Well, hello again and welcome to MBA 604, Innovation and Sustainability. We are in lecture five covering Unit 2 with learning outcomes to be and to see. I am Joni Roberts. I'm the Vice Program Chair and Consulting Professor for Sailors MBA Program. All right. So today, heading further into the course, and we're looking at Unit 2 Sustainability policies, practices and leadership, starting with learning outcome to be where we appraise the results and impacts of innovation combined with sustainability policies and practices, such as product improvements and economic outcomes. All right, so let's get going. Last, our last lecture, we introduced the Sustainable Development Goals as a framework for sustainability, and we are going to talk more about that today to see how companies are actually applying this in the real world. So a really great report that came out from the Business and Sustainable Development Commission, they were formed in Davos back in 2016 to really help reinforce these goals and help businesses understand how they can apply these goals and be successful in the marketplace. And this report here is called Better Business, Better World. And we're going to dive into this for a while today. So what the report really does is make the business case for the SDGs. And it's a multidisciplinary team of leaders from business, finance, civil society, labor and international organizations. And they map out the economic wins that can be available to business if the UN SDGs are achieved. And businesses adopting this plan can transform their own prospects and can even outperform those stuck in yesterday's economic gain. And we'll see some examples of that. So we are, you know, reflecting on the past and considering where we are today and how we want our future to look as we go through this course. And right now, let's reflect on the past 30 years. And incredibly, we've had some real wins. When it comes to poverty and economic growth, we've actually had unprecedented economic growth in these last 30 years. We lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. And that's partly due to the Millennium Development Goals, which preceded the Sustainable Development Goals. And we're benefiting from all of these, you know, the tech revolution with, you know, all sorts of technology that can help solve our most pressing social and environmental challenges. Yet, despite all of these successes, our current model of development is deeply flawed. We have a lot of problems that are coming along with this tremendous economic growth, such as climate change and inequities. So we're having more and more natural disasters. The frequency has increased quite a lot. We're also having more severe storms like hurricanes, carry more water, fires burn hotter and more extensively. And so we're facing those consequences. We have lost biodiversity and ecosystem damage that actually costs an estimated 3 percent of GDP. There are real financial costs that go with the way we've been doing business. Another issue is that median real world wages have been stagnant in developed countries since the 1980s.  Social inequalities worsening in countries around the world. We're seeing the rich, the very super rich get richer, the middle class remaining stagnant and the poor even becoming poorer in some cases. So the spread between the rich and the poor has dramatically increased. Also, on average, women are still paid 25 percent less than men for comparable work. I'll never understand that. We all, you know, have women in our lives and men have daughters and wives. And why would you ever want women to be paid less for comparable work? Makes no sense. All right. So there are many, many more issues that go with that. Like we've been talking about throughout the course. There's something we really need to think a lot about is how this incredible economic growth did not consider the price of externalities.  So if we look more carefully at this part of the equation, we can see that seven, seven point three trillion in environmental externalities went unpriced in 2009, which is 13 percent of GDP. That's the statistic from the Better Business, Better World report. And we can imagine it's most likely higher than that today. And so let's look at what, what does, what does this mean? So if we look at different industries and we see what their profit margins are before you price externalities and then after, we'll see there are some pretty heavy costs associated with some of these industries and they would not be profitable if they had to pay for things like using unsustainable fresh water, sending waste to landfills, wasting food, polluting the air or the ground, and producing the most resource intensive foods like beef. All right, let's look at cattle farming. I have a circle here at the bottom. It's the first column before you add in the externalities. They have about, you know, 3 percent profit margins. And if you add in all of those impacts, the negative impacts that creating beef for human consumption includes, it's actually negative 165. So cattle farming, you know, this is a huge question about what are we doing? What kind of decisions are we making? So what do we do with cattle farming? You know, let's just take that as an example from a policy leadership and business personal practices perspective, right? What do we do with that? Do we, one, should we expand production and consumption? Should we plow down more rainforests and natural land for cattle? Is that what we should do? Should we perhaps reorganize our priorities and our food systems? Perhaps we might want to consider shifting to pulses like lentils and beans for protein. Maybe this is an area where we need to really reduce production and consumption. Personal views are we eat way too much meat way beyond the human need for meat. And certainly if you just go back to previous eras before we had factory farming, humans did not eat nearly this much meat. So we could all reduce our consumption dramatically, right?  Maybe the government is going to set policies surrounding this. Maybe, you know, businesses will start to change what they serve or what they create and make based on this kind of information. So another area that skews these real numbers for economic growth are is subsidies. So let's look at the fossil fuel industry. So economies across the world continue to subsidize fossil fuel consumption, which is in direct conflict with the urgent need to tackle climate risks. All right, so these subsidies, why do governments do this? Well, they're intended to protect consumers by keeping prices low. You know, every time gas goes up at the pump, people just, you know, panic about it and get super upset about it. So what do they do? They make whatever moves they can to bring those prices down and give, you know, people a break on fuel costs. Yet these kinds of decisions come at a very high cost. These are the costs we need to think about. They're like the invisible costs. They're the costs that we don't see immediately when we're putting fuel into our cars or when we're paying for products that have been shipped or created using fossil fuels. We don't think a lot about that. But subsidizing fossil fuels contributes to irreversible damages from climate change, poor health from pollution. We have wars and we create alliances with bad actors over oil. These kind of subsidies actually hinder a healthy economic growth. All right, what does that mean? Well, if we reinvested that money into infrastructure for electric vehicles, that could probably be a much better use of our money. And in our long-term view, but we're always looking at this short term, gas prices went up, hurry up, bring it down, hurry up, bring it down. And we keep making these super short-term decisions that actually keep working against us. All right, so according to the IMF, these are today's numbers that globally fossil fuel subsidies were 5.9 trillion or 6.8% of GDP in 2020. They're expected to increase to 7.4% in 2025 as the share of fuel consumption in emerging markets continues to climb. We need to really think about this, not just close our eyes and close the door, but think about what if we took those fossil fuel subsidies of 5.9 trillion and invested them into sustainable energy and sustainable business practices, sustainable innovation. I would say that would be a much better use of our funds. All right, so in addition, local air pollution is costing the equivalent of between 2% to 10% of GDP across G20 countries, the top 20 economically developed countries, based on estimates of the WHO, the World Health Organization and the IMF. The IMF is International Monetary Fund. And that comes from the Better Business, Better World Report. All right, so what if we took that money and invested it in achieving the SDGs? We've got to make harder, maybe in the short term, but better in the long term decisions. So with these kinds of problems, how can these problems lead to opportunities, right? That's what business is. Business is solving problems, right? Being creative, finding a problem that needs to be solved and creating an opportunity for that to happen. Well, achieving the global goals creates at least U.S. $12 trillion in opportunities. And this is only looking at the four economic systems that the Better Business, Better World Report analyzed. And these are food and agriculture, cities, energy and materials, and health and well-being. All right. Something very important about these SDGs is that the business case for sustainable development, as a core strategy, it gets much stronger as the world achieves the global goals. The more people in on this, the stronger the business case is. Stronger the business case is, it's you get, you know, like there's critical mass, you create supply chains that become more efficient and you create access to products and all of this that when all together, everyone's doing it together, it's a stronger case. All right. So the research shows that the global goals open in 60 of the biggest market hotspots worth up to 12 trillion a year. And this number comes from both business savings. So you're saving money by being more sustainable and you're growing with revenue or achieving revenue outcomes in the four economic systems. All right. So let's see. Okay. So just these four economic systems, if we look at, if we go beyond that, the total economic price for implementing the global goals could be two to three times bigger than this. So maybe we need to shift a little bit and stop thinking this is painful and start thinking this is profitable. And for example, there are some statistics that show achieving the single goal of gender equality could contribute up to 28 trillion to global GDP by 2025. That's easy to do. Gender equality, you just do it. I mean, you don't need government or someone to help you do that. You just do it yourself. I'm a woman. That one just kind of gets me. All right. So let's see. You also save on the cost of these externalities such as carbon taxes that state or national governments do impose and can impose at any time, right? Governments at any time can start taxing any kind of business for the impact they have outside or in the process of creating their products and services and the consumption of those. All right. So also almost 380 million jobs could be created by global goals, opportunities, and the four systems. Sounds pretty good. All right. So the research shows that business needs the goals, right? So the goals offer a compelling growth strategy for businesses and for the world economy and the goals need business. So unless businesses seize the market opportunities of the goals and advance on the progress