So, good evening everyone my name is Angela Mills and I work for the town manager's office for the town of Amherst. This is a meeting of the public art commission. And this meeting is being recorded into the cloud and will be uploaded by our very capable friends in the information technology department and will be posted to the town of Amherst YouTube channel probably within 10 days. Welcome to Governor Healy's extension of COVID mandates. We are conducting this meeting on Zoom, and it is open to the public, and the link has been published four to eight hours before this day in time on the town of Amherst website. So at this time I'd like to turn things over to the chair Terry Holt, and I want to thank everyone for their wonderful service. Thank you Angela. So how many we got right now? We're still waiting. We're going to wait a little bit more for Robert. He should be here. Okay. And Dara. Dara's going to make it. So Terry, Robert's in the attendee room. If you want to as host you can pull him in, you can make him a panelist. If you just click on his name on the attendee, on the panelist list, it should show you who's in the attendee room and then you click on his name in the attendee room. And I think. Loud to talk. Nope. There's a panelist. Yeah. There you go. That one. There you go. Beautiful. All right. Robert's here. Hi, Robert. Okay. That's one, two, three, four, five, six. Still waiting for Dara. So I'm going to take off if you guys are feeling okay. And thank you for waiting for quorum. And Robert, it's always good to hear and see you. Likewise, Angela. Take care. Thanks, Angela. Thank you. Thanks. Good afternoon and how's everyone doing? Good. How are you? I should say evening is six o'clock. We're going to wait just a few more minutes and see if Dara is going to come. I didn't get any. Any indication she was not going to be here. So we'll wait just a couple of minutes. While we are waiting. We have quorum right now, but we can have the little talk. So welcome to Amherst public arts commission meeting of May 11th, 2023. I am Terry Holt on your chair. Light of the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. We're still going by the emergency order from March 12th, 2020, allowing public bodies greater flexibility and utilizing technology and the conduct of meetings under the open meeting law. Pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021. This meeting will be conducted via remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so by clicking the zoom link. So I think I need to listen about all I need to say. All right. Let's give her a couple more minutes. Well, let's give her one more minute. So she's going to show up. In the meantime. Man, it's a beautiful day. I'm getting fantastic solar. I don't know about you. I'm excited because I just got solar all installed. So I'm like, oh, you did. So great. Yeah, very cool. I can't get it because we live in the woods. Oh, I'm sorry. I just got a quote for it, but it doesn't pay, you know, break even until like year eight or nine. And I'm thinking, I'm not sure I'll be here. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. All right. Six or five. We'll go ahead and make sure she's not in the. No, she's not in there. Okay. Let's go ahead. Start our meeting and if she comes along, we'll keep an eye out. Okay. So everybody have an agenda. I actually was just looking for it on the town website and. Was not finding it, but sure it's there. Yeah. Okay. So Jim, are you ready for a minute? So you need a few more minutes. No, I'm all set. Thanks to getting the agenda. I set up all my framework. Ready to go. Okay. So this meeting is not called to order.  Tell me that you're here. Mikey cutting. Here. In Barnhill. Yep. Here. Roy Friedman. Here. Robert Rainan. Here. Okay. Okay. I would invite public comment, but there is nobody to invite. So we'll breeze over that approval of the April minutes. Do we have, do we get a copy of those yet, Jim? I don't remember if I got. I sent them out. I'm, anybody have any, anything to say about the minutes? I think I might have. Not seen them in my email inbox. So. Really. If I have any problem, I'll get back to you, Jim. Okay. Well, let's take a look. I don't know why I didn't see them to everybody else. I'm looking for them now. Well, they would have come out right after the meeting. I'm having trouble with my computer like crazy. I mean, the mail app is giving me grief. So it's possible that I sent them. Refused. I have one that was sent. Received on 424 that has the draft minutes. Yeah. There you go. Okay. Okay. Do you want me to share my screen with them or? Yeah, you could, you could do that. I'm having a little trouble. My Gmail is running very slow. So if you don't mind, could you do that? Yeah, I think you need to make me a co-host. Yeah. Making you a co-host. Go ahead. Oh. Got it. Okay. Let's see. Great. Thank you. Okay. Everything looks, looks good to me. Okay. So I move that we. Except approve the minutes. From the April 25th, 2023 meeting. Anybody second? I second. Great. All in favor. Raise your hand. Thank you. All right. Moving on. Chair report. All right. Chair report. Okay. So I met with Shoshona King last week and. I get some information on how the commission historically runs and how to put our best foot forward. And Shoshona shared her ideas about how to network in town to the commission in the coming months. She also brought me for a tour of town hall where I met Angela Mills, who's fantastic. I love her. I can now check our mailbox at the Jones library. So that was great. Good meeting. To deal with what I hope will be a lack of centralized repository of our upcoming calls for artists. I requested the addition of a call for artists page on the commission's homepage of our town website. Jim, I'm going to send you this so that you don't have to go through it. Thank you. I sent Angela a very detailed request for the page. We need a more visible, easy to find location for all of our calls for art, since we're going to be having more coming up in the future. I'm hoping. Angela agreed to forward along our request to the communications director, Brianna. Sunride. Sunread. So that is the thing that is going to happen. I'm led to believe and that would be great. So if you've seen our homepage, I'm going to give you a link to that. I'm going to give you a link to that. I'm going to give you a link to that. And one of those four will now be calls for artists. So right on our homepage on the website, you'll see calls to artists and it'll bring you right to it. Just basically a posts page that will just list. The calls. So, and the first one would be, of course, the making a public. Okay. Moving on for making it public. I created a new post on the Facebook page for Amherst public art, reminding local artists about the project. I'm going to give you a link to that. Which we'll be talking about later in the meeting. Regarding strategic planning, I met with Robert on Sunday for a conversation on our possible next steps and we'll get to that later. And on boltwood, Port Hall gallery, the fiscal year deadline. I contacted Julianne Applegate and Matt Holloway, who are the co-chairs of the Amherst cultural council. And I asked for an extension of the deadline and they sent me a document to fill out. And I was like, I don't know what to do with that. I don't know what to do with that. I don't know what to do with that. I still think maybe we might want to go forward with a call for art just in case. Also, because since they meet once a month, it might be hard for them to get back to us. We'll talk about that in a minute. Also, I toured the gallery and I opened the lock door. And I took a look inside to see what the setup is. And I took a movie of it. So I can actually share that with you. So I'm going to go back to the gallery. I'm going to have a, I'm going to have to put the art in and stuff it back. And there's a, there's a, every all five have a place you can plug in something. I checked three of the plugs they worked. So my assumption was that they probably all work. So I was pretty excited by that. Okay. I wanted to thank Mikey for excellent work. You're aiding for our town hall gallery. I don't know if you've been to town hall lately, but it's beautiful. I love the latest, the latest installation. I don't know if you've heard of it before, but I think that's a great thing. I think that's an amazing thing. So I hope you're ready to type her install. I'm happy to do that. So that's exciting. Thank you so much. And also there's not here, but congratulations to her. I don't know if you've heard. She's one of the May 2023 feature poets in the Emily, Dickinson's museum, phosphorescence poetry reading series. On May 18th, which is exciting. It's virtual. I hope you can attend. This sounds fantastic and I'm so proud of her for getting in there. And so all of this I'll be putting in the minute so the link will be there as well if you want to attend. Okay, and that is the end of my chair report. And I'm going to send this to you right now Robert. Sorry, not Robert Jim. Robert's pretty cool. Robert doesn't want it. I think he does. No, thanks. It's like, it's like play catch only the job is not to catch it. Oh dear. Okay. All right, and All right, sending that set. Okay. All right, so first order of business is the treasure report. So Robert, if you want to take the floor. And I can make you close if you want to use the, if you want to share screen or anything. Yeah, it'll be a very brief report. I really have nothing new to add to what was reflected in the minutes last time about the balance in our account. I was, I did follow up with Holly, I believe her name is the controller at the time because there was some question about whether the. I think it was $2,000 or 2,500 I think trying to clarify if that money for the portal gallery was actually reflected in that balance the 4,100. So I have not heard back from her so I don't know. You want me to follow up with her. I think you should try and I guess maybe also with your contacts at the cultural council to see if they have a record of having transfer the funds are made the payment. Okay, my other question would be. And maybe we've already talked about this I think Shoshona shared with me some financial records but they seem to end a few years ago so there seems to be a gap. So I'm thinking we'll just start fresh, you know from whatever balance we're told we have, and go from there in terms of record keeping I don't think it's necessarily worth the time and effort to try to recreate the past few years. So, sorry, I agree with you on that. I don't think it's worth the time to reconstruct what we have spent the last couple of years let's just go put our best for it forward starting today. Yeah, and and once we start engaging in activities that have financial impact will will will keep track and that way we can report on how we're doing how much money we have left that sort of thing. Okay, so do you have approximate a current balance known balance. It was the balance that was mentioned in the minutes that we just approved I think it was something like 4184 and some change. So the current balance hasn't changed from the last meeting. Right, it's 4184 dollars and 28 cents. Thank you. I just put it hadn't changed. So I think, as we do move forward, Robert, you'll be probably designing a process for how we handle our the money and the budget and just if you'll just document everything so that we will actually have great, you know documents to hand over to whoever, you know follows in our footsteps So ideally, ideally each project that we undertake will create a budget for it. So, you know, the costs we know how much money we have to raise and then then we track it that way so. Yeah, we'll definitely have some documentation going forward. Great. We'll have spreadsheets. I love spreadsheets. We'll have spreadsheets. Very exciting, very exciting stuff. Anything else, anything for Robert. All right, moving on to town hall gallery exhibitions. Mikey you want to take the floor for that. Sure. I don't have the photographs because I can't. I don't know how you do it. But anyway, I'm Karen Reese town hall and talk to Shoshana and I back in September. And then about two months ago she said I'm ready. I'm ready to put it up. And I went. So I, she didn't know the process. Anyway, she does colored pencil drawings, and they was this was it.  