commissioners could review the agenda and and let us know if there's anything else that that we need to shift. I will just say quickly that I may ask that we while we're trying to make sure that Bridge for Unity and our town counselors are able to speak. I think that I'm probably going to try to talk for just a couple of minutes first about the use of the affinity group discussions at the Amherst Regional Public Schools, at the high school at least, in order for us to to see some of the things that we might be interested in doing as a point of comparison. Before we do that, you know, we are now about 30 minutes behind where we thought we were going to be. So that makes things a little bit tricky as far as, you know, leaving things open for public comment. That said, I think that that we should still do that. And so I bring that up only in order for us to understand what the agenda looks like. Were there any other comments or statements about the agenda before we move on to approval of previous minutes? This is Elizabeth and since this is my last meeting I would like just a minute at the end to, you know, say thank you to everybody. Since I will I will be seeing you I'm sure that but I won't be a member of the commission. So I'd love to do that at the end. We need a virtual cake. I'll create one quickly. I'm going to come get my book. That's what I'm going to do. Yes, what you need to do. Okay, any other and that was a perfectly stated and necessary agenda addition. So thank you Elizabeth for that. I'm wondering if, since we're going to be short on time, do we need to take time to approve minutes tonight? Could we do that another time? Yeah, I mean the only comment that I would make on the minutes would just because it's a vote and the idea is that we're able to share this with the public once they're approved. So the longer we take the less we're sharing with the public. So the February 27 minutes if there's instead of asking hopefully you've had a chance to read them prior to coming to the meeting and so we could just ask if there's a motion to approve the minutes of February 27. So moved. Is there a second? Seconded. Okay, all in favor? All right. All right. Opposed? Abstentions? Okay, great. Well, thank you very much. So for the June 4th, I think the only statement I'll make is with regard to three and dealing with the Civil War plaques, which I think we're going to get back to in a bit. I think that we stated support for the project in general. It reads for restoration and installation of the plaques. We don't know what that looks like right now, but as long as everyone understands that it means support in general for commemoration then I think we're good. Just a note that I received feedback from the family and I apologize for blanking on their names that spoke and that they have been restored. That's what they said. So it's just about the installation. Well, so they were restored and then they've been sitting in storage in temporary. So there's possibility that they'll need. Okay. My guess is, and we'll talk about this a little bit later with what statement we want to make, that our full support would probably be somewhat dependent on the costs and what other options might exist for a similar commemoration. But the idea is that we do want to support commemoration and to the extent feasible the placement of the stones. But if that's the only tweak that I saw, were there any other comments on the minutes of the June 4th meeting? Hearing none, then is there a motion to approve? I guess, can we say HRC voted unanimously to support restoration and installation of the plaques as a general statement? Just because we're going to be looking at a letter today. So with that change, is there a motion to approve the June 4th minutes? I make a motion to approve. Is there a second? I wasn't in the meeting so I don't know if I can second or not. I'll second. Okay. All in favor? Opposed? Abstention. Abstention because I wasn't in the meeting. That's your own reason. All right. Then that motion also carries. Okay. So now we're in the position of being able to open for public comment. And what we'll do is we'll, as necessary, try to give that the 20 minutes so that we can actually hear from our people in town. And so at this point, if there are attendees who want to speak as part of the public comment, we are open for that. And so if you can raise your hand as an attendee. And so right now Lindsey Smith is doing that. But can you just let them know that this is being recorded prior to like their announcement statement, please? Yes. One of the things that everyone should know is that these meetings are being recorded. So if you volunteer to speak, you are also volunteering to be recorded. If you do not wish to be recorded, then you are free not to speak. But because of how that town is handling things right now, all of these meetings are being recorded. All right. Lindsey Smith. Recording is cool with me. Thanks for letting me know. So first, thank you all for setting this up. I appreciate the persistence and putting this together. This is my first encounter with these sorts of meetings. So I could be coming into what I'd like to request after you guys have already set up a resource for this. But you know, there's been a lot going on in the news. We've all handled it well, I think, to be expected. But I'm wondering if there's any sort of addressing the fairly specific relationship between law enforcement and civilians in the town of Amherst and as far outreaching as can be expected. Okay. So