of the whole global package of 17 goals, the abundance they offer won't materialize. So back to this idea that we've got this moonshot effort for planet Earth and not being a spectator situation where you're watching it on TV, but you're an active participant from the country level to the company level to the community level to the individual level. We're all participants in this and the more people who are participating, the better the outcomes for everyone. All right. So it's kind of like choices, right? I think we've talked about that. We have choices and we are creating our future through the choices we are making today and we need to be really proactive in what we are investing in. So looking at these four economic systems, food and agriculture, cities, energy and materials, health and well-being, the Better Business Better World Report analyzed all of these industries and came up with the 60 biggest market opportunities. And here's a glance at some of them. You could reduce food waste in the value chain, right? You could create affordable housing, energy efficiency buildings, electric and hybrid vehicles. You could do car sharing. That's a circular business model. All right. Circular models for automotive, expansion of renewables, circular models for appliances, electronics, more energy efficiency, things like for health and well-being, risk pooling, pooling people together, remote patient monitoring, telehealth, advanced genomics, on and on. Okay. Here are the additional items that total the 60 all together. And you can see that there are many opportunities. And so I'd like for you to think about where can you make a difference? What's your entrepreneurial idea? What's your innovation? How can you be an influencer for sustainability? And looking at these 60 hot markets, where can you make a difference? What lights you up? Which role do you want to play? How do you want to participate in this whole sustainability revolution that we are going through? Another way of looking at these numbers is to put them into themes. And we can see the value of different themes. This is priced out in billions. And we can look at mobility systems being an incredibly valuable market. I think it's 2 trillion right there. And this would be things like mobility systems are like public transport, the circular economy and electric and hybrid vehicles, anything with moving people. Then we have healthcare solutions. That's a really strong market. And healthcare in many countries, including the United States, could use a lot of technology and ways to make healthcare more accessible. And even in your own home, taking even more charge of your own health. And that could even be using wearables and technology and things like that. Energy efficiency, I mean, artificial intelligence helps a lot with making our appliances more energy efficient. And then clean energy. Gosh, don't we all want clean energy? That would solve so many of our problems. And that's situations like anything that's renewable, anything that comes from the sun or the wind or the water or geothermal, natural heat underground, things like that. And making those in sustainable ways. So achieving the global goals, these are like we talked about before, the world's blueprint for environmental and social sustainability. They can also be called the world's to-do list. This is what we all need to do to get on this path and further along this path for creating a better world. So that would mean a world that is comprehensively sustainable, that's socially fair, environmentally secure, economically prosperous, inclusive and more predictable. More predictable means less risk, right? That's a good thing in investments and business. All right.  All right. Achieving the global goals will provide a viable model for long-term growth as long as businesses move towards them together. Again, this can't be an isolated thing here or there are a few great businesses. It has to be all of us in this together. The goals are designed to interact. So progress on all of them will have much more impact in achieving only some of them. We have to think about all of them. Of course, the results will not be a utopia. There will be, you know, many challenges and actually bringing this into being, but the world would undoubtedly be on a better, more resilient path. And we could be building an economy of abundance. So part of our Unit 2 discussion is on leadership. And leadership is absolutely key to success. So leaders that are just in the status quo, doing things the way they've always been done, well, that's easy, right? That's easier. That's the known path. But true sustainability comes from embracing courage and determination to actually make these changes. So we need strong leaders with courage and grit and persistence and creativity and the willingness to do something different. Also, status quo is like the credibility of CEOs is in double-digit decline due to misuse of power and abuses, right? So you've got this whole public trust issue and that affects the value of corporations. And so sustainability is an opportunity to regain public trust by doing the right thing. So a single person or department cannot drive a necessary holistic change. So status quo is like, well, we've got our philanthropy department. We've got our corporate social responsibility department. We've got our one chief sustainability officer who's going to do it all in one company of 10,000 people. So no, true sustainability requires a change in company strategy that starts at the top with the way the leaders think and behave. And then you integrate that into everything you do. So you align your strategy with the global goals and incorporate them into your strategic planning, innovation, business development, and every other activity as well. So from investment and operations to marketing, talent management, and communication. So this is now not a little department or one or two people trying to form a miracle in an organization, but you integrate it as the strategic driver of success. So taking this holistic approach extends company's strategic horizons, encouraging decisions and investments that will deliver long term gains as this trend towards sustainability gathers pace. All right. So question from our study guide is, what are real world examples of businesses that have transformed products and processes to be both sustainable and profitable? Well, a great example is to look at Unilever. Paul Pullman was the CEO of Unilever for 10 years from 2009 to 2019. So he actually took his company back to its roots and then looked at today's situation and brought it into the future. You'll find that back in time, a lot of companies did take care of their people and gave them housing and gave them quality of life and education. They felt morally responsible for the people who work for them in those ways. So Paul Pullman styled a focus on sustainability from the roots of the company founded by the Lever Brothers in the late 1800s. And they were progressive and innovative for human health with soap products, right? Getting people to understand how you wash with soap and it takes care of germs and, you know, it helps you live healthier and live longer and those types of things. They treated employees with dignity and respect and they didn't see any trade-off between seeking to make a profit and seeking to improve society. Like that was the reason for being for Lever Brothers. So Paul Pullman went back to those original roots and then brought, you know, Unilever into the 21st century and refashioned the company so that social responsibility moved from an important facet of the company, like here it is over there, to become its driving force. And the vision to create a better future in which people can improve their quality of life without increasing their environmental footprint. We're going to talk at the end about what a footprint is. He also created the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan in 2010. So how much progress can happen in 10 years? Let's see. This is the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan summary over those 10 years. They used this plan, as you can see, to have three major goals of the organization. One, improving health and well-being for more than a billion people. So by 2020, we will help more than a billion people take action to improve their health and well-being. And that contributes to several of the SDGs, as you can see noted there. All right, so the next is reducing environmental impact by half. By 2030, our goal is to have the environmental footprint of them making a use of our products as we grow our business, here hitting a whole bunch of UN SDGs again. The third major goal, enhancing livelihoods for millions. And this goal states by 2020, we will enhance the livelihoods of millions of people as we grow our business. Again, contributing to a whole bunch more SDGs. So as you keep going down, you'll see how they aligned, they had their big goals, they aligned to the SDGs, and then they created more goals underneath that align to the three major goals. And using the SDGs as a blueprint, as a guide, as the world's to-do list, as what companies can focus in on to make their own products and services better. So this is really a phenomenal outcome. If you go to unilever.com, I recommend that you do visit that site I have linked at the bottom. You'll just see that from the homepage, their commitment to sustainability is integrated in everything they are doing. You want to see the whole PDF that goes with this document, you know, a screen capture that I put here for us. You can click on the, or just search for unilever sustainable living plan, or you can click on that link and from the slides, which will be posted below. And you can dive into this further and you can just see how extensive they extensively, they have integrated this into their whole reason for being. So it's really a standout company. And Paul Coleman is absolutely a leader in sustainability today. As a matter of fact, one of our cases in the exams is based on Paul Coleman and Unilever, but it's called Uniglobal. And it's a female CEO called Paula Jaredus. And so anyway, I really do admire what Paul Coleman did with Unilever and what he's doing today. So what he showed, you know, him, his leadership, but the entire company of people who engaged in this process that you can do well by doing good. So we're looking at this people, planet profits, you know, triple bottom line formula. And for these are some of the statistics or achievements shared in Paul Coleman's chapter in the breakthrough from innovation to impact case study book. And that's in our study guide and learning materials. All right, so here we go. This is from what he wrote that they created a purpose driven culture which attracts and retains people, especially millennials who value this most, they put purpose into everything they do. They have a focus on creating a work culture where everyone can apply their full potential. So you get this personal development and professional development in the process of working there. They support a sustainable workforce by investing in the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual well being of their people. They see that that's an investment that gives returns treating their people well. Another category, let's look at the planet.  