would be a good place to hear updates. You can also go to the website, which I'm going to have to remind myself. I believe is openandoutsr.com and that will give you a sense of what's going on with that. I'm not sure if it's fully updated today, but that is the website for the project. So I think that those are the two places that I would check for more information on what's going on with the closures and open and out. Great, thank you. Great. Anyone else? All righty, then we'll move on to the next item on the agenda. Let's see here, community member reports. Do you need the committees which to make a report at this time? If so, please raise your hand. You don't have anything? Okay. If I don't see any hands raised, so I'm going to go ahead and move on to number seven. Tara, for department reports, do you have anything for department reports? I do not at this time, thank you. Okay. All right, so that leaves German. So the next regular meeting of Art and Public Places committee is scheduled for Monday, January 4th, 2020. And this meeting is now adjourned. Thanks, everyone. Thank you, everybody. Thanks, everybody. Happy holidays. Yes, you too. Thank you. Bye for real. I'm always muting it now. Really? Great meeting to end the year on. Thank you.


Are you a serious writer?  If you do, chances are you probably use like a traditional word processor to get all that work done, but you don't have to. A lot of people use extensible text editors to get that work done, and by extensible text editors, the two that I'm mainly talking about, of course, are Vim and Emacs. And Emacs, especially, I see a lot of professional writers using Emacs. I see that these guys in Emacs forums, places where people talk about what they do in Emacs, I see professional writers using Emacs. Emacs is not just for programmers. Unfortunately, to configure Emacs to your liking, you do have to learn some E-list, and you have to basically write your custom Emacs editor. But beyond that point, what you do with Emacs, it's not just for programmers. You can be a professional writer and write novels and short stories and what have you inside Emacs, because Emacs has hundreds of plugins out there available for this kind of work. And today I wanted to share with you a handful of useful plugins and useful modes. So the first mode I want to share with you guys is the most important one, but I'm just going to briefly cover it because I've done videos on this particular mode before. And that is org mode. Org mode is by far the number one reason why people that write for a living use Emacs. Org mode is amazing. Org mode is this markup kind of language that allows you to do outlining and scheduling, you know, task lists. It allows you to create tables. It allows you to do literate programming for those of you that want to do that sort of thing. But specifically for writers, the outlining aspect is what is really amazing here in org mode. Now, again, I've done previous videos discussing some of the basics of how to learn org mode. So go check my previous videos. Actually, this document, this org document I opened up was my show notes from that previous video that I did. Right now, this org mode document is folded. So I have these top level headlines. So imagine this is an outline. All of these are these top level headlines. If I hit shift tab on the keyboard, I can unfold this.  I basically made an outline during that example org mode video I did previously. If I do shift tab one more time, I can unfold this even further and I get some other stuff unfolding, including a checklist that I had made. Apparently I made a shopping list, eggs, milk, beer. And then I exed out the beer because apparently I remembered to pick it up. I still need to go get the eggs and milk, unfortunately. I did have a deadline for something probably my shopping list. I created a table just to show you guys how easy it is to create a table in org mode. And pretty much anything you want to do, writing wise, you can get done in org mode. Now, after you've written your novel or your short story or your paper or whatever it is you've written in org mode, of course, then you need to be able to export it into other formats. And you can export org documents to a lot of different formats within Emacs directly. You can export to ODT, the open document format. So maybe you write your novel in org mode, but later you want to open it up in something like LibreOffice Writer. So you can add a little other formatting, maybe something that you couldn't do in org mode. It does allow you to export directly to ODT. You can also export to LaTeX. Those of you that use LaTeX, you can export to Markdown. You can export to HTML, which is very useful because not everybody writes and then does print publication. Maybe you just write something and you want to directly publish it to a website, sometimes just being able to export it to HTML is a very handy feature. Now, as great as org mode is, I don't know why anybody wouldn't want to use org