during the public comment period, it's not an opportunity for us to answer. Our meeting will deal with that a little bit. But right now it's just our opportunity to listen. So cool. Okay. Well, I can reframe it and just say I among many am fairly concerned with that specific relationship. It's definitely been on my mind recently as it has been for I realized for many, many other people. And it's something that I don't normally jump in to reach out directly to you guys. I think you do a great job of my wife and I have been here in Amherst for about five years. But it's just something that definitely hits close to home for a lot of people and I felt the need to speak up. So here I am. Thank you very much. And again, our agenda will discuss having conversations and Human Rights Commission involvement, including with the Amherst Police Department. So we will be reporting on that. Not good. Anyone else? I think a number of our attendees are here to speak on particular issues and therefore have space on the agenda. And so that may be why we don't have have to have the 20 minutes of public comment today, although obviously it's good for us to have room for that. Okay. Hearing no one else in the public comment period at this time. I want to, before we go into our involvement in conversations with organizations such as Bridge for Unity and Town Council, I just want to quickly note again that the Amherst Regional Public Schools organized some discussions that were affinity group discussions. So that went with Petwa's idea from our last meeting that there be discussions that are more in group discussions and supportive in the first instance that might allow people to express concerns and perspectives without having their identity perhaps challenged or their experiences nullified in some way or erased in some way by having a large group discussion where they are not viewed as being central to how that discussion should move forward. I also want to say thank you to our town in general and the educators for Black Lives Matters rally and Petwa spoke beautifully at that rally. Thank you Petwa. And so I think that there was some good movement through our education system and I want us to think about that as being one of the models that we would use as far as either discussion groups that are planned in advance or breakout sessions that would allow for smaller group discussion and that's part of what we discussed in our last meeting. Petwa did you have your hand raised? Okay sorry just thought you did. So that's one model that I think we can think about and we can come back to that when we're looking at how we would frame discussion groups. The discussion around the police department we can have that now or we can have that after we've discussed engagement of organizations like Bridge for Unity and the involvement of the town council. If everyone is going to want to stay on for the remainder of our meeting then it might help to get the report on the police department first so that we have a framework for what some discussions look like and whether we might need to find ways to make it clear to the public that we're having those conversations in order to make sure that that we're getting as much feedback or getting as much representation as possible. So on that front I would turn it over to Agassi Chhaya at this point to discuss that. Thanks Matthew. So I'll just briefly share that we did have a myself Dr. Mokar Shabazz and Dr. Demetrius Shabazz met with the police chief, Captain Ting who's one of the officers, Paul Backelman, Shalini and Pat who are both town counselors to ask some very specific questions around current policies and procedures and budgeting just to get a baseline understanding of where Amherst currently is. And I think the conversation was brief but I think it showed some areas where we certainly can now as a community look at how the police may be taking on responsibilities that other social services might be better suited to take on and how to look at that as a community and specifically in terms of our budget. There were 59 community members who attended and there was not an opportunity for the community members to engage in a meaningful way and something that just personally I feel really strongly about is that that indicates a really strong need on the part of the community to have conversation around these issues and I appreciate Lindsay who came to just reiterate that and I encourage I have encouraged the town counselors and Paul and Chief Livingstone to to think about how they can open themselves up to the community to listen whether that be a town hall or that be partnering with us on some specific dialogue opportunities but there's definitely a need to talk and for people to understand what we what we as a community are experiencing right now and where we might want to move. So I think there's a lot of room to move forward. It was certainly just an introductory information gathering starting point and one of the points that I really heard the Chief and Captain Ting acknowledge is that they have struggled to receive feedback from the community and we talked about how there are real reasons that barriers to participation and barriers for folks on giving that feedback and that they are open to understanding what those barriers are and to working to take some of those down so that they can be in better communication. So I think it's really a time for us as the Human Rights Commission and for us as community members to think about how to take them up on that and to figure out