Great thanks. I'm just gonna. So, Shoshana and I agreed to have her so we. I told her she could do July and August, because Stephanie's will be done at the end of June. Okay, sounds good. I have her website. If you want to join a great. website, so I'm going to try to share my screen and see if we can get this to work. Okay, can you give me the link.  Right. All right, let's see if I can do this. Okay magic you see you here. Yes, it. Okay. Let's move out of the way. Okay, so, yeah, she's got, she's got beautiful stuff here. Right. Each one. And they're colored pencil. These are, these are just gorgeous. I was looking through them when you told me about her Mikey and I just, I think her stuff is gorgeous. Yeah, she also did textiles to summer textiles but now she does drawings. I'm going to drag the corner of that so that it enlarges down the screen so we can see it better because it's really what I was looking at.  Here we go. Here we are. See a little better. So ghost trees, woven landscapes here and these are just so pretty. So nice and town hall so thank you Mikey. So gorgeous. All right so that's coming up and then after, after she is done then it's Isabella Halstead which I will get pictures of. She's already had one show. She had a show all through town. When, when. God what's her name. Now I drew a blank. Okay, hold on. So when the old person that ran the, the town hall was running it, she did an exhibit at the town hall of her courses. So did I send you any of those. I didn't see Isabella those stuff did not come through in the email but. Okay. Right, right. She doesn't have a website at this point, but she does watercolor paintings as well as oil and oil paintings, but she is been at UMass for many years. She teaches in English as a second language. She's retired now. She's 85 and she is the granddaughter of the famous artist Charles Hopkinson. She was the artist for the presidents. Wow. And she lives right here in Amherst. And so I have her slated for September and October. And then we have our famous Jim Barnhill. Oh, November and December. Jim, you sent me the, it was an email. And because I just got it. Oh really. So it was not a text. It was an email. So, if you have any photographs of your photograph. I'd say put one up and Jim will be November and December. All right. Quick question Mike because I just don't know how this goes. Do we invite any artists from outside of Amherst? Well, yeah, because Stephanie's lives in North Hampton now. So Pioneer Valley basically is what we. Right. Great. I don't even know if there's a limit to that. Shawna just said to me, anybody. Okay, because I know we have an on plane air society in town and I, I mean, I would love, I would love to have some kind of. They have a show right now at Leonard Art Center. Yeah, that's so exciting. I would love to, you know, get some kind of festival and get some of those in town hall and I've been, I've been going to lots of galleries and craft shows and there's been a lot of artists showing up at craft shows around here and I have been just grabbing cards. So I've got a lot of cards. Yeah. But the problem is with crafts, we don't have any plinths in the town hall gallery that we can put them in. We have no space. It can only be on the wall. So that's one thing. And what was the other. And the other thing is, oh, it's Amy Crawley who used to run the town hall gallery. They used to have Thursday night openings and Thursday night. You know, the arts night. So people would come in and they would see all the different artists. That kind of died with COVID. Right. So I don't know if that's coming back. I think it's too early to figure that out. And what I was told it's something that happened through the public arts commission. Yes, it was. And that's something that's up to us. We can talk about it, but I think we still have to wait for more COVID. But I think we still have to wait for more COVID. And I think we still have to wait for more COVID. Letting down, you know, so we're gotten. But that has been led by us. And I would love to take that up again. Right. I agree. But I think that's the biggest hurdle with artists work in the town hall. I please put this on hold. I am experiencing a computer disaster, which I cannot save the minute. It is frozen and I'm afraid I'm in the process of losing what I've done so far. But I think we still have to wait for more COVID. I think we still have to wait for more COVID. Well, I'll ask a question that doesn't have to go in the minutes. If an artist wants to show. At the town. Hall gallery. Do they just go online and they fill out the form and you got that Mikey. Well, actually, I haven't been getting it. There's, I'm supposed to be getting it. And I gave. I don't think I've ever gotten anything. I did get one from Terry. About a student at UMass. Right. And I thought we'd wait on that grouping till next year. When they're sending them to you. Should I send you if I have an artist who wants to show their. Yeah, I would rather than direct them to the website. I should direct. Yeah. I mean, I think it's easier just to direct them to me. And then I can look at their website. I can look at their stuff. I can look at their website. I can look at their website. I can look at their website. I can look at their website. I can also like more people. On my committee. Oh yeah. Yeah. I hear you. Yeah. We're going to talk about is calling for volunteers and getting more people involved in us and our commission. And that's something that we're going to be working on in the future. Right. Cause this is a lot of work. It's much more work than I thought. I bet. And I'm happy to help you in the next time you're hanging. Also. And I mentioned this earlier, the commission said that I had more people than I thought that would be appropriate. In Lakewood High School, one of the, our teachers, there's five right now. And ask him about students that would be interested. He said next fall, there might be quite a few. Right? Through the year that might be interested. That's good. Good. On our calls for artists page that we are having. So, you know, there is currently a place on our, I'm on that site now, but, you know, if you're not getting it, that's not good. Yeah, I'm not getting anything. I'm hoping that law will live under the same heading on this page that we're having them create so that. Because it says public art commission and then there's applications and you can upload spy images and it's a whole thing. So if it's not going to anyone, that really is a problem. Who with the town do we work with? Angela is sending those to me right now. So I haven't, I have only gotten the one. Well, that's fine too. They can go to you if you just poured them to me, which you did the last time. Yeah. That's fine. Okay. So you are getting them. Well, as far as I know, one. Right. Well, that's good. I mean, if you, yeah, that's good. Okay. When you can put a post on this moment, my file is frozen. I cannot save it. I cannot take the screenshot. I can't do deadly. Oh dear.  Well, this is all recorded. So we can always. Oh, okay. No, I'm not. So yeah. Why don't you just start from, you know, like close it down and then just start from when you boot another one up. Don't worry about it. That's what I'm going to have to do, which is what I just did. Being a quarter. That's that's my out. Yeah. Okay, wait a minute. Oh, it's going to recover it for me. A nice fantastic. No, it's not. I thought it was. You got to love it. Okay. So please, please, let me just have everything to the end of this year, which is good. Awesome. Okay. All right. Okay, I'm back. You're good. Yeah, I'm good now. Okay. Okay, so let's move on then to Boltwood walk gallery call for artists. Um, I'll talk about that first. Um, probably at Port Hole Gallery. Is it portal or portal? Well, we call it the Port Hole Gallery before. Hole. Okay. Or portal. P-O-R-T-A-L or P-O-R-T-H-O-L-V. P-O-R-T-A-L. But I think it's actually P-O-R-T-A-L. Yeah. Well, I have been misspeaking all along. I apologize. We can call it anything we want. Well, there is actually a sign, so we should probably go. Oh, oh, oh, yeah, there we go. We should probably go with that. Okay, so can I change the portal? Change to Boltwood walk the portal down? I went into the closet. I have a key. And, uh, the five windows for art all have a frame. Um, and, uh, it's, it's pretty cool.  That's why you can put little sculptures in there too. It's not just a flat surface. It could be flat too. Um, it really would do well with some lighting. I think I'm having a little something that has lighting would be really cool right there. Um, anyway, I took video. I can share that with you. Um, uh, I will be filling out the form that the Amherst Cultural Council sent to me and I'll send that in, but I'd also like to, I'd like to move forward with putting this out there. I realize we're not going to get any, any calls, but I think just getting it out there would be good for our image. And, uh, I think it just, it needs to be out there in the public and I'll share it to our page. Um, and, uh, I don't expect to get any bites, but obviously if we do, then we'll go from there. Um, I will also fill out the, uh, the form though, so that we're kind of covering both bases. What do we think about it? What do you mean by getting what out where? I want to get that call for artists for the portable portal gallery out into the world. And to where, where are you going to publish that? So we will go up on the Facebook making it public or the Facebook page for call for artists. And it'll go, um, there's a number of other places that we've publicized things. I'll have Angela help me and other places. There's also the Valley, um, Valley Arts Newsletter or something. Valley Arts Newsletter, which I need, I just found this, um, and I, it's free. So I'm going to make my profile on there and I'm going to, I'm going to share it to there. So, uh, what do we think about that? Like doing both, covering both bases. I think that's a good idea. Do we also, can we contact the artist who was there prior and just let him know that this is happening? So if he wants to do it again, he can apply just in case no one else does. I think we can, but I don't, I don't have his information. I don't know who it was. I think we had it from last time. Right? It's on the, um, it's on the, it's on the sign at the. It is that I took pictures. I can take a look at it. Okay. Ben Cowden, C-O-W-D-E-N. And isn't it also on, um, the town, uh, Town Hall site? I think he is. Ben Cowden. Cowden, C-O-W-D-E-N. Got it. Yeah. Let's think about that for a minute. You know, what are you going to say to him? We'd love to have you, uh, uh, display again. But of course, if anybody else whatsoever wants to. No, no. I mean, no, no, no, no, we would say to him, we're putting an open call out. You were the last artist. We wanted to let you know in case you want to apply again. Okay. So you're not going to make any promises about that's good. No. We still need to go through a formal process for, I still think, so we just need to get calls for artists out. And it's, I think it's good practice for us to get out in the world and we'll still cover our basis of asking for an extension. What do you think about that? I think it's good. Yeah, that's good. Okay. All right. Great. Um, Okay. Moving on to making it public. Um, okay. We have no applications yet. Uh, Gabrielle