And you should all see something on your screen that says the meetings being recorded. So, good afternoon and welcome to the first African heritage. Reparation assemblies meeting. My name is Jennifer moist and I am the staff liaison to the age. And I would like to introduce our members from our screen. From my screen view, I have Michelle Miller. Alexis Reed. I'm the director of roads. Town manager, Paul Backelman. Jamila Jemison. And Dr. Millikar Shabazz. So our first order of business will be to hold public comment. During public comment, we were here to listen and we don't respond to the public comments. At this time. And so we do have some hands raised. And I think we're going to. I have Susan. Hi, Jennifer. Hi, everyone. I only raised my hand in the beginning because I didn't see myself on the screen, but I realized that I'm going to be pulled into the room when the time comes. So I have no comment. Sorry. That's okay. Thank you. We can leave you right there. And from Goodwin Memorial. How did. I don't know. No. Okay. So that's all the hands raised. And so now we're going to do the members report. And so typically during a meeting, all of the members, this is a time for you guys to share any information on the topics. That we're in. To share any information in regards to our charge and our mission or information you would like to share with the group. That's not on the agenda itself.  A part of this assembly. And so starting with my screen. I'm going to say Dr. Thank you, everyone. So good to join with you to begin this important work. I am excited to be a part of. Working in Amherst to address. Important matters that were identified in, in various documents and resolutions that our town council at pass. And I think if we put shoulder to the wheel and work together effectively, we will make a lasting contribution to fulfilling those, those important resolutions. Thank you, Dr. Shabazz. Mr. Heather, hello, Lord. Yes, could you please remind me what we're saying? Yes, you're just introducing yourself and why you chose to be part of the assembly. Thank you very much. My name is Heather. Hey, Lord, also known as Hala. And I have done. I'm doing racism work, coming together work for many, many years. I'm excited about Amherst taking this step to look at. Ways to be more repairing and less harming and. I'm grateful to be here. Thank you. Thank you. And Ms. And Jamila. Good afternoon, everyone. Jamila Jemison and. I'm a physician by training. I work in the pharmaceuticals industry. I recently moved back to Amherst, just in the middle of the pandemic, but I grew up here. My family and I did here in 1980. And then I lived here until I went off into college. And basically I, I believe in reparations and. I thought, you know, I have a stake in this community. And I have a stake in this community. I have a stake in this community. I have a stake in this community.  So I, you know, if you don't get involved with an issue that directly pertains to you, I don't know what you're doing. So I wanted to come and be a part of this though. I admit I've not never been on like a public. Community serving group like this before. So I'm learning all the ways as we go along. Excellent. So I'm going to go over for that. And Mr. Irv Rhodes. Oh, no, you muted yourself. Yeah. All right. Hello. My name is Irv Rhodes. I've been living here for an Amherst for 40 years. Plus I think I came here. To finish the doctorate. I finished my doctorate and then I met my wife. We raised our family here. I've been involved with Amherst politics. And then also the social part of. Amherst for any number of years and various positions, including chair of the school committee, president of the Rotary club. And on the charter commission. And one of the things that I've observed then, and then a quote that keeps coming to mind is that people who are really. When they are part of history. They very seldom realize that they're a part of history. This is history making. And so I want to acknowledge that we're all a part of this history. And the importance of it. As we go forward. And one pledge that I can make is that I will be. A fully involved. And be fully engaged with each and every one of you. And I really thank everyone who was involved in getting me appointed to this committee for making yourself. So thank you. Thank you. And Alexis. Oh, thank you. Can you also. Hi, my name is Alexis read. I just myself, I've lived here my whole life. That's about 30 years. But the black side of my family actually came here in the 70s to work at UMass. And eventually, you know, that very deeply involved with the community and, you know, working with the James Baldwin scholars program. And just basically being involved in activism in general. And so it's something that's deeply rooted within myself. And I agree with so much of what everyone has, you know, been saying and that it's, it's not only historical, but also this. This urge to be involved and help out in, you know, in any way that I can. So there's that. And also this is just generally a, an extremely important. And I think that I, I am very invested in and, you know, always looking to the future and, you know, what, what does, you know, black joy and liberation and all of that look like in the future and how can we work to make that reality. Thank you. And Michelle. And I really appreciate what everyone has offered. I come to this as an extension of the reparations work I've been doing in the community for the past year as a representative for reparations for Amherst. And I am very humbled and honored to be part of this committee. It is also my first time serving on a committee, a town committee. So we're all, all of us are learning at the same time. So thank you. And I've been here since 98. Great. And so we also have with us. Paul Backelman, the town manager. Would you like to say a few words, Paul? Thank you, Jen. I hope you'll introduce yourself too. When we finish this. So I just, I'm just here to welcome you and thank you all for putting your names forward and standing up to serve on this really important committee. I agree with members who have said this is historic opportunity. It's groundbreaking work. This is work that is being done in other parts of the country, but not many other parts of the country. So we have the opportunity to be, to really set a standard for other communities who want to do this kind of work. I'm here and Jennifer and other staff are here today to. Help you learn about what it means to be on a committee. There's, it is different. Some of you have had a lot of deep experience serving on committees on school committee and other committees as well as elected officials, but some haven't. And so we want to assume that, you know, just go over some, what the rules are about open meeting law and things like that. And we're here to support you and your work and just keep us posted on what you need. And Jennifer will be your contact on that. So thank you so much. Excellent. And so as I said before, my name is Jennifer Moisten and I have lived in Amherst just about my entire life. And so I've been doing a lot of work around inclusion and equity. And I have to be honest, at first one reparations week, about a year ago when we started talking about them, I was trying to figure what that would look like. And so I'm very interested in seeing the different ways as a group that you guys come together and find different ways to do some of the repair that's been done. Great, great. And so for those, and as some of you are well known in regards to public boards and committees, but it is an entirely different beast on its own. And so to help us out to begin with, we have Suadette who is our town clerk and she is going to go over some of the open meeting laws that are very important that she's going to speak about. And so Su, I'm going to share my screen and bring up your presentation. Okay. And are you ready Su? I am. I can see it too. Can everyone hear me? Yes. Yes. Okay. All right. Well, nice to see you all. I just saw a couple of you at my window a few minutes ago. Welcome. And before we set upon or you set upon making history, just want to go over a couple, couple of pointers that, you know, as Jennifer said, public, public bodies are. Need to follow basically. So, so the, so the purpose of the open meeting laws is for a slide shows is basically to ensure transparency. And the deliberations on which a public body is based. So I'm not going to read this slide's word for word. I have some other wording here that I'd like to read, but basically the democratic process demands on the public. That they have knowledge about the considerations underlying governmental action. Sorry. Let me start that again. This makes no sense. Because the democratic process demands on the public, having knowledge about the considerations underlying governmental action, the open meeting law requires with some exceptions that the meetings of public bodies be open to the public. It also seeks to balance the public's interest in witnessing the deliberations of public officials with the government's need to manage its operations efficiently. And so basically this, this probably sounds familiar. If you've started to read your own meeting law guide that you should have been handed out when you were sworn into your office. But the whole point of this is to make sure that everything that you do is above approach basically in a word. That all the actions that you're taking are, are in the public eye. Nothing is hidden. And. Well, that, that's it. If you can go to the next slide. Sure. Yeah. Thank you. All right. So, all right. So we'll get into that. What I just said earlier. Or just a second ago a little bit further, but. The whole point of this is to make sure that everything that you do is above approach basically in a word. That all the actions that you're taking are. Are in the public eye, nothing is hidden. So I'm going to go a little bit further, but. This slide. So this is the question we get asked a lot. And if you go to the attorney general's website on the open meeting law, this is one of their FAQs. There's a few FAQs that they get asked multiple times. And this is one of them. So the calculation of the quorum. So if you are, let's say a nine member body and I'm on one right now. But if there are vacancies that it can get confusing as to how to calculate a quorum. So basically the open meeting law defines a quorum as a simple majority of the members of a public body. Okay. So a nine member body. A majority of that would be half plus one basically. So it would be five. So let's say that nine member body has two vacancies and there are only seven people. You may be tempted to say half. Or the quorum would be half of the seven, but it's not. It's half of the full member body. All right. So if there are, and if there are ever any questions on any of this, you can always call our office. I wanted to put that out there because we've dealt with this for, you know, years. All right. So the next slide, please. This is another issue that comes up. Through the AG's office, one of those. Multiple asked questions. So. Deliberations. So this is where you get into. You're talking about being careful about what you're talking about outside of a posted meeting. Okay. You don't want anything that you talk about outside of a meeting to be thought of as deliberation, or you will be in violation of the open meeting law. So basically a public body can communicate with other public body members over email, but only on certain things. Okay. Okay. So the next slide, which is basically distribution. Distribution of agendas or scheduling any kind of procedural information, any kind of reports or documents that are going to be discussed at an