ways that we can organize and under you know work together to communicate what we want to see in in our town. Thank you. I attended as a community member and so I got to be an attendee and and I know I attempted to use the Q&A function and so I put questions in and the host I guess was unable to see the questions and and so we ended up so that was that felt like there was an additional level of disconnect that perhaps we might have been able to avoid in some way. Can I just speak specifically for that? So so unfortunately the sort of the original intent of the meeting was not for it to be a community discussion and we had sent a specific set of questions to the Chief to to respond to and so while all those wonderful questions were coming through we only had that one hour and and he had agreed to go through that set of questions that we had given him and the after the fact because I had originally had a meeting with the Chief of Police last year which I think I told you all about with my town counselor Shalini she then shared with other town counselors who then shared with other people and before we knew it a bunch of people were invited which we were happy to have people join but it wasn't set up as a community discussion so unfortunately I think the like unintentional byproduct of that was that people felt like we weren't listening to them or like we weren't acknowledging them and that was a real shame because that was not the intention at all and that that is why I keep reiterating the community has a lot to say and a lot to ask and it I really feel that it's the town and the police department and the town council's responsibility to acknowledge that need and to give people opportunities to come and to really give them the time that your question deserved and that so many other questions deserved because it wasn't set up for that meeting to be able to address those and so I'm really sorry for that okay you know I just I brought that up just because I think that there was and now I see that there's a Q and A here right I comment about a face-to-face facility conversation and while that one of the struggles that I think we're all having is how to have that kind of facilitated conversation when we aren't face to face when we do have these technological difficulties and where we are trying to make sure people feel heard and respected and there's certainly not an intention to make people feel cut off or feel disconnected and you know I think when when because when you said that you were going to be having this meeting as a citizen you know I thought I'd be happy to attend and I wasn't planning on asking questions in any event but but I couldn't help myself once once I was there to type something in but I think trying to come up with with a way for I think it was great for people to hear the questions that were prepared in advance and to hear the answers to those questions it's just certainly a struggle for me to hear Chief Livingstone say that you know we ask every year for comments on how we could do better and we never get them and so the only question I put in was how do we publicize that is there a way for us to share that and is there a way for the comments once they go in are they something that that everyone has a chance to review and so that that was the only question I posed because I thought you know if our Chief of Police is saying I really wish I could hear more voices but you know I did put in that whenever a committee chair every year is asked how is your town manager doing and we get an email and we have a chance to respond and say Paul is doing great and so that's wonderful but if I don't see the the same kind of email or outreach about the police department and you know as chair of the Human Rights Commission I don't see that many people would be would be seeing that I would be getting that and so I think it would be great for us to once we have that information to share that broadly so that people can can speak to the police department and not just either make a complaint that we hear about or make a complaint by meeting with the superintendent. There's another question in the Q&A. Does can town manager Paul Backelman speak to the idea of having a town hall? Paul would you like to speak to the idea of having that kind of town hall conversation with the police chief? Absolutely yeah I think it I think that we're very interested in doing that I know that you have three counselors who are in the audience who have been talking about this and eager to do this as well and we've talked you know I think you're right Matthew how difficult it is in a virtual setting to have a something I don't know how you do a face-to-face facilitated conversation which I think is what's needed in a virtual setting but we can figure out how to make that happen but I think it is really important and to for the town to be in a listening mode and you know I've been looking we've been looking at ways to do that better for the police department so yes definitely want to do that and the chief and Captain Ting are both eager to do that as well so and it's just a matter of how what's the best way to do that and then I leave it to the I think the HRC and the counselors are the ones to do it will be any excuse me be anywhere whatever is best so but I do know that you know the council president has talked a lot about trying to figure out where this goes on to the council you know not a regular meeting may maybe at a regular meeting however they want to do it and to and do it at a time that's not at