was invited to this meeting. She hasn't gotten back to me. Um, she has requested that our commission have input and finding and selecting the judges. So I reached out to you guys and said, Hey, I'd like, I'd love for you to give me some names and we'll start a list. Um, and I drafted a letter to send a potential jurors and I've got that whipped into shape. I think Lori took a look at it. So we have a letter, a draft of a letter that we can send out to any potential jurors that will be from Amherst public art. And then you can put your name commissioner. Um, or maybe I will be sending these out. I haven't quite figured out how this works. Brianna or Gabrielle is, um, I need to like sit down with her and chat with her. She's been a little bit hard to grab. She's, she's very busy. So I'm going to try to have a sit down with her and find out if she wants us to give, give her the list or if we need to contact the, be these people ourselves. So I will get back to you on that. Um, we have posted deadline of May 14th as a deadline for making it public. I would like to request that one of my fellow commissioners make a motion that we extend the deadline to the end of May. I'll make a motion to extend it. Second. Right on favor. Raise your hand fees. All right, Jim, you and. Okay. Thank you. Motion passes. So the deadline will now be the end of May. This will also refresh our news. Uh, this will be a new subject to put out there in the town website and, and on Facebook that we have been extended the deadline. So it kind of freshens up the news and I'll make sure that Gabrielle knows that so that she can send that out to, um, hopefully she can, uh, create a press release to send out. And if not, then I will. So we'll, we'll figure all that out and I'll let you know. Do you need more names of people to put on? That's my next question. Robert, probably Amy Crawley, who used to be on the public arts commission, who is now on another board that I'm on, but, um, she used to run the town gallery. Okay. And I am sending you a name right now. Shirley Jackson Whitaker. Oh, right. She's got an exhibit in the North Amherst hole. No, yeah, no, I've got one there too. Okay. Whatever the gallery is called there in North Amherst. It's the local gallery. Okay. This is names for artists to exhibit. No, this is name for potential jurors for the making of projects. Names of jurors. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Uh, Robert, do you have anybody? Um, I have a question first. Did we, um, did we determine the number of members of the jurors? Let me read to you what we have because that's a very good question. Okay. Um, we told the world in, in our, uh, all the literature on this, we said that we would, the art jury will consist of two APAC members, one representative from the Amherst cultural district, district, one representative from the Amherst BID, two members of the public and town staff, including representation from the planning department, department of public works, office of diversity, equity and inclusion, facilities department with additional representation from the Amherst disability access advisory committee and the Amherst design review board. Now we came up, we didn't come up with any of this. This was done with our prior town planner, um, who was, we were under the understanding was going to be doing the work of finding these people. Um, so, um, I'm a little, uh, I'm having a little trouble coming up with a, I have two names, but, um, it was a struggle because I don't, I don't know people just yet. So, I'm going to write these down and I'm going to talk to Gabrielle about it and see what she says. Maybe Jen Moisten. She's on the, I think she's on the equity and. You spelled her last name for me? M-O-Y-S-T-O-N. Okay. Moisten. Great. Um, anybody have me up there? Uh, I don't know her personally, um, but her name is, uh, Catalina Arubla. She's the executive director of the multi-arts, um, program in town. You spelled her last name for me? Sure. It's A-R-R-U-B-L-A. Catalina is her first name. Okay. I know her. Okay. She's excellent. Great. Okay. Um, I have two names. I have, uh, Demetria Chavez, who is a professor of Black Media Studies at UMass. And, um, her husband is very well known as, as a UMass professor as well. Um, and Letha Gale-Praset, who is a counselor at the middle school. Um, uh, she's a wonderful, a wonderful lady. They're having a lot of trouble right now at the middle school, as you probably have heard. Um, but Letha is, uh, is a, she's, she's amazing. I thought I would contact her and see if, either she's interested or if she knows somebody else who might be interested from the middle school. I'd like to have a little bit more representation, um, of, of schools. So. But we only are asking for two public represent, represent, uh, jurors from the public, right? So we have a lot of names. We do. Um, I think, yeah, what happens if you get more people that say yes, then I'm like, well, um, well, that's why it's a little unclear as, you know, I feel like we need to determine the size first to your point. And, you know, with all of those people who sound like they're town employees, at which, I mean, Jennifer Moisten is, so she could fill one of those roles rather than general public, but, um, I mean, I was going to toss into the mix and I don't have a specific person in mind. I, and maybe, I don't know. I thought it might be nice to have a student, you know, someone from the high school possibly to get, um, Okay, I can look at that cause I worked there. Yeah. And we definitely have to make sure we have someone of color. Well, we've got Jen. The two people that I have on my list are both people of color. Same with the person that I recommended, Shirley Jackson Whitaker, and she's an artist and, and, yeah. I'm going to make a guess that if we send names to other people who are supposed to get names, they would probably like it even if we don't pick them ourselves. So, um, I think what I'm going to do is take all of these names and, uh, contact Gabrielle and ask us, ask her what she would like us to do, that these are the people we come up with. We have not contacted them and, and see what she has. I think that's a good idea. I think we need to also talk with these people who work for the town. I don't know the town people very well. I could ask, ask Angela if she could help us reach out. So, um, I mean, we can all look up the names of everybody on these, on these committees here in the, you know, office of the, the DEI and the facilities, um, the DAAC, um, but, um, I don't have any insight into anybody who, who, who works in these commissions and stuff. If anybody else does great, but I don't have any context. So what I think I will do is ask Angela, she's been there for a while and see if she can give me some names too. So, okay. And like this, like a facilities department people, I don't, I don't know those folks yet. I look forward to meeting them. So. Okay. Anybody have anything else for anybody else? So we've got one, two, three, four plus the two I have. That's six and a student would be seven. Okay. For two, for two, for two jurors, right? Seven names for two jurors. Right. So I think we have to then talk with, um, I'm blanking on her name now. That's Gabrielle Gabrielle Gabriella to, um, decide, you know, how to prioritize the asks then. Right. Okay. Yeah. Plus, like I said, they may love it that we have extra names because they may be having difficulty coming up with names and they may like to pick some of the ones that we don't. I think the first thing I will do is, is contact Angela and ask her for if she has any, any names of people that she knows from these organizations because I don't really know anybody. And then the second thing I will do is send our list on to Gabrielle and see what she wants us to do next. And then we'll get back to you. Yeah, good. All right. So we have extended the deadline. So hopefully that will, uh, hit the new cycle with some new information and hopefully we'll get some people interested. Um, we're trying to make that call easier to see Robert was having a lot of trouble finding the call and I agreed. Um, that's why I'm wanting to put it on that front page, um, of the website of our part of the website and also share it to Facebook. So try to get it out there a little bit more. Okay. I think else on do we have Instagram? Uh, I believe we do. I don't think Shoshona has the password anymore. So I'm not sure how to get into it. So that's too bad because I think that would be a good place to share. I think a lot of artists use Instagram. I'm going to try to reset it using the, uh, the web, the email that she gave me with the password for the town, our commission. So I will try that and I'll let you know. So if that doesn't work, I will volunteer to, if you give me what information you have, I'll talk to Shona and see what I can do to try to get to get it working. I could also make a new Instagram if we had to. It's not, you know, I think it'll, I don't know, that was in the back of my mind actually. Yeah, yeah, you know, if we can't get in there, we'll we can, we can get around that. Okay, moving on to the next one. We're moving on to strategic planning update. Um, I have, so, uh, Robert and I talked and came up with some ideas and we'd like to propose some things to you guys for how to proceed for creating a process for doing this work that we're doing with the public art. Um, and we talked about it and we agreed that we are, we are each here for own reasons, we each bring our own strengths. And I think that we need to find a way to maximize those strengths and our, and our efforts while at the same time understanding that we are volunteers. Um, I want to honor your time and I think, um, I don't want you to burn out. That is something that does happen a lot in volunteer work as I'm very aware, having run a number of volunteer organizations, I don't want it to happen with us. Um, so that's something that's very important to me. Um, so Robert is going to talk to you about this and hopefully we'll have some constructive conversation and figure out the best way to move forward. So Robert, you have the floor. Thank you. So I think in previous meetings, we, we at least touched on the idea of, um, trying to come up with, uh, a strategic plan that would help guide our work, uh, because it feels like, you know, several of us are new. And, uh, just since the fall, it seems like a number of things have, have for lack of a better phrase, sort of been dropped in our laps and, um, you know, it doesn't feel like we necessarily have had a chance to, um, you know, further clarify what we feel is the vision for the commission and, um, you know, to, to define goals for the, the coming year. So, um, I'd be curious to get your perspective.  