upcoming meeting, provided that no opinion of a member of that body is expressed because the minute somebody offers an opinion. That goes out to the full board of the full membership of the board. So that's what you're talking about. So that's what you're talking about. You're talking about the violation of the open meeting law because you're discussing something outside of a posted meeting. So you want to be careful with things like that. And let's go to the next slide. We threw this in here because we figured this is just a good framework for how to conduct meetings. And it's Robert's rules of order is a, is a publication that talks about. All different kinds of meetings and how to compose yourself, how to do it. And the chair keeps the order and enforces rules. And they'll be elected for a term of a year or more, you know, or whatever the membership of the meeting is the timeframe. Or they can be elected just to serve over that particular meeting. So it would be up to you to decide. And the chair will call the meeting to order once a quorum has been established. And members in that meeting are required to speak by addressing the chair. So, you know, they can, you can decide amongst yourselves how you're going to conduct this. This is just, you know, an example of how you can conduct yourselves during your meetings. And again, members may only discuss topics on the posted meeting agenda. So I know. There's a catch-all phrase which you can use in posting your meetings, which is any other topics that may come before this body within 48 hours of the meeting. And that's okay to bring up things that are not contentious. If you feel that they're just, you know, housekeeping kind of things, or, you know, something that's not going to be a topic of contention. But for the most part, when you post a meeting agenda, you really should be covering all the topics that you're going to be discussing at that upcoming meeting and try to stick with that and not include anything else. So let's see motion. So when you're in the middle of your meeting, if someone wants to propose something to the group to be voted on a formal proposal by a member of the public body can, can be brought forward by beginning with I moved that. So it could be I moved that we consider the April 9th meeting minutes at our next meeting. That's, that's like an example of emotion. And it brings it before the group and the motion must be seconded in order to be considered by the group. And then it would be voted on because we're in zoom meetings, all votes have to be done by roll call.  So that's how you handle motions and discussions, debates. Let me see. This would be, you know, once the motions put on the table to be discussed, you would just, you can, you can decide how you're going to do it. It's, you know, it's, it's good if each member asks the clerk, the chair, the clerk, sorry, the chair to speak so that you keep order. So people aren't talking over each other. But I think I've already talked about most of that already. So, and then you would put in the chair after the votes taken at the end would announce the results so that the public in here, you're going to have people calling into the meeting that don't have a visual. So we're going to want to make sure that what's happening is being spoken as well. Okay. Next slide. Yeah. And again, on the agenda, it sets out the order in which specific items are to be considered. And this is a sample format for an agenda. When you're trying to figure out how do we post an agenda? What, what should it say? Basically, these are topics. That are good to cover. So public comments, reading and approval of prior minutes. Any reports that you're going to be discussing. Any unfinished business from previous meetings. Any new business now. Just a little caveat on new business. On an agenda when you're submitting it for posting, which is done through our office. I'll talk about that in a minute. You don't want to say new business on your agenda because it's not specific enough. You should identify what new business you're, you're going to want to discuss. Okay. And then there's that other business, not reasonably anticipated. You should have that on every one of your meeting postings, which is, as I said earlier, a cover all in case there is something that you forgot to list. You can, if it's not a contentious item, you can list it under, you can speak about it under that topic. And then adjournment. Now adjournment, I know it's on the slide. That's something I, I, it's not a topic in my mind. It's not a topic. You really don't need to list it, but okay. Next slide. So meeting minutes. Let me see now. So you do have to take minutes of each meeting. And you're going to elect someone to be the minute taker. You can decide how you want to do that. Certain groups will pass it along to different members. You know, one person will do it for one meeting. Another person will do it for another meeting, or you may want somebody to take them all the time.  And minutes must state that when they're, when they're composed, they must state the time, date and place of the meeting. And identify if the meeting was conducted remotely. I know on our minutes for the groups that I've been in, we even include the link to the zoom video once it's been released. And you're going to list the members that were at that meeting and the members that were absent. You'll summarize the discussions on the agenda topics. The minutes aren't considered a verbatim. But they're not. The minutes are not considered a verbatim. So that's the listing of what happened at that meeting. Because that would be a transcript. So you can, as long as it's specific, but not so blatantly outlined, you know, you don't want to go too far in either direction. But just so the public that haven't, hasn't attended that meeting can read the minutes and know what was stated at that meeting. That's what their purpose is. And it's the minute should record any decisions made. So if there's any motions that were put forward and voted on, it will list the documents used. I think I just heard a little noise is my time up, Jen. Oh, no, you can continue. Okay. I heard a little bling. Okay. And list the documents that were used at that meeting. State the time that the meeting was adjourned. And you should approve your minutes within the next three meetings or 30 days, whichever is later. And this is also in the open meeting law. And also the law requires that existing minutes be made available to the public within 10 days of a request, whether they have been approved or they remain in draft form. Okay. And the last slide. And then I have a couple of things to talk about. That's not in my presentation here too, but you can always go on to mass.gov, the open meeting law. It's through the attorney general's website, which is actually the division of open government. The attorney general has created that division. And they also at that level on the state level, they provide training, they respond to inquiries, they investigate complaints. So, and they're very helpful and they're very responsive. So always feel free to reach out to them as well as our office. Okay. Open meeting law guide, everyone should have gotten a copy of that. And if you haven't let me know, I'll email it to you. And checklists. I'm not quite sure what I've got for that. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe for executive session, if you ever decide to go into executive session, there's a checklist for that. And then again, Robert's rules of order. But I also wanted to talk about posting. So you'll, you'll. We offer training and how to, how to submit a meeting posting. I don't know, Jennifer, are you going to be the one who's doing the posting for the group? Yes. You will be. Oh, okay. Okay. I don't want to get into this, but just real quick. Meetings have to be posted within 48 hours of the meeting, not including Saturdays, Sundays, or Monday holidays. But they also have to keep in mind that you have to give the town clerk sufficient time in which to post it. So you can't submit it right at the 48 hour mark. So that's, I just wanted to bring that up. And it does have to get posted by the town clerk's office to make it legal. So if we get the submission that a meeting is to be posted, we go ahead in there and we verify everything is accurate and complete. And we put our little blurb on there. And that's when you know, it's been officially posted. It'll say receive date and time. By our office. So it'll say that right in the agenda section of the meeting posting. If you ever look it up online. And I think. Let me see. And I think I'm. Oh, I'm conflict of interest. Am I. Yeah. Yeah. To talk about that. Or is that already being handled by somebody else? No, I'm, I'm kind of go through a little bit of everything as we move forward as it pertains to this group in particular, but any feedback on the conflict of interest would be fantastic. Okay. Well, the conflict of interest is something. It's, it's the state ethics commission. It's not the attorney general's office and. It's not the attorney general's office. If you have. Members of boards and committees and. Municipal employees, state employees. Most of us are all subject to the conflict of interest law. And in your appointment letter, I believe you'll have the link there for the online training and. For the summary sheet, but we do all have to comply with that. So. If you have any questions on it, basically just let me know. with that. But it's very important because it pretty much tells you what you really can and cannot do as a public employee. For some people, it's pretty standard kind of things. You can't accept bribes, things like that. That's what it's going to discuss. But there's also these subtle things that you wouldn't even think that was an issue, but it brings it to your attention. If anyone would like links, if you don't have them for whatever reason, I'd be happy to send. So I think that's it for me, unless there are any questions. Yeah, I was just going to open up and ask if folks had questions. It's a lot of bureaucratic issues at the beginning. We'll get into stuff as we go along though. Now, well, thank you so much. Sue, our town clerk, and she's available on the first floor of Town Hall if anyone has questions or needs to get in touch with her. Thank you so much, Sue. You're welcome. And go make history, everybody. I'll leave you now to talk. All right. Bye. Bye. So now I'm going to introduce Sean Mangano, who is the finance director for the town of Amherst, and he's going to give you an overview of the budget process and where we stand with finances now. Hi, Sean. Hi, everybody. So yeah, I'm going to go over the budget process and I'll also highlight along the way the best places to participate for this committee. Great. Thank you. All right. So these are the key points throughout the budget process. And if you have any questions while we go, you can just shout out or let Jen know. So right now we are in that first box, September through December, and the Community Preservation Act window is open. The Community Preservation Act is a separate funding source, essentially. That's partially funded by taxation, partially funded by state funds, and it's allocated by the Community Preservation Act Committee. There are very specific criteria for a project to qualify for the Community Preservation Act, but the four major categories are recreation, open space, affordable housing, and historic preservation. So depending on what you're looking at, it's potentially something could go through that funding source. And right now there's a window of time where anybody can submit a proposal for Community Preservation Act funds. It ends on October 