similar to this program. So we're not quite completed with that yet. It's been about five weeks and what Valley did was we wrote up the grant program and had a software agency work with us so that people could upload secure documents. And we set it out. There were 88 businesses that had applied. We selected 23 of them for grants and the average grant was $5,400. And then from there, as part of our grant arrangement with the city, we sent those applicants to Northampton and Northampton wrote the contract, cut the checks and is doing the follow-up as far as receipts for that funding. So our proposal with Amherst is that we would do that complete project. So of course Amherst would cut the checks. We wouldn't do that, but we would do the follow-up work, the reporting. And I think one of the advantages that we have is that we're familiar with the CDBG funding. So we're familiar with the documentation and all the compliance issues and all the income verification. And for those of you who don't know, the Micro Business CDBG program is targeted to businesses that are five employees or less and they're low to moderate income businesses as stated by the HUD guidelines. So those two things are really critical in selecting applicants. And part of what we would do as part of this grant program is to have people certify as far as uploading their tax returns, profit and loss statements, and other documentation so that we're really clear their low to moderate income. Now the good news or the bad news is that there's a lot of need which a lot of businesses that weren't low to moderate income before certainly will fall into that category now. So and I think I think the need is pretty obvious with people whose businesses are shut down. We talked with the Chamber of Commerce the other day and we'd be working with the bid and the Chamber of Commerce to market this and make sure that it was really spread into Amherst so that the eligible businesses could be a part of it. But when we were having that discussion there was a number 32% of unemployment in Amherst and surrounding areas and last year at this time 3%. So clearly the need is there and the the there's a few different regulations as far as how the money can be spent but really there's I have a list here of you know safety equipment, all the PPP technical support so that people can sell things online, upgrading software, upgrading computers so I think you know it's it would really really help small businesses. I mean I do consulting with small businesses every day and what they really need is grants. The loans have been great. Some of them are getting loans the PPP and the Idle but really there with so much uncertainty they're afraid to use those and to have more debt. So we hope that this program really goes through and you know Valley is poised to administer that quickly. Like I said we have experience doing that so you know that goes through. Great just and thank you so much Dee. Anybody from the committee have any questions for Dee about her presentation or the proposal or the budget? This is Nat, I have a question. I noticed that of the total request amount of $203,000, the amount that is budgeted to actually go out as grants is $165,000 and while the proposal noted that there are at least 20 to 30 businesses that might be the eligibility I think you estimate that that $165,000 can cover 22. Is it possible that there's even greater need than that $165,000 or how is that amount derived? So in general I can say there's greater need than $165,000 for sure. Without doing a survey or assessing that with such a short time period it's really hard to tell and we like I said we had a conversation with both John and Claudia at the chamber and tried to assess that but really it's it's quite difficult you know we we did make a list of some of the businesses you know that are sole proprietor or small businesses you know personal care, martial arts, technical businesses, things like that so I'm I'm clear the needs there because I work with I work with businesses all day long and I think Claudia and John have also seen huge need. I guess my question is isn't there much more need than $165,000? Did you limit it to $165,000 for a reason or? So there's an administrative cost to that. Is that your question? No I guess I'm not quite clear. So very very very simply why are you asking for 203,000 instead of 250,000 or $300,000? This is can you hear this is Joanne Campbell from Valley? I would defer that to Nate because Nate suggested that we that you know there's a limit of $400,000 for the town and trying to figure out what the need is that certainly there's tons of need in for the social service agencies and for micro businesses and so I don't I would defer to Nate a little bit on this. Yeah sure I was trying to cut in there but Joanne said it nicely the there may be more need I think there's there's a few pieces one DHCD really wants they don't really want any money to be unspent or have this be a program where after you know six or eight months you're saying well geez actually we have we have too much money and not that that would be the case but based on the average amount of funding in Northampton you know we didn't want to estimate too much funding for this program and then either have a balance or you know if for instance we weren't sure how businesses would be able to income certify and so you know depending on that that could really restrict how a business is eligible so we're still learning DHCD actually put something in writing today which makes it seem a lot more flexible but typically for a business to income certify it's pretty rigorous and the concern would be if they kept to those rigorous standards we may actually not have as many businesses as we estimate so you know not knowing some of these little details and that there's also a greater need a good need for social services so you know that's kind of the committee's recommendation at this point so if we hear from the rest of the proposals the committee could always say well do we think there's a greater need for the business community then is proposed right now or is it a good you know is it a good number you know my thought is if we you know award ten thousand dollars the maximum you know that's still 15 you know 15 16 businesses so that's still a fair number you know if there's a range then maybe there's 30 businesses that could be supported through this program that's a good number as well so I think I think 165 is you know it's fair you know sure there's more need it's hard to say right now how many businesses would actually be income eligible qualify based on DHC standards like D said there's kind of two pieces the number of employees then income eligibility that's yeah very yeah very helpful and second question if I may whether this is to Joanne or D I'm not sure but I know that the downtown Amherst Foundation has had some success in fundraising and is also giving grants to Amherst businesses is there overlap here and how would that work in terms of you know fine need so we did talk about that with the chamber the other day and they felt that the businesses that they are giving loans to were higher income businesses and they were actually very happy that this would kind of bridge that gap a little bit so and we would we would work closely with them right and also I guess not just in terms of income level but also in terms of size right this is limited to five or fewer so bigger enterprises could also take advantage of the other and they they also have a second round for that I'm not quite sure when that is starting but they feel like as they get more donations they may keep going so you know they they did almost like a pilot to start out with to see and learn from that and then like I said my guess is within the next couple weeks they're going to launch their second round I think that also to that question right I you know the town's welcome with a bid in chamber and they indicated that you know the size of the business and there wouldn't be much overlap in terms of the businesses being supported through the two different programs at the same time you know businesses are eligible for different you know federal programs now too and what we're not precluding those businesses from applying to this program or being eligible they just have to certify that they're not using block grant money for the same purposes so kind of like no double dipping but we're not you know we're not having a hard line here with a business we know that some of this funding isn't necessarily enough it's uh for their for the need so for instance if a business is getting you know ppe you know personal protection plan or other you know unemployment assistance or certain things that's not going to preclude them if you know this money is going to another part of their business that isn't getting supported so make sense thanks all right thank you I've got a question also can I Paul yeah I'm just wondering how how many small businesses do you think they're in how I wrote there in the Amherst and do you have a list already if you had contact or how would they find out about it so there isn't a list as far as we know especially of businesses that are five or under five employees or under there was some documentation about the number of businesses in that category I believe it was around 500 so but as far as we know there is no list and we would obviously advertise it and promote it as with with the town would also I mean we're in partnership with Amherst as far as um doing this grant so we'd have to use our networking resources to promote it do you have any sense of what kind of response you might get I mean have you been getting caught I mean it's a different time it's fine yeah I can I can speak to the fact that we ran the Northampton program and the Northampton program was a little bit different because it was labeled urgent need and so there wasn't a strict income certification for it they still had to give us a profit and loss statement for 2019 but for this particular program they're going to have to upload their taxes and give us some certification for their income for the last six or eight months so um you know we had 88 applicants for that so you know it's really it's really an unknown yeah I will say quickly that um you know I guess I just learned today that DHCD will allow through program design if you know the town and valley we could opt for um applicants to provide the last three months of income as and then secondarily their tax returns so this is new um I just like I said I just actually got an email about 20 minutes ago 10 minutes before the hearing started saying that they let income verifications be done through kind of a projected or or you know the last three months so it's you know it's something that I'm sure we'll probably do as opposed to tax returns but like I said you know that that's something that just came out today so that might open up the pool quite a bit because it's based on you know recent income not you know your 18 or 19 tax return so I think there'll I actually think there'll be you know plenty of responses and in terms of marketing you know the bid and chamber sent a support letter and we're working with them you know we have our list of businesses that have been licensed or other things so there's ways to send out emails or notifications to really get the word out all right any other questions for D for Joanne all right thank you so much appreciate you being here today and so Joanne and D I'll put you back as an attendee and then if that works all right are we ready for um is there someone from family outreach there is hold on a minute all right so I think Laura and assuming and and Nate if there are um several people from one organization can we try to limit it so no one's taking the floor for too long because we've got one two three four five organizations to get through um agencies to get through and we just want to be mindful of time that we have a meeting after this so we've got numerous speakers they really should try to limit their speaking time sure Laura is this Laura from family outreach yes I'm sorry yes it's Laura Reichsman let's see if I can start my video yes hello hello hello hi is Francine or anyone else here or is it are you presenting I am presenting and I might have one or two um board members who came just to give support but I don't know if they're here or not I see John Hornix on I know he wrote a letter from the trust and if you have if you let me if you give me their names I can always see if they're an attendee Betsy or Michelle or anyone else Betsy's here I can promote her to a panelist right now um Michelle uh Michelle yes and she's promoted to a panelist so Betsy and Michelle you're now a panelist with Laura and you can unmute yourselves and start your video if you'd like okay well welcome Laura oh you know sorry Michelle hold on a minute uh there you are now you're should be coming through in a second I'm not sure why that's not okay because Michelle disappeared I didn't do anything to them thanks everyone for your patience panelist eight I don't see well Laura and Betsy are here I hope I didn't just close out on um Michelle Laura we do want to get started and we can see if we're able to absolutely so we are um requesting funds to provide assistance to families um obviously this is a you know already almost three months old or three months old so we've been doing the work already is reflected in our proposal I listed what we have been working on um we have uh you know we work exclusively generally with families we work with one or two individuals sometimes but for the most we're experts in working with families and um you know everybody's been hit really hard they lost their jobs and they're isolated and they have small apartments with lots of kids and so life is really challenging and we've done a mix of working with folks remotely and now we're starting to do social distancing and actually getting to see somebody but not up close uh outreach right now is is an interesting term um the big thing of course is unemployment uh housing right now with the um moratorium everybody's