ylaws that they oversee. And we have the Wetlands Protection Act and the protection that that affords us. What are we missing that you're saying or take any action there too? Or you just wanna have this resolution to reiterate all that, which is fine. I would like to have this resolution come before town meeting. I would like, as I said, for the deliberative body of municipal government to vote on recognizing Arlington's tree canopy as a public health resource as to the language of the resolution, if it's incorrect, if a comm is out of place. Again, I'm not an attorney. I'm not an expert in municipal government. I'm a tree hugger. And I did submit the, and seek the advice of Douglas Heim and Mr. Leone. I don't know how. No, but all I'm saying to you is, well, what is it, you're saying you wanna submit this, but what are you asking, what's in the resolution beyond what we're already doing? What else should we be doing? I'm not saying that sarcastically beyond Wetlands Protection. I believe. I believe.  Just, I'm fine supporting this, but what is it you're asking us to support? Okay, I apologize for speaking over you. The Conservation Commission has a specific parameter of their responsibilities. The Wetlands Protection Act, which I believe we changed in 2019, has its own parameters. I think the Conservation Commission does not overlap with the Wetlands Protection Act. Again, I'm not, and as I said in the past, I've attended many meetings of the Conservation Commission where they in fact ignored the buffer zone and allowed trees to be cut down. I attended those spy pond lane meetings. So in listening for us, the other committees that we have, and I think it's wonderful we have all of these committees, I think sometimes there can be stove piping in municipal government, much as there is in federal government where sometimes committees don't know what other committees are doing, unless you're fortunate to have members that overlap or really illustrative minutes and agendas. So I think there's a need for this resolution, the 15 people who signed the paperwork think so. I've gotten a lot of support from neighbors and colleagues. So I don't know if I'm answering your question. I think there's a need for it. That's what I'm asking for. You know, I don't want to keep, I'll stop there, but I don't understand what your parameters of the resolution is regarding further defining this as a public health resource. And I'll stop there. I thought maybe you would provide that, but I'm hearing that that's not something you can do. All right, Mrs. Mahan, we're gonna move on to Mr. Dunn here. All right. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So I'm gonna, first I'm gonna politely disagree with at least one of my colleagues. And I'm gonna say it's not about the select board passing through resolutions for the town meeting to consider. The good news is it's not even in our power. We can't block this from going to town meeting even if we wanted to. It's in the town manager act. As soon as you get 10 signatures, it goes before town meeting. It's the way it is. I'm totally, and I support that. To me, what this hearing is about and what our vote is, is what we recommend that town meeting should do. And there are times where we think about it. We say, you know, we don't have a strong opinion. We should let the town meeting decide. And if we take a pass and we say that, all right. So be it. There'll be times when I've probably said that in the past. Most of the time though, I think town meeting is best served when we do our jobs well, when we have a hearing. And we consider the various voices and then we make a recommendation. And so I currently am not persuaded that this is unique or different than what we already have on the books. I think the tree bylaws pretty clear. I went back and I read the open space report a little bit before the meeting. I don't, I've heard the proponents suggest that we need to, the trees, we need to acknowledge that the tree canopy supports public health. And I think the language, while it doesn't use the words public and health in that order, it clearly indicates public health through everything else that it says. And I just don't, and the other reason to do it would be to publicize the importance of trees. And while I certainly, you know, as for many years as it does me to the tree committee and I certainly support a lot of the work that they do, I don't think that this is the right venue to do that kind of publicity work. So I, if Mr. Heard, if you're entertaining any motions, I move a recommendation of no action. Done. So I would just say, you know, I agree with the notion that our tree canopy is important and I would certainly think if it went to Tom meeting, they would, you would probably get the votes to agree with that statement as well. I think like Mr. Dunn said, it's just what is this article creating that hasn't, isn't already in place. And I think that's similar to what Mrs. Mahan was trying to get at. And way it comes down on is if there's any number of statements or about issues important to the town that we could put through as a resolution to town meeting to reiterate in this being one of them, it's just a matter of whether or not we want 30 art resolutions in every town meeting with a quality statement that, you know, the vast majority of town meeting members agree with already. And I think that's what we're looking here with this resolution is, you know, most if not all town meeting members agree with the statement that our tree canopy is a public health issue, it's just whether or not we need a resolution in order to reiterate that. And so that's just where I am on that. All right, with that, this is a public hearing. We have two hands raised, three hands raised. A few, okay. We're gonna start with Mona Mandel. Ms. Mandel, if you can just say your name for the record. Hi, my name is Mona Mandel. And I'm 14 Water Street unit two, increasing nine town meeting member. I speak in support of citizen warrant article 78 to have tree canopy as a public health resource.  This is just a resolution to support tree canopy as a holistic way to address it across the various committees that we have and to raise awareness on this topic. So if the select board takes a no action vote on this, this also reflects how the select board feels about tree canopy as a public health. So that's also a message that you're sending to the community. So I just wanted to put that out there as well. And I think right now with everything that we're seeing in Texas and all over the world, I think this is something that we are seeing as a community, as a resolution. So I wanted to support this, the article that Beth has come forward. Thank you very much. You have Carl Wagner. Mr. Wagner, say a name for the record. Thank you. Hopefully you can hear me and see me. We can. Thank you, Carl Wagner, 30 Edge Hill Road. I wasn't planning to speak on Ms. Milovchik's proposal 78, tree canopy as a public health resource, but I have to speak to you members of the select board honestly and say, why not allow the town meeting a body of elected officials just like you five are four plus one will be five, I hope are to reiterate what is important. Like affordability, tree canopy and open space and wetlands are something that is lost and never gained again. And right now there are forces including within unelected town officials here who want to push for the things that could potentially hurt affordability and potentially hurt our tree canopy. And the argument is always made this is better for the people who live here. But honestly, Ms. Milovchik is 100% right. And I think the earlier commenter also this doesn't cost you anything. And yet it could cost the people who live here their fresh air and the open space that they love. And everything that was said by Ms. Milovchik is entirely right. Since the law that you're talking about being the same as what she's giving to the town meeting to speak on was written developers pay a price per head on trees and the trees get taken down. And we've seen this happening over and over again. I believe our representative garbally is part of a project that's gonna take down trees right in the town center. It's very frustrating for people who don't love trees perhaps as much as she does, but we just want air. And given coronavirus, we need air. So thank you very much. Yeah, Lynette Culverhouse. Hi, Lynette Culverhouse, Draper Avenue, town meeting member in precinct 11. I wanna thank Ms. Milovchik for introducing this article to protect a tree canopy and for the other two people who spoke in favor of it.  This includes everything that has life including plants and trees. Not everyone in town sees it this way. We need to do more. It saddens me greatly every time I witness trees and green spaces being destroyed to be replaced by man-made structures. While construction of homes is essential, the destruction of trees is optional. Trees are living organisms that absorb carbon dioxide and help to keep our air clean. They provide shelter from the scorching sun of summer from rain and from wind. And they are home to many creatures as well as contributing to our mental and physical well-being. They are in a symbiotic relationship with all other living beings. We cannot hurt trees without hurting all living things including humans. To some of you, this might seem sounds sappy but the science is clear and I believe that the future of humanity depends on our ability to live in harmony with other species and the natural world. There is a beautiful movie based on science about trees put out by Patagonia. May I suggest that we all watch it to help us grow a deeper respect for the valuable role played by trees in our ecosystem. I would like to urge the board to support this article that seeks to protect our trees that in turn protect and nourish us. Thank you. Yeah, Laura Kiesel. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, you can. Great. This is Laura Kiesel, Mass Ave, precinct six. I support Beth's resolution. I come from a background. I'm an environmental scientist by degree in training and I used to work for the town of Wellesley's Natural Resources Commission as their environmental education coordinator. I admit I don't know all the bylaws in Arlington but looking at the one that was just shared on the screen I do see differences in the nuances of language on that screen and what she's asking for. When you put in a request to have tree canopy considered as a public health resource explicitly it also calls in line in environmental equity and justice issue in terms of making sure that all of the residents throughout Arlington or in a given municipality where these kind of resolutions are proposed which I'm familiar with and other municipalities I've worked with have access to these resources. A lot of times in a given municipality they are concentrated in areas where there's more affluence and privilege and they can over time be deprived of certain areas or neighborhoods where there's less affluence and privilege. And I think we're having a lot of conversations here in Arlington about equity and access and I think tree canopy and the public health resources those offer especially when we're in the midst of a COVID pandemic which has disproportionately impact low income people and people of color is particularly important to consider. There was a very important peer review study that came out this summer that I would implore the select board to look at by urban ecologist, Chris Shell about the importance explicitly of tree canopy as a public health resources. And he looked at urban areas and suburbs that had trees versus less trees and the equity issues there and how if you don't enshrine that in the policy explicitly how that can have disproportionate impacts and just on the more local level there was just an op-ed this past week in Cambridge Day from Black Response Cambridge about affordable housing but also how a lot of times in that conversation access to green spaces and tree cover are often not considered or put into local policy. This is just a resolution but I think when we elevate that these considerations will come to the forefront of our policy considerations. So thank you for listening. Thank you. Elaine Crowder. Yes, hello. Yes, can you say a name for the record? My name is Elaine Crowder. Duke Glenbrook Lane unit 17, Tom meeting member from precinct 19. I heard the suggestion from the board. I have a question actually, not a statement. I heard a suggestion from the board in looking back at the bylaws that the possibility of amending the bylaw to add the language that Beth is proposing. So that would have to be a separate warrant article to amend. So that's what that was my question is that something number one that the board would entertain and if so, number two, what would be the way to do that? Thank you. So attorney Hyman, I don't think that's a possibility at this point. Correct. That's correct, Mr. Heard. So the warrant article is for a resolution. The resolution can resolve to do a number of things but it would have to advise of an intention to amend the bylaw. May I have my first question answered please? So the first, we can't do that is the answer. I'm not saying is that, I know you can't do that now. I'm saying, is this something that the board would entertain in the future? I think I can't speak on behalf of the board and this is a public comment question. So it's not a question to answer but I think it's certainly if someone were to propose it to us and made an argument, sure. Okay, thank you. Yep. And so there's no further public comment on this. There any additional comments from the board? Mrs. Mohan. I'll second Mr. Dunn's motion. On the basis of we have not been provided what the parameters are beyond what we have with the Wetlands Protection Act Conservation Commission and the Treat Committee. Thank you. Any additional comments Mr. Corsi? No further comments. Mr. Diggins. Oh, I do so many. But I just wonder, I know now isn't the time to discuss the philosophy of resolutions but my intention is not to shirk my responsibility and no, that's not what was said and no, that's not what was intended because I feel that our deliberation here be as it will be recorded or summarized by Mr. Heim will elucidate our feelings about this resolution and we can still put it in front of town meeting for the eight minutes that it's going to get. And so be whether resolutions mean or a good thing is a whole nother thing. But as I said, what I like about these, at least this one, is that it brings up an important issue that we can discuss and it's trying to find out what more the town can do. And so that's it, a little disjointed but there's more later on, thanks. Any additional comments Mr. Dunn? No, thank you. All right, yeah. And I would just, again, sort of reiterate where we were at the beginning of this conversation was that I don't think anybody on the board in any way, shape or form was trying to diminish the importance of our tree canopy. I think that's something that everyone on the board supports and has in many, many, many instances reiterated that support with not just warrant articles but just different agenda items that have come before us. I think we've always talked about the value of our tree canopy and how important it is to the town of Marlinton. It's just specifically on this resolution, whether or not this resolution to town meeting as drafted adds anything to the discussion and that's what the board will ultimately vote on. All right, with that, Attorney Heim, I think we're ready for a vote. Mrs. Mohan. Yes. Mr. Dacourcy. Yes. Mr. Diggins. I'm sorry, it's not going the way I thought it was. I think I am confused on the motion. So what's the motion to not vote no action? 10. Okay, so then no. Thanks. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Hurd. Yes. It's a four to one vote. All right. Now that will take us, Ms. Palakshak, if you can stay with us for article 89, we'll bump that up in our agenda here. So if you can present article 89 for us. Okay. Does the resolution still go before town meeting? I'm confused. Mr. Chair, would you like me to? So Ms. Malopchak, the board is just making a recommended vote of this board of select, or select board rather. You would submit a substitute motion if you wanted the town meeting to still discuss the resolution. Thank you. So Beth Malopchak, Russell Street, town meeting member precinct nine. The charge delivered to the African Lodge, June 24th, 1797 at Minotomy by the right worshipful Prince Hall is a document in the collection at the Library of Congress. It inspired me to submit to you a draft warrant article resolution to declare June 24th, Prince Hall Day. Democracy is an idea we believe in democracy. Prince Hall believed in democracy and in the promise it held to the enslaved. Prince Hall made democracy a verb. He was a community organizer. The 16 citizen warrant articles tonight and I understand there are more illustrate that Arlington is organizing. We are keeping covenant with democracy and with the intent of the founders among whom belongs Prince Hall. Community organizer, civic leader, abolitionist, first black and civil rights leader in America. Prince Hall created the first school organized by black citizens for black children. Prince Hall petitioned the great in general court of Massachusetts to end slavery and end the slave trade three years before John Adams drafted the state constitution. And Prince Hall's petition used the language of the Declaration of Independence only six months after the promulgation of the declaration. He was the first American to publicly use the language of the Declaration of Independence for a political purpose other than war with Britain. Prince Hall is the first African-American made a Mason in America. He met with George Washington July 2nd, 1775 in Cambridge to appeal to him to allow African-Americans to a list in the Revolutionary Army. July 3rd, he organized and founded the African Lodge in Boston now known as Prince Hall Grand Lodge. Prince Hall, a civic leader, a human rights advocate, an abolitionist in the 18th century. He demonstrated to Boston, to Massachusetts that black lives matter. It is fitting, it is time to declare June 24th Prince Hall Day in Monotomy in Arlington where he delivered a charge urging his brethren to see the suffering, to have compassion, to not lose hope, to assist the community and to do so respectfully. He described slavery, the passage and entreats his brethren to let Boston know, to let Boston know. I ask you to let Arlington know. I respectfully ask the select board to support this resolution. I urge the select board, if it is within their power to declare June 24th Prince Hall Day, please allow town meeting the opportunity to afford Prince Hall the respect and recognition he deserves. And again, I look forward to presenting this to town meeting that the elected representatives of the Arlington community, our deliberative body to offer them the opportunity to support this resolution. This is a community effort. I may have filed the papers, at least 15 people signed them. Many audience members here tonight and some who are unable to attend did research and discussed with me Prince Hall's legacy. Rosalyn Shaw published a letter to the editor in your Arlington. I relied on Danielle Allen's article in The Atlantic and on the material and speeches from Cambridge's 2009 dedication of their monument. I discussed with Alan Jones, a member of the local Mystic Valley Lodge himself and Mason and I conferred with librarians at the Scottish Wright Masonic Museum in Lexington. Let us highlight Prince Hall Cemetery in East Arlington. Let us inform the Arlington community as to Prince Hall's significance to our community and to the history of the establishment of this experiment in democracy as we approach the 250th anniversary of the events of 1775. We remain in democracy as of yet imperfect but with many supporters. There are eight black masons buried in the cemetery on Gardner Street. Prince Hall Day is envisioned as a first step in education, in an education effort. We hope to organize a speaker series and to support the inclusion of Prince Hall and his legacy in the school curricula. And Professor Danielle Allen and Professor of Ethics at Harvard has a grade eight curricula. We're in touch with her. She sent us an email today and I will be conferring with her assistance on this curricula and standalone courses that she has. So, thank you. Thank you with that. I will turn to the board, Mrs. Mahan. Move approval. All right, Mr. Dacorsi. Yeah, I'll set that in just a couple of comments. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank Ms. Milovchuk for bringing this forward. I did, in providing information, I found Professor Allen's article to be an excellent article. I also did a lot of research on what city councilor Simmons, then mayor Simmons did in Cambridge in developing the Prince Hall Memorial, which is on Cambridge Common, probably 10 yards from the monument to George Washington addressing the Continental Army. And I just have a question for you. As you brought this forward, Prince Hall Day, just wondering, was there any consideration of proposing a monument much the way Cambridge did, either in addition or not in lieu of it, but as an alternative to the print day? And I'm just wondering if you, how your thought process went forward selecting a day as opposed to maybe a process for a monument? First of all, I was very inspired when I read this charge because it so speaks to events happening today and happening over the course of the last decade and longer, as we all know, in the United States. I found it very inspiring. I found the language applicable. And my first thought was the speaker series, but because I believe in living monuments, I believe in monuments that are going to inform and educate and create discourse. So, but then I got to thinking and I met Alan Jones and Elizabeth Carr-Jones on Robbins Hill one day when I was up there walking and had just read a charge and we got into a conversation about it. I didn't even know at that point that he was a Mason. And so we shared our enthusiasm for it. And I said, speaker series would be great, people need to know about this. And then I got to thinking that before speaker series, the first step would be a day, a day to honor this towering figure of the revolutionary era, particularly as we approach 2025 and the 250th year anniversary of the events of 1775. Let's create this day and include this meritorious individual in our history. No one knows about him. No one knows that he's done these things. So I think, as I said, the first step is this day. I chose June 24th because that is the day that he gave this speech and monotony so that's our connection besides the cemetery. So we have the day, then a speaker series, there's a lot of enthusiasm for that among the Masons have expressed support for that. And I spoke to George Parsons of the Arlington Historical Society and he found the idea engaging. And then I think it's very important the development of the school curriculum. And Danielle Allen, the professor at Harvard already has a grade eight model that meets the state standards for what they need to study in grade eight, the different philosophers and writers. And then posing with, well, we've just exchanged that particular email today, but I'm eager to share that with you. Thank you. Have you had any contact with the Prince Hall Masons from the Dorchester Lodge? Yes, I have written to them. I have not heard back from them. I heard that that can be challenging, but I also contacted the NAACP and exchanged emails with them and they put me in touch with Pearl Morrison and Barbara Bolts, longstanding members of the NAACP from Arlington and they support this initiative. Thank you very much. I also point out that two houses up for me, 28 Russell Street is where the Arlington Civil Rights Committee had its first meetings in the 70s. This is another thing that no one knows. That's my next project. I'd like to get the Historical Society interested in doing some recordings so we can find any of the people still around. All right. Mr. Diggins? Thank you, Mr. Chair. And so a question through you, Ms. Belofchik. So my understanding is that there is an event on Memorial Day in which there's a commemoration of sorts to Mr. Hall. Are you aware of that? I'm aware that the Prince Hall Grand Lodge meets and I don't know where they initiate their stepping out but then they march to the cemetery on Gardner Street and then a personage from the Arlington Historical Society gives a speech. Rosemarie Zientski's speech of 2019 was very, very moving and George Parsons said that he would relay my admiration for her speech to her. I was unable to get in touch with her through their website. But this is different. I seek to create a living monument. It was more just a point of information. It wasn't really an argument against doing this because I'm for it. All I will ask is that the day be kept in memory. And so I hear that you have a speaker series but maybe not every year. I mean, maybe every X number of years means something is done so that the day is remembered because I don't know if we have done resolutions or proclamations creating other days and it may be my lack of connectedness that I'm not aware of those other days but I hope this isn't something that happens in 2021 and is forgotten in 2021. Thank you. Thank you. All right, Mr. Dunn. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I thought it was a really excellent proposal and I really liked the detail and I really liked what I learned and I liked that there is a lot more to learn and I'm happy to support this resolution. Thank you. And I'm happy to support this as well. Ms. Molafchuk had emailed me a while back now about this and I looked at the materials and did a little more research on Prince Hall and it's certainly a worthy person to recognize in this manner. So I thank you for bringing this forward. You're welcome. He's in the pantheon of founders and that needs to be known. Sure, thank you. All right, so at this point we will open up for public comment. We have three commenters for now. The first will be Elaine Crowder. I'm sorry, I had already promoted Rebecca Gruber who was first. Oh, sorry, it dropped off my list that's why. All right, Ms. Gruber. Thank you. Rebecca Gruber, Pleasant Street precinct eight. Well, you're all in support of this. So I'll be very brief since it doesn't seem like you need much convincing. I will say that over the last year or so I know that Arlington has initiated several efforts towards ending racial discrimination in our town and towards creating a more diverse, equitable and welcoming community. And I applaud these actions to improve our present and to ensure a better future. This is about not ignoring our history though. How wonderful that our history includes the personage of Prince Hall. Many of you have referred to Professor Daniel Allen a political philosopher and the James Bryant Conan University Professor at Harvard's work. And she describes Prince Hall as the embodiment of black agency. She promotes the value of featuring a man of color in the founding of our country. And she reminds us that understanding his black experience gives the fullest richest picture of what freedom is, why it means something and why we all need to hang on to it with all intensity and power. And as Ms. Milovchuk has said, Professor Allen is aware of and excited by this effort in Arlington to establish Prince Hall Day. The Prince Hall Cemetery on the National Register of Historic Places located in Arlington honors Prince Hall, community activists, abolitionists and leader in the free black community of 18th century America, allowing Arlington to claim a special connection to this important historical figure. And by resolving to declare June 24th as Prince Hall Day, Arlington further honors our town's connection to a man who fought for liberty and justice for all. Thank you. I am gonna interrupt the citizen forum for one moment and entertain a motion to allow our meeting to go past our 11 o'clock PM deadline. If we have a motion from the board. So moved. We grudge yes. For a second. All right. Do you have a motion by Mrs. Dickens? Seconded by Mrs. Mahan, attorney Han. Mrs. Mahan. I would say yes. And if you got the yes vote, please keep that in mind. Mr. Dacorsi. Yes. Mr. Dickens. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Hurd. Yes. All right. And Elaine Crowder is Ms. Crowder. If you could just say your name for the record. Elaine Crowder to Glenbrook town meeting member from precinct 19, I will also abbreviate my remarks. I enjoyed learning about Prince Hall when Beth mentioned that this is part of the town's legacy. One thing that hasn't been mentioned is that in 1868 Arlington town meeting approved locating the Prince Hall mystic cemetery in town as the final resting place for Prince Hall and his fellow masons. Over 150 years later, his legacy really has newfound relevance for our town. Town meeting can play a pivotal role today in elevating awareness of this important local change maker. As Beth mentioned, Prince Hall is a spiritual leader, a civic leader who established African-American Freemasonry in Boston and an abolitionist nearly 100 years before the Civil War. He was a patriot and many Arlingtonians today don't know his name as I didn't. So I see the resolution to establish June 24th as Prince Hall Day in Arlington as being something that would change that. Thank you. Mr. Wagner. Thank you, Carl Wagner, 30 Ed Show Road. Very briefly, because it sounds like you're going to rightly support this a couple of politically salient points to make. First of all, I believe it's Black History Month. So congratulations for saying yes to this as I hope you will do. Secondly, in following the words of Mr. Ducorsi, thank you for the select board's preliminary support for some kind of statue, which I think would be great in Arlington. I don't believe we have any statues to Black men in Arlington. Let's do it. Thirdly, there was some concern, perhaps about taking away from Memorial Day. And first of all, I just point out that everybody listening or watching the recording should go to the arlingtonhistorical.org website because there are like 24 years of great speeches that are listed there and you can read them and they are informational and emotional as well as informational. And also, I wanted to point out that in addition to Memorial Day, Beth's Day would give a second day and there's a third day which we probably don't want to put his day on. That is, he was probably born on September 12th, 1735 or 1738. We already have a town day and town day comes right around the time of our other great Arlingtonian, Uncle Sam, who was born on the 13th of 1766. Last point to make politically salient is that if we get this going in town meeting and they say, yes, fast enough and we talk about maybe doing something for a statue or a memorial, 1735 or 1738 was his birthday. And both of those have nice years coming up soon, either five year or 10 year anniversaries from his birthday. So this could all be stuck in a really nice way to commemorate some five year or 10 year anniversary of his birth, depending on what that is. So I hope you'll support this. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. And Mr. Sonija. Hi, can I speak now? Yes. Hi, this is Rajiv Sonija, member of the Arlington Human Rights Commission, although I speak in a personal capacity, resident of Mary Street. I also don't want to reiterate all the comments many speakers have made before me. And I'm glad to hear that it seems like the members of the select board are inclined to support this article. I also want to express my support for this article. And I'm very happy to hear today continuing on the theme of supporting historical aspects of this nation, honoring Indigenous Peoples' Day, commemorating Juneteenth. We look to commemorate Prince Holiday as well. It's very important for our nation and our children to understand that this historical aspect of this country was founded by many diverse people and not just people of European ancestry. And to find the end, I just want to quote, which is of a special relevance to our town. Last year, on May 30th in the wake of the killing of George Floyd, the Arlington Human Rights Commission quoted Prince Hall in their commemoration. And they said, give the right hand of affection and fellowship to whom it justly belongs. Let their color and complexion be what it will. Let the nation be what it may, for they are your brethren and it is your indispensable duty so to do. So I thank the select board for considering this article and I hope to see you voted in town meeting. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And Ms. Bergman. Hi, can you hear me? If you can. Okay. I also would like to speak in favor of this resolution. A few things that you should know. Well, first of all, anything about Prince Hall, I didn't know anything about the participation of black Americans in the Revolutionary War, even though I spent a whole year learning about it when I was in fifth grade. And that's why I think it's really important to commemorate him with his own day rather than sharing it on Memorial Day. We've too often made our black heroes invisible and it's been missing from our history. So it's really important to call attention to Prince Hall. A few things you may not know about him. He fought at Bunker Hill. He, a hundred years before Frederick Douglass, he called for the abolition of slavery and for unalienable rights for all men, including black men. And he is considered by having created the Mason Lodge for the black Americans to have created the first official institution, black institution in America. So I think he's very important. And I'm glad that you are all in favor of this resolution. Thank you very much. And I think I forgot to say that I'm on Park Avenue. Thank you. All right, and that is all our public speakers. Do you have any additional comments from the board? Seeing none, Attorney Hyde? Mr. Heard, just so we're clear, I think based on the board's comments, what I'll do is work with Ms. Malakcheck to assemble something in a resolution format and codify the comments of the board. Mrs. Mohan? Yes. Mr. DeCorsi? Yes. Mr. Degans? Yes. Mr. Dunn? Yes. Mr. Heard? Yes. The unanimous vote. Could I just correct for the record, Prince Hall is not buried in the Arlington Cemetery. He's buried in Boston on Cops Hill. Thank you. Yes, I know that. I actually grew up on Goddus Street and Memorial Way and then Fremont Street. And I actually have been down there for cleanups, but there are seven or eight, I believe African-American Freemasons who are buried there. So definitely knew that. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Malakcheck. That will take us to Article 79, Resolution Encouragement of Energy, Efficient and or Sustainable Energy Installations in Historic Districts. Served by Sue Doctrow. Who's Doctrow with us? I'm here. Hi. Hi, Ms. Doctrow. If you could just tell us for your article. Yeah, I just wanna say I loved that last discussion and I thank you too for supporting the Prince Hall Day. It's really wonderful. Okay, so this article, I'm Sue Doctrow. I live in 99 Westminster Ave. I'm a town meeting member for Precinct 21 and I'm a resident of the Mount Gilboa Historic District. And I appreciate your consideration of this resolution. We sent a memo that's in your package. So I'll refer to it, but I'm not gonna summarize it in detail to save time. I'm just gonna touch on a few points and mention a couple others. The resolution that we seek would be to encourage the Arlington Historic Districts Commission, which I'm gonna call AHDC, to approve all clean energy projects that do not irreversibly change, that is, do not destroy historic architecture. Mostly addressing solar panels, but the intent is also to include heat pumps. Based on discussions I had recently with people from Bedford, our HDC is relatively welcoming already to solar panel projects. And I think we can be proud of that. In Bedford, the first parish church had to go to court to install panels on their historic buildings. So some solar panel projects are approved by our HDC, while others are not. Projects that don't show from the street are probably a fair the best. But our HDC clearly also approved some panels that do show from the street. When the commission has not approved them, the reasons have included that the panels would not match the roof color or the panels could not be placed in a regular rectangle because of dormers and other structures. And this irregular pattern was often regarded as unsightly described as jagged and mosaic in some of the hearings. But recently I learned that these standards do not always seem to be consistent. So there's one recent example and that's in the memo that showed unanimous approval of a project that shows from the street but the panels don't match the roof. The roof is red and they didn't have a regular array. So I was really glad to see that the recent project was approved and maybe it indicates that the views of the commissioners are moving toward more lenience in the design standards. But it also leaves me with some sympathy for the people whose projects were rejected before because of roof color and the regular patterns. So a successful vote by town meeting on this resolution, I think would at least convey a message that many of us believe that climate crisis is urgent and Arlington is committed to net zero carbon emissions and we believe that clean energy projects should be of a very high priority with fewer impediments even in our historic districts. So I think this is why Sustainable Arlington voted last year when we first introduced this before the pandemic, Sustainable Arlington voted to support this article. And also as I noted in the memo, we really appreciate that the Clean Energy Future Committee is including study of this issue in the net zero action plan. So as a resolution of course, this would be voluntary. It removes no authority from the AHDC. Town council advises that town meeting does not have the power to create a bylaw that would exempt solar panels from HDC review. This was actually demonstrated in Bedford in 2018. The attorney general rejected a bylaw change that was voted in overwhelmingly at their special town meeting. Their bylaw would have enabled certain solar panel projects without HDC review. But it was rejected by the attorney general because of the conflict with state law. So interestingly, because of the way the state law is written, Arlington has been able to exempt paint colors and importantly the color of roofing materials from HDC review. I just wanted to mention that because as I noted, some solar panel projects have not been allowed because the panels would not match the roof color. So color seems to be an important factor in some of these decisions. So I'll end here, but anyway, thank you for listening. And I hope that you'll support some positive action on this article. Thanks. Thank you. Ms. Liggins? Thank you, Mr. Chair. So for the reasons I've stated earlier, I am going to support this. I understand that you understand the limitations of what can be accomplished with this. If nothing else, we hopefully need someone from the AHRD. AHDC. Thank you. Thank you very much. Even if my brain wasn't fried, I would have gotten that one. It's not late. Yes, okay. And it'd be interesting to hear them make the argument against it. So they'll have four minutes. You'll have four minutes, I mean, have at it. There. Is there a question? Yeah, I was just going to second Mr. Diggins' motion and thank you, Ms. Doctor, for the presentation. And I think it's worth hearing from Tom, meeting on this issue and realizing that the Starrk District Commission still has authority here. But thank you for staying up with us here on another late night at the select board. Ms. Mahan? No question. I'm in favor. Thank you. Thanks. Mr. Dunn. Ironically, I actually wish that they were here to argue now because I think- I know. I wish they'd come. Yeah, exactly. To me, that's the point of the, you know, that's the point of these hearings is that you make a better resolution, you make a better article, and that's what a more efficient use of time meetings time. However, the merits of the article as per- or the resolution, excuse me, as proposed, certainly makes sense to me and I'm happy to support it. You don't know that they aren't here to argue this. All right, and I'll support it as well. I think this is touching on a really important subject in town where we've gone through, we've talked about historic structures earlier in this meeting. And one of the things that Mr. Helmuth said jokingly at the time was that they're happy at the Jason Russell House to put a more efficient heating system that isn't at risk or in the building down. And so I think that this competing interest with the historic structures and this sustainability is something that is really important to everyone in our community. So I will support this resolution as well. At this time, we will open this up to public comment. We have two raised hands right now. Do you have Stephen Macalca? Mr. Macalca, can you hear us? Hello, good evening. I'm Stephen Macalca, live on Russell Street in Precinct nine. I'm chair of the Arlington Historic Districts Commission.  