1st, and these funds go to the Community Preservation Act Committee who will make a recommendation, which will ultimately go to the town manager and the town council, and those funds will become available July 1st of next year. And so that's, right now, that's sort of the first piece of the budget process that we're in. The thing that's about to open up, move into the next box, is the resident capital request. This is another sort of form that we make available on the website that anybody, any resident can submit a request for a capital project. We've had several in the past, last year there was one around a sustainability analysis of buildings, for example. And these requests come in, they will be evaluated by the town manager, and then potentially included into the capital plan that goes to the council for approval. And it's also evaluated by the Joint Capital Planning Committee, which we'll talk about in a second. And so that's open for the month of October. After that is the, in November, we do something called the Financial Indicators Report. It's a big meeting between the town council, the school committee, library board of trustees, I believe the regional school committee is also part of it. And at this meeting, that's where we lay out our sort of initial forecast for the upcoming budget year. So this year we'll be given a forecast for the FY23 budget. And we look at things around revenue trends, expenditure trends, and then we make forecasts for the following year about where revenues are going to be. And that meeting is really important because it sort of sets the stage for what the council will give us for budget guidelines, and whether it's going to be a good budget year or a bad budget year. Either at that meeting sometimes or shortly after we have a budget forum. It's a required meeting as part of the charter. And we intentionally do that meeting very early in the process so that the community can give input as to what they like to see in the next year's budget, you know, things they'd like to see more of or things they would like to see less of. We get that very early in the process before the budget is really developed at all so that it can influence the development of the budget going forward. So I think that's a key point for this committee. If you wanted to provide feedback or ideas or recommendations to the council, that budget forum or sometime in the month of November is a good time. And the reason why that's a good time is because the next box are the budget guidelines. Each year the finance committee will sort of craft budget guidelines, and these guidelines will then go to the council who will ultimately vote on them. And those guidelines will set the parameters that myself and the town manager will try to develop the budget within. And so some of the things that are in those guidelines are like how much operating budgets budgets can go up, certain percentages and things like that. But there are also programmatic things that are sometimes in those budget guidelines where they might call out a specific area that they want to see more investment in or changes in. So it's important if you wanted to influence those budget guidelines or provide input before those guidelines are issued, you'd want to have a share input in November before the finance committee really digs in to developing those budget guidelines. And then along the way we're doing lots of behind the scenes preparation of the budget and things like that. In February to March is the joint capital planning committee. This is a group that has representation from the school committee, the town council, library board of trustees, and the way it works now under the new charters at the town manager will have a draft five-year capital improvement program and will present that draft the joint capital planning committee and they will essentially just analyze it and pick it apart and well in a good way to try to make it better. And they'll also receive presentations from departments of all their projects. So every department will come that has a project for that upcoming cycle and they will present that information to the joint capital planning committee. And so this is another good opportunity if there's anything capital related there's public input at all these meetings and the joint capital planning committee can then hear that and use that when they analyze the plan. Then the next major milestone is April 1st school department budgets and the library budgets are due. They're on an earlier process so that they can be folded into the town manager's budget. So those must be voted on and approved by their respective committees by April 1st. Then we keep we move forward we keep doing some more work and then on May 1st the town manager's budget is due. And so on that either on that night or whenever the next meeting is after that that's when we give the initial presentation of the budget to the council and the public and field sort of initial questions on the budget. Shortly after that there's a public hearing and the public hearing is where people can react to the town manager's budget. So slightly different to them from the forum where people give input before the budget's developed. This is more reactionary. So now there's a budget that's released and it you know will will make investments in certain things. And this is the opportunity for people to say whether they agree or disagree and the parts they like and parts they don't like. Then throughout the month of May there are probably seven or eight meetings with the finance committee where they meet with every department of the town and they dig into the the finer details of their budgets their department budgets and those meetings are all public. And so by the end of May the finance committee does a lot of work in that compressed timeline so that by the end they can make a recommendation whether to support the budget or not support the budget. And then in June it will go back to the town council for action on the budget and they have to take action by the end of June. Jen do you want to go to the next slide? So ways to participate in the process so aside from the sort of key dates in the previous slide one of the ways that's really effective is through your staff liaison. I'll use an example of the environmental climate action committee. Their staff liaison often advocates for things through the operating budgets or through capital budgets. And like this most recent year for example there was a new capital item around sustainability which was a result of that advocacy. So one way would be just to through Jen if there's ideas or things that you want the town manager to consider would be to share those and have Jen relay those to us. If there are things specific to the schools or libraries just to be aware that those are separate processes from the town's process so the school committee has their own process where they do the initial budget presentation in January and a hearing in February. And then the final presentation and vote was in March. I think the library is on a similar schedule. So if there were any any actions or recommendations that were specific to those portions of the budget we'd want to connect you with the process before they vote their budget. We can always provide feedback to the town council or the town manager. And then the new thing that we started doing this last year is using Engage Amherst which is a online platform where we can create different projects and assign people to them and post information about that project. And then anybody can come and provide feedback submit questions and the nice thing about Engage Amherst is that it will keep create a log of all that so it will any question that's submitted it will keep that question so people can come and before they ask maybe the same question they can see that it was already asked and and see the response. And it can also log you know feedback comments anything like that. And so we did it a little bit we done with different projects we started with FY22 budget last year and I expect we'll do it again with the FY23 budget. And then the last thing I wanted to show you was the budget document itself. Can you click on that link Jen? So if you scroll to the table of contents which is two pages down so this budget document is on our website. I think if you hover over government one of the icons is the budget and if you click on that I'll bring it to the FY22 budget page which has this document. So Jen if you click on any of this stuff would be potentially interesting depending on how much you like budgets. But the area in particular if you click on versus summary of municipal budget and accounting if you click on that page number. So this will give you you know some of these months fluctuate a little bit based on the schedule of the council. But this will give you a little finer breakdown of the different tasks both sort of internal tasks things that the staff are working on. And then the external actions that committees or councils may be making. And this also goes into a little bit of like the information on municipal budgeting and accounting and things like that. You can scroll the next page too Jen. And it just goes throughout the whole fiscal year to give you a sense of you know throughout the year what are the different pieces of the budget that are being worked on. And yep yep great. So yeah I'm happy to answer any questions on the budget process if there's anything in particular that people wanted more information on. And then I was also going to give an update after on the the stabilization fund and what the next few months look like. Okay so I thought Dr. Shabazz has his hand up. Well thank you. Sean Magano the question of the stabilization funds I do await hearing more on that and what's entailed. But if this body was to recommend that to the council to look at earmarking the receipts on the cannabis industry in the town of Amherst. There are timeline considerations that you would advise us to consider? Yeah no that's a good question. That would be one of those things that you would want to share in November. If you wanted it to be something that's in effect for the FY23 budget that's the kind of thing that you'd want the council to consider when they're developing their budget guidelines. And they will start doing that in November and they usually finalize them in December. But the best time would be to get it to them before the finance committee deliberates on it because the finance committee drafts those guidelines. And then the council will review them and weigh in on them. But you'd want it to be something that's shared before the finance committee drafts them. And so we I don't think we don't have the exact dates but as soon as we do have exact dates on when those things are going to happen we can share those with the committee. Thank you and Mr. Irv Rhodes has his hand raised. Yes Jennifer could you go back to the beginning of Sean's presentation with the flow chart? Sure. Is this the chart you're looking at? Yes that's the one I'm looking at. There are a couple things there that are actually more than a couple things there. But one of the things that unfortunately this committee is going to miss because of the timeline is the CPAC and having and making any kind of recommendations in terms of using CPAC money. We can't do anything about that. It would be impossible for us to get some things together for that. But the October and November and all in November are really important dates that we're going to have to keep in mind. But the other thing is May 1 Town Manager budget and that is due and we must keep in mind that the Town Manager when the Town Manager presents the budget that budget cannot be