They cut CO2 from energy by 47% and reduced waste disposal by 98% for ton of production. Quite remarkable. Many factories run on renewable energy with company wide expectation of being carbon positive net positive, which is Paul Coleman's new name of his new book with Andrew Winston, carbon net positive by 2030. Continuous innovation across the brands resulted in better products, less packaging, smaller sizes and more items that could be put on each shipping load. So there's just so many benefits that came for the company by innovating and getting everyone engaged in this process of bettering products and the workplace for people. Well, profits, let's look at profits. The 22 sustainable living brands in Unilever, 22 of the brands are in this game of sustainability. They are growing 70% faster than other brands in account for 46% of a company's total growth. And from 2009 to 2017 Unilever's total shareholder return had risen by 300%. All right. So there's an excellent case to show you how companies can do well and do good and it can work with the right leadership and the right engagement from everyone in the organization. All right. All right, so next let's think about how can organizations effectively measure their impact on social and environmental sustainability. Well, this is an area that does have its challenges. Trying to determine what matters, what to measure, what's material, what's significant. The great news is that there has been a surge in sustainability data and measurement frameworks in recent decades. So investors, business, municipalities, governments, global institutions and communities are gathering information on environmental, social and governance issues at an unprecedented scale. So that is great news, right? People are caring more about this and doing, actually doing really great things in the workplace to help achieve these goals. The challenges, however, is that the proliferation of different indices, metrics and frameworks bring new challenges. So now there are many, many frameworks and metrics to choose from. For example, there are like over 2,500 metrics by which to measure sustainable supply chains. A business deciding to track biodiversity has over 34 frameworks to choose from and a government tracking inequality can measure it 19 different ways. So measuring what matters becomes challenging when we're asking businesses to be transparent and sharing their impact and then having that data be comparable from one organization to another organization. So there are things that are being done and have been underway for quite some time. One is the Global Reporting Initiative, GRI. They've been around now 25 years and they have standards they've created for sustainability reporting and they are extensive and comprehensive and they're by industry and by topic and so you can, you know, if you're leading up an initiative to start measuring impact, GRI is one tool to look into. There are others and this is shifting and changing right now and it hasn't fallen totally into place but choose wisely. So it takes a lot of time, effort and energy to do this kind of measurement. So companies have this increasing pressure from the stakeholder groups, you know, the government, the consumers, the investors to be more transparent about their environmental, economic and social impacts and provide credible sustainability reporting. Okay, so if everyone's using GRI while you have a better chance of everything being comparable, right? Let's see. So it is now the most widely used standards and used in more than 90 countries and in 2017, 63% of the largest 100 companies and 75% of the Global Fortune 250 reported applying the GRI framework. Doesn't mean it's the only framework they use either but this is one of the major ones and I think will continue to be an important player in measuring for sustainability. So what has also really come up in recent years, especially post-pandemic, the conversation is really ESG, ESG, ESG and this is environmental, governance. So these are considered like the three pillars of sustainability and what do these categories mean? Well, environmental, the things we've been talking about here in this course and again, you can go to the global goals and dive into those to see what matters, what's important. You can do the same for social issues. Look at the SDGs, see what's identified there. The items listed here are pretty universally understood to be environmental and social issues related to ESG and governance passage you with how a company is run, like what's its management structure, what are the employee relations like. We want to know about executive compensation, employee compensation, it's about transparency and ethics. So ESG evaluates a company's and helps determine responsible investing. So earlier we talked about those externalities and those externalities have real costs and for the most part they're not factored into the price of goods being shared in the marketplace. So let's go back to cattle farming. What if you're an investor in cattle farming? Yet the real price for profitability of cattle farming is negative 165. Well, that's a risk, right? What if policies change? What if consumer demand changes? What if your supply chain changes and says no, our consumers don't want the rainforest cut down for beef production or we want to consume less beef, things like that. Well, that's a risk and in business you need to constantly be assessing the environmental forces, right? So in unit two we're talking about policies and those policies can shift and change and you have to stay abreast of that. So ESG is a way of staying abreast of those risk profiles and determining how sustainable a company is, right? What's their longevity based on the decisions they're making and the way they're making products and services? All right, another thing I think we did talk about though is like carbon taxes. Carbon taxes, as that plays out in the marketplace, can affect profitability. All right, so what is the research show? It shows that companies manage with the long-term ESG friendly approach and a clear focus on sustainability perform better financially than those that aren't. There has been a huge rise in interest and responsible and sustainable investment among asset managers and owners and rapid growth among companies providing ESG analysis. So as of 2022, 96% of the world's largest 250 companies report on sustainability. And the lack of a standardized system for reporting on ESG performance is the main reason ESG analysis is time-consuming and expensive while also making comparison difficult. All right, so remember we are in the beginning of this new economic system, this newer way of doing business. We're looking at the beginning of the 21st century to now and these things are playing out and they haven't settled. This is an area that hasn't really settled that, but these inconsistencies in reporting methods, yes, they are a challenge, but these standards are starting to converge and so you'll see more of that as we move forward, converging, merging, combining and that's going to be ultimately cleared out, but it is currently definitely a challenge. Okay, for learning outcome to be, here are your study guide resources and links and some additional resources. Really highly recommend, you also recommend or you read the additional resources because you'll see some really great case studies like making a man-made blue zone in the Netherlands, like intentionally making a blue zone, which is healthy lifestyle. The blue zone cultures are ones where they have found that people live regularly to be 100 years old or more and so how can you recreate that human sustainability? And then what about Dutch marine industry and engineering in the oceans? How can a company that's 100 plus years old respond to current changes? There's some really good things on citizen driven innovation and creative community spaces and you'll see a lot more examples of companies that have successfully integrated the SDGs and sustainability into their businesses like the Business and Sustainable Development Commission Report, the Better Business Better World Report, has a lot a lot of examples in there and well just dive in and you will see a lot more examples which we could never go over in our time here, but I just want to encourage you to look and see what companies are doing because can inspire you and give you hope and give you you know some energy to do what you need to do to take part in this. All right our final final learning outcome for unit two is to recognize social and environmental ethical issues such as equity well-being production and consumption arising from innovation as sustainability policies and practices. So let's see how we can bring this to life for us. Well something I mentioned in unit one which is something I'll mention again and I think we're seeing that as we move through this course more and more that sustainable business is ethical business that's your ethics yes your ethics strategy and wow right we can be an ethical business start to finish and and by being conscientiously sustainable being creative being innovative and thinking differently and creating new ways of doing business. So in unit two we're also talking about policies and choices and this is the production possibility frontier in the PPF it's a classic you know economic way of looking at trade-offs. So in this case we're looking at the trade-off between economic output and environmental protection and you know we think back to Paul Pullman and Unilever in the very beginning of that company in the 1800s they didn't see that as a trade-off they saw it as like what they do their reason for being and I kind of question this this kind of economic thinking when it comes to sustainability because I think it what influences this thinking very much is are you looking at a short-term viewer or a long-term viewer and you need to carefully weigh that out so each society will have to weigh its own values and decide whether it prefers a choice like P on the production possibility frontier which is more economic output and less environmental protection or a choice like T with more environmental protection and less economic output these are the choices we make right these are the values we express in our lives and in our societies and in our businesses and in the work that we do and our personal purpose and in our life experiences. So my question for you is where would you place countries like China on this production possibility frontier what about the USA what about Sweden what about Costa Rica South Africa perhaps the country you are from you're not from one of those countries where would you put your own country on this production possibility frontier and where would you like to see your country on this production possibility frontier and do you believe that perhaps there are not truly trade-offs between economic output and environmental protection which is what some of the research we've talked about today has shown so these are the questions we have about moving into a more sustainable world you know does this idea really is it really a trade-off or not okay I'm going to let you think about that I have some ideas but you'll have to reach out to me directly if you want my feedback I want you to consider and look up those countries and decide for yourself where you place them all right another ethical issue is our individual and our collective impact and there's something called earth overshoot day and this is a day that an organization called the global footprint network determines through all of its research and analysis that when we use all of the earth's resources that it can regenerate in one year so if we were 100 sustainable we would not have an overshoot day we'd make it the whole year without using more resources than the earth can regenerate right but what's happening is that every year this goes earlier and earlier and earlier in the year this day hits earlier