We were thinking about scheduling a retreat and we can talk about whether this should be a half day or a whole day, um, and really just devoting that time to, um, focusing on this more strategic, uh, plan and, and goals, um, because, you know, we feel like we're, we're not going to be as efficient as we could be if we're always just sort of, um, in reactive mode as opposed to being able to plan and, and have a vision and that would guide, you know, fundraising efforts, et cetera. So, um, I'd be curious to, to get anyone's thoughts on that, uh, and then we can talk a bit more about what the retreat might look like. And I have the first thing, you know, we'll have to do a doodle poll to figure out a time that works for everybody. Well, I don't think we talked about this. We talked about this and I thought the, I think it's a great idea personally. And I think what we ought to do is pick a date and go forward and do it. Okay. I agree. I think you've been putting out fires for so long that, uh, you know, we don't really have any time to take a breath and decide what we want to do, what our process should look like, you know, going forward. So let's do it again. I talked to Angel a little bit about this before the meeting and she said that we just need to pick a date and, uh, she will, uh, try to find a, uh, I guess we've either, she finds a location or we find a location and then we still have to let the public know and they are invited, of course, because they have to be. Um, so it just has to be a room that is large enough for us and for, uh, public to be there as well. So I'll let Angela know and we'll go from there. So I can do a doodle poll. Good. Get that out to you. I did want to ask if anybody has a problem with possibly meeting on a Saturday or a Sunday, because having a few hours, you know, uh, all together on a weekday is hard for a lot of us. So would you, would anybody be, would anybody have a problem with putting out like some weekend days? Oh, no. Uh, for me personally, I would, it would have to be a weekend. I wouldn't be able to have, uh, the time during the week, unfortunately. Yeah. No, that's, I understand me too. Yeah. So, uh, like a Saturday or a Sunday afternoon or morning would be better or afternoon, I can send out a bunch of potential options. Mikey. So I think if we're going to have it at the town hall, it can't be on the weekends. Yeah. I don't think it's going to have to be at the town hall. I think we're going to have to have somewhere else, possibly at Jones Library or there's, I think Jim is about to give us some suggestions. Well, no, I wasn't going to say we should decide how long we're going to spend, but I think that's key to figure out where we're going to have it. So are we thinking, uh, four hours max, Robert, do you think? Yeah.  I think if too long might not be as effective as a more focused time. So I think probably half a day. Okay. Or, you know, if we find we need more time, we could always schedule a follow up. I think it's, I don't think, I guess, you know, as we move into the process, I will think about what we want as an outcome from the meeting. I think, you know, I feel like we should try to guard against being overly ambitious. I feel like if we come out of the process with a couple of achievable goals, uh, that's, that's a good thing, you know, for, for the next year, and that's momentum to build on for, for the future. So I think to be realistic, you know, aspirational, of course, but, but also realistic, given that we are all volunteers and, um, you know, it kind of feels like we're starting from scratch in a way. So there's no kind of about that, Robert. Yes, we're starting from scratch. So, uh, so, uh, mornings are, uh, are afternoons better for people on the weekends? The better on Sunday's afternoons are better. Sunday afternoons. Okay, what about you, Laurie? Sunday afternoons can work for me. Okay. All right. So let's all send out some, some potentials and we'll pick one and we'll move forward. Okay. I think a four hour window to sit down and really, you know, have some, you know, the constructive conversations about goals, setting and, and, you know, processes will be really good for us. Yeah. Robert, you have something else? Uh, no, no. I was wondering, is there in all of the materials that you've now gotten boxes of or gone through, Terry, um, is, is there sort of a, um, anything other than what's on the website, Amherst's website about what the, this commission is charged with doing or, or a part of, is there anything? Cause I just feel like we sort of know about it because it's on the website or someone, Shoshana told us about things that were going on, but I'm a little lost in terms of, you know, there's, I don't know that is there any documentation? There's some historical, there's some newspaper clippings of past projects that we've done. There's a lot of forms. There's, uh, folders about past projects that I can totally share. I'll bring this to the meeting, believe me. Okay. Cause one of the things, I mean, I, I feel like the website, you know, the Amherst town website, it's really outdated and it should really reflect, you know, whatever we come up with in our strategic plan, um, going forward and so that it should be fairly visible for, for everyone to understand who we are and what we do. I think that's a question that we're going to be talking about in our retreat. Um, Robert and I have been talking about branding, um, the possibility of having, uh, you know, working on some kind of logo and that kind of thing. That's, uh, not the purpose of this upcoming retreat, but, um, it's something that we want to talk about, um, having some kind of logo, clear identity. I think it should be included because I think we should be in this retreat, you know, revisiting our commission overview, you know, what our charge is, what we say we're doing and really revisit it to see if there's anything that we want to change or if we're, you know, if it's fine the way it is, because that's really going to be the foundation for, for what we plan. That's what Robert talked about was coming out of this meeting with a more clearer vision for what public art should be doing in Amherst. Right. I look back and I've got a document from 2020 entitled draft committee charge. Great. So I will send that out to everybody. Yeah, any any past documents that would be would be really helpful. And since we are creating our own path forward here, I think that'd be helpful. Thank you. That's wonderful. Uh, just just to clarify, sorry, one clarifying question. If there are some documents that we would like to share regarding strategic planning, etc. Before the actual get together, I can I can send those as long as I'm not asking for discussion or vote or anything. That's that's permissible, Jim. You can send them if there is no deliberation, meaning no discussion. Right. So just please see attached documents. Right, you can do that. OK. The other thing, let me just say that the other members of the committee cannot discuss the document with a quorum and the quorum can be either a quorum at the same time or it can be one where you get A talks to B, B talks to C, C talks to D and all of a sudden the quorum has been talked to. They can't do that either. OK. But you can send them. OK, so we can send documents. We can't really talk about them. So to be good idea to send them to me because I have to attach them to the minutes. If you're submitting them, if they're submitted to the meeting, then they have to be attached to the minutes. OK. So it's not a big deal. OK. I think else for strategic planning. I guess I have one question. Because I was looking at the website and I think I asked this early on and we never got an answer. When it has the tour Amherst art, you know, that's kind of an old thing there. And I wonder. And I think we asked this in the past, but I don't know that ever got answered. Which art public art in the town is the Amherst Public Arts Commission responsible for? Oh, good question. Which say that again, I'm sorry. Which which which art was something that our Commission did. Is that what you're saying? Are we responsible for? Yes. Are we responsible for carrying forward and stewarding? Clearly, the Robert Frost Emily one poetic dialogue right comes under us. Yeah, poetic dialogue. And I actually, I guess I should ask if where we are with that, by the way, that's next. But yeah, so poetic dialogue. But on this list of, you know, all this art that's in Amherst that's here, that's public art, which of those are we responsible for caretaking, looking after which of it, you know, what's owned by the town. I think that's just really important for us to know what we're responsible for, that's already there. Yeah. And I don't know what are our assets and what are responsibilities to those assets. That's something we should probably try to bring to the retreat, too. Yeah. Well, I'll go through my files from the previous appointment and make a list of what I know about. Great. I think great. Yeah, any legacy documents that you happen to find, Jim, do you think that might help our move forward? If you could share those really, really helpful, including documents. OK. OK. And on that note, I wanted to talk about just the and other business not reasonably expected. I just didn't have a place for this regarding the poetic dialogue. When I spoke to Shoshana last last week, I she said she gave me the name of the person, which I have written down, and I have his phone number. And so I think what I'm going to do is with your permission, I will call him and see if he can repair this this this art and find out what his what his estimate will be. And if it is, I'd like to see if maybe we can approve, we can vote for and approve to pay him up to five hundred dollars and with no problem. And then Robert and I will both have to sign a check. It's two signers. And if his estimate comes in over five hundred, then I think I'm going to wait until our next meeting to get that approval. So what do we think about that? I just want to get it done. I just want to get it off our plate. You know, yeah. OK. I move that we approve paying up to five hundred dollars to repair poetic dialogue. I second. Great. Everybody in favor? Raise your hand. Jim, are you OK with that? Yeah, I just can't type and write and raise your hand. OK, I will be calling Jamil. I have his name written down somewhere. OK, so I will give him a call and see what he says. And we'll just move forward with that. I think that's all I've got on my list. Anybody would like to talk about any other subjects or. The thing I want one question. So are the I'm just on the website again. Are we responsible for those public boxes, electric boxes? Yes, so. By Amherst is a project that our town manager would like us to take up again, and I'm going to be meeting with him and asking him for a budget so that we can do that going forward. Robert and I talked about the fact that we need to go to Finance Committee and ask for money every year and we don't have any process for this. No one has said anything about this, but we know it's something we need to do. That is a project that I think is is a fantastic project and I'd love to see it see it bring brought back and also Paul wants us to bring it back. So what I have decided to do is just to make an appointment with Paul and talk to him about it and see, you know, if he can throw us any money at it. If he can't, then we will be, you know, writing some grants will be appealing to the Mass Cultural Council. They have a deadline coming up in October for the grant cycle coming up. So we'll we could ask we could ask for money for part of that for that for that project. So that is something that's kind of a future project. We can talk about that down the road. That is that is kind of my plan. Excellent. Thank you. All right. In the meantime, when you're driving around Amherst, if you see a transformer box that is a really been beaten with the ugly stick, then let, you know, write down the locations that we know, which ones we'd like to pin point this time. And I honestly feel like like we we center so much of our art and focus on downtown. I would love to see us reaching out toward other parts of town. You know, South Amherst has nothing. This is where I live. It was complete. So yeah, be on the lookout for other other places we can spread some art. I think that'd be great. Good. Thank you. That's a good suggestion. Yeah. OK, if we are agreed that there's nothing else that we need to discuss today, then I would like to call for adjourn adjournment of meeting. Anybody have a problem with that? All right. OK. Well, thank you so much for your time. I'm so excited that we kept this to an hour. I was so afraid this is going to be a two hour meeting, but it was not. Thank you so much. Thank you, Terry. I will be sending you emails and letting you know these things that I'll get back to you about. OK, thanks a lot. Great. Thank you. It's nice to see you tonight. Bye bye. Bye bye.