mode, but there are a number of other markup style languages people can use other than org if you want to. I'll briefly mention one other one that is pretty popular among writers and that is Muse. So I do have an example of a Muse document somewhere on my system here. So yeah, I titled this first dot Muse and it's very similar to something like org mode. It's not as powerful, but it does have some outlining abilities. You can see first level, second level, third level, same thing with asterisks. You can see the headings at the top for author date description and the title. It gets a little bigger font. I did some examples of emphasis, strong emphasis, very strong emphasis. These are done with asterisks. So if I get into insert mode, you guys can see that if I wrap a word with single asterisks, it's emphasis. And the strong emphasis is you probably already guessed it would be two asterisks. Very strong is three asterisks surrounding the word. Underlined is underscores surrounding the word. Verbatim and monospace are the equal sign surrounding the word. Let me get in there and I will show you the equal signs. All right, let me put that back to the proper formatting. I copied a brief example of writing poetry. Poetry requires that white space be preserved. So what you do is you start these lines with the greater than sign. That's the right pointing chevron and you can space the lines of poetry, how you need them to space and it'll actually reserve that space for you. If you wanted to, you could also wrap your poetry in something like these tags here, the verse tags. Much like org mode, you can do tables. The tables and muses are not as cool as the tables and org mode not as powerful. Basically, muse is a kind of poor man's org mode. You can do hyperlinks, you know, a lot of the same stuff you can do in org mode. Org mode just takes it to another level. One of the most important features, of course, for writers is spell checking. There are a number of spell checkers out there for you in Emacs. There's a spell, there's hun spell, there's fly spell. My particular distribution of Emacs is called doom Emacs. And I believe it does have fly spell installed. I don't believe it is enabled though. So if I try to enable fly spell mode, yeah, I just get an error. They have it not enabled by default is because most people don't need a spell checker. Obviously, if you're doing creative writing, you're going to want it. But a lot of people that use Emacs are doing it for programming and, you know, other stuff. And they don't want to enable fly spell or any spell checker by default is because of the overhead from running those programs. Emacs noticeably slower because I mean, it's searching through every word and a document, especially if it's a long document. You know, it's got to do a lot of work to figure out the spelling mistakes and the suggestions for the fixes. Another useful mode for people that are writing, especially those of you that write for news journals, news websites. Oftentimes they have a certain word count. They want you to try to get. Your news articles to be at least 500 words, but maybe no more than a thousand words, something like that. And having a word count plugin is especially useful for those that need it. So if I enable WC mode, so it's word count mode WC dash mode. I don't know if do me max had this plugin installed by default or if I had to install it. I can't remember. Once you enable WC mode and then you need to go back and run the WC dash count command. And it will tell me exactly how many words were in this document. I moved my mouse so it. But look at the very bottom of the screen. There's 41 lines to this document. 161 words, 1066 characters. So pretty cool WC mode. Another interesting mode is write good mode. So if I do alt X on the keyboard and I do write good, all one word write good dash mode. Let me go ahead and enable that mode. Now that I have the right good mode enabled. If I go back and do alt X on the keyboard and type write good all one word again dash. You see other than enabling the right good mode, I had the option of also running right grade level, write good version, write good reading ease. So write good reading ease. Let's do that one for a test that basically tests this document for reading ease. It's going to judge it and it's going to give us a score. Actually, let's do grade level. That's the one that basically tells us how easy to read our document is. So first of all, if you want to select the whole document, I'm using the evil key bindings here. I'm just going to GG to go to the top of the document shift V to get into visual mode. Capital G to go at the end of the document. We just selected the whole document. And now I'm going to run write good dash grade dash level. And at the bottom of the screen, you see our flesh cancade grade level score is 6.87. I don't know if that's a good score. I don't know if that's a bad score. But those of you that need this write good is a pretty cool plugin. The last mode