very frightened a lot of what we do right now is negotiating with landlords uh we have some folks who uh because their immigration status don't have any can't get any supports can't get an employment can't get food stamps or benefits and they're really hurting um and so we've been helping them a lot we've also been helping uh people come up with a plan for when those moratoriums for um eviction uh go away uh and we're very experienced working with folks to um get assistance and that's I think a lot of what we'll be doing all our caseworkers speak Spanish which has been extremely helpful um and we're well known I think one of the things that I wrote about in the proposal as well is that we're getting a lot of calls and we're getting a lot of calls from people we don't know and being uh doing business in Amherst for 30 years and I've been there for 28 of those 30 years I know a lot of people and a lot of the calls we're getting are from people who have not needed our assistance before so um that's really the uh the request and the budget reflects both the part-time and a full-time person because I really wasn't sure how much money you had and how you were going to be able to distribute it so I wanted to give options of um of how that would work we'd be able to start um doing the work the minute you know the day we got funding uh we wouldn't have any lag time on that and um we try to help as many people as we can great thank you is anybody else um representing family outreach planning on speaking I'll speak briefly if I'm Betsy Betsy sorry just quickly Laura if you have Michelle's number I feel like maybe I I she had a computer problem so she um she was rebooting okay good yeah I feel bad I wasn't sure if it was me me or it was her computer that had a problem so she said just to go ahead it's okay okay thanks um so yeah I've been on the board for 19 years I've lived in Amherst for 20 years and we moved here we didn't know that there was poverty in Amherst and I've had an education through family outreach of how deep the needs are for families in Amherst and the pandemic has just made it worse I mean it's Francine Rodriguez who's the program manager said that she's getting twice as many calls as she was getting last year at this time and you know people are people are getting desperate I mean the fuel assistance stuff is going to come are the fuel um the they're going to need fuel assistance because it's going to come off sometime I don't know what the date is but between losing housing and fuel assistance people are going to be very scared trying to educate their children at home is tough trying to navigate someone someone tried to get a driver's license and had filled out all the paperwork but spoke only Spanish and she gets gets to the rmv and the person said oh well you're going to start over and Francine got on the phone spent three and a half hours on the phone with that person and got the license taken care of and that's the kind of thing the family outreach does is the big stuff and the little stuff and for somebody who needs a license to be able to get to work that's a big thing and for somebody who needs you know food assistance or mental health issues and has needs access to services it's all of them are big issues and so I have been so impressed with what family outreach does and the professionalism that they have and how organized they are so that they don't skip a beat people will walk in and they will be taken care of they will be seen Francine has a line that says the door never closes because we don't drop families when they seem to have graduated from services but pandemic can send people who are even doing well back into needs and they're prepared but extra staffing would be good because they're already handling 650 families a year and so an extra an extra caseworker would be amazing to be able to spread it and also to predict that maybe they need programs that are assistance programs that are different than what we're doing that are not you know not necessarily direct funding things but would help with the mental health and the well-being of the clients so anyway I hope you'll consider funding family outreach it's really near and dear to my heart but I know the quality of the work they do and Laura and her team are amazing and that's it thank you Betsy get to hear your voice anybody from CDBG have questions for Laura or Betsy I've got a quick one Laura what what the new these new names what do you think the biggest need out there that you're hearing with these new families unemployment unemployment absolutely is huge is huge it is it is quite the bureaucracy it's quite the system and so everything is set up with the expectation that somebody is computer literate that somebody can even if you're an English speaker some of the language some of the hoops you have to jump through are really challenging upload a file what does that mean to some people right so all those things are really challenging and I've been so impressed at how the caseworkers have been able to do this remotely I mean we live in an amazing time because Francine or Iris or you know we can get on these three way phone calls and we can really accomplish what we need to get accomplished and so I would say unemployment is the first one I think and of course the other one is just trying to maintain good relationships with neighbors with crazy kids running around all day and you know all those things negotiating with landlords you know right now they can't send out you know notices to quit but you know the day that that moratorium went into I think it was like I don't know April 14 I'm just going to throw this out but it's like April 14th at five o'clock you couldn't send any any more 15-day notices well so what happens Southpoint sends out to all all these families who have no income they sent them out in the morning of that day and Francine got on the call and she's talking to Bonnie and she's talking to the you know this new property manager and she's you know working with them because it's so scary she you know then had to make probably 35 calls to families just to reassure them no you don't need to start packing you know it'll be okay we'll be there we'll help you so I would say you know that's that's a lot of what we're seeing the new people and it's all it's all fear right fear that they're not going to be able to pay their rent feed their children yeah great thanks thanks um I see that Kevin Noonan has raised his hand Nate so do you want to call on him yeah uh I Gail you're I I can allow him to talk so Kevin you're unmuted he's going to unmute himself yeah Kevin you have to unmute yourself but you're able to speak I can unmute you here you go Kevin if you unmute your microphone I'm trying right now you should be able to speak are you having trouble try it one more time maybe I will try one more thing I'll promote him to panelists so now Kevin you can unmute yourself if you want to try that thanks everyone for your patience this is not where is Kevin he disappeared can I ask can I ask a question in the meantime sure um thanks Laura it's really gut wrenching to hear about all the just the explosion and need uh that you're that you're seeing I guess my question is about the additional caseworker fuller part time and you said there wouldn't be any you know lag and getting up and running is this a new hire or no it's such a short period of time that hiring somebody just just means one more person you know who's going to lose their job in nine months right or a year or however long this funding goes on so that's the good thing about us being part of the Center for Human Development is there's actually a number of caseworkers who are underutilized right now that can come work for me that day oh we're already in conversations with them so where we you know we'll be able to hit the ground running very helpful yeah yep thank you anybody else oh Kevin are you there yes like to ask a question sorry yes make a comment we have a very slow internet connection here and uh so now i'm using my phone okay um here you have an application but we don't see our name on the screen so we're wondering what happens sorry what was that Kevin we submitted an application but we don't see our name on the screen so we're wondering what happened did you submit it in application yes yes sir yesterday all right i can take a look thanks i can wait i think you've got two two uh things of zoom going yeah well one one wasn't working let me get out of that yeah he's showing up on his laptop okay sorry let me get out of the other one yeah that's the moment the bed internet okay can i just um bring it back to family outreach because we like moving forward does anybody else have any other questions for Laura or Betsy from the cd bg committee okay thank you Laura thank you Betsy and um it's good to see you and hear you okay Nate in the meantime are you should we move on to endless community connections while you look for Kevin's proposal yeah um Kevin if you can hear me can you re-send that i don't see it anywhere in my yeah i don't miss uh sorry went into a secondary spam folder i guess that's not that funny i don't know why that would have i can forward that to the committee and i can just again update that yeah that's really interesting um is there someone um from Amherst community connections that is going to present yeah let me see if um anyone's here if anyone's here for Amit uh Amherst Community Connections you could raise your hand i don't see them on the um on the attendee list right now i'm gonna send a quick email we can send them and come up dude all right let's see so i can forward the um let me just forward the um kevin's email i'm not sure oh good i can forward that on to the um to the committee i don't know why can you just share the name of the proposal of the agency oh so craigs doors had submitted one kevin you know representing craigs doors okay and i'll just forward that on right now right now let me email Amherst Community Connections too i thought that they were everyone else seemed to be aware that they were there was a hearing so are they just all hanging out somewhere and another they're like they're in the attendee pool you know so there's um right so i've just sent everyone the um craigs doors and i don't see anyone from uh Amherst Community Connections i'll send them an email maybe we can just move on right um so that would bring us to the literacy project can you let us know who is uh is judith here yeah and i'll judith i'll promote you you um i'll promote you to panelists judith so you'll be able to speak so you should be promoted to panelists yep and laura let's see judith you can unmute yourself now and start your video if you'd like okay hi everyone i'm judith roberts i'm the director of the literacy project and um me applied for um funding we've gone online with our classes for the obviously for the safety of our students and staff and um um we've applied for some funding for um to support our online classes um for with um books to send home and um also um online learning programs and um to teach readers and um zoom accounts for our teachers because we're using zoom for our classes um and um i would also like to add if i could um to our proposal to request um a total of ten thousand dollars from the committee rather than four i'd like to add um six thousand dollars which is um a little bit less we have five locations so the six thousand dollars is a little bit less than a fifth of the salary of our program director who is working really hard to make this online learning work and we started it on march 16th so we had some we have some experience now with how it works for our students during the crisis and um but then when we come back in the fall we want to not be really responding crisis response but we want to have a steady really strong connection with all of our students and one thing we found that many of our students can't afford computers and we're using donations not cdbg money to provide our students with laptops to work at home and um when we open up after we're closed for the summer but when we reopen in september we're going to devote ourselves to at least the first month is going to be teaching computer literacy to our students and we will still meet one-on-one with students with social distancing and masks etc at the jca which is where we're located but we will have all of our classes on zoom and what we're really focusing on is we're a high school equivalency readiness program so we're focusing on getting people ready to take and pass the high school equivalency test which is called the high set test stands for high school equivalency test and which is very very important for the adults that we teach to get them ready a lot of people are out of work now worked in restaurants etc and but folks are getting ready for job training programs and it does say on the plan for today that we that's job training and online classes we actually don't do job training but we get people ready to work with our partners Holyoke Community College Greenfield Community College and the Franklin Hampshire Career Center that do job training for jobs that are really needed right now during the pandemic certified nursing assistants EMTs medical assistants community health workers and folks have to have a high school degree or a high school equivalency degree so that's what we are providing students with is the high school equivalency degree so we teach adults and the adults we work with go to the Family Outreach Center they use the Amherst Survival Center so we create a web we really are sort of in the business of teaching people to fish so we're in the business of preparing people to be better able to support themselves and their families and get the jobs that are going to be out there that will continue to be out there as we go through the pandemic and beyond so I just want to state that I'd like to increase my request to ten thousand dollars and I can substantiate that but the six the four thousand is for supplies and materials for online classes and the six thousand is as I said less than a fifth of our program directors so we expect