We haven't met as a commission about this resolution. So these are my personal thoughts. First, I just want to say thank you to Ms. Dogtro for her civic engagement across the year. She's been to many of our hearings and I always find her to be very thoughtful. So I appreciate her thoughts here. I did want to just say a couple of things to put on the record. I think as a commission, we've been very supportive of energy efficiency, where it's appropriate. And I think what's really important here is something that was in the materials you had that said that often the issues are site-specific questions and challenges of how to accomplish energy efficiency at the same time as accomplishing the goal of preserving historic structures and historic legacy in town. I think we try really hard to do that. We develop guidelines that give a pathway to applicants on how to get there, how we can find common ground. And I think we work really hard with applicants in the hearings to find common ground. But often it's site-specific. It's project-specific. Language like any application get approved, I think is difficult because of the specific situations that come up that need to be considered individually. And I just want to end by saying that I think that I cannot think of any heat pump or mini-split that we've denied in historic district. We've required that they be sited along the side of the house and perhaps be screened as opposed to, I've had a couple of people say we want to install them in our front yard. And then we think that that's inappropriate in the historic district. But we work with the applicant to find a way of making that work. And in terms of solar panels, we've approved 19 installations at least. And I think I've missed some in my, going back through the record here at home. There have been a couple that have been denied but I think those are for specific reasons that are laid out in the guidelines. And at least, I can think of only three and one of those were the applicant proposed to take off very significant historic features from the house in order to accomplish. And they weren't willing to be flexible and try to accommodate. So I think that we are generally very much support energy efficiency. We're appropriate and we try to work when we, as much as we can with the applicants to reach that goal. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mishog. All right, Beth Milovchuk, Ms. Milovchuk, if you just say a name for the record. Beth Milovchuk, Russell Street. I actually live right across the street from Steve Mokoga. He's in an R2, I'm in R4. And I'm on the Arlington Historic District Commission, recent appointee. I don't think I'm there yet a year. I'd like to thank Sue Doctorow for pursuing and bringing this resolution forward. I think it's timely. I look forward to discussions on the issues that Sue's raised and to refining the guidelines so that applicants maybe find the whole process less onerous. I've gone through the process and I've sat in on a few before I was on the commission. And so I think revisiting some of these issues is, you know, it's all about educating everybody and looking at the issues from different perspectives. And so, Sue, I'd just like to thank you and I thank the board for considering this. Thanks, that's all. Thank you. All right, and that is all of our public commentators. Any additional comments or questions from the board? Mr. Dunn. Thank you, Mr. Herd. First of all, I would like to stand corrected. Steve Mokoga made some excellent and very thoughtful comments and I jumped the gun and saying that they wouldn't be here and I apologize. That said, I support the resolution and I move that we support the resolution proposed by Ms. Dr. O. All right. You have a second? Second. All right, we have a motion and a second. Attorney Hyde. This is Mohan. Yes. Mr. DeCoursey. Yes. Mr. Diggins. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Herd. Yes. Mr. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Axtrop. Thank you. And thank you, Steve. All right, so that takes us to article 80. Resolution Facilities Department report, clarify responsibilities, track progress of the Department of Facilities and Maintenance. Before we take this up, I'm gonna go to the board briefly for comment on whether or not we'd like to take Ms. Thornton articles together or individually just for guidance. Mr. DeCoursey. Yeah, thank you, Ms. I think I'd have to finish for Ms. Thornton if she's here, if she's comfortable with going through all of them rather than have her wait longer and come back later. So if it's all right with her, I think it makes sense to do all of them. She'll stay on for sure. I just a little feedback into my experiment into the consolidated hearing. So Ms. Thornton, if you're able to, what you can do is just run down the articles that you have before us and then we'll turn to the board for any questions, comments that they have on any of the articles that you're proposing. Can I make a suggestion, Mr. Chairman? Sure. First of all, I wanna say in all gratitude, I mean, this is a challenge to democracy and you guys are rising to the challenge and I am extremely grateful for your endurance. I just really appreciate it. Rather, I've been thinking about how to go through this quickly and there are these five different resolutions are batchable and what I'd like to do is take them out of numerical order and give them to you in batches and then let you ask questions and then take a vote at the end. Does that make sense? Yep, whatever you're comfortable with it. So we'll take separate votes on all of the articles at the end. Right, that would be terrific because I'm not sure I can hold all five in my head at this point. So the first of all, my name is Barbara Thornton. I'm at 223 Park Ave in Arlington. I'm a town meeting member in precinct 16, I think. The first theme of the two, including two articles, 84 and 81, is I wanted to address the housing problems in Arlington and I will preface this by saying that these were all prepared to come to you a year ago and as I re-looked at them to bring them forward to this town meeting, I realized that I would think that they are all as important, if not more important than they were when I brought them up a year ago. The first one, article 84 is for the request that the Arlington Housing Authority come before town meeting and give a report much like Mintmandas and other organizations do that are important to the town and to particularly the legislative body of the town to understand what they're doing. Arlington Housing Authority provides critical services, the most critical services for affordable housing in Arlington. Affordable housing is a major discussion in Arlington and I would like to have the town as people in the town are thinking about how to approach that issue, hear about all of the resources available which includes the Arlington Housing Authority. So a nice invitation to them suggesting talk about your budget, talk about your master plan, that is the resolution for article 84. The related resolution under the theme of addressing the housing problems in Arlington stems from a meeting that was or a report that was done by the MIT students over a year ago for the Broadway Corridor. And that report has become even more important, I think as the governor's transit communities discussion and recent legislation came up. That report suggests that we are going to be looking intensely at the housing issues in particularly in East Arlington and around the Broadway, around the made transit quarters and around A-Life. I suggest that we have a design competition and there are ways of doing that. There are organizations in the region that can provide us with architects and designers to come up with some designs and that will get the process moving in town because inevitably we are going to have zoning legislation a year on these issues. And this will get the conversation started. So those are the two articles on housing and I'll stop there for any questions from the board. Board for any questions on article 84 or article 81, Mr. Dunn? So I definitely understand why, my question is, is why do this in the form of a resolution? And so the question about asking the housing authority to speak to town meeting makes perfect sense. That's town meeting inviting another body and it's absolutely appropriate. On the competition, have you approached like for instance the planning director or the town manager and asked, hey, would you do this separately without putting it before town meeting first? Actually, no, I remember this conversation went back to a year ago. So I don't remember if I talked to Adam Chaplain about it. I did talk recently to Aaron Zwerko about it and I have been approached by an Arlington resident, Charles Blandy, who's at Tufts University and he's bringing another team of students to me with his negotiation class to talk about housing and to use this concept that we're gonna be getting into about what kind of housing should we have as part of their negotiation class on behalf of the town. Okay, so I guess my inclination then is to either, and I'm not making a motion right now. My inclination would be to table this one and invite a conversation with the town manager or the planning director and see if we can get to an agreement without actually putting it before town meeting or alternatively, I probably wouldn't be supporting it. I'm happy to support the one related to the housing authority. Mohan? Try to be expeditious. My comments would be exactly along the same lines as Mr. Dunn's housing authority. Definitely in support of that, regarding the Planning Department Redevelopment Board or the town manager, if perhaps those conversations through email or Zoom or some other way could happen and then see if this needs to continue as a resolution, that's sort of my line of thinking also. So I'm definitely on board with the housing authority invitation. I'm definitely on board with the sentiments of Article 81, but if we can sort of circumvent not just the conversation, but actually getting this done by Ms. Thornton is amenable to this. Speaking or communicating with the town manager, vis-a-vis Planning Department, vis-a-vis Redevelopment Board, that's where I'm inclined to go. Will, thank you. Thank you. Mr. Diggins? Yes, I'm kind of feeling the same way as my colleagues, although once again, I'm going to recommend that it go ahead to town meeting. But for the HA, I mean, do they issue a report of some sort to the state? I mean, they are set up by the state.  