I want to briefly touch on is called write room and write room is nice because a lot of people that do writing, you know, especially once you really get into especially fiction, you just start writing and you're really into it. And you want a distraction free page. You don't want anything else. No line numbers, no vertical splits and horizontal splits. You don't want to see status bar. You want as much removed from the page as possible. And there is a mode such as that for Emacs. It's called write room mode. So if I do meta X here and type right room, all one word dash mode and enable that. And you can see what happens. Pretty much everything goes away. Now I still have the line numbers enabled. I could actually get rid of the line numbers if I wanted to. So the line numbers here in do me max are displayed dash line dash numbers dash mode. And if I just toggle that mode off, I get rid of the line numbers. And you see it's a very clean look and it's centered in the middle of the screen. And all you have is the document you're working on and the status stuff in Emacs goes away.  And again, it's a really cool mode. That's called right room mode for distraction free writing. I myself, I don't write for a living and I don't actually use any of the stuff. I discussed on this video other than org mode because org mode is useful for a wide variety of uses. But even though I'm not a professional writer, I get a lot of people that view my YouTube channel that know I use Emacs. A lot of you guys write for a living and I get these questions a lot about, hey, what can Emacs do for me as far as you guys that write for a living? So I'm throwing it out there. Those are a few of the plugins for Emacs that I see a lot of writers use. Now, before I go, I need to think a few special people. I need to think Michael Gabe Nate, Corbinian Mitchell, Entropy UK, John Devin Fran, Art5530, Chris, DJ Nani, Dylan George Lewis, I'm Repaul Robert, Sean Tobias and Willie. They are my highest tiered patrons over on Patreon. They are the producers of this episode. I also need to thank each and every one of these ladies and gentlemen. These are all my supporters over on Patreon because this channel is sponsored by you guys. The community. If you'd like to support my work, you'll find ETO for on Patreon. Alright guys, peace.


The CBS Radio Workshop, dedicated to man's imagination, the theater of the mind. Tonight, Starboy, the legend of the two morning stars, as the tale is told by the medicine men of the great Blackfoot Indian nation. It is an ancient story of love, symbolizing the fact that in the clear morning skies of our western prairies, the planet we call Jupiter sometimes appears near the morning star like a smaller double or a sun. There are two bright stars which sometimes rise together in our morning skies just before the great sun begins his daily journey to the land of the endless waters. One is the morning star, the other is Starboy, the morning star's son, who once was known as Poyah, or Scarface. I, Natosin, keeper of the medicine of the great sun god, will tell you the story of these two stars, and of the Blackfoot, that is, Siksika woman, who was wife to one and mother to the other. And I will tell you of Swatsaki's sad fate, and of how Poyah, the fruit of her love for the morning star, finally joined his father in the skies and became a star himself. It was long ago when the people of the Siksika still used dogs instead of horses to draw their burdens, and long before the white man came. It was in those days, one night in the gentle spring, that our people were camped near the mountains, and two young maidens were sleeping in the fresh grass outside their teepee, breathing the clean air, dreaming of their lovers to come. One of them was Swatsaki, the feather girl, the other her younger sister, who was called Annatoki. And just when the dark of night began to take refuge behind the rim of the buttes, Swatsaki opened her eyes, and gazed at the morning star, who was just then rising over the prairie. Annatoki, wake up. How wise he must be. Annatoki? For a sleep, of course. There have been so many young men in the village who have wanted to marry me, but unless one comes along as beautiful as the morning star, I shall sleep. And Swatsaki went back to sleep, but in her sleep the morning star looked at her fondly. Swatsaki, Swatsaki of the Siksika, you are indeed beautiful. Who are you? Do not wake him. I heard your dreams. Is it really you? It is, feather girl, the morning star. I have watched over you from above and wish you could be mine. My morning star, my love. And Swatsaki awoke from her slumber with the golden flecks of the prairie sunflower in her eyes. And all that day, in the days that followed, she smiled and sang to herself like the meadowlark, as she fetched the wood in the water and scraped the buffalo hides to make winter robes for her family. But when the leaves began to fall from the sycamores, the people saw that Swatsaki was with child and they taunted her.  