Welcome to Nation Beat. I am Janelle Norville bringing you this brief on the pulse of our nation and highlights around the heart of St. Lucia. Millet residents vocal as works on the Millet water intake moves a full speed ahead. Following a comprehensive public sensitization campaign, the island records a decrease in suicide rates for 2018 and the nation's students function in the digital age. The government of St. Lucia has committed EC168 million dollars this new year 2019 to improvements in the water sector. The amount will finance projects at the John Compton Dam where phase one of the disilting of the dam began last May. The Denry Water Project as well as the construction of the Grace Water Intake. Further upgrades include the Millet Water Intake. In that community, residents have been fully engaged in the rehabilitation process. Lisa Joseph has a closer look at what has been happening there. Scores of residents from Millet and its environs flocked to the Millet Infant School on January 14, 2019 to obtain first hand information on the status of works on the rehabilitation of the Millet water intake. In keeping with the mandate of the government of St. Lucia to involve residents of communities at all stages of project implementation under the Disaster Vulnerability Reduction Project, the DVRP, yet another call was made for Millet residents to engage with local representatives of the consulting firm Burnside International and government officials. Eager to ensure that the interests are on the front burner, several persons asked forthright questions surrounding the nature of the project and its impact on the surrounding communities. Strategic planning manager with the Water and Switch Company, Wasco, Peter Novel, explained that the objective of the project is to re-establish the Millet water intake as the primary source of raw water with the John Compton Dam providing the secondary source to meet the shortfall. This, he said, will build adequate redundancy into the system, which is critical for reducing the risk to disasters. Local social and environmental safeguard specialists represented the consultancy firm assured residents that anyone whose property was compromised or utilized during project implementation will be duly compensated. The social and environmental safeguard specialists employed with the project coordinating units in the Department of Economic Development provided contact details that residents can use to allow for speedy redress or clarification on any matters pertaining to the project. Residents were assured that during the project implementation phase, which is expected to last approximately nine months, water supply will not be compromised. From the Government Information Service, Lisa Joseph reporting. Export St. Lucia Teeper is once again making significant strides in increasing the volume and variety of agricultural products coming from St. Lucia. In December of 2018, a grouping of local CMOS farmers made history by becoming the first to export sun-dried CMOS from St. Lucia to the UK. The test shipment of sun-dried CMOS, which was shipped to the buyer in the United Kingdom, was a resulting success, with rows of approval chiming through. To the extent that the buyer has already expressed interest in a second order of the product in the coming weeks, as well as considering imports of a wider variety of agricultural produce from the island. In preparation for the shipment, exporter Cohen Samuel from Total Health Food Services said that this new market has given CMOS farmers a renewed sense of hope, as they now have a bigger outlet for sale and distribution of their produce. The Department of Fisheries, a key partner in the process, says it is delighted at the prospect. Deputy Chief Fisheries Officer Thomas Nelson says that new and improved methods of CMOS farming will see farmers having greater and more consistent yields in time to come. In the meantime, however, he insists that proper methods and practices should be maintained. The CEO of Expo St. Lucia Tipper, Sunita Daniel, indicates that the market is going to be available and the quality is going to be of the highest. The CEO of Expo St. Lucia Tipper, Sunita Daniel, indicates that this shipment is the organization realizing that there needs diversification in St. Lucia's agricultural export products. We want to still support traditional exports but we want to look at other exports of other commodities and that includes agriculture. So there are a lot of commodities in agriculture that have a lot of export potential that we've not really been looking at. And for fisheries, CMOS is one of them. All parties involved say they look forward to the solidification of this new outlet for CMOS farmers and anticipate good things to come with this success. For Expo St. Lucia Tipper, Jason Darius, reporting. The Department of Health and Wellness records a decrease in suicide rates for 2018 amid efforts to provide inclusions in distress with accessible avenues to find help. More from Funnel Neptune. According to the Department of Health and Wellness suicide report, the figures pointed to a drop for suicide rates in 2018 compared to previous years. St. Lucia has recorded three completed suicides for 2018 compared to 13 in 2017. Consultant psychiatrist Dr. Julius Gilead highlighted the changes in the suicide rates over the last three years. As was noted, between 2015 and 2017 there was an average of about 7 to 8 completed suicides for the year and that was after the national health plan was started. But in 2017 there was a bump up to 13 which we saw a decrease last year, 2-3. Dr. Gilead applauded the suicide prevention efforts of the Department, especially with the support of the national health plan and also sensitization activities. The consultant psychiatrist also noted that despite the decrease in suicide rates, the Department will continue to embark on initiatives to mask significant gains in suicide prevention. We plan on doing things a little better this year to continue to incentivize the public as to the presence of the health plan and to remind persons that it is there for them in case they are having suicidal thoughts. We as well want to go out a little more to the other communities because our efforts last year were centered mainly in castries, apart from the TV ads. So we want to go out into the communities a little more to try to bring that help to persons out there who may not be able to come to castries to be a part of whatever activities that we are having here. Dr. Gilead is urging anyone whose life or whose loved ones life is in immediate danger because of suicide thoughts to call the national health plan at 2-0-3. Reporting from the Communications Unit of the Ministry of Health and Wellness, I am Fennel Neptune. St. Lucia has improved its passport power ranking in the Hindi passport index with citizens enjoying visa-free visa on arrival access to 145 countries. St. Lucia now sits in 6th place originally and 31st globally, moving up to sports. This marks a new high for St. Lucia, which moved up its rank in 7 spots since 2008. St. Lucia is benefiting from the need for greater visa-free access to promising destinations, which has grown steadily with increase of global economies. So how did neighboring territories fare? Well-greened a ranked 8th originally and 33rd globally with access to 143 countries. St. Kitts and Nevis ranked 3rd regionally and 27th globally with access to 151 countries. While Antigua and Barbuda ranked 4th regionally and 28th globally with access to 150 countries. This is Nation Beat. Coming up beneficiaries of government's $10 million school rehabilitation program, welcome the comfort. Welcome back. As the country looks to increase its economic competitiveness, St. Lucia's are benefiting from modern computer programming skills training encompassed in the series of innovation programs introduced in the education sector. Among them is robotics, digital literacy and computer coding. More from Alicia Ali. The 12-week pilot computer coding workshop was the realization of a partnership between the Ministry of Education, Innovation, Gender Relations and Sustainable Development alongside the Caribbean Science Foundation. It aims to increase student interest in science and engineering careers, especially that of computer science. Curriculum specialist for technology and integration, Jermaine Anthony said this workshop serves to encourage the formation of more globally competitive ICT companies. It is really a bit scary if you think about artificial intelligence, blockchain technology, Internet of Things and all of a sudden we are nowhere in the scope in terms of developing, producing, manipulating those things. We cannot continue to be just consumers looking out for the latest Samsung iPhone and we have no role to play in development. Cardinal Ward is a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MIT. Professor