There's no, they don't issue any kind of report I've actually reached out to people at the state and asked them what they know. And they said, well, you know, not a lot. So I could be, there could be reports that they give that are HUD required reports that are specific, but not like this is what we're doing in the town. It's more like this is how we spent the federal money would be my guess. I see, I see. Okay. Alliance reports. Okay, all right. And along the lines of the design, yeah, I was wondering, so let's say we didn't have the resolution process. How would you go about getting that competition? I would go meet with Adam and meet with Jenny and say, this is such a great idea. And then I'd walk over to the foundation in Watertown where they have this stuff. And then I'd find some other people at MIT and Harvard that might do it. I just like, as long as I had permission from the town and people wanted it done, I'd see what I could do to make it happen. All right. Well, let's get started meeting then, you know, at Tom Beattie, if this should get by, you know, and you get to talk about it at Tom Beattie you can tell them what you're doing. Adam and ask them to join in. Thanks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yeah, I'm in agreement with the comments that Mr. Dunn and Mrs. Mahan made earlier. And thank you for bringing these before us tonight. All right. So do we want to take a motion now or wait for public comment as far as two articles? Looks like we're hearing a motion to approve one. To approve one motion to table. Yes. My motion would be on the housing party. My eyes across like right now to move approval to formally invite them a resolution to formally invite them move approval on that. And the second Broadway corridor. I don't want to say competition. I don't want to say competition in any way. I'm going to want to just have a final decision on the reason why I've come to this table. Table that right now and allow the store to have conversations with Tom manager and supporting director. A second both. All right. Well, open up to public comment. We have one. Two hands raise. We have Mr. Wagner. Karl Wagner 30 HL road. authority is an important organization and just recently they started making their recordings of their meetings available on the ACMI and they have started to do many things that are really good like including some of their residents in their in their governing process. However, I want to direct the attention of the board. You know it's late. I don't know if you had a chance to look at the notes supplied on article 81. This is not the right way to do what the proponent hopes to do. It talks about changing East Arlington along Broadway Corridor to have units 50 to 200 per building. 25 25% units in affordable housing, but that's what we already have and it's area median income. So that would be for people potentially earning $100,000 or more. It talks about only really 75 to 100% one bedroom units. It talks about incredibly dense floor area ratio of 3.2. No height restrictions on building, waving other residential zoning restrictions. This is a Trojan horse and I would say to you please especially since the town meeting has voted no when they found out what density proponents like the proponent here were trying to push on us because they ruin our affordability. They heard our anti-racist action. They remove low and middle income people from Arlington and make it very difficult to move in. These kinds of actions are like a wet dream for developers. We really have to not do this as a as a motion of this sort. It should be completely open to debate in the town meeting. Thank you very much. Just a quick response. Those were not a question. We just got to continue with our public comments here. Mr. Leone. Good evening again. I would like to speak to Article 84. I can invite them this year. No use waiting for a resolution. I can formally invite them for the next annual town meeting and we don't even need a resolution to do that. It's not a problem. They'll be invited this year. Mr. Leone. Yes. Can you hear me? I just said I'll invite the Arlington Housing Authority this year. I have no problem doing that. We don't even need a resolution. Anything we can do to eliminate these resolutions from the town meeting, I'm a favor up because the way I look at it, each one is going to take 15 minutes. It's 16 of them. It's going to add three or four hours to town meeting for every resolution just to open it and vote it. At least we can eliminate this one. I'll formally invite them this year and every year after. Can I just ask a question of Mr. Leone? Yes, briefly. Can I work with you to word the resolution? I mean to word the invitation. You can send me your thoughts. I think that's the same thing. I'm not a lawyer. I'm always nervous. You can send me your thoughts and I'll write my own letter. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thank you. And Ms. Kiesel. Hi, this is Laura Kiesel from Mass Ave Precinct 6. I am a tenant at the Housing Corporation of Arlington and a Section 8 voucher holder with Arlington Housing Authority. And so I do think it's a good idea to have the Arlington Housing Authority to present at town meeting. But the one question or concern I would have is I would also hope that that would be balanced with having some kind of solicitation of listening to the tenants. I think that several of the properties have tenants unions. And again, I know Arlington is having a lot of questions about equity. And I think it's important to also hear from those who actually live at the properties. I know that they are starting to record the meetings and there have been a lot of concerns about maintenance issues, other things that aren't being addressed. I'm hoping that Barbara Thornton has solicited some input from AHA voucher holders in Arlington and tenants as well in considering this. Because I think that that would be a good thing for town meeting also to hear. I recently watched the town meeting recording from when the Affordable Housing Trust Act was voted on. And I saw that some AHA tenants were on the list to speak. But debate got shut down before they could even be heard from. And so no one who is actually a renter and particularly a renter living in affordable housing was listened to on that issue. Regarding the Broadway article, which I don't know much about, but I will say that I also recently watched the Arlington Human Rights Commission panel on housing and equity. And toward the end, this came up and Connor Ring, who is part of a tenants union renter here in Arlington and is an activist with City Life Vita Urbana, mentioned that if we're going to be developing Broadway or East Arlington Mass Ave corridors, it would be really important to also survey and listen to the renters and tenants and see what their concerns might be and how their rents are going to be impacted and their displacement concerns. So I also hope that will be considered or balanced in any of these articles. Thank you. Hello, can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you now. Hi, I'm sorry for the technical difficulties. This is Asha Kepka, precinct one. As a East Arlington resident, I would like to ask that you consider greater input when it comes to making decisions on starting design group competition from East Arlington residents. We are very concerned about redevelopment of Broadway corridor. And I even hosted one of the groups from MIT last year, year and a half ago, and we gave them a lot of input. And I don't believe our input was being considered in their design proposals. So I do urge you that you actually, before you even start any planning designs, you do ask residents for the input. Thank you. Thank you. All right. And that is all our public commentators. Do we have any additional comments from the board? Yes. I'm going to reverse my vote on the resolution. I think that the moderator has solved the question about the housing authority. All right. So we have a... I would say same thing on 84. Seems like the moderator is going to take that action. I'll move my vote. Dan was taking out his second time. No, no, I made the motion to approve 84 and table 81. So now I'll make the motion to withdraw from 84. Joining Mr. Dunn, who seconded my motion. Yep. All right. Any additional comments? So Mr. Hurch, for the sake of clarity, I move we recommend no action on 84. I think that's what you were intending, Ms. Mahan, correct, right? You were changing your motion to no action. Then I second. I just want to be really clear, but I'm happy to second it. All right. No, if Mr. Dunn wants to make that motion, I'll second it. All right. I've already moved on. Attorney Himes, we... I got it. I got it. So on the motion to table the design corridor article, Mrs. Mahan. Yes. Mr. Dacorsi. Yes. Mr. Diggins. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Hurd. Yes. unanimous vote to table. On the motion to... I'm sorry, Mr. Hurd. I don't mean to... On the motion with respect to the invitation of the housing authority of no action, Mrs. Mahan. Yes. Mr. Dacorsi. Yes. Mr. Diggins. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Hurd. Yes. It's unanimous vote. I will record that the board is essentially taking the representation of the moderator and the demoderator will receive input as generously offered to receive input from Mrs. Thornton. Right. And Mrs. Thornton, which articles did you want to present? 82 and 83. The themes that tie these two together are they strengthen the paths for productive citizen engagement. Yep. You can go ahead and present those two articles. The article 82 is to encourage a voluntary process where the practice of town meeting changes a little bit. And I've had conversations back and forth in the email with Mr. Leone about this article. And I think that there are ways, I know he's concerned about the losing his prerogatives and I don't intend that at all. But I think there are ways of simplifying the process around the one or two very contentious issues that come before town meeting that have a lot of moving parts. So I'm not talking about every article. And I'm not talking about lining people up in front of microphones for the floors and against. I'm talking about giving people that are proposing things in town meeting that are complicated an opportunity to break up their presentation so that that people can take part A, part B, part C, and all three parts are heard for the pros and for the cons. And that either Mr. Chapter Lane or Ms. Rate or somebody like that identifies those issues that before they come up and tells Mr. Leone about it ahead of time. And he either calls on those six people alternately or he says I'm reserving 20 minutes for those three people to come up and talk and the other three people to come up and talk so that the town meeting knows that everything has the main issues have been heard on these contentious issues. Okay. That's 82. All right. 