and collectively meaning all countries in the world together collectively that earth overshoot day is the 28th of July okay next year it'll be earlier because that unfortunately is the path that we are on at this point until we change that so that means in 2022 we would need 1.75 earths to keep up with our usage sustainably but obviously we only have one earth what we need 1.75 to keep up with the way that we're using the resources here um all right so if everyone lived like norwegians just a developed economy with you know a lot of infrastructure and things like that um we would actually need if everyone on the planet lived like norwegians we would need four planets right and you know it's probably the same for the united states i don't know we need the least four planets for the usa um two everyone live like us but the statistic from our video the footprint of companies they are norwegian so they share what their country would take um the presenters in that video are our professors um from norway okay now in jamaica in jamaica when is earth just looking at the country jamaica earth overshoot day is december 20th so what we have is an ethical issue and sustainability is the unfairness and we hear this all the time that that smaller developing nations are paying a huge price and they're not even the cause of the problem like the global north you know or the more developed nations in the world so that is unethical it's unethical that we even need for earth's or even 1.75 earths um collectively but it's also unfair it's unfair to countries that are way more sustainable in their lifestyles like jamaica and many others um i just pulled that from the global footprint network website and um so there's this huge unfairness and a country like jamaica is an island nation and we have sea level rise and they're going to pay the price they're going to pay a huge price for that right all right so we see this unfairness and we need to think that's why we need to think globally not just individualistically in our own houses in our own communities we need to think bigger way way way bigger all right so what are footprints we talked about footprints a little bit earlier in our talk today and the footprint of companies is really the sum of our individual footprints what we all do individually becomes the footprint of companies and it becomes our collective impact so the way we shop eat travel has either a positive or negative effect on the environment and society right so that's our footprint those problems we are causing those externalities from what we're buying how we're traveling what we're eating all of these things and we need to reduce the negative effects and we need to increase the positive effects on both societal and environmental impacts and as we are talking about in this course this requires innovation in new ways of making and using products all right so i'm going to leave you with this um this is another chapter in our breakthrough from innovation to impact book case study book it's the responsible society which was written by um jan petter uh balkan ender who was the prime minister of the netherlands from 2002 to 2008 and he wrote this chapter in the breakthrough book in around 2018 so he um through his leadership in sustainability as prime minister and even after being prime minister his work today these are his lessons learned he says in my opinion it is a matter of how you change the mindset and how you change the mainstream i am convinced that the role of business is changing so these are some of his leadership lessons learned which are always be aware of the dna and values of your organization use the creativity of your organization and its people try to make a connection between the sustainable development goals climate change the circular economy the new economy and the moral dimension if you have analyzed things well and have the conviction to carry out reforms and implement new ideas stick to them in order to be successful especially when it comes to innovation it is essential to cooperate with other organizations and sectors invest in new alliances and relevant stakeholders and leadership requires long term thinking in order to accomplish change you need to develop a long term view all right so i'll leave you with that to to reflect on and here are your study guide resources for our learning outcome to see and next up we will be heading into unit three where we will be integrating entrepreneurship with innovation and sustainability all right so see you next time and take care until then


All right. This is the CPA committee meeting of September 10th, 2020 meeting by zoom and the meeting is being recorded and will be put on the town's YouTube channel for later, later viewing. So we have a quorum. I suppose we may yet see who might we. Oh, there's Kathy Shane. Hi Kathy. Hi, we know Fletcher is not attending. We do not seem to have Dr. Williams at the moment. So can we have a minute taker. You don't even have to take minutes now you could watch it all again, and take minutes then. I'll take minutes. Thank you Robin. In a while. But seriously, I think we could, if you wanted to just sit back and then watch it again later time. Oh, no, I'd rather take minutes. Okay, nothing personal. That's all right. Okay. Thanks Robin. So we all have the agenda Anthony. Oh, okay. There it is. There it is. Thank you for putting that up. So the next next item is to elect a chair and vice chair, which we certainly can do. We are short and at large member and a planning board member. So I think we could wait. If we want to, we could perhaps just appoint chairs pro tem to carry us along. I don't have an opinion about that. Anyone have a thought about whether we should go ahead and. I like that idea. Of pro 10 and wait till we're a little more up to number. I think we can do our full compliment. I believe the planning board is fully. Has a full membership now. So I think they just. Just need to appoint somebody. I'm sorry. Can I ask for the explanation of what pro 10 means? I'm not. I've heard it. I don't know what it means. Means for the moment for the time. Okay. So I think that's a good idea. Okay. Anyone else have an opinion? So there should be. Good idea. I think I also think. Sarah. Okay. Yeah. Can I just ask a procedural question? I don't see a chat function. Do we not have a chat function? And that's fine. I just. Wanted to know. Are we in like webinar mode or I don't know. We are in webinar mode. Yes. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So, um, So we won't elect a chair and vice chair, but if we're going to just. Do that on a temporary basis, maybe we should do that now and just decide who will fill those roles for the next. Me for the next meeting. Whenever that is. So. All right. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what the next meeting. Whenever that is. So. All right. So I.  That's Diana nominating me. I really need a formal vote. I mean. I'm happy to do it. Anyone have an opinion. Okay. I was thinking ahead to the next meeting. Or I will just remain the vice chair and, you know, until we elect somebody else. Okay. All right. Let's just do it that way. So I'll continue as vice chair until I am. Either reelected or replaced. And hopefully we'll have full membership. The next time. We'll have full membership. And decide on budget amount for new projects in the coming fiscal year. Thank you, Anthony. So maybe you could walk us through. And when, so when we say the next, the coming fiscal year, we're talking about. Fiscal 2022. Right. Right. With funds. Those funds becoming available July 1st. 2021. Correct. Correct. Okay. I'm going to go through the financials for you. Okay. So. So 21 is still estimated. Because until we, until we set the tax rate. It will continue. It will be estimated. The only actual number on here is the beginning balance for fiscal year 21. Because we closed out 20. And we know what that beginning balance is going to be. We're estimating our assessment to be about 950,000. And we just got something. I think I forwarded it to the committee from the state saying that they're matching share right now for us to use. Percent 17.7%. That's for the 21. So I. So I updated that. Somebody asked me a question. Sonia, can I ask? I don't, I didn't look back at our previous financials. Is that represented increased the decrease in the state match or they hadn't. It's an increase in their projected percentage. So it's an increase, but it's. Things could still change. Okay. Okay. So for fiscal year 21, we had a little over 2 million. We, we voted appropriations. For your microphone. If you're going to talk. Excuse me, Dave, I, Dave, I think you must have some other microphone operating. Or, or mute. Mute your voice. I believe I just muted him. He'll need to unmute himself. Okay. All right. I'm sorry, Sonia. That's okay. Thank you. So we voted 1.256 million. For the fiscal year 21 process. And we voted a budgeted reserve of 377,000. So that's available now. Even. Once the tax rate is set, we could spend that money. For the. Being the budget and reserve. Right. For the 21. Budget period at the end of fiscal year 21 that. We would have a budgeted reserve. And then the fiscal year. For the budget and reserve. In the budgeted reserve. We would have a budgeted reserve for the fiscal year. That would be cash. So. Normally I would add back, but because of the timing and the estimates, you would add back any unused portion of the budgeted reserve. But it's too early to add it back. Too early in the fiscal year. And then there was the historical. We voted 50,000 for the historical preservation, doesn't go away. That carries over from year to year until you spend it because it's a designated reserve. That brings us to an estimated beginning balance for fiscal year 22 of 416,000. We increased the local tax estimate. We've been coming in a little higher so it's safe to increase it to the million. And then we always stick with our 11% state match until we hear differently from the state. So for fiscal year 22, we have a 1,526,951 available. We have to subtract our debt service because that's already an obligation, which will leave us a 1,138. Also you have that 50,000. It doesn't go back into the pile, but we just know it's there if we need to add it to any historic thing. Anything else, anything that closes from the budgeted reserve could also be added to that 1.1 million dollars. So did I confuse everybody with that? Just took me a moment to find the one point. I was just doing it in my head, but I see it's okay. So and you're saying of that 1.14, 50,000 is reserved specifically for historical preservation, but otherwise. The 1.1, yes. It's not included in the 1.14. Oh, it is? So that's set aside. It's a different pot of money to spend, but you can't spend it. Sonya, I have a question. Can you hear me? Yeah. Okay. So let's say we have a project that's 50,000 for historic preservation, but that counts sort of for last year. Do we have to have sort of 100,000, let's say, for this year, so that we account for historic preservation for last year and for this year? Well, yeah, that 50,000 just helped us. It counts towards our last year, 10% obligation. So it could be spent three years from now, but it's appropriated from that 10%. For fiscal year 22, you still need to spend 10%. Okay. I just wanted to be sure. Yeah, got it. Thank you. Okay. Can you explain the budgeted reserve what that is? Last year, you didn't have enough projects to spend all the money on this. So you decided to put the 377 in a budgeted reserve. And the reason we do it in budgeted reserve is because once the tax rate is set, you can't go back and spend