increased but it can be various items can be decreased and all of us need to keep that in mind as we go forward. Thank you. Jen do you want me to give the update on the stabilization fund now? Yes please. So there was a new stabilization fund created for reparations and there's no funding in it yet. The plan at the time was when we do the free cash transfer which is an annual process every year anything that's over 5 percent of our budget we transfer to from free cash to our stabilization fund and so that will be coming up in October or November. It's based on a state report that our comptroller does so it's sort of based on when she completes that report. But that will be coming up in the next couple of months and so the time the intent was when that free cash transfer which is a vote of the council when that vote happens at the same time that's when I think it was 208 or 210,000 somewhere along those lines when those funds would be transferred into this new stabilization fund. And the thing to remember with stabilization funds is that it's a majority vote of the council to put money in to them and it's a two-thirds majority to pull money out. So just when we get to the point down the road where there is actual expenditures to potentially make from this from the stabilization fund it'll be a two-thirds vote of the council at that point to pull it out to spend it. Excellent. And Dr. Shabazz has an additional question. And remind me in terms of the council's action or rather the nature of that fund that fund is then invested and begins to accrue dividends is that correct? Yeah, so the stabilization fund will any money that's in there we do interest allocations every year so our funds are invested in various ways but whatever the interest is for the year gets allocated out to funds based on their balances. So yeah it will begin to generate returns as soon as the money goes in there. And that's something that again we could provide a report on usually we do that allocation at the end of the year so it's something we could do a report on at the end of the year so you could see sort of how it's growing year after year. Thank you. And Mr. Rhodes? Sean I think you're going to be doing this but I want to make sure I get it in that what you just said on the stabilization fund and the use thereof I'm assuming that we will get that put down and writing for us so we can refer to it on any time that we have a need to. Sure, in terms of sort of what I just outlined in terms of. Yeah, in terms of what you just said and outlines and uses etc everything that's associated with it. Yeah we can give you sort of a stabilization fund sort of fact sheet just so you have that as a reference and it's going forward because that that'll be an important piece of your deliberations. All right thank you. And Michelle? Yeah, thank you for these presentations and I wonder if we can get a copy of them. Both of the presentations that would be great. So I'll be sending the entire packet out shortly. Awesome, okay. And I wonder what the group thinks and maybe this isn't the appropriate time to ask but I know that the Community Preservation Act funding the the window is closing on October 1. But I do wonder if the group has any thoughts about the possibility of getting something together for that for this cycle. So I again I don't know if this is the right time to ask that question but I plant the seed with the group. Irv? Yes I mean in relationship to that question Michelle of course there are a number of things that I would like to propose. And in my thoughts about doing so within the parameters of the committee meeting and when our first meeting is going to be which we have not even decided yet that getting that done within that short timeframe would be quite a challenge. Doesn't mean that it could not be done but it would be challenging. Jen can I just respond to that really quick? One thing to be aware of that they've been doing the last couple years which might take a little bit of the pressure off is they've been voting a budgeted reserve each year for a certain portion of their funds. I think last year was 500,000 and what that is is it's a portion of their money that they set aside where if there's a project that comes up throughout the during the year after the deadline that they want the CPA committee to consider. The CPA committee can consider it and pull it out of those funds so it sets aside so they don't allocate all of their monies. So again for example if you came up with a CPA eligible project in January for example and you wanted to pull from that fund that could be an option so that you don't have to rush and do it now. Again they would have to evaluate it recommended and it would have to go through the same sort of approval process but it would be a pot of money that's still available for them to consider. That's great information and I hope that that will be included in our packet. And Dr. Shabazz? Just mentioning and especially in light of that there are possibilities even after October 1 to submit something that discussions before our Juneteenth event here in the town have been going on with members of the historical African-American community particularly in relation to the Civil War tablets but also more broadly around certain kinds of preservation of African-American history African heritage in Amherst that there are discussions that would we believe would fit under the historic preservation area and discussions are taking place. They probably won't materialize before October 1 and even if they did it would still be important I think for those ideas to pass through this body for recommendation for endorsement on their way out to the approval at the CPAC level. Are there additional questions for Sean? No. So Jenna I'll try to get you something today or tomorrow just to summarize those things that we just discussed around the stabilization fund and then around the CPA timeline and also send the link to the eligibility criteria so you could review that it'll help you kind of figure out what projects might fit. You know there's multiple ways things might be eligible so I'll get that to you shortly. All right thank you very much and has a question again? No question I just want to thank Sean for his presentation and also Sean and I go way back all the way to when he was at in the schools and so it's always great to see him and also it's also always great to see someone that you've worked with over the years and how they progress through their career so thank you Sean. I think I gave my first quarterly budget report to Irv back in 2011 and then Dr. Shabazz I know I presented several times too as well so it's nice to work with you two again. All right thank you. Thank you. Jennifer point of order before moving forward? Yes. Do we need to think about someone for purposes of this meeting in collecting and inscribing out notes for minutes? No, not for this particular meeting no. You got to cover all right I got to cover thank you. Yes okay so that was a lot of municipal information I guess we could call that and so we're just going to kind of continue on so this is the African Heritage Reparation Assembly and as you guys know the charge is here the purpose of this assembly is to develop and recommend to the town council a municipal reparation plan that includes both reparations funds fund and community wide process of reconciliation and repair for harms against Black people. Here's the charge the charge can also be found on the web page for a AHRA. There are two reports the first report is due on October 31st 2021 to the town council so I think that maybe you guys should start thinking about if that's a realistic time frame to meet a report or not or if we will need more time so that if it's if we need to ask the town council for more time we can do so and then there's a final report that is due with the completion of the assembly's work so as always I always have a set of rules for meetings so we are all here for the common good and shared success of our community the AHRA is trying to create an environment where honesty openness and trust are the norm so we really cannot stress enough that the meetings here need to be kind of like what we consider a safe space like there's there's a time that people aren't going to agree and that we need to be respectful of that um so I would ask that people say it here and share your thoughts and lean into discomfort and be willing to challenge yourself but also part of that means is don't walk away from the meeting and say oh this should have happened or that should have happened please say it at the meeting itself um we need everyone to have compassionate listening and this goes for those who are going to be making public comments and as far as us listening and them listening and in the audience's listening as well we're asking people to really listen respect each other speak from our own experiences and no judgment and no shaming the assembly acts by passing motions as our town clerk had told us the assembly can only act when there is a quorum of members present the meetings must be posted at least 48 hours in advance as an individual member you have no authority to act as the assembly you can act by voting on a motion the power is in the vote it also means that if you're in town and you're speaking with folks that you were not representing the AHRA at that time as an individual but as a body you guys can transparency and local government so any email exchange between members and myself is considered to be public comment so um and then also there is the conflict of interest law the conflict of interest law seeks to prevent conflicts between private interests and public duties so we want to keep those things in mind and again there's the Robert rules of order which the town clerk also spoke on this is the summary of conflict of interest which you will read again as you go through the conflict of interest online so that we will at some point elect a chair I guess that's part it's on our agenda and I guess the question is whether or not you guys want to wait until we have a seventh member or if you guys want to make that decision it's up for discussion after we finish this little presentation but the chair works with staff to create the agenda and ensure documents documentation is available for the meeting the chair opens the meeting keeps orders order of the meeting announces agenda items and closes the meeting the vice chair acts as the chair in the absence of the chair the minute taker records the minutes of the meeting including start and finish times who was in attendance and records of votes of the board or committee so mr. Evrode sent this email with some meeting guidelines here which was the speaking order meeting facilitator will establish speaking order for discussions taking turns um contradict traditional society identity based processes where men speak more than women older people speak more than younger people and people with more degrees speak more than people with fewer degrees so this is all up for discussion the air time like any other meeting is always important to share and we will so public comment has about a three minute time we ask people to limit their their comments to three minutes if possible um depending on how many people we have for open comment kind of can also guide that but we have to be mindful within our group itself with how often and how long we're speaking for and speak for you only own your own thoughts no devil's advocates and make eye statements address and respond to issues and ideas not people and personalities assume positive intent on the part of others so public comment is a time for the public to bring their concerns to the group often there is