83 is, and I think we've all sat through some testy meetings where people are not as civil and collegial as one might wish. And that's what happens in a democracy. But I think that there are ways when you have a lot of committees and a lot of people meeting and everybody is working on the best interests of the town, but things kind of get out of control if there is somebody in each of the meetings that is trained in facilitation and in setting an agenda and helping that meeting go through smoothly. So this is requesting that the town attempt to assign facilitation skills or train somebody in every one of the meetings that's set up in town. Somebody is there with facilitation skills that have been provided through the town. That's 83. So that is the summary of the strengthened paths for productive citizen engagement. And we'll turn to the board for any questions. Mr. Davis. Thank you. So the lighter one, was that the one that had a limit on the number of committees? Oh, I wanted to do that, but that didn't go through.  When I talked to Doug Heim about this, I said maybe we could just say we're only going to have seven committees in town. And that would make things simpler, but that didn't. I don't think I got down the stairs before thinking that. Okay, I thought I was like the limit of the number of committees that could be proposed. Yeah. No. Okay. All right. I did read something. I thought it was recent. So, well, once again, it's like, what can we do now? With respect to the me creating the facilitation while creating any training for facilities or having people trained to be good facilitators. What can we do now? What would you do if this warrant, I mean, this article doesn't pass. There's training out there, but if the town meeting doesn't feel like it's important, I don't think there's anything that I can that I can do. And the, I've talked with Julie Brazil about this a year and a half ago now, a year ago. And I, and I've talked with other people as well. There's, there's training available. But if the bulk of people in town meeting don't believe that it's important or that would be even useful to have that training, I don't think any committee is going to pick it up. Somebody, somebody in the town has to say to the committees, you know, this is a, this is a policy that we want to try and implement. Here are three ways you can get trained. Can you make sure that one or two people in your committee are trained?  Please do it. I don't think it can be done without a resolution. So you don't think the town can, can, well, how would, how would it work if the, if it, if the resolution passed me? So then what would the town do? Well, then the town would have, it is a little bit intrusive. And without, without the legislative body saying to the executive body, we agree this is an important thing to do. I don't know that the executive body would make it a priority. Maybe they would. I mean, I think the executives in this town have suffered more than anybody from the, from the discord. All right. And I mean, I'm just suffering like massive short-term memory failure. What was the first one again in this? In this, in this group, the first one was to encourage the voluntary process between, let's say, Mr. Chapter Lane and Mr. Leone, sitting down and saying on town. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, you know, I'm just going to wait because I see Mr. Leone's hands raised. So I'll just sit back and watch that one. So thanks. This is Mohan. Oh my Lord. Oh, after these two articles, I'm going to need like another five minute break, honestly. I, on, is it the collaborative training citizen review? I'm really not in favor of that. So I would move no action on that. And then I would be interested in hearing from the town moderator regarding the discussion around people speaking or citizen initiative. But right now my brain's kind of fried. So after we do these two, I need like a five minute break. So that's where I'm at. I would no action on the previous one and would like to hear from Ms. Thornton, the town moderator, and the one, two, three, four people that want to speak on that. Does it make sense to postpone all of this? I mean, well, we have, we're going to have busy agendas for a while. So while we're in this, I think we should at least roll through. I know. I appreciate that. I just feel like I've been carrying this for over a year and it's now midnight and nobody, I can't focus. I'm sure everybody's having a hard time focusing. So that would be subject to a motion from the board. So right now I'm just going to go through the board members for any comments. So Mr. Dunn. I'd like to hear the public. I would like to finish these two. And then I think I would be very interested in a motion to move on to postpone the rest. All right. Mr. Corsi. Thank you. Yeah, I'd like to hear from Mr. Leone as well on Article 82. And on Article 83, I see the intent that you're bringing up there, Ms. Thornton, in the issues that may arise on various committees. But I almost look at that as something that perhaps is looked at on a case-by-case basis. And there may be a particular committee where they may need some assistance and it can be offered. But I'm not sure I would support a blanket resolution to provide that type of training to every committee. All right. We will look to the public for input. This is the public hearing. If our moderator, Ms. Leone. Hi, Ms. Leakon. Yep, for the third time. I would like to speak to both of these. Three extremely briefly. I'm not even sure what town meeting has the authority to direct other committees on how to act besides setting them up and saying who their members are and setting their guidelines and guidance, their mission statement. Beyond that, I don't think we can tell them how to conduct themselves or what training they should or shouldn't take. So I think if this is going to go through, it would be a bylaw from the select board and not a town meeting resolution on 84. Oh, excuse me, 82. I'm getting a little tired myself. I'm against this one. Flat out. The way the town meeting actually works is we don't do people calling up and getting on some sort of secret list beforehand. Even if it's not a secret list, we're an open town meeting. The way it represented the open town meeting, the way it works is the proponents, I reach out to proponents or they reach out to me and they say, I'm the proponent, I want to have the first up and they get it. But they get their seven minutes. They're not going to come up in batches of six people and seven minutes each. If the proponent wants their time, they have to request it right up front and ask the town meeting for permission to extend over their seven minutes. And it is often the case, Ms. Thornton, that they split their time up between different speakers and we allow that as of right as long as they're under seven minutes. I'm often contacted beforehand by opponents of an article and I do look for them to raise their hand. This would be against the way town meeting has always conducted itself, at least in the time that I've been there since early 90s, 93, 94, and the way town meeting has always functioned. The bylaw or the notes that you've picked out, which I have up here on my screen at least, are from the town of Brookline. Brookline does conduct their town meeting differently than us, just as Lexington conducts it differently. They have pro and con speaker microphones and they have neutral microphones. We don't do that. We don't have people line up. One of the reasons we don't do that is for fear, at least my belief in the people, if there are 15 people at the pro microphone, someone may not get up and speak against something out of intimidation by the other speakers. I've always believed that and I think it's a truth. The way they function their town meetings is different from ours and that's why these moderator rules in other towns would allow for this pre-registration. Frankly, whether Mr. Chapter Lane or Ms. Rait shouldn't be interfering with the way town meeting functions and taking speaker lists, that would be a job that the moderator would have to do on top of his or her own daily job. It's just going to add complexity to the moderator's life. It's going to add, I think, a feeling of hardship among town meeting members if a stream of people get up and speak and even before the town meeting members who were there and have raised their hand have had a chance to speak, they could coordinate and say, all right, I'm going to speak, then you speak, then you speak, then you move the question even before the other side has the possibility. And it's always up to the town meeting to vote to accept a motion to terminate debate or move on. But let's face it, after long nights such as this for you guys, someone gets up and moves the question. It's going to pass. And the one side who has had a coordinated campaign to get on that speaker list and make the speaker list controlled by their foresight isn't doing any justice or service to the town meeting or to the democracy as I see it. You've got to rely on your moderator to some extent to know the crowd. I've been doing moderating in here since 2008. I've been a town meeting member since 94. I can tell who's going to speak which way to a great extent. They fool me sometimes, but I think we get a pretty fair debate the way it is. We get both pros and cons. I don't really think that this is needed nor do I think it's a wise way to start regulating town meeting more than it already is. I'll bring this to the town meeting procedure committee, obviously, but I can't speak to them without a meeting of the procedure committee, which you'll be invited to. But I would urge the select board to just vote no action on this one. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Wagner. Thank you. Carl Wagner, 30 Edge Hill Road. I appreciate the moderator's comments just now. I have 15 or more years I think in the town meeting history behind me, and I just wanted to point out that despite the governor's new law, which removes a lot of local control by making almost all votes down to 50 percent, the proposal by Ms. Thornton is the worst attack on local control and democracy for our town I've ever seen. Thank you. Mr. O'Connor. Good evening. I must admit that I'm amused by this conversation. I realized that the November, James O'Connor, former member of precinct 19, I did relocate my official legal residence to air, but I am an experienced assistant moderator and I agree with Mr. Wagner and with Mr. Leone as the current continuing member of the town meeting procedures committee that the issue about regulating what town meeting members do since we are subject to the voters election is that we represent our precincts and any organizational training should come from precinct meetings, which I think one of our members, Mr. Diggins, has been promoting quite a bit. When we have precinct meetings, we discuss the warrant articles, we discuss procedures with new members, as somebody that's been involved with town meeting for 23 years. Every meeting opportunity I had, I talked with fellow members of our precinct to discuss the issues, but I think to address two issues. One, is this something that should be a resolution? I have to say I agree with Mr. Leone in that over the last several years there's been a lot more resolutions coming from town meeting that town meeting really doesn't regulate its body other than to ask for a bylaw to set speaker limits and we've done so, but the representation of the membership really enables everybody to represent their particular viewpoints and if you start regulating that, as Mr. Wagner said, you're disrupting democracy as it is. I know we're all tired, but I also think we need to enable people's fair communication as members of the body and I just really have concerns about how much you regulate and how much you suggest that one must be trained to act with the quorum. I mean, we're all grown-ups when we get representative, we fail to do our job as a representative of our precinct. I would expect the voters to speak up and just like they can see our votes, can say, I don't feel it's appropriate that you get reelected, but to try to legislate that and to create a resolution that I think as Mr. Leone has pointed out when our town meeting procedure is coming up. I'll just close by saying I agree that this is going too far and I would hope that we can find another way to demonstrate on better representation if people are concerned. Thank you. Mr. Chair, if I could, we're past 12 o'clock, so if we want to go further, we have to wait the 12 o'clock rule. I will just say to everyone, and I usually don't bear, I have to be up at 4.30 to start administering the three disabled family members that live with me, injections and medicines at 4.30. So I really can't last much longer because I legit can't sleep to five, six, or seven. I need to get up at four o'clock. So I'm not going to waive the 12 o'clock rule. If somebody else does, I'll abide by that, but I can't stay much longer because Attorney Hybe can correct me, but I think we, it's an 11 o'clock rule, which we just open it up into perpetuity. Right, but then when we get to 12 o'clock, if we go beyond that, we need to waive the 12 o'clock midnight rule, which I'm not sure. I think that the board has traditionally set a parameter for how long it extends. I'm not 100% familiar with where that rule is codified, but my understanding has been traditionally that you guys take another vote to keep extending. All right. On the past two or three nights that we've been at midnight, Mr. Carroll's waived the 12 o'clock rule and we've gone to like quarter one. I just can't do that again. But I'll be guided by my colleagues. All right. Does anyone want to make an additional motion on this? Mr. Diggins? I mean, I think we can probably wrap this up in 15, 20 minutes, Mrs. Mahan. Would that be okay with you? So, I mean, I think where we are is we have two more public commentators and then we'll take a vote and then we'll entertain a motion when we wrap up this particular article, if we want to table the remaining warrant article hearings. Thanks, Mr. Chair. That's what I was getting at. I think we're around five to seven minutes left on these two articles that we have in front of us. So, we'll go to Beth Milošek and we dropped a one. Beth Milošek. And address the record? Beth Milošek, Russell Street, town meeting member. I support Carl Wagner statements and I hardly support the commentary of the town moderator and the assistant town moderator. I think suggestions of regulating our municipal elected deliberative body would be anti-democratic. Thank you. All right. Rebecca Gruber, speaker, comment. Ms. Gruber, you have to unmute yourself. People noted. I'm going to speak briefly about the other warrant article 83. I'm very much afraid that this warrant will have unintended consequences. I should say, my prior career, I delivered corporate education to Fortune 500 companies and I have conducted training in both facilitation and on getting to yes negotiations. So, I'm a huge believer in the value of this type of training and if the town has the resources to offer training to committee members who want it, that would be great. But it's been my observation of the many town meetings I've attended over the last several months that for the most part, town meetings are remarkably well run. The town residents who generously volunteer their time like tonight to be on these committees are dedicated to successful efforts and the results of their committees. And on the very few occasions when a meeting has resulted in conflict or discourse has been problematic, my experience has been that the committee regrouped and established or recommitted to group norms to ensure that meetings resume in a productive congenial manner. And this is to be expected from people who volunteer their time to work towards a greater good of Arlington. I would suggest that any effort to completely avoid conflict like this warrant article attempts to do would not increase predictivity but would rather result in decrease predictivity as discourse and exchange would likely be overly constrained. And even worse, it might discourage town residents volunteering to serve on these committees and cause current committee members to resign. Town residents who are made to feel that they lack the professional skills and motivations to work effectively with their fellow residents are unlikely to want to provide their expertise, their energy, their time to work for the benefit of Arlington. In short, I don't believe this warrant article is necessary and more importantly could potentially have a negative effect on the ability of Arlington to tap into one of its greatest resources, its resident volunteers. Thank you. Thank you. And then we'll close our public participation. So I'll open up the board for motion on articles 82 and 83. Anyone like to make the motion? Ms. Dunn. I move. I recommend no action. I move that we on both articles. We have a second. Second. Any additional comments, Mr. Stiggins? Well, I feel that I'm not saying that we should mandate training need to be a good facilitator, but I think it'd be good to make that available. And I understand that that may be something that the select board should take up because I know that I would, I would take it because I feel I'd probably take it every time it was offered because I feel that things would change me and it'd be good to have some insights as to how I could do better if I were in a position of facilitating. And with respect to the lineup of speakers, there is something that is bothering. I think most of us about the way the speakers mean or selected mean, whether this process that we have is the best we can do. Maybe that's the case, but clearly there's something that bothers most of us about it. And I think we need to work some way to make people less bothered by it. I mean, so look, I mean, lots of things we go before Tom meeting out of these resolutions that shouldn't. I have problems with the resolution process, but as long as we have it, I'm going to let them go. Thank you. Ms. Mon. My brain is like really twisted right now. So I believe Mr. Dunn's motion was seconded. If it wasn't, I would second it. And I'll talk to the chair tomorrow the next day about if we keep doing these marathons after midnight nights or if we can do like a day, you know, a 10 to four thing during the day to get to stuff done because I feel to myself personally, I'm not, you know, once I get beyond 11 o'clock, I'm not the same day I am. I am at seven o'clock. And that's just not fair to these proponents that also are staying up this late. So if someone seconded Mr. Dunn's motion, that's fine. If they haven't, I would second it. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yep. All right, attorney. We have a motion by Mr. Dunn, seconded by Mr. Corsi. Mrs. Mon. Sorry, attorney. Yeah, you need to take them separately. I'll do, I'm sorry, I'll do 83 first. Is that what? 82. 82. On a motion to action on article 82, Mrs. Mon. Yes, thank you. Mr. Corsi. Yes. Mr. Diggins. No. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Herd. Yes. Four to one vote. And on article 83 on a motion of no action, Mrs. Mon. Yes, thank you. Mr. Corsi. Yes. Mr. Diggins. No. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Herd. Yes. So four to one vote. All right. And so thank you, Ms. Thornton, for participating. We're going to entertain a motion to table the hearings on articles 80, 87, 88, 90, and 91. So moved. Second. All right. Attorney Hyde. Mrs. Mon. Yes. Mr. Corsi. Yes. Mr. Diggins. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Herd. Yes. Yeah, Ms. Thornton. We have correspondents received road safety concerns, Stephen Chong, 104 Lane Caster Road, overnight parking concerns, Eamon Keating, 65 Freeman Street, number two, and Blossom Street dedication for Allen Hovernas, Ara Gazarians, Armenian Cultural Foundation. Move receipt. Second. Mr. Diggins. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Herd. Yes. Yes. Your business. Attorney Hyde. Another business. Mr. Chapter Lane. I wouldn't dare. Mr. Dunn. Thank you all for the pleasure. Thanks for being here. Mr. Diggins. Welcome aboard. And maybe you'll have more frequent, shorter meetings tonight. Thanks. Mr. Corsi. A new business. Ms. Mon. Stay for the chair, unless you have new business. I've moved to adjourn. Second. Do the second. Second. Mrs. Mon. Yes. Thank you, Lord Jesus. Mr. Corsi. Yes. Mr. Diggins. Yes. Mr. Dunn. Yes. Mr. Herd. Yes. You're nervous. Thank you. I'm legit up in like three and a half hours. I'm not even kidding. Not that you guys aren't, but God bless you and good night. So long. Take care, everybody. Good night, everybody. Good night.