this money unless it was voted as a reserve. Okay. So if you remember the year before with the North Amherst Community Farm, they wanted more money for their windows, we couldn't give it to them because we didn't budget a reserve and the tax rate was already set. Okay. This will prevent that from happening. Okay. So projects could come up for the fiscal year 21 that we could fund with this 377. And I'm pretty sure the town is looking at bringing the front steps of town hall at some point, whether they're going to do it for fiscal year 21 or 22. They're just that's coming. Excuse me. I'm confused. So that 377 is still available, but only until the tax rates are set. Is that what you said? No, it is available for the whole fiscal year, even after the tax rate is set because we budgeted it. I'm sorry, as a 2021 fiscal year 2021, you said they might bring it in for 2021. The stairs? Yeah. Or did I mishear you? I thought you said they might bring in the stairs as a 20. They might bring the project of the stairs that would come out of this 377 in the fiscal year 2021 if they wanted to start early spring. They're supposed to get back to me on that within the next week, so we'll figure that one out. Okay. Okay. And once I hear, I'll let everybody know. Presumably that's something we vote on, right? They've somebody come and present that to us? Yes, it would be. Okay. Full submittal. Yeah. Can you? Also, I want you to note that in the fiscal year 21 box up here, you'll see returned appropriations in fiscal year 21. So we closed out 94,000 in open project funds. So in your packet, you also have a report on outstanding balances. And in there, if you see the highlighted ones, the highlighted yellow with the red writing, and it says close right next to it, if you were to add all those up, it would add up to that 94,000. So that those are being returned to the pot. Right. And is that happening pursuant to this letter that Anthony sent out to everyone? Yes, everybody came back and said we're done with this. We're done with this. So and there's little notes on the side there to tell you what's still going on. So this is in place of that letter this year. And I haven't really had a whole lot of chance to dive into that letter. That was that's ready to go out the whole instructions that stuff that Robin and Sarah sent me. Right. I haven't had a real chance to discuss that with other staff members and everything. But if we send that out, once all your projects are approved or recommended, and once they're approved by the town council, we can send out a letter letting them know that and letting them know that they have this reporting requirement. The only thing the only thing that I'm kind of questioning right off the top is do we really need to do it twice a year? So that's something I want to discuss with the committee before that all goes out. So I guess I'm lost now. Well, it's great. We have $94,000 to put in the pot. Right. But you said or the agenda item includes deciding on the budget amount for new projects. What what is it we need to decide? That part I don't understand. Maybe I shouldn't use the word decide. But basically what we have right now is 1.14. Right. Can you Sonia? If more projects close or the budget reserve comes back in, then it'll be more. Can anyone hear me? Yes. Okay. Sonia, can you revisit your comment on the 377 budgeted reserve listed under the 2021? I heard two different comments and I just want to confirm my understanding as to that availability. My understanding is that it was voted because had it not been it wouldn't have been available should the need arise. But is that limited towards 2021 or is it available supplemental to the 1138 1.4 in other words? No, what happens is at the end of the fiscal year that closes out to the fund balance. You can't it's like a free cash. It has to be recertified every year. So you'd have to revote it every year. So when you're going through the 2022 budget process and you realize you haven't really spent any of the 377, you might want to vote it 350 in and just keep 350 in there every year. So there's always money available. I mean, that's that's an option for the committee. So it could be supplemental if needed for some reason. If you voted in, yes. Okay, very good. So but it doesn't get used unless we specifically vote to fund something from that reserve. It's totally just a funding source. So if anybody wanted to use it for anything, you'd have to go through the whole process of presenting the project and the committee would have to vote the recommendation. Right. Thank you. Okay. And I think that's it for me. Okay, so we there's nothing for us to decide at this point. We're just aware of the funds that may be available in this next round. Yes. Okay. Great. Maybe Sarah, this is a point where I could ask the question that's that I alluded to before the meeting started, which is when do we ever get to see the written reports, the so-called annual reports on where people are on the project that CPAC has funded? Okay, so I just got those about three weeks ago. So we haven't had a chance to implement those and send those out. We figured we would implement that process with this fiscal year 22 budget process. So when the people got approved for these and the town council voted it, they would get a letter of approval and we would send out the report requirement that they would have to fill out. Okay. What I was, what I was, I'll just throw it out there. What I was thinking is that when we send the letters out, we tell them that they have to give us an update by June 30. That way I would have, we would have all those reports and get them to you before we start our process in September. That sounds good. What were you alluding to when you said you didn't want to ask them twice or ask for reports twice? The report, the letter is requiring a report being submitted twice a year. So the letter would have to go out and everybody would have to report on that on their projects twice a year. That was as Robin and Sarah had proposed, right, their draft. Yes. Yeah, I don't think we're wedded to that. I think we had some thinking about it, but I'm happy to discuss that, you know. Yeah, I'm thinking we should just try it for the, for the year, each year and then if we get good use out of it and we think we need more often, there's no reason why we can require twice a year. Subsequently. It's certainly a nice step in the right direction. Right. Any other questions? Sonia, there is actually, the return to appropriation is actually about $107,000. There were some other articles we had closed out prior to the ones you gave me this week. Okay, that's great. So that's going to be a little slightly different in the number, about another 13,000. Wonderful. Always good. War is definitely good. I didn't know Holly was there. Thank you for, okay, giving us more money. Are we ready to move on then? Any more questions about the debt service? It looks like we're making final payments on, well, one project. Yeah, that's great. And it looks, and you'll probably see Valley CDC come on in fiscal year 23 for the SROs. Okay. So that's 18 months away. More than 18 months. Okay. All right. Should we move on then to the proposal letter? Okay. Okay, I have some comments about the proposal letter, which I don't know if I can get to. Let me see. How do I get there? I need to, I've written them out if I can reduce what I'm seeing up here or I can try to do it by memory. I was, I know for starters that I thought it would be good to have a catchier title before the subtitle of propose a community preservation act project. I was thinking something like you need money to do something good for the town or something that asks the question and then propose a community preservation act project would be how they do it. Like I said, I can't see my notes. So I'm kind of, how can I reduce this, the size of what I'm looking at? I'm not sure you can. We're looking at Anthony's screen. You can click on view in the upper right hand corner and it might exit you out of full screen at which point you could access documents on your desktop. All right. Let me see. In the upper right. Well, that's where it appears on my screen. In the upper right there's view and there's full screen or exit full screen. If you're able to exit full screen from a desktop, you're likely able to then view your own desktop documents that Sonia sent to us. You can't, you cannot manipulate and navigate the screen that Anthony is displaying. He would have to do it for you. Well, I see you guys over to one side, but what I can't see is my notes, which is. Diana? Yeah. You use a Mac or a Windows computer? Mac. You should just be able to minimize this like any other program and call up your notes. Oh, I see. Well, yes, if I see the little If up on top you have a dagger that says view options with the down arrow, one of them is exit full screen also. Way up. Yeah, I see where it says view and that doesn't work. And oh, here, maybe under meeting. There we go. Okay, great. All right. Give me a second. I'll pull up my notes here. Perhaps I can interject a question while you're, you're getting that. Anthony, is this, is this, does this letter simply appear on the CPA committee website or is this actually mailed out to somebody? So that was going to be my, that was going to be my next point, which is we're calling out a letter, but as of right now, the only plan is to put it on the website. So it's an announcement. Yeah. Okay. So, okay. So what I had was a need to grant to, to benefit Amherst quest mark and then go into the proposal community preservation act project sort of get them thinking before this is confronting them. So I, I would suggest that that is probably a really good idea for the social media side of this push when, when Brianna puts it out on the, on the front page and on Twitter and Facebook. Probably leading with that on the social media push is probably a good idea. Okay. Well, okay. Then my next point was to, instead of please submit proposals to say proposals are due Monday, October 12, 2020, they should be submitted at the link below. I think you need to be dogmatic there. Okay. I would suggest highlighting that as well. Pardon. I would suggest also highlighting the due date, not just in the top, but in the letter proposals, submit proposals to us by Monday at the due date. Okay. And then under available funding, the order in which I would do it, it was, would be like this. Other funding sources, question, possibility of multiple funding sources, question mark, need for additional funding in future years, question mark, it sort of builds a natural progression in my mind. So anyway, that's a thought. And then you have a number four under the submission process. I have, and first I tell you right now, there's a conflict between the form and the date. But let's assume that the date on this is correct. In October and or November, applicants will present their project proposals for CPAC and the public. I think it's a little clearer what is being expected. And then you have to decide do you want it in January or February? Because the form says that and the letter says October, November. The form would be out of date. So, all right. Remind me, when we get to the form, remind me of that. All right. And the last point is just submits their recommendations to town council. It's spell out the fact that we're talking about recommendations. So, those were my comments that I... You're referring to number five under submission process, Diana? Yeah, that's a good edit. Okay. All right. That's it. I'm done with that. I have a follow-up comment on your initial comment, Diana, regarding