Or is it something else? Whatever it is.  Where is your husband, dearie? Fighting the Cheyennes, I suppose. She is fighting braver enemies than that, I am sure. Swatsaki knew that she was pure, but she remembered the dreams she had had in the spring and knew that she now was the wife of the morning star. There was a great happiness in her, even while she shrank from the prying questions of the other women of the clan. And then, one day, Swatsaki returned with water from a spring in the valley and found a young man blocking her path back to the camp.  You are strange and let me pass. But I am not a stranger. You do not recognize me, reflection of my light? You are tall and straight. Your hair is long and glossy. You smell of the sacred sweet grass and of the pines that top our mountains. And a light shines from your eyes. I know you truly, but tell me yourself. You need to ask that of your husband, your lover, the morning star. Do you not remember that night in the month of the flowers when you slept on the dewy ground outside your family teepee and dreamed of your love for me? I do indeed. I do remember. I do, I do. I fell in love with you that night, and I have now come to ask you to accompany me to the sky. We shall live in my family's great lodge with my father the sun, my mother the moon, and you will be happy. Never again will you hear idle slander. All my life I have dreamed of this. It is happening, isn't it? Will you come with me? I shall have to say goodbye to my parents. There's no time for that. If you come, it must be now. I should not leave my parents without a farewell. They've been good to me. But then you are my husband, aren't you? I am your husband and the father of our child to be. You will come. I put this yellow feather into your hair and this juniper branch into your right hand. And in your left hand you will hold this finer thread. Now close your eyes. When Soatsaki opened her eyes again, she was in the sky at the lodge of the sun and the moon, who are the parents of Morningstar. The sun god was already gone on his long daily journey across the lands of the earth, but Morningstar's mother, the moon, had just returned from a night-long pilgrimage. She had followed her husband's daytime route, granting pleasures where the sun had neglected them, especially to the smaller animals and to the young lovers. This mother is Soatsaki, the feather girl. I saw her on the earth one night in the time of the bursting buds.  My lodge is yours, feather girl, and my husband will rejoice as I do that you are bringing us a grandchild. Thank you, moon goddess. I am now your mother. Under the laws of the sun, it is not proper for your own mother to visit you, nor even to speak to your husband. So I shall have to act as your mother now. Thank you, moon mother. Come inside with me, feather girl. I will show you a soft buckskin dress, which I worked on for many seasons, against the day when Morningstar would bring home a wife. It is as soft as a cloud and has colored stitching around the neck and cloth you buy. The sun, the chief of all living things, returned to his lodge that evening, and he also welcomed the feather girl. And as time went on, Soatsaki became a true daughter to the sun and the moon, and the moon goddess gave her new daughter many gifts, including bracelets made of elk's teeth, cleverly joined. I give you these because you have made Morningstar happy, and so I've made my husband, the sun, and me happy too. And this is a magic digger for lifting roots. But there are secrets about this digger. Secrets? The digger can be used only by a pure woman. Pure I am. What other secrets are there? There is one plan. Feather girl! Yay, I'm home! In here. Feather girl, I...   It is a great happiness to come home to you. How is...   There is no need. I am leaving.  I thought the gods, at least, would know how long it takes to bear the masonry. They do not. Goodbye. How can you be so sure that it will be a son? Oh, I know. Look, look what your mother gave me. The root digger? Did she also warn you? Warn me about what? That digger is magic. It will lift from the ground any root in the sky, except one. One? The large sacred turnip which covers the hole through which the North Star, the star of the states, put as your people call it, shines down to the earth at night.  It is the hole through which I first saw you, Soatsaki. Yes, but the turnip... The gods use this magic root to close the hole during the day. Do not ever try to lift it. No, I won't. I won't. Do you know that as a husband you are very odd? You are so wise. You teach me so much.  