Ward also serves as the interim director of the Caribbean Science Foundation. He is encouraging more young people to consider a career in the field. The big box is in computer science where you are going to make life easy for lots of people by writing code that succinct, short, powerful, using mathematical algorithms and tools to enable computers to do their job faster. The pilot workshop funded by the United States Embassy in Barbados boasts of 20 diverse participants spanning gender and age categories. Participants age ranges from 16 years old to 40 years old while one-third of the participants are female. From the communications unit in the Ministry of Education, Innovation, Gender Relations and Sustainable Development, I am Alicia Alley reporting. Still with the education sector under the Equip project, government has invested 10 million in the expansion, rehabilitation and furnishing of several learning institutions in a bid to improve the quality, relevance and effectiveness of instruction. Parliamentary representative for Ancillary Canaries Hon. Dominic Fede has welcomed the injection, noting the importance of the upgrades to a key segment of society. The Ministry of Education has invested approximately 10 million to develop school infrastructures around the island. Beneficiaries of the investments include the Ancillary Infant School, Canaries Infant School, Millet Primary School and Rosocombined School. The parliamentary representative of Ancillary Canaries expressed his gratitude towards the Ministry of Education for the works being done in schools in the constituency. We have been the beneficiary of tremendous work done by the Ministry of Education in a number of areas. And I think that this is our own commitment as a government to the need to ensure that our kids are in the best possible learning environment. We believe that this helps to improve the education system significantly. And it sends a strong message to the students and to the teachers and to all the stakeholders that the government is very serious and committed to their respective objectives. Brenda Joseph, principal of the Rosocombined School, stated that the renovations have boosted the morale of the students and expressed her appreciation on behalf of the school. When they came and saw the building was painted for the first time, I could see that the children were enlisted. And I am so happy that this is done in addition to the washrooms. And I think that our children now would really appreciate school even more because they realize that they are being cared for, the facilities that we need for them to really perform well, the facilities are there. The principal explained that the newly renovated building will be housed in grade 6 classes as well as the special education class. From the Government Information Service, I am Manisha Antoine reporting. That's Nation Beat. Join us next time on NTN at 7.30pm with a repeat at 7.30am and on this station as we fill the pulse and heart of our community. You can also catch up with us anytime on the St. Lucia Government Facebook page or YouTube channel. I am Janelle Norville.


Why does the narcissist want you back?  They will regard you as perfect or better than in reality They will have this unrealistic image of you in their minds They might not discuss what happened in the past, but if they do they may even be apologetic They may regretfully acknowledge or excuse their behavior as Though they were just going through a difficult time and they needed time to work on themselves and become a better person They will say anything to get you under their thumb again, but none of this means anything to them They don't really believe that they were the problem. They don't think they did anything wrong But once a narcissist has done everything they can to devalue and discard you and Made you leave them and go no contact They will then put all of their efforts into securing another source of supply Because once they've already secured you They're not good at repeating the love bombing phase They don't really want to do that because they're used to you now They want something new Which is why they have to discard you Because they have to make room for their new supply They have no use for you anymore Because it no longer stimulates them. It's no longer exciting Every supply has an expiry date At some point they're going to get bored. They will start to see all these things wrong with you and Then they will start looking for someone else Even if you haven't done anything wrong at some point, they just no longer have a use for you and you may not be aware of it You may have thought that everything was fine But then out of the blue They don't want anything to do with you because they have their own reasons and they can also be very impulsive They will often downgrade with a new supply They will target someone who may seem less attractive someone who seems less capable because whether or not a narcissist wants a person around is Determined by how useful they are to them If the narcissist thinks that the new supply is more useful to them They will make them their primary source Even though they may be flawed Because to the narcissist, they're perfect This is what confuses a lot of people when they see the new supply It's like something out of the movie shadow howl Where the narcissist cannot see what is in front of them because in their minds Everything about this new supply is better than you They are delusional It's a symptom of their disorder They trick themselves into seeing whatever they want to see Because they could not manifest it for real So now they don't want anything to do with reality Because reality doesn't reflect back to them how they want things to be Which is how they end up stuck in their fantasy Where they see things as better than they actually are They engage in magical thinking Even though something may be bad for them They use fantasy to block out reality Which is why it always results in failure in the end Because they're so delusional They hold beliefs and oppressions that are contradicted by reality But at some point they do get a view of reality Which they see as a reflection of themselves And it disgusts them They don't want anything to do with it But they couldn't see any of this before Because they were stuck in the fantasy Which they used as a coping mechanism to deal with reality Because they cannot cope with reality But they want you back Only because they spent some time away from you You're like a drug to the narcissist When they're using it every day It doesn't have much of an effect on them But if they leave it for a few weeks and come back to it It's like the first time they're over again But it will lose its effect just as it did before And that is when the narcissist looks for other drugs That they have not built up a tolerance to Because that's all people really are to the narcissist They're just drugs that they use to self-medicate To cope with reality To feel better about themselves When the narcissist targets a new supply It's like they've taken a drug They're intoxicated They can't see the forest for the trees All they know is they want more of the drug Because it's new and it makes them feel better But it leaves them unable to recognize your value or usefulness It's only when the drug finally wears off That they are then able to see you as you actually are And that's when they want you back But until then It's like they're under a spell It's like they're in a trance It's like they're not consciously aware of what they're doing So then they come back Like they finally recognize your value But even then They don't see you as a person They just see an object that could be useful to them After their previous situation didn't work out for them Now they hate their new supply They don't want anything to do with them They want them running back to you They want you to take them back And give them another chance But it never lasts long Because they're not grounded in reality Their minds are always somewhere else Thank you for watching I hope this video resonated with you Please like, comment, share and subscribe If you would like to donate My PayPal link is in the video description Coaching in queries You can email me at Thank you for watching And I'll talk to you soon


The stakeholder engagement navigator web tool is designed to help researchers select the most appropriate stakeholder engagement methods for their clinical and translational research projects. It provides a comprehensive list of engagement methods, organized according to budget, time commitment, and number of interactions. Researchers can filter the list by purpose of engagement, such as gaining feedback, building relationships, or influencing policy. This allows them to quickly identify the best fit for their project. This article was authored by Bethany M. Kwam, Kate Itel, Marilyn Coas, and others.