each of our sites to contribute something um do people have questions for me I'm a frozen um any questions for Judith committee I don't seem like it okay I hope I was clear um literacy project does not do job training we're getting people ready to enter into dub training programs by getting them ready to take and pass the high school equivalency test which is really key you can't enter these dub training programs without that so that's the work that we do um and before I leave I just want to apologize in advance I have another zoom meeting at five o'clock that I have to go to but um so I'm going to sign up in a few minutes here I know thanks Judith I um yeah I mean I was able to hear you and everything so I think that worked and we've noted the increase from four thousand to ten thousand on our um proposal okay thank you for um being here and doing the work that you do and and listening to me I see that it's a little hard to see me because I have a bright window behind me thank you for all the work you do and thank you for being here today thanks okay um so before we head to Amherst survival center any word um Nate from anybody from Amherst community connections I have not heard anything okay somewhat unusual but had they indicated they would be here today um you know through email I thought they were aware of it um so I'm not sure why that wouldn't be the case okay um should we move on to the survival center sure that sounds good and I'll um and and the level be presenting yeah she may name others so level I'll promote you to panelists and then you can um and is the plan sort of to end this portion of our meeting at five and then we meet for the next meeting part uh I think you know as a hearing we can you know until we we've um heard from everyone you know it doesn't there's no hard and fast rule that five was a end time um so I don't that might give some time for someone from Amherst community connections to chime in so I think you're available to speak if you'd like great can you hear me yep excellent um well thank you so much and thanks to the committee for convening this hearing um the Amherst survival center as you know has submitted a request for $100,000 in cdbg coronavirus funds um to ensure the food security of 3,000 low to moderate income Amherst residents um by dramatically expanding our food pantry operations so since march we have really been focused on these two parallel public health crises that we are seeing in Amherst certainly COVID-19 and also the public health crisis of food insecurity the situation is certainly dire now and we also know that as we start to recover and the economy reopens that unemployment is going to persist for our lowest wage workers those with less education those with limited english language skills etc and so that unfortunately this public health crisis of food insecurity is dramatically increased right now and is going to persist it's worthy to note that before COVID-19 the Amherst survival center was serving about 2,000 Amherst residents in our food pantry and these were folks who were struggling financially when the economy was supposedly thriving we are seeing these folks much worse off they need more food and more consistently in order to just make ends meet we're seeing individuals who are homeless who no longer have access to public spaces or the friends houses who might have let them stay sometimes or help support them and are experiencing a great loss there we're providing extra meals for those folks special ready-to-eat allocations from our pantry and have been really pleased to also help connect folks to expanded services that Cribes Doors is working to create out of their resource center as well which I believe that they will be speaking to we also have residents coming to the Amherst survival center who one person told me that she used to coupon the heck out of savings her regular shopping trips for her family consisted of going to six different grocery stores and that was how she was able to feed her family on her incredibly tight budget only buying the things that were on sale and that she had coupons for she can't do that anymore those items aren't on the shelf it's not safe to go to that many grocery stores and so she's needing the Amherst survival center food pantry more than ever and then we also have this whole group of low and moderate income Amherst residents who were previously food secure who had enough food they may have been on the borderline or not they may have really been okay and that they are now experiencing significant food insecurity for the first time they're unemployed both of the adults in the household are unemployed other people in their extended families who they might have turned to for help are also struggling last week uh compared to the same week last year almost four times as many 383 percent as many people registered for the food pantry for the first time that was 69 new people in one week um out of the 538 people that we served compared to only 18 new people in that same time period last year this this reality of folks who have not previously come to access services here is significant um and that number doesn't even include people who haven't been in a year or two or three that's literally folks who have never come before 25 more Amherst residents access the food pantry in that one week alone I think this is a good moment to um at this hearing to recognize the absolutely incredible support from the community through this time we've received financial contributions um a local sixth grader just did a toilet you draw drive for her final project at school um and our volunteers uh thank you thank you thank you thank you um many of your neighbors and your friends have been volunteering here through this crisis several of them as many as four days per week um the support from the individuals in this community has has been incredible and to continue at this level and to expand in the ways that we know we need to when are ready to we need support from the town um so with this investment that we're requesting of $100,000 from the cdbg coronavirus funds we would be able to provide monthly groceries for 3,000 low and moderate income Amherst residents we would be able to improve access for those with COVID related health and transportation barriers by offering delivery to between 700 and 1,000 Amherst residents as well as on-site no contact curbside pickup and on-site minimal contact pickup we would be able to increase our food allocations to two weeks instead of one week per month filling that gap we're hearing consistently from families that the allocation is not enough we would offer a new emergency box mid-month supplement providing extra food if people need more would be expanding evening and weekend hours for low wage workers returning to work um and this also supports where even to maintain that sort of same number of participant levels the costs of operation amidst COVID-19 are really significant um i'm impressed every day by the team here staff and volunteers who really seemingly overnight have successfully shifted operations to offer food throughout this crisis to offer kindness and compassion to people who are so scared people are so scared they are scared they need food they don't know what they're going to do um and the folks the team here has not missed a beat or a single day of service and in fact over the last two months is now growing and growing growing um this month we uh delivered more than 12,000 meals worth of groceries to 300 Amherst residents um considering that before COVID only a few months ago we delivered to about 50 seniors that's a phenomenal new service that's offered and we are we have the ability and readiness to continue to scale that to meet the dramatic need that we're seeing. I know that $100,000 is a big number which is what we're requesting from the CDBG COVID funds um but so is 3,000 which is the number of Amherst residents served um what's not a big number is the $91 per year per Amherst residents that this service then costs that's less than eight dollars a month per person for up to two weeks of groceries picked up or delivered to their door and less than half of that is CDBG funds including both the CDBG CARES funds as well as the other town allocation combined. The total cost of the Amherst pantry is $274,000 we have some of that secured we're requesting $100,000 from the CDBG coronavirus um and then we'll be raising we'll need to raise $350,000 from individual donors to support the pantry as a whole um roughly half of which is supporting Amherst residents. So it is an incredible honor to get to be a part of this organization through this time um I've never been more proud of what I get to do every day and how critical these services are it has never been more it's never been more evident the the role of the center in the town um and the support for Amherst residents has has never been more clear so we are in the process of gearing up we are doing this um it is it is working um we have the readiness to continue to scale and we really need the town support to get us there so I really really appreciate your your consideration of this of this significant ask um it will have an enormous impact on 3000 Amherst residents. Thank you so much Lev uh is there anybody else with you yeah from the survival center yes um I believe that um Rory is on the line if you see her name yep your Rory is now up as a panelist yeah great and then Jan Idelson um is also gonna speak um Ted is here but is happy to speed his time so he can move things along but I would um let the opportunity to give the opportunity to Rory and Jan all right Jan you're also being promoted to panelists thank you very much sure thank you love so who's going next Rory sure am I here yes you hear you okay can you see me yeah it does to you sometimes I stay hidden I don't know how to do that this doesn't look like the other zoom that I've participated in that's why we can hear you okay well my name is Rory Woods I am um oh start my video there we go hi we see you you see me now yes terrific I can't see myself but that's probably for the best uh so thank you for having me my name is Rory Woods I'm a regular participant at the Amherst Survival Center um I'm a homeless person I'm sitting in in a in a lovely conference room in a an Amherst office space right now that I've been uh allowed to use um so I rely upon the Amherst Survival Center for my very survival they are so aptly named and they have been so consistent and so terrific I just that the support from these people during this time has just been overwhelming uh to me because it you know I wouldn't have any place to bathe otherwise I have relied upon the Amherst Survival Center for my my personal hygiene needs for the past 18 months and I you know that they're open four days a week for that um otherwise I had five or six friends throughout the Valley from East Hampton North Hampton Amherst and Pelham that I would stop in on and I would make them dinner and you know try to help out around the house in exchange for you know a bath um now it's just the four times a week people don't want me in their house they sorry Rory can't come in stay ten feet away kind of thing so that's how it is um but uh you know I'm still getting by I can I can survive on four showers a week it works for me uh so far so good um but the food pantry is critical because there aren't so many places uh you know there's no there's no places for me now to go and like those same friends that would let me use the bathtub will let me use their kitchen particularly if I made dinner for them it was a great arrangement but that's no longer possible um and the food pantry uh has prepared food you know it's cold but that's fine it's great um so I'm getting by and I'm even able to help out a friend of mine who's a single mother who's now stuck at home with their children in their apartment in rolling green where um they don't have a car and the kids aren't comfortable going to the Amherst Survival Center or to the churches for the meals so because I do have a vehicle I'm able to pick up for them and bring food to them I also have a friend who's a senior who is a shut-in um at this point because she's afraid she's just afraid to interact with the world you know she has too many you know uh risk factors for the COVID situation so that I'm able to bring food to that person as well and so those are regular things that I can do to feel like I'm giving back a little bit to um to to my community uh so I would just want to to emphasize how great of the support of the Amherst Survival Center has been for me and that literally I I absolutely depend upon them for my survival and I'm seeing I'm seeing then just like Lev said that it's like Grand Central Station over there it's mind-boggling to me how how well they're managing it um so thank you so much thank you does anybody from the community have a question for Rory okay thank you Rory and on to Jan hello hi Jan can you hear and see me got you I know you want to keep this brief there are two things I want to read first a letter from Gina Kopinski uh a a participant she says among the fine aspects of the life in Amherst, Massachusetts is the existence of the Amherst Survival Center the Survival Center provides a community with incalculable good survival yes but very importantly hard also certainly at this time of COVID-19 without the Survival Center's dependable and prompt food aid life would have been so much more difficult for some and I know it would have been terribly hard for me the Survival Center provides a lifeline there is dependability and encouragement and that helps me feel hope and I and others are more are most grateful the Survival Center helps people help themselves that's a fine thing we must do what we can to help it continue beautiful and that is Gina she lives at Chestnut Court and now I'm going to add another two minutes I'm speaking as a former Amherst Survival Center president but most importantly a current daily volunteer and we need your support in the past 15 days 15 years along with you all I have witnessed that Survival Center grow adapt and grow