Your people's sky? Yes, of course. Oh, I know the sky belongs to the gods, but we live beneath it. You wife no longer live there. Well, not now, but... even the gods cannot foretell the future. Mother girl, are you unhappy here with me? With you? No. I love you, my shining star. Still, this lodge... The lodge? What is wrong with it? Nothing, only it is your mother's lodge, not mine. Does that matter? No, not at all. Are we not all happy here together? Oh, yes, indeed, three gods and a woman of the earth, the sixika woman. Now I want to go out and try my magic root digger. You rest, my shining star. Everything here seems to be magical. In the proper number of passages of the Sun God, of course, the feather girl's child was born. It was a boy, just as Swatsaki had predicted. He was a straight, strong, and handsome boy. His skin was that of his mother, and his hair had the same soft texture as hers. But the sparkle in his large shining eyes was that of his father, the morning star. The boy was perfect in all respects, except one. He had a mysterious scar on his face, and as he grew older, the scar grew larger. And so he was called Poiya, which means scarface.  Out in the meadows, she would take Poiya from her back and put him on the ground while she used her magic digger to gather roots for the cooking pot. There were turnips and parsnips and rutabagas, and the feather girl collected them all, but she always avoided the biggest one, the one which the gods had forbidden her to touch, the giant root which closes the hole in the sky. But as the moons turned into seasons and the seasons into years, Swatsaki knew that there was a great pain in her heart, and there was a pain which would grow stronger each day. It was a longing for the green earth, a longing for her own kind, the siksika, and their way of living, and perhaps most of all, a longing for life itself, for the gods are immortal and it is not easy for a man or a woman of our world to live with the immortals. And so there came a day. Parsnip, you monster turnip, a monument to the gods arrogance. Have you no feelings? No, of course not. And you, you magic digger, you want any help to me either. Oh, grandfather of all roots, why don't you move? It's no use, the morning star warned me. I do so long to see, looking brave. You travel each spring to your nesting grounds in the north and then fly home again for the rest of the year. Can you not see I am like one of you? Help me, please. Thank you, wise ones. I think you've seen into my heart. I am a goddess, you know, at least I'm supposed to be. My husband is the morning star and I live with him and the sun and the moon in that great lodge over that hill. But I, I am a woman of the earth.  Or else I shall die myself. Will you not help me, poor? What's the matter with you? Oh, I see you're invoking the gods. Well, I understand that at least, but I don't know that it will do any good. This root digger is supposed to be magical, but I can't say that it's been much help. The two cranes who had remained with Sawatthaki strutted through a dance, nutting and trumpeting. Then took their places on opposite sides of the sacred turnip. And the male took hold of the leaves with his beak and began to pull back and forth until he had loosened it in its hole. And after that, when the two cranes and the feather girl pulled together, the root came out of the ground without a struggle and left a hole through which Sawatthaki could see the earth again for the first time in years. Our people and Sawatthakis were just then making ready for the wolf dance and there was much thinking and praying and laughter too. And Sawatthaki was sad and homesick for her people. She sat for a long time and watched the familiar scenes. Children, women are tanning buffalo hides and gathering berries. And there are the girls fetching water. Look at the rows of young men along the path. The insults are flying fast, I know, just as in my time. And Sawatthaki longed for the life she had once known. When she returned to the lodge of the fun god the morning star and his mother the moon saw right away that something important had happened to her. It was the morning star who guessed the secret. You look unhappy, daughter. I know. Yes, I know. You've dug up the sacred root.  I warned you not to do it. I knew it would cause great unhappiness. I love my son, feather girl, and I wish to protect him. And I love you too. But most of all, I love my grandson, Poella. I do not wish to lose him. It is true you warned me and I opened the hole anyway. But I longed for my home, for the bustle of daily life in my village for the yelps of dogs and the shouts of small boys and for the friendliness of many people around me. I'm not really a goddess, I suppose. When the sun god, the head of the household, returned from his long travels, he too was told that Soatsaki had dug up the sacred root. I am sorry, earth girl. I am grieved for my son. But you have violated the law. You must return to your people. But husband. Silence. There is nothing I can do. The law has been broken. But our grandchild. My son. I also sorrow. But this woman has broken the law and she must return to the earth. It would not be fair to the child to take him away from his mother. But I could. There will be no more discussion.  