And it's still the breakfast in Plostivia, Africa. Tunde Kola will be joining us via phone this morning. He's a legal practitioner. Tunde, it's good to have you join us. Good morning, my teacher. Thank you for having me. And thank you for joining. We set off with the leadership. On the leadership newspaper as Reconciliation Process drags, Wicke hits PDP again, says party towing path of failure. That's what it is. And there's also another comment that was attributed to him. And he said, what will he profit him? You know, if he joins the APC. Well, underneath of the leadership, the board caption on the leadership, you find, once again, the Buja politicians polarizing the party, ask Artiku to scrutinize supporters' electoral value. Nigerians are getting tired of the situation. And that's what you find. Another one says, as a caption on Leadership Foundation chairman, that Azai Abag's Blueprint Post-Humors Award. OK, not very relevant for us at the time. Seven Zamfra family members die after vegetable meal. I mean, it feels like there's something about food poisoning recently, because you have one or two persons whose meal has been contaminated. IBB at 81, Bullet has no ethnic religious bias. Let's unite against insecurity. I remember when my grandmother talks about experiencing the war. It's not something that anyone wants to experience. And so the bullets will not discriminate where you're from. It's not a good thing. And we should guide against it. Of course, you have a stakeholder speaking. Strike asks you federal government meeting and in debt lock. Nigeria to save $2 trillion from malaria elimination. President Mohamed Abu-Hari is saying, economy in security orders top agenda is governor's meet today. And I sit on the leadership newspaper. Let's go to the next newspaper on our table. And of course, this time we're talking about, not about the leadership, but we're looking at the punch newspaper. The headlines on the front page of the punch are quite interesting. The paper leads with this one. Atikoo, or PDP crisis. Atikoo, we case men hold peace talks on Friday. Are we not tired about this? Some people are tired, but I'm not tired. It was quite interesting to hear some of the things that the governor of River State has said in recent times. Very, very strong words. So I think the politician, I guess, rather would tell us some more about this. PDP crisis. Atikoo and we case men hold peace talks on Friday. The writer to that, a party that wants to win election cannot be involved in fighting. River's governor, Atikoo's camp wants meeting to hold in Abuja. Fintiri leads delegation, says sources. If I were Atikoo, I would take next flight to Podhakot and close this chapter. Ohamubuwa may have a point, because the recent picture from we case sprawling mansion on other George road in Podhakot is a private residence. But some rivers will call the government house, the new government house. It shows some former governors and present governors in PDP with Peter Obi and the wiki in a very nice and friendly picture. So they need to move fast in the PDP. Maybe, I will see what I guess says. The next one from the punch, power generation falls by 503 megawatts, workers threaten strike. ASU-FG meeting, deadlocked, lecturer stage workout. Bandits IPOB members threats to 2023 elections or Damba's I'll say in that one. Y7 million diasporas, other Nigerians unregistered. This is according to INEC. US group opposes Benin Brown's return to Nigeria. 30 children, 144 Libya returnes arrive Nigeria. Can see a picture of them on the front page of the punch. That's still an issue and one to keep an eye on. Four students celebrating wasps at Lagos Beach Drown. It's a heartbreaking one. Four students celebrating wasps at Lagos Beach Drown. Murdered Marpoly Queen's corpse found on her birthday, so according to her friend, an FIIRO restores demoted officers' salary amidst fraud trial. These are the headlines on the front page of the punch. Well, let's take a look at the daily trust newspaper that's been made available by a paper vendor. No respite for operators as aviation fuel heats 903 Naira. That's per liter. Nigerians show on air travel over high costs of tickets. I mean, who would not? Lagos Abuja return flight now 200,000 Naira. Abuja canoe, you have 160,000 Naira. And experts predict higher fare airlines caught flight. Month after month, the National Assembly resolution not yet implemented. These are the writers. I mean, I wonder what would happen because we're approaching the festive period.  It will just become, you know, a difficult time. We also saw pictures emanating. I mean, there were pictures from the airport where you see the airport's various country. It just shows that it's a lot. Well, we get to a tickle. Voters not rumor peddlers will decide your fate. And 2023 Boni Dambanzoa acts Nigerians to show on religious sentiment. Matawale, okay, is death penalty for kidnappers, bandit and informant. Desquired in Kwan Kusso's NNPP, Shakarow decides on next exit. Again, abductors of Nasser were commissioned to demand 100 million Naira just before move away from the Daily Trust newspaper, malaria budding on Nigeria to reach 2 trillion Naira by 2030. That's what the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is quoted to say. That's the much we can take this morning on the Daily Trust. Let's move over to the nation before we bring our guests in very quickly. We'll run through the headlines on the front page of the nation. The big one there, as you can see, 2023. Desquired in PDP as Obin meets WK Otom others. Party on self-destructive path, says reverse governor, are you must go. Rain to pound Legos Ogumoshu or your own dough, Eki Tiedou. All right, we're looking, it doesn't look like that these days. Maybe we are on the, what we call the August break. But we have to prepare for that. This is what the authorities are saying. Conditions of remaining 27 train attack victims critical, says negotiator. Jai's, okay, we'll leave that one. Don't lose hope, IBB tells Nigerians. Show this as he clocks 81. Happy birthday to him. Insecurity, terrorists bandits are threat to 2023 polls, says Dambazar. Governors meet today on insecurity. Legos stakeholders seek total ban on Okada. More from the nation, federal government, ASU talks deadlocked. Federal government, ASU talks deadlocked. Thog shoots four in Ondo. Nema receives 174 Libya returnees. And the final ones from the nation, Washington police intercept 14 suspects, 12 motorcycles in truck, and 14 drowned in Legos. Let's bring it at this point. Guest, Tunde Kolaouale, legal practitioner. Thank you very much for your time, Barista. Let's start with Wike and the PDP. And of course, Artikou Abubakar. Artikou has been told to hop on the next plane, as we can see on the front page of the punch newspaper, to Podhakot. Hop on the next plane to Podhakot, go see Wike, close this chapter out. Do you agree with that? Looking at what's been happening in the meetings Wike has been holding in recent times, days. Well, I agree that Elijah Shippewa Abubakar require to reconcile with Wike and all other persons who may be abusing the PDP. When you are putting a major election, like the 2003 election, you cannot talk to them when you do have the divided house in your hand. So to that extent, I agree that the reconciliation is the very prime and Elijah Shippewa workhouse agenda. And we are seeing how that has worked wonders within the PDP. Immediately as soon as we emerge as the presidential flag theater of the PDP, they went around all the other participants trying to make PDP stand. And we are from the middle-aged process that our reconciliation process is still continuing. And the manner that we carry the reconciliation process higher on product and deeper than what it is after the summary of the PDP by missing out the people like Wike and some of the product is considered an element within some of the product political party. But what I don't agree with is that we should take the next slide to protocol. For me, that would be an appeasement. A party member or the different political parties have constitutions, rules and regulations which provides to our members to behave their conduct and their responsibility towards the political parties. Wike would think about the obligations that we hold the PDP under the constitution, and under ethics of the practice of the policies. Like I said before, the mind is not using like an envelope who has been talked about by the answer but it's not within the, it's not yet inside the part of the answer. But it is given like a wounded and live for a minute and tell them. And we also give people the impressions that the party has borrowed money or emptied the bank so they get to compare that to a primary, a presidential primary of the PDP. First of all, if it's neck-dripping there, you will require to pay back that debt. Another of these days is that they have to put pressure on a larger people of background, the PDP, put heat on them so that they will begin to negotiate things and consist of many things to them and make it possible for facilitator is going to receive his indebtedness. And you and I will know, indebtedness may not just be an envelope, money-free means a loan, it may have cut the cost of the commodities in airs made to some people. So rather than appease Wike, I will prefer so that the party and the people of background to withdraw into line. I have a strong feeling that a larger people of background as the resources, as the rich, as the experience, as the connection, to win the PDP, to win the presidential election with or without Wike, I have that strong belief that when you are fighting a war, you will have a strategy, you will have a tactic. A larger people of background, politicalist speaking, is both in mass of strategy and that of tactic. All right, Tunde Kolawale, let's take a look at the leadership newspaper. It's about the federal government and ASU. And we know that ASU had been on this strike since the 14th of February, 2022. And just yesterday, there were feelings that it might just be better. They would come to a consensus or some level of agreement. But unfortunately, that meeting did not come to some any kind of agreement. What are your thoughts? I mean, time is actually going. The calendar year has been distorted for the students. And what does this mean? What we are having in the area of higher education is a strategy of monumental proportions. That the university, I mean, that our university will be short-term for all part of this month and then we will be unable to find solutions to the problems in that area. And don't forget, go and do your analysis. In the return to this people rule, go and do your part fine. You will be shocked about the numbers of days that ASU and generally the higher institutions in Nigeria have gone on strike in the return to this people rule. And I keep saying this. It is not democracy at all. It is not what we do in the National Assembly in Abuja in the respective data assemblies. Or in the data column of government, both at the local government, state level and the federal level. That translates into development. The time for development is education. After education, you need disciplinary leadership. After disciplinary leadership, you need very easy land follow-up. All the countries of the world that are developed, they are developing a rest on education. Go and set the US. Go and set this thing. It is the other, it is the Cambridge, it is the MIT and Lauda. Tundakala Wale, all right. Well, we neglect education. I don't know if people find solutions to there and Lauda. You don't have any own development. Tundakala Wale, let's come back to some of the issues now.  