the proposal community preservation act project. In light of what you said, adding how to or the timetable of steps would describe it. We could potentially add that to that header. How to propose a community or the timetable steps to propose. I'm indifferent whether or not that should be added, but that was my understanding of an interpretation of what you were asking. Well, the point really is it sort of proposed a community preservation act project. I don't think it'll catch people as much as either iterating the fact that these are multiple steps or something a little bit less dry. Anyway, I will be quiet about this and go back to the full screen. So, on the main page of the CPA website, there is a button that says propose a project and that leads you right into this. It's the same wording. It's the very first option at the top of the sidebar of the CPA page. Okay. Yeah, this isn't like a publicity piece. This isn't the press release that will go on the front page where it says they're now available. Click here and then it brings you into the CPA page where the very first option is propose a project. Right, Anthony? That's exactly correct. That's good to know. Anyone else have comments or suggestions? Yeah, I have one thing. This is Sarah. I guess on the front page, Anthony, it might be helpful to break up these sections. I don't know with some headers about the first paragraph. It's just a lot to read. I would sort of be like, why are we like background? I just have some headers to guide people. Okay. Do you want me to specifically give you headers or can you? No, I think we do one for the first paragraph, which is basically about the CPA. Yeah. One for the second, which is the committee. Yeah, exactly. And then the third header above at this time that says how to propose or something like that. Great. And then in the first paragraph, I might either bullet or bold the quote because it really explains what we're supporting for the acquisition, creation, preservation of open space, bullet for the acquisition, preservation, historic. Those are, that's like key. That's like the heart of what we're doing. Yeah. So putting it as an indented quote is a perfectly appropriate thing to do. Yeah, sure. Exactly. Yeah. Sorry, I'm sort of sorry. I didn't mean to. Yeah, I can make, I think I can make that into a block. Micromanage the formatting, but yes, would be helpful.  All right. A couple things. I think not everybody, hard to believe this for all you who do this for a living. Not everybody knows when a fiscal year starts or ends or what that means. So I think it would be helpful to say perhaps near the end of the first paragraph when it refers to approximately $1 million for fiscal year 2021 to add like 12 months beginning July 1st. Oh, and it should be 22. 22. Yes. Okay. Okay. So beginning July 1st, 2021. Okay. So folks know exactly when that year begins, when the funds become available. Get at it. And I forget if it's clear, do we are all do submissions? Do we only want submissions online through the form? If so, I think we should say that. And under submission process, complete the application, you know, maybe include a link or something, or maybe near the end of that page, it says apply here. Is that a link or? Yeah. The thought had been that we wanted to at least encourage people to read the whole thing before they blindly click to apply somewhere else. They would have not that everyone is going to read everything here, but if we had to put big, it would make it easier to bypass everything. Well, then can under submission process item one say complete the online application? I mean, if you don't want people to be mailing in things or printing out forms, or if we don't care, you know, if they can mail it in, then state that and give an address. I mean, every last year, everyone did it online, except for the North Amherst Library people. Right. I mean, if someone mail and when they mailed it, you know, I didn't, I didn't give them a hard time about it. I just scanned it. But yeah, we can make that clear. I have an additional comment if you're don't have further ones, Sarah ahead, Sam. I just want to reiterate because your comment got me reading the where to apply and the reference of the end of invitation, Sarah, and it seems to me the paragraph on the first page that begins at this time, we invite you to submit projects appropriate to the provisions of the act, et cetera, et cetera. Please submit proposals by Monday, whatever. I think it's worth highlighting that. So it will stand out. And this kind of goes in line with what Sarah, Sarah E was mentioning about having headers to the key point. So it'd be easy for someone to navigate it. But I think at this time we invite is significant. That's my opinion. I have, how would you want it? Do you want to just bold? I would, I would bold from at this time to the end where we say at the link below and perhaps have that link highlighted. Okay, because you, because you also wanted me to highlight the date. So I'll have a highlight and a highlight. Perhaps. Yeah. I think the dates, the most crucial factor for anyone who's submitting anything, that's the first thing they're going to go to. What's the deadline? But just to make clear, regardless of all the background information, the proposal evaluation criteria will be important, but the fact that it's an invitation and a dead, dead due date for me, that's my opinion, stand out. Well, it is right at the very top. Yeah, I'm not, I'm not sure. I mean, if people are already looking at this, they need further encouragement. I mean, I'll, if everyone thinks that needs to be, well, we could eliminate it if we wanted then where it says at this time, but if it's in there, I think it's significant because it's an announcement or not. I mean, it's not critical. I agree. I mean, we're kind of parsing minor things at this point. If anyone else thinks it makes sense, speak up, otherwise we can just retain the highlight for the please submit proposals by. I don't think it needs to be highlighted twice, but I feel strongly. So Diana's points about the bullet points under Craig's hearing three reordering them. If I want a favor of that. Is that okay? Can you clarify? So I believe Diana, I'm just curious about, I'm curious if there's consensus for that. I think I assume the reason they were there is that they were in order of our preference that we seem to prefer proposals that have that have sought funding elsewhere and well, maybe not, but maybe that's not maybe my assumptions. I think it sort of gets there anyway, but anyhow, whatever the committee wants is fine. Can you describe the proposed edit? Go back to it. All right. I have to shrink. Wait a minute. I have to get back to it. I believe you wanted to make it first lack of other funding. Second, second future years, third multiple sources. It was slightly different. I'll try to get to it. Remind me, view options. Let's do 50%. No, that doesn't do it. Diane, this doesn't seem to me a priority. This just seems like, so I don't feel like we need to reorder it. It's just, well, I, I honestly felt it made more sense, but okay.  You mean you feel like it's, it sounds, it's a prioritized list and it's the wrong priorities. All right. What I had was other funding sources. So that's a question, a general question, possibility of multiple funding sources question need for additional funding in future years question. That's kind of a broader issue that concerns our committee because we don't want people coming back year after year asking for another $300,000 or whatever.  All right. I'll defer to the committee. I'm indifferent. Okay. So I've been on the website just making those changes right away. So you were to go to the project site. It should reflect all the changes right now. You are fast. It was just, it was just the easiest way was just to get right in the website. So, so Anthony, while everyone was discussing that, what came to my mind is it might be good to have a link to the chart that shows the allowable uses. When this goes out, everybody can click on that and make sure that it's within the scope of CPA. That's a good thought. I'll have to, I'll have to cut that allowable uses chart out and put it somewhere, but I can do that. Okay. Actually, it wouldn't even need to be a link. I should just put the image right in the, in the letter. Yeah, that would work. Just before I forget, I'll forget tomorrow. So I had to bring it. Yeah. Well, and it's recorded now for posterity. So there we go. Okay. So is, are we, if we're good with the letter, then we can move on to the form. Yeah, I didn't have anything except the conflict of the dates. I thought a form was fine. People don't expect much literary to think to a form. A form is a form. So long as it's clear, and I thought it was, I didn't have any changes except for the conflict. Except for the conflict? What did? Was the date conflict? Oh, yeah. Where is the date? Where is the date on the form? I have to find the form. Give me one. Oh, I see. Instructing. Okay. Yep. I see what you're saying. That's the proposals by Mondays, October 12th. Okay. For CPAP. No, not that one. It's the Project 2012 in January or February. That's the conflict. Yeah, I got it. I think in light of the timeframe reference of 430, I think we need to add the 430 p.m. to the instructions submit proposals by Monday, October 12th, 2020. If 430 p.m. is in fact the deadline that we have, it should mirror the letter. I don't know how strict we are on that or not, but for some types of submissions, whether it be the state of Wisconsin or Arizona, 10 minutes makes a crucial difference, as we've seen. So I recommend we add the 430 p.m. under the submit proposals by Monday, October 12th, 2020, and add the time deadline. That's, I can do that. The form is, the time is strict just because that's how our website works. But of course, I can make it any time. I just set it for the end of my workday. Let's just reference it in there so it mirrors whatever the letter is. Yep, good change. Any other comments on the form? I have one, the affirmation. There are some projects such as Valley CDC, I don't know, would they be, in fact, be able to spend it all in three years? Is there a way to kind of qualify that, you know, will typically have maximum of three years or, you know, if more time is, I'm sorry? It's the dance we're doing between trying to set expectations and but not shackling ourselves to not allowing exceptions.  Right, that's what I was going to suggest to some sort of language about extension that that would be the process to go beyond the three years. Extension request. If extension, if an extension is needed, you know, that needs to be approved by the committee or something. Right, and if we're going to send out the reports that they're going to fill out every year, then that form could probably address that issue. Okay. I believe we also left the word May in there so that it was not, it's absolutely going away in three years.  Right. I just wonder is it, would anyone be deterred?  