My son. You will go and call on the spider man who brought the feather girl up here for you. Tell him that she must go back to the earth. Father. I regret it, Morningstar, but there is the law. But husband. The earth girl would no longer be happy with us. She has seen her own people again. And so Suwatsaki returned to her people. To us. The Siksika. She wanted only to bring up her child in familiar surroundings. But the people were unkind for which shame still attaches to the Blackfoot nation. And the boy Boyar suffered much from the cruel jibes of his playmates. Once Suwatsaki tried to return to her husband. She climbed to the top of the highest bluff in the land of the Blackfeet and prayed. Morningstar. Husband. I pray to you. Hear me as you once heard me.  I beseech thee, love of my life take me back to thee. I was at fault grievously at fault. But can you not forgive me? I longed to return to my home. The only home I have ever known as woman and wife. Morningstar, if this sighing of the breeze is your answer. But I know that unless you take me into your lodge again my life is ended. It was only the prairie that called me away from you, my love. We, the Siksika, have lived here and fought here and died here so long that this earth has become our home. Shining love, my only husband believe. Never have I loved anyone other than thee.  Please be a father to our son.  Some say it was of a broken heart. Our forefathers tell us that on the night when she joined the Great Spirit the pines sighed again on the mountains nearby. But Soatsaki had left behind her Poiah, the Morningstar's son. And the Scarface boy fared even worse with the other children of the tribe than before. He's nothing but a Scarface. Did your mother give you that? Where was she when it happened? The son of a god, he says. With a scar across his face. And nobody knowing who his father was. It was the Morningstar. Poiah's life was not happy. And when he grew to manhood he fell in love. But his chosen maiden would have no part of him because of the scar on his face. Poiah, despairing, consulted an old medicine woman, the only friend he had left since his mother's death. What ails me, Second Mother? What ails me, Holy One? The scar. True, the scar. You cannot do anything about it yourself, Poiah. But I know who gave you the scar.  He is the only one who can take it away. But who would? The father of the man who loved your mother, of course. The son god.  And perhaps you too.  But you, he loved as well. Because you're his grandchild. He may even have forgotten by now that he ever put the scar there. But I still have it. The son god put it there. Only the son god can take it off. Then I shall have to journey to the home of the son. Or I shall never find a wife. So Poiah set out and journeyed across the plains and over the mountains, higher than any man can imagine until he finally came to the big water which borders the sundown side of the world. When he reached the water's edge, he lay there for three days, fasting. And on the fourth day, a silvery trail appeared on the limitless water stretching far into the unknown. And Poiah rose to his feet and followed the trail until he reached the lodge of the son.  Who are you? What are you from the earth below?  Don't you recognize me, grandfather? You might at least recognize the scar on my face. You put it there, didn't you? The feather girl. I suppose I did put that scar there. I must have resented your mother very much. Yes, sir. But I have the scar. Does it bother you? Yes, sir. I have found a girl, but... she will not even consider me as long as I have this mark. Oh, that is sad, isn't it? Well, we shall see. What is sad, father? Oh, morning, star, it is the boy's story. He claims that he is your son. Well, that would make me his grandfather, I suppose. Oh, yes, he also suggests that I have disfigured him and that he has trouble with girls. He does look a little gruesome at that, doesn't he? You are not... I am Poi, your father. They call me Scarface. Only sometimes they call me worse names since I have neither father nor mother. Your mother? She died many years ago, soon after you sent us back to the earth. What do you want, my son? Oh, he says that the girls don't like him. Or did I say that before? You did, father. But about that scar, sir, you will have to take it off. Meantime, son, you can live with us in the lodge. And so Poi lived with the gods, helping them with their hunts and other pursuits, some of which ordinary men may not even hear about. The morning star, meantime, taught Poi our many secrets, including those of the sacred Sundance and other ceremonies. In the end, after Poi's scar had finally been healed by the sun, the morning star gave Poi a magic flute to charm the heart of any girl he desired and a wonderful song to go with it. He also gave him a robe of soft-tanned leather decorated with sacred paintings and told him that none but a virtuous girl should ever be allowed to wear it. Such a maiden would be able to perform miracles, such as healing the sick, and bringing the robe over them. Morning star then sent