a designated time limit per person and board and committee members do not respond to the public comment that's very important so there's no gathering or speaking on behalf of the group and there's no reply to all i cannot stress that enough i send little memes of no reply all please do not reply all so anytime any time that that there needs to be communications typically it's best to send it to me and then i can send it to the group or to the individuals that it needs to go to um just so that we can kind of that we can avoid any any little lapse of or what is the word i'm looking for i'm so sorry any walking on that fine line of what is the violation of the open meeting law as an ah ahra member you have no power but as the assembly you have all the power the power lies within the vote and most if not all of our meetings started are going to be zoom so obviously we have zoom etiquette so we ask as everyone is now to keep your microphones on mute um designate your workspace space workspace set up your technology ahead of time communicate with the host and always be professional so we have had zoom bombings in the past we work hard to try to avoid that that's why we host our meetings and webinars instead of instead of meetings if we are to be zoom bombed please sign out of the meeting and then re-enter or wait for a new link from myself and then we thank you for volunteering your time yes paul thank you jen so i think there's one thing that we also want to emphasize which is the public records law which is you know jen mentioned about sending an email to everyone but if you are you are a public official now as you're sworn into your your duty uh if you write an email or if you write correspondence anything any paper that's associated with this meeting is all subject to the public records law so someone may come in and say send me all the correspondence that the has occurred between a ahra members and we will have to ask you for this from your personal account so you will go through and tell us what information it is um and so those are all subject to um public disclosure so whatever you write and you write an email regarding the work of the ahra my my advice to my staff is assume that it will be public assume that someone will ask it ask for it at some point and so measure what you're saying in words um and before you put it reduce it to paper so but just so you alert that there may we may get a public records request and this comes in to pretty frequently very frequently to the town um and sometimes we'll go to committees or boards and say please send me all your emails that you have on your personal account or if you have a different account that might respond to this public records request and we have 10 days to respond to that thank you okay are there any additional questions to any of the above that was just we just spoke about um yes michelle just a quick question gen if we have an emergency during a meeting and we have to leave for some reason what would be the best way to communicate without just dropping off the meeting um send an email or is there another possibility yeah so if you have my cell phone you can give me send a text um you can email you can raise your hands and just say you know i'm sorry i have to i have to step out quickly so any of those will work okay thank you you're welcome okay so we're going to go back to the agenda here and so our next item is on the agenda is elect a chair or vice chair and so i wasn't sure how the group felt about that and what how they wanted to proceed with that because we are one member short okay uh mr rhodes you know i don't know how other people feel about this at this point in time i myself would like to get this business item out of the way um as soon as possible so i'll uh so what i'm recommending is that we do it today if we don't do it today then uh our next meeting we will be taking up time doing that given the time that we have uh we have to do certain things i would recommend that we do it today thank you dr shabazz yep i was going to offer um deferring until the next meeting both gives all of us a chance to uh let this process settle in a little bit get to know each other in the intervening time not so much in terms of the um the the seventh member i don't know if that will be in place for the next time or not but but really just giving ourselves a little more time we can elect someone perhaps to serve in the role at that at that meeting but um uh but but in terms of um uh just to allow a little bit of time i hear uh uh brother rhodes um you know desire to kind of uh take care of items as as they come up so that we can you know move full steam ahead but uh it seems to me this might be one that we could uh uh or rather let me say it this way i'd rather we we revisit it based upon uh figuring out our schedule and how often we think we'll be meeting thank you any other comments yeah um in in terms of getting to know each other better um i would i i don't know how we're going to do that given the open meeting laws uh that we have to deal with um and so uh you know when i look at that i said well how am i going to get to know any one of these people better without being in violation of some open meeting law uh and how do how do one go about doing that outside of open open meeting law um and so um you know that's just you know one of those reality checks that i have in my mind in terms in terms of dr shabazz's comments and i do i do feel a sense of urgency in relationship to moving this process forward as soon as possible yes does anyone else have a comment in regards to chair or vice chair yes jamila yeah um so i think that i'm on the side of looking at the meeting schedule perhaps and then sort of going ahead and uh and doing that if if it turns out that we put a meeting schedule together today and then we're like okay also we feel like we're ready i'm happy to work today but i would also be fine tabling that i'm really eager to figure out how slash if we're going to deliver a report at the end of october which is a very very short time from now um so i that almost is more urgent to me than uh the chair okay great thanks so do we want to go ahead and and try and determine um a date and a time the length of the meetings and the frequency of the meeting and then we can go back to the chairpiece okay so what are i mean i guess it really has to do with schedules so does daytime work best for folks evening times what are the best things miss alexis i don't want to call on people and make them feel like i'm calling them out but like i i haven't heard from you yet so it would be great to hear from you yeah i yes so i i work 10 to 6 monday through friday um you know whatever happens i'll make it work but it would be great if i could not have to do this anymore okay that's understood yeah that's one of the hardest things about boards and committees is finding an appropriate time for everybody that is makes it keeps it equitable and heather um yes evenings are a little tricky between different subcommittees and advisory with school committee but um there's a bunch of wednesdays and thursdays that could work and mondays potentially dependant okay michelle yeah i can i can definitely make evenings work if that works best i can also make day time work but um i right now thursdays are good evening time i could also do mondays for now if i am elected as a town counselor that will change in january with meetings then but for me i'm fairly flexible right now thursdays are my best evening of all of the evenings okay and jamila your schedule yeah um i prefer evenings or early mornings um i can do that um but i i am able to be flexible with afternoon times during the work day okay and irv um yeah this this process is sort of awkward because um you know there are count getting our calendars together and i'm aware of that myself heather and michelle are all up for elected offices uh and uh once elected our schedules will change drastically um for all of us in terms of those meeting times in the evenings especially um and also the committee work that goes along with that so um anything that we do is uh today if we can do it i'd rather do this via doodle poll or whatever uh to get some consistency in terms of what we're what we're going to decide to do but if we do this today it's going to have to be considered to be a temporary meeting schedule uh well it it's you know boards and committees can change when they meet as as needed to meet the needs of the members so you know i was just trying to figure out do you have an idea do you guys think we need to be meeting weekly bi-weekly monthly i think monthly might be a little too much yeah i for myself i would like to meet weekly evening times from four on are best for me um and and again in terms of the days of the week at this point in times it's all problematic but as you said they can be adjusted dr shabazz just following the momentum and flow of things i too can make myself available uh evenings after six if that's consistent with what i was hearing from alexis and uh uh you know thursday's is as good a is as good a uh an afternoon good of an evening as uh as any during the week so uh if we're all kind of zeroing in on that i think it's fine to kind of zero in in now because when you just tell somebody do it by doodle like you did for this there's such a wide range to the work from but by zeroing in on that we're talking like six o'clock or six thirty um you know and during a week weeknight that that gives you some some parameters to start kind of zeroing in and i too think that we might want to look at weekly or every other week right now just to see where we are toward getting out this this october if we're trying to make something for this end of october or not and and just to really get ourselves immersed and and get our feet wet with this process we might need to be looking a little bit little bit frequently all of that can change up after november second or after dates that people are sworn in for their for their their duties on on elected offices but at least through the rest of uh september through through october sounds like we we might do well to try and get together uh weekly um perhaps a thursday evening so um i'm actually hoping that we can start with mondays and then switch to thursdays as we go on if needed i'm already with the cswg on thursday evenings i see that there you go um i can't meet on october fourth that what about um you know um well again i'm thinking about you know again those things that can change um when um january comes and people sworn in because i don't know when town council meets but i believe it's mondays um but anyway um if if we're going to do it and we want to we want to do it today then monday and the evening uh starting anytime after five after six is the latest earliest we can start because alexis is at work until six so six all right i mean i can i can go along with six and so it seems like mondays could be you know hectic over the next six weeks with the council meetings on mondays so um what about wednesdays or tuesday or wednesdays tuesday is preferable for me oh heather do you have a conflict you have that i have a conflict look going on you know i was gonna say uh wednesdays are preferable every other week for tuesday nights will be either regional school committee or school committee meeting so depending on what time okay and what time are those that i don't want to double yeah i don't want to i'm good for double dipping just um not overlapping too much and they're at 6 30 but i'm good to go how do wednesdays work for you i also have in like every sort of second and third wednesday of the month engagement so it's it's just awkward that's usually from seven to eight or eight