So now I shouldn't apply or. Can you put a short statement at the end of the May statement about extension? You know, just something simple to suggest that, because it says at the time May return and use money, extensions would be considered on a case-by-case basis or something like that. It seems to boil down to our motivation and how significant we think it is to set the expectations of three years or not. Right. I mean, I got the feeling from the committee that they wanted to make sure that there wasn't all these old projects hanging out there. Right. I mean, I think the, absolutely true. Yeah. The expectation of three years is what we want to set forward. And then just a simple clause to state that, you know, there is an extension process. I mean, that's kind of standard, I think with grants, you know, that you can't make it. You ask for an extension, but to have just a tiny bit of language in there so that if somebody was looking at this, at this application and they saw that, you know, if they anticipated that something might not finish in three years, they wouldn't be deterred. I think it would be fine to add that. My opinion, something that indicates they could request an extension. Sure. It may not be granted. I think that would be fine from my opinion. So you could put at the end, after June 30th, 2024, the town may return any unused money to the CPA fund for new appropriation unless an extension is granted ahead of time or approved by a timely manner. Yeah. Yeah. And in the grant agreement letter, there's probably language around the extension opportunity. So this is just a nod to that. But what we don't want to see is people going, well, you know, we didn't know that. So we're making sure that they all know that up front in there, acknowledging that when they submit. I think that's right. These aren't big enough grants for people to be like, I want a five-year grant for, you know, but that's, I think it's fine to have this small nod to the extension. Anything further on the form? Not for me. Okay. In that case, we'll put it live tomorrow morning. And I'll, I haven't told, I don't think I, we haven't told Breanna yet that this is coming. So it might take a day or two for her to get it up. But the form that we'll, we'll have, I'll have the form itself live sometime tomorrow morning then. Okay. Super. So now to the schedule, our schedule, which Sean made for us. You're all here. So you must have read it. It means our, our October and November are busy, but I'm assuming everybody's okay with that. Obviously we haven't, we don't know who are new at large and planning board members are yet. Hopefully they will have seen this in advance. So they'll, they won't agree to be on the committee if they can't do it. Does anyone want to raise any objections or concerns? The only thought I had, which I communicated to Sonia and to you, I believe, Sarah, was that there's always the potential later on in November. If we have extended discussions, such as happened last spring, it's conceivable we might need another week in there. I know there's another week listed. As long as, you know, I assume this is our desired schedule, but there's the opportunity if something comes up where we could add greater deliberation. Hopefully that wouldn't occur, but I do think it's, it's important that we understand there may be the potential for it. That's my only comment. It's not a suggestion to edit anything. Right. Yeah, I think because this is so aggressive, there is room to grow if we have to. And it will so depend on how many proposals are submitted. Right. Some years it's, you know, 30. And some years it's 10. I thought that last year's process we accomplished quite a lot in the spring in terms of the ratings, but I also thought it was compressed a bit, which, you know, might have been just my perception, but if we just retain, as Sonia indicated, the capacity if needed, it's a good thing to just keep in the back of our heads. Yep. All right. Then I guess this is our schedule and seeing a lot of each other. And before we end this meeting, there is a meeting on the 24th. That's if needed. So if there's something you want to talk about on the 24th, we can schedule that or we can cross that off tonight. I leave that up to the committee. I just wanted to bring it up before the end of the meeting. So how would we decide that if people think they have items that we should discuss? Should they send those suggestions just to me or to me and Anthony? And then we just... Sure. That works. Sure. Okay. Either way, as long as it gets to Anthony or me. Right. Can we get this as a recurring meeting in our calendars and the Zoom link so we have it ready to go? Sure, if I can figure out how to do that. Sorry to make whatever... To do what, Sarah? Invite... Have a counterhold with the recurring Zoom link. I think we can figure that out. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. I'm reminded to... We should all be pruning our email list and be careful of replying all and not sending out messages to people who are no longer on the committee. All right. So I think we're done with that. Next is update on signage and I'll ask Sam to give us an update on that. Okay. So there's been a few things in terms of thoughts from our kind last spring. I had had conversations or email communications with a few members of the board and Nate provided his feedback prior to departing as well. We tried to identify locations that could be priorities for signs if we want to peck away at them in a prioritized basis. Essentially, we identified the bigger ones as the more important ones, Plum Brook, the new ones, Dodd Park, Mill Valley, Graw Park, North Hampton Road, depending, Kendrick Park, and there's a listing here. Not all of them. We also thought that it might make sense and the committee will need as we go forward to decide what to do, but we thought it probably made sense to have two different types of signage assuming we go that route. One that would be for the historical or recreation and a different type of sign for the open space areas just because they're existing right now. I did have a conversation with some members of the town staff, Sonia, Dave, who I see is here now, trying to identify what types of things could be done. No decisions were made, it was just brainstorming for the purpose of informing the committee. The thought was that it makes sense for to have plaques if we go that route, small, non-intrusive, without a simple statement such as funded your CPA, MR CPA dollars at work, something along those lines, and a small, unintrusive ones for those that are structures and that for the open space trails, it would make sense to add signage beneath or as an adjunct to existing signage. I did some review in terms of how this might get funded. Initially, I was thinking it needed to be a project submittal, but in talking with the state CPA coalition and also Sonia's suggestion, it seems that the administrative expenses would be the route to utilize for retroactive signage if we go that route, and new projects could have either a request within the project or could be administrative, so the funding mechanisms are most likely would be administrative. I did speak with and request and Dave, I don't know if you have any feedback on it or not, the thought is that it's a priority for the committee to come up with a mock-up of a logo and or a statement that would go on any signs that we chose to proceed with, and maybe we could come up with a few examples to choose or to talk about to brainstorm over time so that the committee could consider, because I believe it makes sense for us to come up with a logo of some sort that could be placed on signs. If there is any additional feedback, Dave, it'd be great if you could speak. I see that your hand is up. Do you have the ability, Anthony, to respond to Dave's raised hand? He should be able to unmute himself. Can you hear me? Yep. Great, yeah. Very quickly and not to rehash everything that Sam said, but yeah, I think we've had a good discussion about some of the different applications and if you can visualize a kiosk on a trail as one application, the dug park, a similar application, so kind of recreation and conservation we saw is very similar and again, to save money, I think if we came up with a template and a type of sign that could be simply attached to existing kiosks or new kiosks each time there's a new addition to Groth Park, for instance, as we opened the spray park a few weeks ago and the playground a couple of months ago, something could be attached to a kiosk there that's as funded by Amherst CPA dollars or whatever you all decide and then as Sam noted, indoors, there clearly would be something that might be a little nicer if you will and more appropriate for, for instance, viewing inside the JCA for the steeple improvement or the UU for the stained glass window or the Jones Library for some of the work that has been done there. So I know Sam, you came up, you did a little Google searching and came up with some examples of what other communities are doing. I don't know if you sent those out to the whole group or not. I have not. If Anthony has the ability to share my screen, I could show them quickly for viewing. We can also send them out. The question was how do we go about creating an example for discussion? Does it make sense to, would it be created by the town staff first where we could talk about it as a group or, you know, do we go external to a sign company? So we mocked up a couple very simple things just for tonight and again, I apologize, we didn't have a lot of time, but Angela Mills in the town manager's office and I think Anthony has them, if he can share them. This is what you just emailed to me, right? Yes. Yeah. And also these are just simple ideas. I'd also like to give Holly credit who was on that previous call for recommending a short comment as a statement as opposed to a long sentence on any sign. Thank you. And I believe Anthony, you assisted as well. Thanks, Dave. Again, these just kind of follow what other communities have done. We thought they should have the town seal on them. And again, these are very, you know, we could work these further. You know, I think it's something that could be done in the house. I really don't think we need to hire a designer. No, I can't see. I can see PDFs, but I can make it bigger. There's nothing to see yet. I don't think it's it says I'm sharing my screen right now. Yeah, but we just see your mail, your inbox or your message or something. This is what you're talking about. It's too small. I don't know. The documents are not open yet. Anthony, it's because you sometimes you have to reshare your screen if you've opened a new thing. Okay, let's try again. Like you've opened it and you can see it on your screen, but it's still back at your email. There we go. Okay, great. Thank you, Sarah. There's three just quick little mockups using the town seal. That was one. That was another. Cool. And then this is again, nothing unique here. We're kind of copying what's already been done out there. Did we put the year on? I was thinking that would be a nice thing to do. You know, so great. I like this. I like this one in particular, but for all of them, I would strike the word committee. Just Community Preservation Act, Amherst, Mass in any order, I think. I mean, it's not a, right, it's up to town council, right? We don't really get. Yeah, no, I agree. This project funded by the town of Amherst Community Preservation Act funds or something like that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So 2020, 2021. So if you're comfortable, why don't I have Angela work up? We might work up five, six of these different things using slightly different language, and we can get them to Anthony to share with you before your next meeting. Could I, can I make one mock-up that just had the seal in color and black and white for the other might be more striking? I don't know. It's just a thought. And I offer a radical idea, which is that could we, we've, so I feel like we've sort of expressed what we want. Can we just complete this? Do we have to vote on six? I just feel like that's not a good use of the collective time. So what are you saying, Sarah? I think we've said that we love this language, that this project