again our neighbors tell us how they want support and we provide it with compassion and dignity it is not surprising to me the Amherst Survival Center has met this pandemic head on I've watched the staff as they created a safety infrastructure to assure a healthy environment to all who enter our parking lot and their building our huge dining hall is now a pantry our parking lot is now our fresh food and lunch distribution area we are continuing to be neighbors supporting neighbors this is a time where our strength continues to be unwavering with committed volunteers staff and a healthy leadership team we welcome around 120 Amherst residents a day some are here for lunch do you want meat or vegetarian do you want it cold or hot are there others hungry at home would you like a bag of fruit a bag of vegetables bread dessert how about some mortar people might come here for lunches but they find out about our pantry because many people are new and this is daily so you already know about our pantry Amherst neighbors leave here with about a week's worth of food every month but that's not enough right now we need to double that we need to double it as soon as possible and we really need your help with this our neighbors are depending on us sometimes i get to answer the phone and neighbors will call they are desperate and they're scared they don't know what the future is none of us do they need food i answer the phone they're scared i say come on in some are afraid to leave their car i said don't worry you come in we'll bring it to your car some can't get to us i say no problem we'll bring it to your doorstep that's what we've already done that's the way we do things we help people where they're at so before the pandemic the survival center led the way in best practices and providing help to our Amherst neighbors now with the pandemic we are continuing to provide even more food to Amherst we need the town support to keep going this amazing work that our community counts on as successful as the Amherst survival center has been it has come with an emotional physical and financial toll i can say that personally too i've never worked so hard in my life so i'm asking the town to ensure that we are able to continue to support our neighbors during this time this horrible nightmare with compassion no Amherst neighbor will be turned away with determination we will continue to meet the community's needs and with integrity we are as as transparent as glass and with the town's help the entire town may be able to sleep a tad better at night thank you thank you jan uh anybody have a question for jan or lev or rory before we and their presentation time okay thank you yeah i do um have you guys seen any leveling off or tapering off of registrations since governor baker reopened the uh the state that's a great question um keith i think we will need to look at longer trend lines to be able to make that determination um as i noted last week was that was actually another peak um in new registrations um we hadn't seen that level since the early weeks of the crisis um so it's hard to say exactly what combination of new people coming in versus also our continued outreach and making food more accessible for folks who need it but no we haven't seen that shift yet i think we'll have to probably wait a couple of months to start to see that that impact play out um i think anecdotally um one of the pieces that we hear is that folks have they have gotten so far behind on bills on expenses etc um and also we know that as these because of such a high unemployment rate um which is particularly true in amherst unfortunately we're at one of the higher unemployment rates in the state at this point are new rates for new claims at least um that it's these folks who are lower wage workers or have less formal education or other things that make it already they're they're not the first folks to re-enter into the workforce um and so i i'm not surprised by the fact that we haven't seen that yet but it's certainly something we'll continue to watch the numbers in the weeks to come thank you so i have a question and um i know that in some communities um public schools have been supplementing meals for families um and i didn't see this in the proposal and i wondered if there's any partnership between you and the public schools or you and mass to help um manage this time of crisis with getting enough food out in the community great um yeah so uh the Amherst public schools uh have done an impressive job partnering with you mass with the baby burk trucks to have lunches available at a variety of community locations for any Amherst public school child through this period of time similar to the summer meals program that has been offered in past years uh what we have heard is that for some families this works really well um and for some families this has really not been a match either because they tend to distribute food for a very brief window of time we've actually heard from some families that that timing conflicts with times that their kids have mandatory zoom classes and so they're not able to get to the lunch or perhaps it's just that it's too close and so they can't get there for others it's not convenient um or and the the different trucks offer different foods and you know whether or not the kids like it so it seems like it has been an amazing resource for some families and then there are a number of other families that are really not utilizing it we were because of that offering um in march we were in conversation with the schools around what they were going to do to try to figure out our response um and because we knew of that offering we kept our allocations basically the same in the month of march but then um we started to hear throughout april more need from families and so started to scale up so beginning in may we've put together a significant kids boost so every um so that families of school age children get an additional um set of groceries that's additional non perishables extra ingredients kind of make kid friendly meals extra meat extra dairy extra milk extra cheese more cereal um i know how many boxes of cereal we are going through in my house um and so uh extra cereal and other things um are included in that so we're now giving that um out and plan to continue to do that so we are certainly been hearing from families that that uh school meal gap is significant and you're the i'm sorry just kind of just finishing up um the boost program you started in may for kids that'll continue through the summer as you typically mimicking the typical boost program you have for the summer yeah it will continue um without getting into too much details it's it's a slightly different sort of set of groceries and points but yes it's extra food for um every school age kid and that will absolutely continue through the summer um and in fact is is one of the areas where um i think we we need to really further bolster the amount of additional food that we're providing there great thank you um now did you have a question i was going to say that ted parker's raised his hand and i don't have you want him to speak and as soon as like he wants to yes i would love to let ted speak and you should be allowed to talk now hey ted we should be able to hear you if you're here we go uh can you hear me now yes great um i just wanted to point out that pandemic on insurance uh unemployment insurance expires in july and it's unlikely to be extended by the federal government and i think that there may be a surge later on in in in demand for the survival center's services when folks who are currently making close to what they were making employed or maybe even a little more will be no longer have those funds available and so i'm not sure that uh we've seen the high point of demand for um uh pantry at the survival center thank you can i comment who's i i don't know it's it's rory woods yes go ahead thank you i just want to offer my anecdotal experience on that um i was formerly employed part time in the food service industry as a server i was laid off with uh the entire restaurant on um march 13th and we were all told that the restaurant was closing permanently and that if and when they reopened we'd all have to reapply um the outlook is not good for me being reemployed again anytime soon thank you all right uh anybody else from cdbg have questions for ted rory jane or left okay thank you and my survival center participants thank you i saw that on me i saw that way lane had raised her hand so we're gonna go back to our community connections sure let me just um do a little and may i ask a question or will this do you need silence to do this um you can ask a question on that who's the question to all of us because given that we just got the pre store's proposal we don't really have sufficient time to look at it while we're live here so should we um talk about that later on figure out how to move forward with that that can be the um i mean i could you know we can have kevin present at the end and then um you know uh we can always the committee can always meet again since the deadline's been extended or um you know if you think you understand it um you make recommendations you know a preliminary set of recommendations to the town manager okay i'm going to make you a panelist so you can present your proposal so you should be able to unmute yourself and start your video if you'd like and so can everyone still see my screen is that what's what's visible is the chart yes hi i apologize for wasn't well not being here i was too wrapped up in a case work that's okay we're here now and we're still here too highway lane how are you good welcome and um give us your time thank you i didn't realize that the present the submission uh folks are supposed to be here doing a presentation so i apologize if i'm not well prepared so you would like me to prepare to present the proposal that i submitted well you don't really need to propose i mean we all we've all read it um and it was um you know we have three pages of the document and then a page of your budget so i don't think for sake for your time sake that you need to propose to give it to us out loud but if you want to give us some features or anything that's happened since you submitted this that you'd like to let us know or give us some selling at points okay great thank you for the opportunity i'm very grateful for uh giving the opportunity to present it so uh because of the COVID-19 uh our office has to adapt to the time so on march 15th when we got the information that the governor baker has asked for stay at home order so we right away on the very day we started doing the preparation for the remote casework and we call that tele support so started in march of 15th we went ahead gather everybody's information and put it in the digital format so we have been doing the tele support and those uh since march 15th for the past 10 plus weeks now and we found uh even though we are not able to see the clients face to face to help them address the struggles they are going through such as behind on rent or struggling with substance abuse needing referrals or needing application for full stamp because something happened they were left out of the full stamp application pool so all these things we are able to do it online for them through our tele support so we have built a database of 200 plus 260 plus of participants that we served this past year and able to reach out to them with the help of five caseworkers doing it in through the telephone and email technology and by providing the information and assisting them to apply for funding whether it's rent assistance or full stamp we are able to help them stay put stay at home not having to worry about going out asking for help when nobody is open so that's the feature of our COVID-19 coping strategy as an agency and the work is very gratifying given places are shut down we are still able to reach out to the people we have been working with so we intend to continue this feature of the work but now our agency has started opening up so we are able to also provide in-office visit but because of the safe distancing need we can do appointments only when we used to do the drop-ins which will make the safe distancing impossible so to augment the tele support we are now opening to do the in-person by appointment visits so again through these two combination we can provide the same if not more service to the folks at their convenience and to help them stay stabilized in their housing and to help the people who are homeless struggling because of our two housing programs the housing first and the rental subsidy program at the same time when we do the case management we have housing available to place them funding available for them to get into their housing so this is the housing-based support service in the time of COVID-19 through technology and through in-office support we are able to keep our MRS residents sheltered in place and that's my spiel so if you have any question i'm here to answer your questions i does anybody mind if i jump in so um we think on the page three of your proposal it says that you're asking for forty seven thousand dollars for the program proposed and then on the um and then because other organizations that usually get funding from have pushed their funding forward i just want to make sure i'm understanding this to fiscal 2022 you're asking for an additional thirty seven is that correct and do you mind if i can go get a copy of this proposal thank you so much what do you write back okay i just need to get clarity because yeah nate's nate's summary um had the budget that's 83 500 but the way i read the proposal was that the request was for 37 000 from the cdbg funds and the rest could be covered by other yeah i thought it just seemed really i mean on the revenue side it seemed to be clear and then i guess on the expense side i didn't understand it as much so yeah yeah it could be my mistake too i just it'll be good and for everyone who's still listening on the computer thanks we have um you know um kevin newton will present and we also have someone from pvpc who'll present after amherst community