or nine depending and i know i i mean i hate to offer friday as a meeting day because it's friday but work must get done so how do people feel about fridays i can do fridays michelle and irv that's what i call making a giant sacrifice right there doing a meeting on friday evening um that is um you know i don't want to get divorced but um i i think that that would be really tough on a number a number of ways i mean i would i would try i will try to make a work of everyone else can make it on friday and no other day and i'm willing to um do it oh i'm cheating on these other ones what was the consensus on oh sorry jan what was the consensus on tuesday night tuesday night was not well um heather has every other tuesday has a meeting so i mean that would be kind of hard until we could get a particular day down because again once we hit november first i can meet like the november fourth thursday and we can change to thursday we just have to get through the next six weeks so maybe we can do fridays and then reevaluate when that time comes or we could or if we're going to do every other week so maybe we could be the opposing week of the council meeting i mean of the school committee meeting so did the school committee meet this tuesday so that would be open for next tuesday yes and then we could determine next tuesday i mean we're gonna have to take it a little bit by a little bit right then the alternative turn of day could be the friday if we feel like we need to meet at least once a week yeah let me see if i understand this if we meet we choose tuesday we would meet next tuesday yes our first meeting would be next tuesday yes and then after next tuesday we would be meeting every other tuesday is that correct yes and if needed we could throw a friday meeting in there if we felt it was needed i'm just also aware of public participation and friday evenings could be a little bit more challenging to get community engagement and public participation but i think that's sounds like a really good plan to do the every other tuesday and then meet on fridays if needed and again this is only for over the next six weeks sorry was this starting at six or was this after six do you need 630 lax this i mean that would that would be great but i i want to default to the majority 630 um work for everyone and so the question is do we think we need an hour and a half two hours we can always determine that per meeting but yeah i yeah i'm always one for um when we're doing meetings to have some time limit so that we can you know discipline ourselves to being efficient in our meetings you know because you sometimes you have meetings that go on all evening and i think that that is something that we don't want to get caught up in so i think that as for now um trying to determine the time uh time limit is is problematic however i would like to suggest that it no be no longer than a two hour meeting so tuesday in an hour and i get 630 yeah why don't we say 630 to 8 if you can be available to kind of open the zoom at maybe uh 615 we won't formally start until 630 but give us a little time for some uh for those that might arrive at 615 to to uh uh get situated and uh uh but then formally start at 630 projecting an 8 p.m finish if need be we can ask ourselves you know at that time if we need an extension of 15 minutes an extension of 30 minutes and just kind of proceed from there as as our completing our agenda uh dictates okay all right so i've got tuesday the 28th from 630 to 8 p.m starting opening up the meeting at 615 and so i just realized this upcoming tuesday this isn't an ongoing thing but i'm teaching a class um so at 530 so i think um you guys should still have your meeting and perhaps we can get your meeting open and started and then um they have your discussion and then i can go back and take minutes if needed afterwards let me ask the question if we're going to do a 630 meeting it will be posted to the public as a 630 meeting beginning of a 630 meeting yes correct or in 615 maybe for our purposes but we can't transact any business no you can't it's kind of get to know get to know each other um okay so tuesday 630 8 o'clock p.m and what are the items that you would like on the agenda because this agenda needs to be posted by tomorrow to meet meet the 48 hour um meeting law anybody have any topics on on deck on deck well well for me the first one would be election of offices we're not doing tonight and we're going to do it next tuesday that's the first item of course all the other regular items that come on the agenda will be present there are there any um yeah yes michelle um just two items that i i don't know if it's for today or next time but i would like to talk about the possibility of offering a public comment both before the meeting and at the end of the meeting maybe splitting the public comment period um and then the other um the other piece is talking about whether we would like to bring evanston the evanston folks that we've been working with up into this point into the conversation sooner than later so maybe inviting somebody sooner than later like alderman robin russimans and or any of the other folks we've been working with um just to sort of help us set a foundation based on the work that they've already done there in evanston this and okay so i have heather first um i don't know i i don't know if this is an agenda item but prioritizing looking at the end of october date when we're supposed to be presenting whether we want to keep that and hit the ground running or if there's flexibility thank you you and um mr roads i just i just want to be clear that uh because i'm not that all these items that we're mentioning are items for uh the upcoming agenda on the uh 28th yes thank you you doctor shabazz oh um thank you the it seems to me um that a useful kind of uh visioning uh exercise would be really important secondly there is a um community-based uh group that has been meeting over several months to try and create a process of engaging the uh african heritage community the black african-american community um and they would certainly be interested i think in trying to um uh offer to talk with us and offer what uh what uh what they may what they hope they can present in terms of ways to get feedback uh from the uh uh the african heritage community of amherst about uh items of concern items of uh of interest of priorities and so that's uh uh if that could be an agenda item to discuss and to hear from uh folks from the black assembly of amherst massachusetts and jamila um possibly i'm being too literal um and hopefully this is the unification of heather's priority on time and uh dr shabazz's visioning but i'd like to be clear about what our report is and what's supposed to be in it and that kind of thing what we're supposed to produce i was just gonna just gonna go back to that because i was like yeah i don't exactly know what's going what is supposed to be in there to see if we need to extend the time out or not so paul do you have any insight on that i don't but i think it's a perfect item to talk about your next meeting to get clarification on what is what does that look like as a power point as a written report you know that kind of thing yes perfect item but and we can ask the council what their intention is what their request is okay is there a member of the group that wants to reach out to the council and ask that question um if not then i can so yeah i have uh no problems to to sort of uh um reach out through you on that i do note we have a counselor uh in as an attendee and uh based upon that interest uh you know we don't have a specific council liason signed to this and i think i've heard that the council isn't even doing that anymore but um i think it is important to sort of uh tap in with any interested counselors about what kinds of things they are interested in seeing from this committee in in in relation to a report or recommendation the kind of build up to to now that we've uh talked about in the past is the ability for this group to kind of uh as part of planning as part of producing a municipal plan to um to make a recommendation uh working with the town town manager working with staff to to understand the intricacies legally and financially um but then to upon vetting these ideas to then proceed to make a recommendation to the council for their for their deliberation and possible motion and voting so for example um relative to the question of um tax revenues from cannabis sales uh potentially being a a revenue stream that a reparative justice plan a reparation municipal reparations plan would draw from um the question becomes the way in which to initiate that that that conversation amongst ourselves to make sure that there is sufficient um information amongst ourselves that is certain it's this that particular question certainly dovetails with our meeting with first repair in that uh first repair uh coming out of the Evanston Illinois experience that is exactly the revenue source that funded their municipal uh reparations plan or part a considerable part of the uh the source that is funding their municipal uh reparative justice plan so i uh i would certainly say that um the we have i think there is something of a sense of what we may mean by a report that it has to do with uh renditions uh relative to the creation of a municipal reparation uh reparative justice plan that we could begin to stimulate the necessary actions action steps that the council itself will ultimately have to have to be part of of discussing uh vetting and uh and and voting okay mr roge uh yes um i am i am really concerned about the way we're going to be using our time here in terms of what we have to accomplish uh you know we we we seem like we're going to be meeting every other Tuesday every other Tuesday if you go back to the budget timelines that uh is going to put an incredible crunch on us in terms of dealing with some of those timelines and um so i i do have a sense of anxiety about that uh because um there are things that we are going to or at least i believe we are going to want to be putting forward to have an impact upon that budget process and that's going to take some time for us to discuss within it what i would like to suggest is that uh for for our next meeting is that we can prioritize those things that we need to deal with and talk about and discuss and come to agreement uh on for our next meeting uh because now i'm listening to a whole group a lot of topics and i'm saying well how are we going to practically deal with them so i i guess i would like to break those topics down in terms of what are those topics that we're going to want to take actions on i eat vote on versus i uh topics that we just want to have additional information on and have other people present to present to us okay and miss i'm i'm going to go back to everything i'm just trying to follow the the hand raised so we're going to go back to the meeting date right because that's of concern right meeting months a week once meeting bi-weekly so and i can't quite remember monday was an issue because it falls on the same day as the council meetings monday does fall on the date of council meeting yeah and mr balkerman yeah well i don't it doesn't matter if it falls on the same day as the council meetings it does i want to clarify one thing there will be a liaison from the council the president has requested a liaison there's a lot of interest in it the council will choose its liaison on monday to see aware of that and michelle i'm wondering if it's possible on the off week um if we feel like there is this crunch between now and november to meet at during the day um to to slip in a daytime meeting so that it would only be every other week that we would do that