was funded by the town of Amherst Community Preservation Act funds with the year on it. And then the town can just wrap the wrap. I just, I don't need to vote and I don't need to waste the town, Angie's time making six options for me to vote on. I think it would be beneficial to see two different possible phraseologies, whatever they might be, because the signs are going to be up for a very long time. And there's, there's the chance that we might want a distinct type of statement for external outdoor signage versus a plaque. And for the plaques, you know, I believe it's likely we would need permission from the occupants or owners of the structures of historical projects if we're going to have a plaque. I would, my preference would be to just have a cup, you know, just a little bit of deliberation external to a meeting of two or three different commentaries. I'm pleased to hear that you, Sarah, and others are, you know, in line favorable, view it favorably, because I think it'll be a good thing for us to move forward. And I like the idea of doing it quick. But Sam, Sam, why don't you and I, who are, we've lost Nate, but why don't you and I pursue this with any town staff and we can just come back with some very specific plan and that sounds great to say yes or no, or, you know, we don't like it. That sounds great. One other comment is that in looking at other towns and in speaking with the state coalition, the recommendation was made that we might also, for long-term construction projects such as Valley CDC, we might want to have a banner or something that is temporary that can be placed in or during the construction process. It could mirror whatever signage and logo exists. It's something to consider. The thought is that signage can get worked on according to whatever schedule works for the town and it doesn't necessarily need to be immediate, but over the course of time, over the course of the next year and as we go forward, this will be a good thing. So thank you for your suggestion, Sarah, and that sounds great. Okay. So Sam, did you say you had some examples to show as well? Are you still wanting to show those? Oh, no, no, I think these look great. I love that logo. I think your idea is a great idea to when something is being built and a construction project is going on, like the Valley CDC, this project partially funded by town of Amherst CPA funds. I think that's a great thing to have that we could move around to other projects. The only thing if we could change the word funding and funds, it would be a little more interesting. I don't have a suggestion on the movement, but I'll think about it. You're also going to have to have one that says it's been partially funded, because they're not all 100% funded. So you're going to have to come up with a wording for that, which is just simply adding partially. I think the bigger long-term issue that we'll have to face since Sarah and brought this to my attention, and also by the state folks, is we'll have to consider how to approach private property plaques. I believe it's achievable according to the status occurred all over the place, and Dave suggested a letter, a nice letter from the committee. That's something that in time, but immediately the town, certainly for the properties owned by the town with internal decision making could move forward. So these look really nice. Thank you so much Dave. Can I maybe suggest one thing about, so I think we could, it's quite easy as Sam, you just suggested to go back in time and we can do open space projects, we can do recreation projects and get those up as soon as we have these. I think we could approach previous awardees, organizations that have gotten CPA and simply asked them and I think it would be difficult for them to say no. I also think you can simply require as part of your contract discussions and contracting with future private entities who might receive funding that it's a requirement. There has to be a plan. Grant funders do this all the time. So we simply say private entity X, nonprofit Y, we require that you put up this black at the conclusion of your project. It's another thing that we should put in the grant agreement letter. Yeah, it's pretty standard stuff. The question that Sarah had is, is that something that's doable or should we review it further? I think it is wise to review to make sure that there are complications affiliated with that. I'm certainly in favor with our placing such a statement in grants. I'm less concerned about the immediate year as opposed to the long term for the CPA and whatever the collective wisdom is on that makes sense for me. Well, we have quite a few months till any contracts are going to be stopped, right? So off the top of my head, I can think of 25 or 30 projects that have been funded in the last 10 years that these plaque signs could go up on immediately. So it'll get, I think, good coverage. Great. Okay. Moving on then. Thank you, Sam. I think we have already addressed the next agenda item update on prior year project balances. Yes. So anything more that Holly or Sonia want to say about that? No, we're all set. Okay. So you'll get, you'll have even more money for us next time, right, Holly? It's great. Just a tiny bit more, yep. Okay. All right. Discuss any policy additions or changes? I don't know anybody. I do think, and we're not going to do it tonight, obviously, but I don't think we've quite put to bed that CPA plan. I think we're very close. So that's just something for the future. Great. And it needs posting too. Right. When it's done. So I don't know. Was anyone thinking of some particular policy additions or changes? I was not. I think if we have an updated plan, even in a partial form, recognizing it may be edited further, it would be a better listing than the current plan if we've changed it significantly, even in its current form. Well, I think the only outstanding issue was some language around the reporting, and I think we're basically there. Because people are going to start making submitting projects, they will be referring to that document. Any applicant who's not familiar with it will be reviewing what we say in there. Yes. Well, the fundamental requirements have not changed. So I don't think there'll be a lettuce stray even if it's a little out of date. Right. All right. So we have no outstanding minutes. We will. We will hopefully for next time have two sets. Are there any members of the public watching us who might wish to make a comment? There are no attendees other than the panelists. Anthony, for note's purposes, I see three Sonya Aldriches. Is there any way we can on the other two? So I don't know who they are. They have not connected audio or video. I actually think it might be David Williams. I think he might have connected multiple times. I don't know. He's there now. He is. Are you hearing us, David? Okay, that's fine. So I don't know who they are. Okay. And I don't know why they're coming up with Sonya. About half of you came in as Sonya and I renamed you. That's interesting. So that's something else for IT to figure out tomorrow, I guess. Can we just say, well, those who came in as Sonya, was that like Apple or Mac versus PC or a phone versus something else? I have no clue. I have not seen that before in a Zoom meeting. Okay. All right then. I have no topics that I should have couldn't possibly have anticipated. Does anyone have any suggestion for business for next time, whenever that is? I don't. I have a comment which is that I should have mentioned with the signage. We did and I was able to acquire the previously existing Facebook page for the Amherst CPAC set up by Paris years ago and I see that there's a link on the site to it. I'll send that to the various members so that they can also click like or whatever it would, you know, wouldn't be harmful to expand awareness of the fact that there's a CPA in Amherst. As I recall, Anthony wanted to kind of bring that into that IT. Yeah, we did. There was a form to get filled out and that's been taken care of with Brianna. So it's within the town requirements of what we have to do in terms of who's the administrator. And as a committee, we have the ability to make edits. At present, I'm the administrator of it and I can add another editor and I also indicated to Brianna that it would be she's welcome to be an editor or have access as well. The main key there just with any Facebook page obviously is it's got to be professional and the motivation here is just simply to as a committee, you know, if we have an invitation going out, we can put that and maybe add a few pictures. It's just a presence that over time will, you know, the more awareness we get of what we do, the better I think for the town. So just FYI. Indeed, great. Yeah, I look forward to seeing that. Okay. All right. Any other comments? No, it says that we could use it to review ongoing projects but we're not at a stage where we could do that, am I correct? That's what it says on the information right. And I'm not sure what maybe Sonia could say that would be for projects that are in progress but they're still working at spending their money. Is that what is meant by ongoing projects or our own internal projects like signage and stuff? I assume is Sonia there? I am. I'm trying to figure out what exactly you're talking about the Facebook meeting. September 24th. Oh, I thought you were talking about Facebook and I'm like, you know, we switched. So I don't think there's stuff for us to look at, am I correct Sonia? Right, right. I just put that there in case there was something from this meeting that you wanted to carry over to the next meeting. No, I'm only interested in what people have been doing and how far along they are. And we're not at the point to look at that. Right. And I don't know that we'll really need to talk about it. Okay, well, Kathy has her hand. Oh, I'm sorry, Kathy. You're muted. Yeah. Yeah, no, I didn't want to break in but it just occurred to me we have a council meeting on Monday night and Lynn often begins it with announcements. She could announce that the CPA proposal period is now open. It goes up on an agenda piece and if there's a way we can have Athena work with able to, with Anthony, a link to, you know, with instructions on how to so that you would get an announcement out. I think that's a great idea. Can you affect it or how do we get it going? Does Anthony do it or what? You're muted, Kathy. You're muted again, Kathy. Sorry. I will email Lynn right after I get off this that the agenda always has kind of announcements and it's often the next meeting, but so she can just put a line in there. Council is getting kind of used to the agenda changes multiple times before Monday morning, you know, with one more thing. And then it's just a question of whether that link can show up and I'm sure Athena can figure out whether that's possible or I'll check in with Athena. Okay. All right. Thank you. Great idea. Wonderful. All right. Then if there is nothing else, I will take a motion to adjourn. Dave Zomek has his hand up. I'm sorry. I don't see, I don't see everybody. Okay. Dave, I'm sorry. I think that was from earlier. So I did not mean to raise my hand again. I think it was from earlier. Can we confirm that we're not meeting the 24th, correct? Unless something burning comes up that needs to be dealt with. Yes. Yes. I moved to adjourn. Here's a second. Second. Sam and Sarah. Okay. Robin. All in favor of adjourning. Just, I don't know, raise your hand. I can't see everyone anyway, but I don't think anyone. Hi. Hi. Anyone opposed? All right. Thank you. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you so much. Thanks everybody. Bye.