connections and um when we're done taking public comment the public hearing to me close the committee will still meet and you can still stay um an attendee and the committee will discuss the preliminary recommendations for the town manager hi i'm back now so it's the it's um item number four letter b on page three the budget and so you're asking for 47 000 for the proposed program and then i didn't really understand about the additional 37 000 so can you just give a brief explanation about that sure the 37 000 i assume given the positive news that we learned early this year that the committee has recommended us to be uh one of the five agencies that will be receiving the uh cdbg funding so my assumption is that our agency has been recommended for this round of cdbg so we will be receiving that okay so your ask is for 47 yes 83 5 sorry that was my yep my mistake okay that's okay i just wanted i understand because many other agencies such as my colleagues emmerc survival center or family outreach of emmerst or creak stores everyone has really a population that they have different needs and i want to make sure that we are able to share our you know resources to allow everybody to serve the population who have unique needs so i would only ask for 87 hopefully that we can get funded put together we will work a hundred percent even though we will not get a hundred percent of the funding right so cdbg committee members you have to make that notation in your um spreadsheet that um is on the screen right now yeah i can change that okay and um you might want to change literacy private to 10 as well okay anybody else have a question for wailing uh yes i had a question that's okay um uh the proposal is for the program manager and uh caseworkers are these new new hires or have they been identified or how does that work um because we will be serving people in a different way and originally our understanding is based on our projection that we will be serving 350 plus people that was the last year and the year before total number of people we serve so we figured in order to serve that same number of people we will have to have similar staff coverage so it will not be a new hire but based on the 350 projection the staffing level will be such so therefore it's not a new hire but just was in the grand proposal to the edbg this past winter this past november when you were reviewing it that's the same budget i was using so not a new hire but you'll increase the hours in your current staff that's the answer say that again it's not a new hire you're going to increase the hours of your current staff we are not just because the two agencies that we were applying for grant i think i mentioned that in my proposal the united way and the community foundation of western mass they have new funding priorities such as food so therefore they were not able to cover the grant money that we were requesting because of the new funding priorities and we are short in order to do what we committed to doing so we are coming back to the community when proposed cdbg to see whether we could ask you for assistance i understand so it's the same as last year it's just that the 47 000 that you were hoping to get from the united way and community foundation didn't come through so to try to keep the same program you requested you're requesting additional funding to be able to complete the proposal that you had brought to us last year correct yes mr. Lawson correct thank you nat for clarifying um anybody else have a question for wailing anybody else okay uh wailing thank you so much for joining us we appreciate your time well thank you so much for having me and now we're hanging here a little bit to listen into uh mr. newness discussion okay and we will now uh bring Kevin in oh we're bringing from from pdpc first oh right sorry about that so who do we have from pdpc see pdpc you can unmute yourself yet you're hi everyone can hear me yes we can thank you for joining us oh thank you for having me i appreciate this opportunity this proposal comes from pvpc from the domestic violence prevention project manager monica moran um she's unable to attend the meeting i've worked closely with her in the preparation of this project and if if funded uh will be part of the execution so i'm happy to review and present and ask questions answer questions um the proposal as you saw is in response to an uptick in lethality and dangerousness in domestic violence that has occurred during the pandemic um that's international national regional um the uh the pandemic and the cause and the consequences don't cause domestic violence as you know but the people who perpetrate it and their set of values believe that under the under conditions that they don't like they actually have the right to use the control and violence they need to and the pandemic creates many stressful conditions that they don't like um i run i have founded and run the perpetration services throughout western mass that serve amherst area and so through our discussions we realize there's a big gap in service most of the messaging has been in order to deal with safety under the increased risk has been to advise survivors who are now um sheltering at home or taking refuge in places that are no shelter no safe where there's no safety or refuge advises people to stay out of the kitchen where weapons are and strategies that we know are not very effective um but people do what they have to do and so through our discussions because i work primarily in developing perpetration services that i've worked in survivor services for over 30 years so i do both sides we realize there is no service or messages directly to prevent and respond to people who are maybe violent or are have been violent um the united state doesn't have a helpline uh there is no state that has a statewide helpline for people who may perpetrate however doing some research the united kingdom has had one for 17 years new zealand has one and they're showing a 200 uh in um i think it's australia as well a 200 increase in use of messaging text and phone communication in the united kingdom and i think it's um 73 percent in the ones down under where people who might be violent are actually reaching out for help from people who are very very skillful and helping interrupt deescalate reframe and work with people who have this form of tendency towards violence which is different as we know than generalized violence um so the proposal is to invite amherst into a regional application there are 19 towns that are committed and seven that are considering we're hoping you're one of the ones considering um to uh have a three pronged project one would be to create this helpline we are working with the department of public health and folks who certify the intimate partner abuse education perfect uh perpetration services to get their advice on structure and um also we're partnering with behavioral health network which um has the state certified intimate partner abuse education perpetration services for most of western mass so the first part would be a helpline to um staffed by people already certified but the money would be used to increase hours so people would already be trained to respond and prevent domestic violence by dealing directly with people who may perpetrate which is a real innovation for us and we think it's long overdue the second part would have um service provision for them because people have um uh associated needs like un like we know from running these services unmet addiction needs they also are struggling with income needing food housing and need help connecting them um to resources and the third prong would be to provide advocacy services to the partners who are living with the people who may or have perpetrated violence and if they um live in an area um or would accept local advocacy services we would refer to those but our research shows that um the majority of survivors of who are living with the people who are perpetrating who are getting help do not uh go to traditional advocacy services they don't want shelter um at the end in times like that especially if they're more rural or they're needing to be around the network of their family or in times like this where shelter domestic violence shelters are not are limited to accept half the people they might have it's not even an option so working with them to um manage what's happening and also come up with plans that are realistic for them would be the third prong so three prongs would be a health line services for people who might perpetrate services for survivors and um for a little context there is uh it's a very unbalanced uh service provision in massachusetts uh there are over 40 24 7 hotlines for survivors i've worked on them myself and there are none for people who might perpetrate and there are services that provide 14 certified programs in massachusetts that provide services primarily through the criminal justice system on probation condition to 2,500 people who perpetrate violence as opposed to community-based advocacy programs that provide service to uh between 11 and 12,000 survivors so there's a lot of people not being helped and it's a real missed opportunity to prevent um we're trying to change the conversation so that we don't think of domestic violence as an inevitability that we have to deal with the aftermath but prevent it by engaging the people who uh perpetrated so what questions do you have anybody have a question Paul yeah there we go can you hear me yes okay so we're um physically with this um i mean how what's your plan about having this phone line so people can call but is it in an office somewhere or is it people's homes or so usually hold on and my thing says battery low and i thought i was plugged in i just want to check my outlet one second okay i'm plugged in i had the wrong computer plugged in so we i have set up other hotlines in the area so i'm familiar we're using that model where you have people um who are local to the region who are already trained which we do have we have um through behavioral health networks proteas project we have people who live all throughout western mass who are already trained in intimate partner abuse education perpetration intervention so they would have a work cell phone that they carry and take shifts um all throughout western mass and then they would meet weekly to do uh well on zoom until we're allowed to meet together to to get supervision to debrief and then the um the actual people who provide the advocacy services we actually are still in discussion there's an office that exists in um calmer and in the where where per end in north hampton where perpetration services are offered so we're just looking at where's the best place to maybe sprinkle people throughout western mass because there's 19 towns participating to see for when it's time to do in person work where they should be situated while it's remote or phone it's going to be easier so people that call in uh there'll be somebody that has a cell phone that gets handed off to yeah you go you get a number and then the number uh can be programmed to go to other numbers like so that whoever has the shift from 12 to 8 gets the call because that's their schedule so um and these calls looking at how it's done in um with the respect program in the uk and the where they have a high level of training it takes a long time for someone who's perpetrated or thinking of it to actually get to the point of the unlike other hotlines where they're saying i need help with this so they can take about 35 40 minutes before they get around to saying what's really going on so these folks have to be really well trained on what to listen for so our our model is to only work with the pool of certified trained folks in this form of intervention so they know how to work it so somebody would change the call forwarding to different numbers oh yeah you can pre-program that according to a schedule like at 801 it automatically shifts to so and so's number it so somebody can just schedule it all at once yes yeah see if it's someone who manages that okay good thank you behavioral health network does a similar after hours uh call service with the northwestern district attorney's office same thing there are several people who are trained in on the survivor side and it's for police intervention enhanced service and when the clock changes the phone someone else's phone automatically rings so got it thank you anybody else have questions okay so i would just um ask uh i would just ask uh you to consider participating in what's really an innovation we would like to have these kinds of interventions not be tied to a criminal justice service but to have a truly equity based uh community intervention that's about building relationships for safety isolation increases lethality and so isolation orders are very dangerous and so we we want to be part of thinking out of the box and so we we would like you to be part of that so thank you for hearing me out and um behalf of monica we hope you'll take this into consideration it's your time hi me on to is kevin still with us yeah kevin is still here so i'll um i'll make him a panelist right kevin you should um you're a panelist now you can unmute yourself and speak to your proposal i can actually try pulling it up too while we're okay there we go can you hear me yep yes okay good y'all set name yeah i was just gonna pull up your um okay but your sideways what's this i'm sideways oh yeah that happens sometimes that's okay okay well we do we do have kind of a funky internet connection here so if that's okay i'll turn the video off now that you got you your your vertical now yeah no but that's not the problem it's just that the internet comes and goes so now that we've had a chance to meet i'll switch it in the video can you see a picture of me now yeah yeah well the mask and a dog yes that's my dog elton he goes everywhere with me so thank you for the opportunity sorry about the mix up i don't know what happened but i guess we ended up in some spam folder yeah you ended up in like my i like two junk folders and you were like in my high alert uh spam folder what does that mean i