um i know it's not ideal but i wonder if it's a possibility for for the group to consider that yeah and i'm actually looking at the council calendar right now so they meet every other week so they meet on monday the 27th oh and then they meet on the fourth but then they don't meet until the 18th because the 11th is a holiday so i don't know if we could do the i mean having the two days like a monday tuesday one week monday one week tuesday does that seem feasible for folks that's feasible you know i jennifer um the the the issue that comes up in my mind is this 48 hour issue relationship to posting the agendas will we have enough time to do that so we would be meeting tuesday which is why i'm trying to find out what the agenda items are now for tuesday's meeting but and then so i post the meetings and i think that we should have what i'm trying to say is it no different time consuming for any other group that i meet with i don't think what i'm referring to is if we do these alternate days or being discussed whether we have enough time i'm not doing the calculations in my mind yeah so if we meet on a tuesday and then the next week we're going to meet on monday then i would post the meeting probably wednesday all right dr shabazz yeah so i i think this is important i like the way we're we're kind of fleshing out what is uh maybe a a set of dates over the next six weeks um therefore we can begin to um you know what we don't accomplish in the agenda we're talking about right now on next tuesday we know we've got a next date to to kind of you know park it at i think for example in trying to schedule um a representative from first repair uh we're going to need a little time for that you know to to and to see what's consistent with their schedule so now that we know that we're looking at uh next tuesday and then the monday after that we've got a couple of dates to to present to them uh to see if they can begin to make make either of those days in my mind that's maybe about a 30 minute um uh piece for them to kind of present uh some of the background of of the work in evanston as as could be relevant to us here um and um and so if you're also trying to kind of put times on on some of these agenda items uh for whenever that would be um i would say least try to budget 30 minutes for for the representative from first repair um the discussion with respect to the black assembly of amherst massachusetts i think could be a could be a 15 minutes and let me say as well if we do go with this idea of starting at 6 30 with say a 15 minute public comment period um the black assembly of amherst massachusetts could if we know ahead of time could potentially have three minutes five minutes within that within that opening 15 minutes for someone from there to to sort of you know dialogue about what their hopes are for the african heritage reparations assembly what they're hoping to do that that can complement our work that can help inform our work um i think that could even possibly be three to five minutes within public comment but if we wanted to dialogue back with them maybe it shouldn't be public comment we should just make it a regular item in a regular meeting so we could have a little bit of back and forth with whomever comes from bam um and finally i don't have a problem as well with thinking about 15 minutes at the back end be it be at 8 15 or what have you if we see that there might be might be interest because part of a big part of our work in this early period um is very um is of kind of a strategic planning kind of thing thinking about the town calendar thinking about recommendations we need to make that's that's going to be timely and consistent with what the town um how the town's calendar is structured but then it's also an educational uh uh function in this early period it's educating about what reparative justice is what it what it looks like what it can be for us here in amherst uh and so the the idea of robust uh participation opportunities for the public to to come forward and to and to you know speak to these issues is is i think valuable a valuable way to start out um depending on if if that interest is there okay mr rhodes yeah all those things that um dr shabazz talked about are really important things and you know i you know i i think that in my mind when i look at look at everything that we're discussing again i i want to try to break our first agenda down in terms of a those things and items that we're going to uh that we might think need to have take action on or vote on and be those things and which will be information section uh session for us uh which uh might include uh everything that uh dr shabazz is talking about and other things other people might want to hear about but we would like for us to keep in mind this would be our first meeting and um and that that meeting will have uh some things that we really must deal with and i want to make sure we leave enough time for that and then come back to those items that need to be action take action on and then hear the other kinds of items in which would contribute to our education so um dr shabazz i think that i heard you say that you would be okay with well so paul if if the council appoints someone to be the liaison for this group will they be at the first at our Tuesday meeting i don't know so it doesn't require the counselor to be at the meetings they're there to observe they can watch it on you know tape replay they're not a participant they're there to um report back to the council more so than being okay but if someone you can go to if you need to yep so i was just thinking dr shabazz if you wanted you had offered to reach out to the counselors to ask what um their kind of vision for the they see for the report what they want to see for the report would be um and so if that's i think that's one of the first things that we got to bring it back so once we have the dates we got to bring it back to that report because that deadline is so quick um and everything will determine whether i don't think there's an issue if we ask for more time but i just think we need to know whether or not and we won't know that until we know what we're putting in the report or what you guys are putting in the report so um if you can go ahead and ask the council and then report that back on Tuesday which will kind of get everybody's wheels moving um i think we also need to talk about outreach a little bit jennifer just one thing i think right off the bat i think that we need to ask for an extension of time rather than in terms of this report um because of of our meeting every other week um and i i think trying to um work under that kind of time pressure is not something that we need to do now i think that um you know we should have that as an item on our agenda to ask uh for an extension of time in other words with our first meeting that we have that as an agenda item mm-hmm and i just want to clarify i believe that we're going to be meeting every every other tuesday and then every other monday correct okay so again i understand but anyway i'm i'm just saying suggesting that we have that on our on that our agenda for our first meeting and so we can vote on that absolutely and michelle i i'm not sure that we necessarily need to ask the council at this moment to make an extension on that um that's um my you know perspective is that we want to find out what the council expectations are and instead of sort of adding another agenda item for the council to have to you know decide on one way or another right now i think we have probably a little bit of time before we have to do that but if you know if the group feels like that's something that we should definitely move forward with right away um you know that's okay too i just i don't think that piece is as urgent right now based on my observations of watching other you know um committee work unfold yep and i think that we can just put it on the agenda right um and then we can hear what dr shabazz has has learned from the counselors um and what you guys have about a week to think about what you might want to see in a report and then we still have to tackle the visioning process exercise so it won't be at that tuesday meeting so we would need someone to lead the visioning process exercise or we need to brainstorm on what it is that we're envisioning to happen for reparations to some degree mr rhodes yeah i i guess when i talk when you talk about the visioning process that we really should have some idea of what we're talking about and how much time is that going to take in relationship to our first meeting if i have a number of things in mind in terms of the visioning process that's something that there are different models of of the visioning process that we could use so it's you know it's something that in my mind i'm trying to get my head around i'm saying all right yeah we'll have a visioning process but we haven't even decided what that process is going to look like right i'm i think i'm gonna check with one of the with all of you and see if one of you guys can take that piece on i don't know if you can or can't or if that's too big but it seems like it's really a very at this point very broad because everybody's gonna have different ideas and they have to get narrowed down somehow jamila yeah i was just going to call out the time to folks just to be conscious of that and also i can say on my behalf i'm very happy to do homework so if there are pre-reads if we want to do a visioning process and somebody says here's a process please read it and we'll come and execute it next Tuesday i'm ready to do that just to keep meetings tight so i'm sure that if there is a suggestion yes all right so jamila is going to work on a visioning process is that what i just heard i think i just got vol untold i'm sure i can find them yes but i like that to you to send it i send it to you to send out jennifer yes all right yeah that sounds great okay so um so so far i have the on the agenda the election of officers we'll do public comment before and after visioning process exercise um um follow up with dr shabazz on what the expectation is for the report and whether or not we're going to request time for additional time for the report so the only thing else that i ask is i'm i'm struggling with what to so some of you guys i know when some of you i don't and so some of you i always refer to as dr shabazz and some of you as mr erv roads and so it would be helpful if you guys could send me an email with how you would like to be addressed in the meetings and whether or not you want your pronouns used or what your proper pronouns pronouns are um paul i had in my notes also about evanston or so a representative from evanston coming in i didn't know if the idea was to talk about inviting them for your next meeting or to invite them to your next meeting yeah so because we also have the um first repair and then we have bam so let let me say i um we can certainly send information a link or whatever about first repair some of us have met with um robin uh simons who was the counselor uh former city counselor in evanston that uh worked and and and got their municipal reparations plan uh approved um and so you know we're some some of familiar some are not so we can certainly get get the links out and um if it's i'd like to at least begin to feel out with them uh their potential availability for one of our dates on our calendar and then yes we can then take that up tuesday after people have had a chance to to maybe look at the links look at the information we can take up the the final kind of scheduling if that's if that's agreeable okay and michelle yeah that's what i was going to suggest as well and i'm happy to make that connection to see what availability first