his son back to Earth by the short route over the Milky Way. And when Poi had won his girl and the two together had worked many marvels among the sick of the Blackfoot Nation and neighboring tribes, the sun god relented. He took Poi and his wife to live in the sky forever. He made Poi almost as beautiful as the morning star, and he gave him a new name, Starboy. He also gave him a circuit across the sky. But now and then Starboy's path crosses that of his father, and when that happens, it is always a sign of good fortune for the sick sick are people. It is the meeting of the two morning stars. You have been listening to the CBS Radio Workshop and Starboy, the Blackfoot Indian legend of the two morning stars, as written by Henry E. Fritch, with music based on authentic Blackfoot and Siu Indian melodies, adapted and arranged by Alexander Steinert and conducted by Alfredo Antonini. Starboy was produced and directed in New York by Paul Roberts. Elspeth Eric was heard as Soatsaki, Louis van Rooten as Natasen the Medicine Man, Joe Helgeson as Morning Star, and Tom Ellis as Starboy. Others in the cast included Cliff Hall, Elaine Ross, Peggy Allenby, Nell Harrison, Ray Brown, Ruth Tobin. The calls of the hooping cranes heard on the program were recorded by the Laboratory of Ornithology, Cornell University. This is Bob Hyatt inviting you to listen again next week when from Hollywood the CBS Radio Workshop presents Subways Are for Sleeping. Edmund G. Love's fantastic story of a man in New York who has lived without a home for four years. America listens most to the CBS Radio Network.


In this module, we're going to talk about the dynamics of cooperation and competition between agents within complex systems. We will firstly discuss the general concept before looking at zero and positive sum games. Following this, we will be talking about negative externalities as we look at the so-called tragedy of the commons and social dilemma. A core premise of complexity theory is that global patterns in complex systems emerge out of the synchronization between the states of elements on the local level, whereas the terms synchronization or desynchronization are generic to any type of system when we are dealing with elements that have agency, that is to say some form of choice over their actions. We will refer to this as cooperation and competition, as agents now have some choice as to whether they synchronize their state with other agents locally, what we call cooperation, or inversely, they may choose to adopt an asynchronous state with respect to other agents, what we call competition. Cooperation and competition between agents don't occur randomly. It is the product of both local and global forces as the incentives for an agent to choose one of either are often built into the context of the situation they are engaged in. In order to illustrate this, we will look at what is called a zero sum game. In game theory and economic theory, a zero sum game is a mathematical representation of a situation in which each participant's gain or loss is exactly balanced by the losses or gains of the other participants. If the total gains of the participants are added up and the total losses are subtracted, they will sum to zero. Thus, cutting a cake where taking a larger piece reduces the amount of cake available for others is an example of this. A zero sum game is also called a strictly competitive game, as the pie cannot be enlarged by good negotiation and cooperation. There is no incentive for cooperation between agents in these situations, but in fact a strong attractor state toward competition. War is another example of a zero sum situation. In these games, what the other loses, you gain, thus keeping track and comparing your state to that of your opponent makes sense. Zero sum games are linear and additive. The whole system is simply a summation of its constituent elements, thus they are essentially simple or non-complex. Complexity arises when we have a dynamic between competition and cooperation. Situations where participants are interdependent, being able to all gain or suffer together, are referred to as non-zero sum. For example, all trade is by definition positive sum. Because when two parties agree to an exchange, each party must consider the goods it is receiving to be more valuable than the goods it is delivering. This type of positive sum game is a strong driver towards cooperation. As the pie gets bigger and everyone gets higher payoffs by simply interacting. There are many scenarios like this where the cost of coordination is relatively low and the payoff is relatively high. Everyone driving on the correct side of the road is an example of this. There is little incentive not to do so and very high incentives to coordinate, thus making cooperation a very strong attractor state. But of course not all scenarios are like this. Non-zero sum games often involve an interplay between competition and cooperation. As an example of this, we might think about a game of