alert i'm not sure why okay well thank you um so craig stores as you know was founded with the mission to provide safe carrying shelter for people who are experiencing homelessness and uh while they're working to while we work to help them get housing and uh we operate a seasonal shelter which closed on may 3rd but we keep the resource center open the year round and uh we've just recently entered into a collaboration with the anna survival center to serve a lunch to people here at the resource center uh on the four days when they are open and they're doing great work up there but with this intense uh uh focus on putting more food out there's a conflict in terms of space so we're going to try and pick up food from them and bring it down to the resource center and serve serve it to people who are homeless here but one of the things that we lack as an organization is is the ability to do case management and housing search we do rely on our collaborations with with organizations like embers community connections as well but so many of our people have no income and they're not able to afford themselves of the opportunities that are available through those programs the cpa program that i think that ecc offers does require some income in order to participate so we have to get creative and find ways to house people that are not traditional uh we've been since the shelter closed chasing people out into the woods well not chasing them out of the woods chasing people in the woods trying to make sure they have tarps and sleeping bags and and tents and everything they need to survive there's one case that we were working with a young couple that they're living in the woods and she's pregnant and uh we're trying to get her into emergency shelter so but there's a need for case management which we have not traditionally had any funding for so one of the questions i had actually for unate is there you mentioned at the top of the program here that there was some interest in spending this money quickly so is it possible that we should shorten the the time frame we we put in for a year of the funding but is it possible that we can shorten it is that the preference of the committee well no i mean some of it was DHD had said that on a call but they a year is could be fine but DHD really wants to know that the program is in response to impacts from covid so you know yeah all right you know is the is the resource center you know is the need for this case management and housing stabilization is this because of covid or is this is just an extension of what you want to do anyway so i mean the case has no no yeah this is definitely in response to covid because you know the size of the first Baptist church isn't going to grow the size that it's available to us is limited to the undercroft of the church and you know a conference room where the women stay that's not going to get any bigger off the summer so the 28 people that we serve there probably aren't going to fit in and we're going to have to have more space between them is what i'm saying so we're trying to reduce the number over the summer and through the fall we're trying to reduce the number of people who are there who need that service during the winter so yes this is definitely that i mean we're living in a post-covid world almost everything we do is now related to covid-19 all our interactions are you know it's it's a strange new world that we're living in and these are uncharted waters as we as erlund says you know so we're trying to make sure that we have the ability to get as many people housed before the winter cold comes back to the england and and put and thereby reduce the the need for shelter so it's it's definitely related to covid-19 so uh but the reason i was asking about that the timeline is that it certainly would be possible for us to make a six-month proposal if that's the preference of the committee that's all what i was asking about you know the the unemployment figures are are going to be higher due to covid-19 and when the governor's moratorium on evictions expires there's going to be even more homeless people so we're trying to do what we can to remediate that crisis that's definitely on the horizon and and reduce the need for for you know congregate shelter congregate shelters in the age of covid-19 is sort of the something that might almost be a thing of the past you know it's just going to be very difficult because you know we were fortunate and blessed really we didn't have a single positive case now we should have told you it's because of our great work and our hard work we we we squeezed those bleach bottles till our hands cramped you know and we we uh we made sure people kept adequate social distance but you know i think the virus just hadn't reached our region in the ways that that it had in say New York or Boston or even Pittsfield uh that's not likely to be the case going forward we're likely to see to see it creep into the people into the community of people who are homeless and you know they don't necessarily they don't necessarily engage in social distancing when we're not sort of around to help them you know and uh i've personally seen people who are homeless sharing cigarettes or or drink or something you know it's it one in if it comes to their community just as we've seen in recent days with the eight diagnosed at the Hammond County House of Correction i think there's going to be a massive problem and so we're trying to get people housed so that they have they can maintain that distance you know there's there's a group of them living off university drives that's that's uh you know uh another thing that we would do is try to help them maintain sanitation and won't and get clean water and hopefully get permission to put a port party on that site we're just worried that if they're going to live in tents that's you know i think i used the term in a letter i wrote recently to the to the Amherst Bulletin they've melted into the woods but they didn't go away we know where they are and this is very difficult for them to in this COVID-19 world to to be able to to cope and stay healthy without the access to clean water and and hand washing and and good food so we're we're really delighted that the Survival Center has teamed up with us we've done some made-up testing already we've had about eight people over for lunch already the jca has also given us some money to buy food from local Amherst businesses so that it was like two birds with one stone we uh we helped the people who are homeless and at the same time they've directed us to help specifically Amherst restaurants not chain not chain restaurants but specific Amherst restaurants so that's what we're up against and that's what we're looking for i realized you know being able sitting through this meeting i've been able to total the total you have more requests than you do money so that's what i'm saying if it's if a six-month proposal is more acceptable to the community then we could certainly make an adjustment we're just needing to get the job underway and that's what our main concern is i'm hoping i still have you guys here because i don't hear anything okay oh you're muted okay all the committee members are muted somehow i'm sorry my dog was barking um my dog is in a picture he doesn't bark when he's sitting here um kevin i apologize you know we just got this proposal and the budget so we haven't had much time to mull it over so questions will be based on what you've just shared with us so we might come back and have additional questions so let's take time to and i'd be happy to come back thank you for the proposal and the budget yeah thank you anybody have questions okay all right thank you so um anybody else left in the green room or the waiting room or the panel room or wherever they're waiting mate looks like um john hornick has raised his hand okay as long as he's not losing his cheer hey john you're allowed to talk now yeah you can yeah okay thank you um i will try to be brief given i know that the hour is late for you all um clearly things are bad out there i am not here to ask for funding but ask for funding to complement work that the Amherst municipal housing trust is already working on um we just uh put out a request for quotations for an emergency rental assistance program one of the things that a few other speakers have talked about is the fact that there has been a temporary moratorium on evictions but we are all concerned that that's going to go away in the not too distant future and so the reason for an emergency rental assistance program is to assist families on paying future rent or perhaps paying arrears on rent that they currently owe the housing trust committed $250,000 to this program depending upon the nature of applications we expect to be able to serve 60 to 80 families for at least three months we hope that additional funds might be available in the future can you just take the amount again $250,000 thank you the source of the funds are community preservation act what that means is that they only go for rental assistance there are no supportive services that can be provided with those dollars to the families that we serve with a program like this you would think that that would be um a critical part of what we want to do but unfortunately um as I said the nature of what we're doing or the nature of funding source we're relying on prevents us from doing that we view the CARES Act as an important opportunity for us for the town to be able to provide those complementary support services to families and to individuals the way we've designed our program uh the priority is to families to the extent that homelessness can result from eviction the last people we want to see is thrown onto the street are families so we've said at least 70 of the available funds would go to families but some will go to individuals as well so we're what we're looking for is an organization that you can fund that will provide support services critical support services to families and individuals who are at risk of eviction there are at least two proposals and we had uh kind of brief descriptions of them that were presented at the last meeting of the Amherst Affordable Housing Trust and we voted unanimously to ask you to support both of those programs and those would be the program from Family Outreach of Amherst and from Amherst Community Connections um we think both of those would complement the emergency rental assistance program that we are currently looking for an administrator for and we'll probably be start putting putting out money in in about a month or so um I think both of those proposals are worthy um on the other hand we know that sometimes social service funding agencies have a tendency to say well let's give a little bit of money to everybody and uh kind of split the difference I think in this case you would be better advised to look at the proposals for the organizations that are offering social services and choose one and fully fund the best proposal I mean from my point of view I think the strongest proposal is one that can assist people in going into housing court that has dual-language Spanish speakers because we know a lot of the families are Latino I think those some of the important things for you to look at as well as the track record of the program so really my plea is that you fund at least one if not both of these programs in order to allow us to have a compliment for the commitment the investment that we've made in the emergency rental assistance program thank you thank you anybody have questions for john all right anybody else thank you for your time john anybody else out there in the wings with their hand up me uh anyone at this time okay so should we conclude this part of the meeting and take a five minute bathroom break and then or reconvene so we can stretch sure we can say that you know um it's like wayling has raised her hand okay are we you're allowed to talk you know unmute yourself nope see her in my no she's on oh she's but you keep talking permitted hey wayling you'll have to unmute yourself or all right i have a minute myself so um the reason i want to add another piece of information is this um we are one of the four agencies as i understand have been invited by the tongue of embers the embers municipal affordable housing trust to submit a quote a proposal for quotation and we are working hard to complete that quote quotation so our operation philosophy has been you don't want just to provide support service if there's no housing as part of the solution the support service is really in vain it's just a lot of talking but doesn't really help people solve the problem so our agency has had the wonderful support of the town since 2016 received three housing related fundings two of them are for the housing first and we are operating on the phase two the housing first and the other one is the current just started this February the rental subsidy program so because of this combination of support service and housing so we feel we understand the complexity of the combination and the experience we have incorporated learned in these past four years and the fact that we are submitting the quotation rfq so we want to emphasize it we are really in agreement with Mr. Hornick the need to have support service if you are going to help people pay their back rent you have to know how to help them to get themselves back to the income producing stage such as securing employment such as dealing with other problems that will lead them to their decrease in income or lead them to have rent unpaid so that's the type of support service that we are ready to do based on our track record and in terms of helping people bilingual by culture or housing court experience we have helped people go into housing court advocating for them and many times through landlord mediation we really help families stay away from the housing court all together but work out the budget plan such that landlord is happy and the tenants are able to pay the rent oh somebody left the cookie so that's the extra I would like to add to the discussion thank you thank you all right anybody else out there waiting