Some of the consents are financial, you know, apart from the payment platform system, which they have also asked, but really improving funding, some sort of increment of salary, an agreement that was made in 2009. And to be very honest, the federal government has been saying that they don't have what it takes, you know, no funds, lack of funds. That's what it is. Now, the meeting with the federal government, the BRICS committee that was being set up, it was reported that why there was no form of agreement was because there was no new offer on the table. And the federal government had asked you that the strike should be called off because your consents will be reflected in the 2023 budget. And that's what it is. But let's look at the crux of the matter now. Funding is a big issue. The government is saying they don't have the resources because if you're talking about increasing, you know, the salaries, we're going to be looking at a lot, about 560 billionaire, you know, expenditure for the government. And so shouldn't we begin to consider this as, you know, a reality, especially when we see what's going on in our economy? I agree that we need to generate new form of education because without forming education, the responsibility that the education sector have to the migrant people is difficult to make, for me. But the truth of the matter today is that the country is bankrupt. And when the country is bankrupt, the alternative is to have to meet the obligations of whatever monarchy requires us to make. We need that to merely print money and give to us to do whatever they want to do, which is at the end of the day lead to inflation or other sectors of the Nigerian economy and society will be shot down to satisfy our human demand. That is what I have recommended. In fact, I wrote to a lot of people in the later newspaper saying there are two people, as intelligent people, as one of the smartest people in our money to concentrate their energy on good governance. And I want to concentrate on their energy on good governance and we have the right people in power who are able to generate income, value, develop the economy, and manage the image of the country to that place. There are a lot of resources in the fridge, not just to develop the educational sector, but also in social and health and world view. But as it is today, the answer is we are not looking that direction. Which area of our lives not to run down? We have just mentioned the education sector this morning. Look at what is cost, the education for a per liter. Look at how health care has skyrocketed because of the challenges in that sector. The state of our roads, most of these places, are epileptic. The project has to put on the battle front. We have to buy a treatment and now that also provides a stretcher allowance for them and also feed them. All this is cost money and it is the daily resources that you are also looking at to find the funds for it. Oil and food wear is no longer selling the way to sell in the intelligent market because people are looking at a society's energy. So if I were asked to, if they would be honest with themselves, they took away their energy on making sure that good people get into government. When good people get into government, all areas of our lives would be adequately funded. Because when people who are good at government, they will be better and future managers of resources. What actually is into them for me is just looking at the case of war, which is not likely to bring any results. In fact, at the end of the day, it will bring about a new class of stock shops. Not just the ASU, not just the investment system and also the digital endowment. Or maybe we should think of selling of our universities to... No, I don't think so. If you sell off the universities, then the poor people in our mess will not be able to access universities or higher education. What will they let? Well, we are the private universities. We are a very creative way by which we can manage the universities. We are a very creative way by which we can manage all the research institutions. Don't forget that the research institutions are doing the same thing that the universities are doing. They also do teaching. But all the research institutions are also one that both of them are research, both of them are nine-hours, both of them are three-hours in bad energy, both of them are two-hours research to the normal. They are all one-hours and they're not prepared because of poor performance. They are like, no activities in there. They only draw salaries and then they go back out to play. We need to really begin to talk about good governance, rather than the quantum of money that goes into the pockets of individuals as studies and movement. Quite interesting. Toon De Kola, let's move on to some other stories. And this issue is one that will continue to be in the conversation until the strike is suspended, at least. Hopefully that Utah's agreement can be signed today so that we can have the students go back to school. But some Nigerians feel that the federal government now beginning to yield to some of ASUS demands is only a ploy to make sure students go back to school during the election period so they don't vote. You know, I've lived some comments this part of my way. Some people are not taking it. These are the same people who will say, no, federal government end ASUS strike. Yeah, I do edit the workshop for a table to do whatever it wants on this on the side. Absolutely. OK. The Daily Trust has its lead story talking about aviation fuel. No respite for operators as aviation fuel hits 903 Naira. What are your thoughts on that? You know, Nigerians are shunning air travel over high costs of tickets. I mean, we told Abuja Kanukos 168. Look at this. I have a friend who used to manage an aviation who was an MD of an aviation industry from 20 years ago. You know, I found back at the 20 years ago that he was managing one of the airlines. His complaint for me most of the time was the high cost of aviation fuel. Now, when they did this for the, the cost of aviation fuel in Nigeria is the highest in the whole of the West Africa region and one of the highest throughout the whole of Africa. So it isn't a thing that began to pay in. The cost is not perfect. And when the ratio of fuel is that expensive, cost of maintaining aircraft too, because we don't have any aircraft maintenance aircraft in Nigeria, we also be very expensive. I think the only one that exists is in Ethiopia and I think maybe South Africa. So what is the cost of all this? Our inability to refine petroleum products in Nigeria. If we have the finalists that are functional, they will refine petroleum products, not just for aviation, but also for automobiles and some of these other and zilaline machinery areas. But we'll be unable to do that. The second one is that our allies are one of the most toxic people that we can never think about. When they import this aviation fuel, rather than make simple profits, they make profits in a compound manner. Amen. And sometimes they will not blame them because they import some of these things using foreign energy. And because they cannot get the foreign energy through the CBN, they go to the black market to buy. And when they get to the black market to buy, the cost of buying from the black market will be passed over. So the consumer, and that is why we are moving in this cycle of inability to have a very viable and effective aviation industry. Of course, it's also not for gas. What happened when the out of gas was probing the substance in the petroleum sector? There are some of our allies who import the two ship loads of the petroleum products and they will go to the MMPC and say it is 20 ship loads that they are imported. And then they will now be asking the government to pay them the subsidy for that 20 cargoes of fuel. So it's a fire of corruption and ineffectiveness in government. Of course, at the bottom, we need to break the cycle, what I call the cycle of poverty in Nigeria that we really require to break. And we are going to break it if you don't let the government that can guarantee that. Thank you so much. We have to go now and I wish we had more time to continue this conversation. It's quite unfortunate as learned as we are as a people. I mean, if you look at Nigeria, we constantly say that we're blessed with human resource and material resources and what a view. Very knowledgeable people, but it feels like our decision at the end of the day has kept us where we are. We constantly have elected persons or we have people who are running the affairs of the country. And the result is something contrary to who we are. And it just breaks my heart, you know, every other time. I mean, look at that. And so you look at how much we're spending on things, the cost of running governance. Look at the fact that we have the resources. Why are we not taking advantage of it? We have the brains. Why are we not paying attention to the things that matter? If we say that education is the bedrock of the nation, then why are we acting differently? Why is it different? I really don't know what will happen. Maybe we'll constantly pray and hope that there's a miracle and things change. I don't know when that would happen, but fingers across and we're hopeful. We'll stay right here on the breakfast, but we have to take a break now. When we return, we'll continue with more interesting conversations. Please stay with us.


Even once we escape the COVID-19 pandemic, there are multiple urgent challenges facing our government in Westminster.  However, in the Queen's speech, which is a chance for the government to put forward their legislative agenda for the coming year, the most headline-grabbing announcement has aimed to solve a problem which doesn't exist. Yes, Boris Johnson's government has confirmed it will be legislating to make photo ID a requirement for voting, even though only six cases of fraud were recorded in 2019. Here's Matt Hancock defending the policy. There is some concern and it's surely you would agree legitimate concern about some groups in society about not having the relevant photo ID at the moment. I mean that's surely going to disenfranchise people, won't you? I mean look, the figures say 47% of black people don't have a driver's license compared to 26% of white people. I mean there is a real danger, isn't there, that you could ultimately prevent sort of key constituents in society from having their say. No, it's about fairness. It's about making sure that when people do something as important as voting then they are who they say they are and that we've piloted this, we've looked at it in great detail, we're committed to making it happen and I think you know people across this country want to know for sure that elections are fair and this is just one measure to make the country a fairer place. But apparently only six cases of voter fraud in the last election? Well I think that six cases too many and I think that you'll find there's very very strong support for the principle that our elections should be robust. It's just but it's just one example of important changes to improve the country to make it fairer.  For one this idea, oh six is too many, apply that to any other area of policy which the government writes. The austerity which the British Medical Journal said killed 120,000 people or led to 120,000 unnecessary deaths. Six examples of voter fraud is a real problem. 120,000 people who die unnecessary deaths because of austerity, well we're just cutting the deficit, we're just balancing the books. The other part of that argument which I think is I mean bizarre, it's not bizarre because I can see what he's doing, it's incredibly cynical, is decided voting is very very important so we should make it hard. The conclusion should be the precise opposite. Voting is very very important which is why we should make it very very easy. We should make sure there are no barriers to voting whatsoever because even in these proposals they're saying it won't just be a passport or a driver's license, there might be other ID which is acceptable and also you will be able to apply to your local authority for a free you know piece of ID you know so that they are trying to remove some of the barriers from it. I think only to make this acceptable so they can pass it through Parliament. But what you are creating undoubtedly and inevitably is a barrier to voting and if you create a barrier to vote that by definition makes it harder to vote which means by definition less people are going to vote. You can look at the data about how this is disproportionately going to affect different sections of society and we should that's incredibly important but the most obvious thing to say here and the most irrefutable thing to say here is this creates a barrier to voting why would you want to do that when there is no problem to begin with? I think it raises an interesting question which is that if the Conservative Party or the new party of the working class which is what a lot of the hot takes have been saying in the past week then why are they pursuing a policy which will make it much more difficult for low-income voters to cast their vote? Hmm it can't be that we've got this like really weird idea of working class which is coded as older homeowner and we've stopped thinking about working age people on actual low incomes have we and maybe that's that exact cohort of voters who Labour have been invisibilizing and traipsing after you know there's older homeowner voters. I just think that what this speaks to is the fundamental paranoia at the heart of the modern Conservative project because on the one hand they are absolutely riding high in the polls they dominate the legislature but they're looking at a generational cliff edge where they know they've lost the bulk of working age people and they cannot attract the support of people who are actually on low incomes and don't have asset wealth to fall back on and so that's why you see this measure which disenfranchises low-income people disenfranchises first-time voters and disenfranchises disproportionately people of colour as well. It's because they look at the shifting demographics in this country and they're scared. This isn't the bold swagger of a confident Boris Johnson who's you know striding around the red wall like a colossus this is a deeply paranoid and afraid political project.