doubles tennis where you have a zero sum game of competition with your opposition, but a positive sum game with your team member. Problems in the real world are typically non-zero sum, where there is no single optimal strategy that is preferable to all others, nor is there a predictable outcome. Others engaged in a non-zero sum conflict have both some complementary interest and some interests that are opposed. There are a number of variables that can be altered to adjust whether a game will on balance favor cooperation or competition between agents. Ongoing interactions between agents over a prolonged period of time, as well as dense interactions, allows for trust building. In many traditional societies there is some required resource placed at the heart of the community, such as a water well or mill in order to promote interaction. This interaction between agents helps to develop reputation systems and identification so that people can cooperate with those they know to be trustworthy, owning to their cooperation in the past. Bringing people together, giving them information and channels for communication, are the basic ingredients for social cooperation and self-organization. Research on lobster fishing off of Maine, New England showed that small communities on islands are better able to cooperate in order to maintain their commons than those on the mainland. Another key factor governing cooperation and competition within complex adaptive systems is externalities. To illustrate this we might think about a classical example called the tragedy of the commons. Garrett Hardin in 1968 wrote a paper in Science Magazine in which he imagined a grazing pasture that was open to all and he posited that if this was the case everyone would bring their animals on to graze the pasture more and more which would end in the over usage of the commons and its ultimate collapse. Any individual will get an immediate gain from over grazing the pasture but the long-term cost of this would be spread out over the whole population of people using the resource and thus the cost would be externalized from the simple cost-benefit equation that each agent is making. Meaning the full cost is not subtracted from the benefits to the individual and thus the action is in their individual interests even if it is to everyone's detriment. The choice by an agent to overgraze the pasture is then considered a rational action. By rational we simply mean that the action is consistent with the logic of the agent's self-preservation. The tragedy of the commons is an instance of the more generic social dilemma which is a dynamic where individual rational choice leads to a situation where everyone is worse off. We might say individual rationality leads to collective irrationality. The social dilemma is behind many economic and social challenges from overfishing to traffic jams to air pollution and voting. The basic mechanics driving this system are feedback loops and externalities. As soon as we have interactions between agents within a system what one element does affects another. But the question is does this effect then return to the agent that created it? If it does then the agent must account for it. I might be too lazy to carry my coat with me when I go out but if I know that the consequences of this inaction will have an immediate negative effect on me in the very short-term future when it starts raining then I will take account of it factoring it into the equation that governs my current actions. But if one element does affect another without that effect then returning to its source then we have externalities. We call it an externality because the effect that one agent is having on its environment becomes external to the equation under which the agent is operating. If as in our first example every action of an agent feeds back to its source then the system will be self-regulating with every cost and benefit being paid for by the agent that created it and thus everything can be regulated by the agents locally in a distributed fashion. But with negative externalities the cost and benefits of an agent's actions become decoupled from the local regulatory mechanisms of the agents and there becomes a need for global governance and top-down regulation. In this module we have been discussing some of the main dynamics behind cooperation and competition. We have talked about how different scenarios, what we call games, create certain attractor states that make competition or cooperation the default position. We looked at zero-sum games that create a dynamic of competition by pitting the losses and gains of individuals against each other. Inversely, we saw how positive-sum games can create strong attractors for competition as coordination makes the total payoffs increase in value. We also talked about more complex scenarios where there are incentives for both cooperation and competition. Finally, we discussed the social dilemma and the dynamics of the negative externalities that were behind it.