to have their chance to speak it's like Claudia is i will allow her to speak hi Claudia you can you can speak hi there if you see me I don't know if you can see me I can't see you I can't that's fine okay I firstly I just want to thank everyone I want to thank Valley I'm going back to the original micro enterprise uh proposal through Valley CDC partnership and CDBG funding I just want to thank that uh D. Dice for presenting tonight and I'm willing to partner with the town of Amherst we know that the regional grant is a lot more attractive in this particular process so I want to thank her for presenting tonight and I just want to thank um the chamber and the bid put in a letter together and uh what we did was we were are supporting both the micro enterprise portion of the CDBG application as well as the social services you know we feel strongly that there's a if we could strike a chord and a balance of both knowing that there was a common thread through all of the testimony and applications tonight which was unemployment and you know putting people back to work and supporting our local businesses will get people off these programs and back to work so you know so I really strongly support both but we feel like the micro enterprise again is just to put our economy back on track as well as we can and as she mentioned Valley D mentioned one of the pieces is in our grant process there were at least a dozen or so businesses that were left out in this process that would absolutely qualify under this program and we could easily reach out and we said that we would be partners in reaching out to those businesses I know there were questions earlier about how to reach those businesses and we've already had a lot of direct contact with them and we will continue both of it and chamber have admitted to supporting the process to getting the word out along with the town so we are happy to partner on this to gather to make that that happen and to get the word out and but we know I mean this is just an extraordinary time the needs are great and they are in every corner there's no corner of this community that's untouched so I just want to again just support and reiterate what D shared but also to clarify some points made so I hope that helps and thank you thank you Claudia thank you okay Nate anybody else out there I don't see anyone all right so should we take a 10-minute break and we can meet at like 615 maybe maybe just like about five and come back at 610 sure is it um yeah the meeting will stay the meeting will stay running yes does the committee have any comments about that or uh Nate's Keith have a hard stop at 645 for another zoom meeting okay so we could um so my thought would be let's take a few minutes we can come back and discuss the proposals and if the committee um uh you know if we need more time we could schedule a meeting uh early next week if that's possible to resume the discussion since we do have a few extra days with the extension from DHCD okay and just and actually just on that point one quick question I mean if given that the deadline has been extended is don't we need to doesn't it make sense to meet later meet again to meet again um you know unless we're going to keep hearing proposals um um I mean it's up to the committee if you want to meet again show me if there's any um the things that we need to discuss or if um we need any follow-up or if I feel like I'm you know at this point without hearing use anyone else's views I feel like I'm pretty clear in my mind which direction I want to go but I don't know about anyone else okay hold on let's break for five minutes come back I really need a five minute break all right but leave your computer on and running and I'll see you we'll see each other in five thanks everyone now are you doing the math well what I came up with was including the craigs doors and the update to literacy project and so forth um the total ask is about 493,000 yeah I came up with a formula already but I don't want to spill the beans yet I said I came up with a formula for distribution um but I don't want to spill the beans so everybody's fat all right looks like um hey everyone I can make myself visible again since you know so why do you Nate not why are you invisible during the call oh well I think the um you know I just want to give the um screen to the presenters I still and I've heard I don't know if it's true if you're if the bandwidth is bad if people um stop the video it works better but moderator you mean if the moderators stop yeah if like everyone turns the video off and sometimes the call goes the meetings go better but I I'm not sure if that's true or not all right so um we have uh discussed a review comment from public hearing as the next item under the public meeting portion of our agenda so just should we go around and see if anybody has can I just clarify we can give to we're not limited to the number of agencies like we are during our normal work here right so this is um this money is going to be um appended to our 19 grants so DHCD took this money and folded it in to the 2019 grants which ours you know is actually gonna would be wrapping up this summer so we'll just we want to have to do like an extension it'll be you know like a an amendment to our 19 grant but um the COVID funding doesn't have any um any restrictions on the number of social services that are funded right so we could fund as many I think DHCD really does want to look at though um agencies or programs that are um addressing impacts from COVID so you know they've said that a lot um you know and we have to justify that as a local need um I think before we begin though Keith I know you have to leave if committee members aren't sure we can finish tonight I mean would we want to just set a date next week um sorry about the calendar just so we you know we could we could discuss we could um have a date um certain that we could meet again instead of doing some of it now just re-scheduling no we can we have the discussion now but for instance Keith needs to leave in um in half an hour if we can't finish in half an hour and we've just received Craig's doors um would we want to meet again say like on June 1st or June 2nd um it is would it be early afternoon or evening or what it seemed like early after um you know around three or four works better for committee members it's really up to you do you want to propose next Tuesday at four because I don't think we would need as long as we have today because this is just the committee meeting we're not having comments from agencies so Tuesday the second at four yep that's on the theme anybody else Keith and Andrew Andrew yeah I'm sorry I'm looking okay I work with preschoolers on zoom and we see if you can hear me touch your nose so Tuesday at four is good touch your nose yep no that's fine so I just have a so the extension was until June 12th am I remembering that right yes yes so that means that if we meet on Tuesday and get proposals after that we would need to meet to meet again like I think the idea would be we um you know we have we set a deadline to receive proposals we could ask for if we want to get more proposals in but at some point we have to stop you know we can't keep receiving proposals um so it's up to the you know if the committee wants to still keep it open a little bit so sorry so what is that what is the June 12th extension then if it's not one we need to observe I'm not I'm not understanding no I think I think what it was is I think DHT heard from a number of communities that they actually couldn't do this process by June 5th so for instance you know the um sometimes in the summer smaller communities there's the board of select committee or select boards doesn't need so they couldn't get a signature to apply or they didn't have enough time to have agencies submit proposals and you know I think we've we've had a pretty good turnout you know we were able to get the word out but if we wanted to continue the um receiving proposals is up to the committee if we think we can have a few extra days you know I think that's I think that was really the reason I think DHT felt you know was was they want they wanted to get moving quickly so they put June 5th and then they found out from a lot of communities that it was too quick right so June 5th and June 12th are not proposal deadlines those are for the entire process right that's when the town all towns have to submit their applications to DHT nice so it was going to be June 5th but now it's June 12th so basically once we finish our work then um Nate you'd be the one but have to put everything together in the form that goes to the state by that deadline right right so I work with the town manager's office to you know like a normal process finalize the recommendations and then submit to the state so how do we feel about going out and assisting more proposals or right saying that if we're meeting again on June 2nd uh if that works you know would we allow proposals to be submitted for the another day or two for instance I think we already had one deadline and we had lots of proposals that's well over the amount of funding we have available I'm not sure what committee members feel about that before we answer that though can we answer does June 2nd at four work just in case we need that time it looks like we might yes that's fine okay does that work for you you walked away for me all right yes okay all right touch my nose touch your nose um but that's a tough question do we go out and solicit more I mean there's a nice array of agencies doing all doing COVID related work that feels very necessary and I mean I think the wonderful part about this is that we don't have to limit it we can give to as many agencies as we want which is always super conundrum in the process how long does it has the people had to respond and get a proposal in do you have any idea this agent well we you know we you know they you know they I think they turned this around and um like a week a week and a half or something or you know so it wasn't a long time to um I'd have to look exactly when they were when we put it out there but it wasn't you know it wasn't very long and so I think that's what communities were saying you know how how do you apply to DC with a program proposal if you don't even have time to talk to an agency to get a program together you know we're fortunate enough that we have programs that are you know up and running and have capacity how the ability to do that some may not so there still may be programs who are looking I think you know I've heard that there may be a second round of funding that comes through that's one the other one is our 2020 grant which we're you know we receive in the fall DCD is anticipating allowing communities to amend those grants as well so we haven't I haven't heard about those changes yet but perhaps they might allow communities to fund more than five social services for instance in your 20 grant which hasn't happened yet but there may be a possibility so you know I'm just saying that there you know there's probably maybe two more chances to allocate funding to this if it you know I can't say it for certain that it's that it'll happen but that's what I'm hearing I would I would support extending I would support soliciting some more you know I think it's not surprising that the ones who have applied are Nate as you say the ones who are sort of used to our process and maybe have capacity to do that that is a very short amount of time at a time on lots of people maybe the people who you know are among those who most need the support are incredibly busy did we did you reach out to any of the people that did apply directly or did everybody get up the notice went out you know I sent it to the past recipients so the past you know a few years you know I have the Amherst Human Service Network to COSA you know was in the you know a few different media outlets so you know I did the the typical outreach I mean I you know I as we've discussed before and I sent it to who I know but there may be organizations or agencies I don't know so it's hard to say you know that everyone who needs this funding know about it given it was a short window would you would you put something else out you know if we if we're able to take more proposals we should put a notice somewhere I would think yeah no I could I could put it again on the town website and do some more emails and try to advertise it again yeah yeah I would think that you know accepting more would be just to make sure we haven't missed something you know because it is such a short period of time but as Nat said we already have you know almost 492 thousand dollars worth of asks right now and we can only get 400,000 so we don't want to I don't want to say shoot ourselves in the foot but you know then the use of the pie gets smaller and smaller and smaller does more agencies apply if we decide to pull it everybody I just want to try to be fair to people so that everybody that wanted it will play knows about it and can so Nat if Nate if you extend it it would should we if you decide to get the word out in the community that we're still accepting proposals meeting on Tuesday really wouldn't do much good because by the time you get the information out people need time to process so maybe we should I'm looking at a calendar we should just push this up a whole week so organizations have at least a week to get their proposal together so if we met the week of the 8th or because people made a week we met like on the 8th then we could make our final decision that day because that's because meeting next week doesn't do much good if we're going to take in more proposals right we'd have to do if it's a public hearing if we're wanting if we need presentations we have to have a five-day notice requirement yeah so how much time do you need Nate at the end we'll need a few days I mean I think if we're you know if we push it instead of the second if we meet on the fourth you know I don't like I mean if we meet on the fifth of friday I mean that gives us plenty of time to advertise another hearing you know we consider this this second meeting also you know be a hearing and