repair has i'm also happy to send any information that we've compiled from first repair to the to jennifer i think right she'll disseminate it to the group so i will i will i will do that yep and um irv yeah and into my preferred name is irv uh the other things uh as my daughter says everyone has one so um i'm just irv and uh what i would like for you to do jennifer at this moment in time please list all the things that uh we have discussed as possible agenda items so we can know where we are list them now yes okay so what i have um our election of officers the public comment before and after prioritizing the report due date day visioning process exercise outreach um an invitation to bam an invitation to um first repair and the asking the councils what they want from out of the report and uh requesting additional time for report and then i have prioritizing so the the two invitations are or is that does that mean we're going to be voting on asking for people uh those two people those two groups to appear before us or are they going to be there i don't know that either one of those are happening right now i think that dr shabazz said now that we have an idea of a schedule that he can reach out but these were all the things that were just talked about for potential agenda items and so i've read them all and so what i have to actually put on the agenda is everything basically except for the invitations does that make sense i'm sorry that was probably confusing no that was clear i think there's just the last two items then it's just a matter of if folks want to think out loud now about process wise do you wish for us at the tuesday meeting to to discuss um those those those uh representatives coming um and uh and and proceeding to then you know see where we are with respect to that coming on our calendar michelle is saying she can check with first repair on their availability for an upcoming uh uh uh monday or uh you know two tuesdays from now um possibility and so she would know something of that at the time but yes it would be to to try to um uh give folks right now the chance to think about this and then to make a decision about uh that being a part of a subsequent um uh uh date on our calendar and likewise with someone from the uh black assembly of amherst massachusetts um some of us are part of that assembly some of us are not but it's an opportunity we'll we'll get you information i i guess through through jennifer about it and we can then have um have the discussion at the at the tuesday meeting so it was actually those are action items in terms of the uh the other thing is uh because i'm looking at my uh watch and thinking about time is to make sure that the next meeting the monday meet the monday meeting that we're going to have uh what date exactly is that october fourth i'm not available on october fourth it's not it's not a constant thing it's just that one one day i'm sorry you're muted jenn once is a little meeting right once is a meeting um it would be great if all of the members were together for at least the first three meetings right and then move forward from there so that is it's it is tough but i think that this is probably an easier way than trying to send out a doodle poll um because the last doodle poll this was the only time out of 20 dates that everybody agreed on so um alexis yeah just a quick question and maybe i'm just not understanding so for our next meeting we're discussing whether or not these groups will join or they're going to join and make public comment before we talk about visioning okay and then is visioning like visioning is it's going to be a longer thing or or i said okay because i just i feel like it's just like a little bit inappropriate to like not include people and do visioning first without consulting like you know bam and the other groups so yeah i don't know i was just a little bit confused about like when what was happening good point good point mm-hmm well and so i think part of the visioning process exercise is just so this group has an idea but as i said before there's a amount of outreach that has to occur before anything else can really happen and so you know basically we have to report and i don't know that anybody really has an idea of what that looks like right now so i think the envisioning process just kind of helps tie that together a little bit this is kind of off the calendar building aspect of this but let me just share honestly what i think is kind of in my sense of priority and i want to take a deep breath and invite others to take a deep breath as well you know erb talked about an anxiety with with this process with timeframes and all of that so i i definitely will speak to the to the council counselors i'll start with the one that's here as an attendee i'll i'll you know perhaps see if any others uh want to talk about that or or see if if if she recommends any others i should talk to but uh or if any of you want to make a recommendation of any that i should talk to uh town manager bolkerman uh jennifer um i welcome that but let me say this to me i think our most critical priority is to build the financial instrument that would support whatever reparative justice plan we might come up with because anything we come up with i think will entail some costs will entail entail some budget which is why we had the budget the chief financial officer here to talk to us about budget it's likely to involve some budget and so i think one of our highest priorities is to as part of this planning process is to think about the appropriate ways to develop a fund because the the free cash amount that's that is a very good start but that's not um a sufficient amount to do much with when you think about 200 000 generating 4.5 annually in interest that's not a very substantial amount to do much with so we've got to think about how does the town as part of constructing a plan develop a funding mechanism that can support the work to repair harms um so for me that is one of the utmost priorities i raised the question of tax revenues on cannabis as a possibility because it came up previously as a discussion amongst our counselors as a possibility i i distinctly recall it being mentioned that presently those revenues are not specifically earmarked to anything so if that has not changed we've got an important window to begin to construct the planning process and the and the argument the rationale for why this would be would make an appropriate place to earmark those those funds so you know ultimately in this process we want to talk about what is the harm uh some of the research that was done by reparations for Amherst is a good starting place the website of the national uh coalition of blacks for reparations in america in cobra if you ever if you go to that website uh has good discussion about the harm nationally broadly um narc the national african-american reparations commission has good information and analyses people have constructed our own son of of Amherst william darryl jr and uh kirsten mullen his partner their book from here to equality at the broad federal level outlines a sense of the harm uh that has been done in producing the uh the wealth gap although be clear that project is about is an argument about a federal reparations plan not a municipal plan so but these are resources in the way of homework in the spirit of dr jemison that we could begin to look at collectively to have a common vocabulary to have a common idea about what we're talking about here but ultimately uh before the harm analysis i think the the the critical priority right now is to help the town think about uh and make commitments about constructing the funding mechanism that would go toward dealing with addressing repairing the harms that we we help to we help to identify and we help to plan about but i think our priority right now ought to be thinking about the financial instrument thank you okay and i'm just gonna skip to jamila quickly irv jamila um thank you dr shabazz i am in agreement that the priority is the financial instrument i am for my own sake going to call out time again um we're almost 30 minutes over on a 90 minute meeting i like alexis i'm also during my normal work day here so um i'd love to understand what are the final things we need to resolve at this meeting so that we can a little comfortably move forward to the next meeting thank you irv so i just took a deep breath the there are two major issues that this committee is going to have to grapple with uh dr shabazz mentioned one and therefore we when he talked about my anxiety uh is how we move towards that goal of defining a funding source a continuing sustainable funding source that's one of the major areas of our charge is to do that the second major thing that we we're going to have to grapple with is who is going to be eligible for this and that particular item is surrounded by legal kinds of concerns and we need to know what those legal concerns are and legal parameters are so yeah i mean there there are things i get i want to i guess i'm a i'm not only a process person i'm also a person who looks at how do we get to from a to b uh and a particular period of time and when i look at getting from a to b and a time frame that we have available to us and giving given that there are certain members won't be available on certain times and dates and knowing that certain things can be delayed because of of uh not having a quorum or something yes i i do feel that and so i do feel there's a sense of urgency in terms of of us moving forward with it and and and unfortunately i i didn't even mention that for an agenda item at relationship to deciding the process for deciding who is going to be eligible okay and i just so i just wonder to keeping in mind what jamila said i'm in regards to time because we are over so i think the best thing that we can do right now is just to just only do our one meeting for tuesday and then we just have to i don't want to spend too much time on it figure out the next meeting if it's not going to be that monday because everybody needs to be there so if people can take a look at their calendars again and see if there are things that can be moved or not moved or different time of the day that would be great but for now we're going to go with tuesday and before we get to who qualifies for what i i'm so my only concern with that is we still haven't or you guys haven't really figured out what reparations mean in amherst right like i don't so i think we need to kind of grab there because it could be that we're providing different types of services or or it could be a combination of everything so i mean i just thought that would be helpful but in in the sake of time which all of my meetings run over you know it's just one of those things and so i anybody who needs to leave i you know if you need to leave please feel free to i don't want to keep um you here and then i've got mr roads yeah just remember that every whether every decision we make in relationship to how and what and where and whom uh a reparation is going uh going to happen all of that is going to be wrapped around with legal parameters and dr shabazz yes so thank you wrote uh irv i think it's good to get some of these things on the table thank everyone for the time today and the extra time if there's no ejection i move that we adjourn this meeting sounds good it's 403 it's been moved and do we have a second second second from uh dr jemison uh all in favor say aye all right with your hand i don't think we need to do a roll call sound like we're all ready to go see you irv did you have something else i don't know my hand no no okay i've already left all right thank you everyone nice to meet you bye see you guys on Thank you. Bye, thank you.