then a meeting um and that gives me enough time you know it is up to the town manager so you know there may be some discussion with the town manager and staff and then you know the DCD expects you know a cover letter and then a kind of a package proposal it's nice that we're getting those activity proposals from agencies but we'll have to refine I think those a little bit and then come up with a you know an application yeah I guess you know I think my my concern is that um you know even if we do keep it open there won't be new you know channels so it won't necessarily reach anybody new and it just kind of pushes everything back and puts more and more pressure on Nate you know the town and town manager to put the package together sure well so so but that gets into the the question of how much time does Nate need right so certainly we should leave Nate the time he needs and then I think the the whole avenue of distribution thing is less about reaching more people and more about giving the few people who actually may need more time then it looks like Lev has her hand raised if you want to recognize her gale in an hour in a minute um sure Lev go ahead sure Lev I'll allow you to talk you can you should be all set to unmute yourself great can you hear me yes excellent um thanks for taking us I know this is the committee section um I would like to just respond by um clearly it's the committee's decision in terms of seeking new proposals um however I just want to express that as an applicant um there's a a part of that that feels challenging there's a cdbg expectation around a public hearing process and by adding additional public hearings that is um adding additional time that would also make sense for these organizations on frontline doing frontline work to be present for um and I guess from my perspective hearing the thoughtful presentations of multiple organizations today there's a capacity represented here um not people who are sitting around waiting to write grant proposals but folks who are answering the phones all day long dealing with new processes ramping up programs etc so I would just really encourage the committee to think about the enormous capacity of multiple organizations who presented today and who made the best effort to put proposals together in a very short time frame it was a week that include exactly one week that included a holiday weekend so I would just encourage the committee to can consider the the impact on applicants thank you now just um Nate I have to just ask you if we hypothetically we have two camps we can go out and extend the time for proposals to come in or we we can't we can say we're not and we can begin deliberating when we again is it detrimental to the committee's um position in the community if we don't go out and allow time for more proposals um I don't is it a have to I guess is it a have to do we have to do it or is it up to us I don't think it's a have to I think it's the committee can discuss it you know I don't I think that um you know we had a process that was quite abbreviated um but we were able to generate some some proposal activities you know um you know Paul and Andrew said though did the word get out there enough it was a short week with the holiday so did you know was there you know did it not get out there broadly enough uh in the time frame I know it was you know wrap you know what Lev is saying it is it was a it was a hardship for people to put something together so quickly um because they were doing other you know they were they were working as well the um but you know I think it's at the discussion of the committee I don't you know I think if we were to hold another meeting or hearing next week it gives the town time to um you know to to get an application together um you know I don't you know I think so for instance we had decisions by next Friday by um I had a calendar but you know for instance if we knew by um by June 5th what we needed what are the recommendations were that gives me a week to put together something with the town manager's office and that's fine but it doesn't give organizations much time to get it if you put out a notification tomorrow and they've got to turn around and get it to us in a couple of days does that feel workable for agencies um good question so yeah anybody want to jump in I think Andrew's spoken in favor of extending it I've spoken uh in favor of cutting it off at this point so I don't know if other committee members have other thoughts I'd favor extending it right Mindy Dom also has her hand raised Gail if you want to recognize her uh sure Mindy you're allowed to talk Mindy thank you so much I'm sorry to intrude in this part of the meeting I've been a fly on the wall not really because you knew I was here but I'm just listening because I've been following and tracking this money through the state back to the town um with excitement actually because it's the rare time that federal funds related to COVID is actually being designated for a local use um as you know right now there's discussion and disagreement in the in congress as to whether or not the fed should be funding local services but this particular care's money um was designated for community development block grant with the great help of our state of our us senators marky and warren and they did it because they knew that there were COVID related basic needs issues that were surfacing and emerging that needed to be tended to right away and so they created this I Nate can speak to it I think it's unprecedented um way to use community development block grant funds to meet basic needs that were being that we were seeing as a result of COVID-19 and the previous speaker is correct this money is specific for what is happening on the ground in our town as a result of COVID-19 um Nate mentioned earlier that there will be probably an opportunity for the committee and for other towns in Massachusetts to reprogram money that they might have designated for the next fiscal year if COVID-19 impacts would impact those decisions so there'll be an opportunity to revisit that if you wanted to I think there's also going to be an opportunity to do next year's community development block grant but you should know that every town is facing the same timeframe in terms of spending getting this money from the feds and spending it on needs as they exist in the present day not needs for you know months from now but needs from now through the next couple of months so I just want to reassure you that you're not facing a timeframe that's different from other towns I'm impressed that organizations that are providing everyday services in incredible amounts in unprecedented amounts to people in our town had it together to be able to pull together these quite significant grant applications and I don't know if it's true but it's quite possible that other organizations that might have considered it might have self excluded themselves knowing that this is community development block grant money specific to emerging COVID-19 related needs in the present day so I just wanted to reassure you that this is a timeframe that towns throughout the Commonwealth are dealing with it's a special federal program and it's great that we have organizations in town that are providing these services and that can demonstrate and document it so that we can you can make a quick decision if you need to so thank you for letting me have my say thank you Nadee um so did Keith have um Keith did you weigh in as to whether we should uh open up the timeline up for more proposals or not I'm great okay oh he's unmuted maybe he's uh did you hear me no go ahead uh Keith do you want to weigh in on whether you think we should you know open up some more proposals or not we should not okay so you think we shouldn't Nat thinks we shouldn't Paul thinks we should Keith thinks we should and I'm the tiebreaker um I think we should and I but I think we have to keep our timeline tight so if you have to have a recommend you know 12 the 12th is the deadline that you have to have we have to have the recommendation is that it the 12th is the recommendation that we give to you or you and or you communicate it to the town manager the 12th is a day we have to submit it to the state so that's the day that I it has to be submitted at the very latest okay so if we if you put something out today's Wednesday if you put something out Thursday folks would have you know barely a week to turn it around but at least it feels like we're doing what we should be doing um and we met again on Thursday the 4th and then that would be to hear for a public hearing and then to make final recommendations would that work for people yep yep can I ask about the public hearing aspect um so we spent two hours today with public hearing and no time for the committee process can we you know make sure that doesn't happen on the 4th or how how would that work yeah I think Matt I'll just I think we can um you know I think the for those still listening we can let the people know that who's the the agencies that have already presented don't need to present again right so it'd be for new information or if the committee you know if if members email me individually and have some you know a really big question about one of the proposals we can uh I can let the applicants you know know and they could respond but um you know my thought would be we don't necessarily need to hear from the same agencies again I think it has to be exclusive to new newly received proposals um just for the sake of time all right so if we're saying say Thursday June 4th at four so touch your nose if that works for you works for you all Keith has to say something because we can't see him okay it's Thursday June 4th at four for a public hearing to accept um we'll be taking in we'll have received the proposals hopefully at least a day before to read them through and then folks will be able to present only exclusively for um new proposals submitted between now and whatever deadline you're giving me the um yeah man Keith you have to look like you probably have to leave in about 10 minutes so it looks like Gail Ted Parker has raised his hand but so the committee likes that plan I just want to make sure that that sounds good well for that four and I can you know it'll be the same you know it'll be the same notices and similar postings that went out for today and now that sounds fine I also need to leave in a few minutes okay okay and um do you want to hear from Ted before Keith and Andrew sign off sure Ted you're allowed to speak oh I I think the process that you just uh can you hear me yes I think the process that you just approved creates like inequity in it in that you're allowed you're basically saying some folks who will have you know more time to present at a hearing than others I think that if you want to create an equitable process then you have to allow those who have already applied the extra time to revisit their proposals that were put together in the original timeline and and if they wanted to amend them that they should have the right to represent those proposals otherwise you're creating a two-tier system where some people had an extra week to to think about what they wanted to do can I respond to that may I respond I think that folks if they had wanted to respond by today would have I don't think that they were mulling over perhaps anticipating that the deadline would be extended so to in my eyes it doesn't feel like there's equitable I just think that it we're trying to cast a wider net and allow for those agencies who just didn't know about this have an opportunity to submit a proposal Nate would you like to add? Paul's got his hand up and I think that the flip side is exactly the same as you know you're pointing out and that people didn't may not have heard about it and then once if we didn't do a second round it would say that they weren't given a fair chance and could complain about that so I mean I think it was a short time if there's some amendment I don't know why we couldn't let that happen if people wanted to add to what they've said but I think to be fair everybody it would because it was a short notice we should extend it that's all thank you all right we're losing Keith in eight minutes and we're losing Andrew shortly as well I think Paul your point yeah we can I can send a notice out saying that those who submitted can also always amend proposals and then you know I think we'd have to be the committee we'd have to run a pretty efficient meeting on the fourth so you know we're going to meet at four right right so we'll have more time or we could you want to bump it up to three so we have plenty of time that's up to the committee members it might be worth just in case anybody this three would three work for everybody else okay now touch your ear three works three three okay so we're going to move the June 4th meeting up to three o'clock and I think what um but but we also know that organizations had three pages to submit so we're not looking for additional materials to I think it's a revised meet but we're not looking for any additional materials right right right yeah so right they revised I mean you know I agree I mean this was a short time frame so people may have put in a budget that they would like to revisit a little bit more for instance just um you know or you know maybe the program doesn't necessarily change what details do so I think if yeah if if they if you want to revise proposals they have that ability okay so that sounds fair to uh committee members okay all right anything else um on our agenda which just got buried on the um public comment we've had other items not anticipated within 48 hours so we're all agreement in agreement that our next meeting is June 4th at 3 p.m to hear from new applicants as well as receive revised proposals from current applicants with a plan to have sufficient time to meet and discuss the proposals and make a recommendation okay all right that's it meeting is adjourned thanks everyone thank you good to see you all see you all again you know a week and a half okay you well let's see how do we shut it off now okay there we go let's see you