night maybe on a Saturday afternoon or a Sunday afternoon so other people can participate do multiple times at least for this first phase I think is what they're thinking and if we wanted to thank you Paul if we wanted to invite the town counselors and at this point Shabazz has just put in the Q&A communication from Shalini about some tentative dates they have set aside for conversation so yeah and and Lynn Griezmer who is also on the call also in attendee right now spoke with with me about the possibility of us co-hosting with the town council and you know working to try to think about what a facilitated discussion would look like we discussed the possibility of bringing in someone who perhaps isn't in our community one of the concerns I had about community member facilitating a conversation is that that community member's voice is going to have to shift right so if one of us for example tried to act as a facilitator a people know us from from being members of the community and may have expectations of what our views might be which might make facilitation less credible and b if we were acting in a role as a facilitator and I can say this is someone who doesn't necessarily take pleasure at running meetings but because I'd much rather just chime in every once in a while with what I think is a really great idea but if you're facilitating you can't really do that in the same way so it makes it a little bit trickier so I think we're looking at trying to see and if we can come up with some names to present to the town council as potential facilitators so if any of you have particularly people who in this time period were distrust nationwide is in part stemming from the history of racial violence of our country and of our police forces not specifically the Amherst police department but police departments generally and and frankly policing because of that nationwide history frankly global history people of color particularly African Americans and Latinx people have experience of fear and so a facilitator who doesn't minimize that would be incredibly helpful so as as you think of people to recommend please consider that as well and I think that's part of why we've invited bridges for you bridge for unity correct is that they've been doing this work and have offered to work with us on this project and we have two representatives Deborah and I believe the name was Pat but now it's not here anymore who have come tonight to talk about that uh Paul so thanks so I have to jump off and I totally apologize I'll watch the rest of this um meeting but I do do want to recognize I mean I think what was put in the chat should could be read out but again just to note that we have three counselors who are looking for helping how to frame it and so I'm glad you guys are thinking along these same lines so I apologize I have to go though so yes okay um thank you Paul and um um and I don't know whether it is uh uh Dr. D. Shavas or Dr. Amalkar Shavas who is pointing out that uh bridge for unity has non-amorous residents who can help and um and has again cited some of the language um of of uh looking at trying to organize the the discussion so for those of you who can look at the Q&A um we'll see first a description of intergroup dialogue as discussed and then the the question of or the manner in which we can move forward so um before moving on though I wanted to ask of the commissioners first if there was if there were any further questions about uh the meeting that uh Ghazid Haya and uh doctors uh D. Amalkar Shavas uh organized with our police chief and with Captain Tank. I just I just want to make a suggestion if if possible that as as we go forth with some of these meetings there may be some communities that may not feel um either safe or don't want to engage in these conversations in front of police officers that we figure out a way to still get those voices in so I'll use myself as an example as somebody who's over of cave rate and dissent who has great relationships with the cave rate and community um and and I know that we do have some folks here that may not be documented I can't see them going into into these discussions you know I could lead a conversation with folks from the cavern community and try to get some of those views and then those who are willing to come to this setting to to bring come with them and have that discussion and those that were not then if they would give me their permission I could bring some of their views in it's been saying so that way that that discussion will still take place but not necessarily in front of whatever you know way we set it up because the people may not feel comfortable one day and it could be a plethora reasons language is also part of it you know some people I know the cave rate and community don't don't don't speak English fluently or don't speak it at all so I just wanted to throw in that suggestion thank you I think Aziz Haya also raised that that a similar point and with uh with with the police chief and Captain Ting and Captain Ting said at that point how thankful he was to hear that point because as far as hearing other voices when the police department looks at it through one lens and they think well this is the answer we just have to make ourselves available and people will come in they didn't even think about the fact that there were people who would feel uncomfortable coming in so that that was definitely part of the the conversation but thank you for bringing it up here because I I wouldn't have repeated it otherwise um Matt said oh sorry go ahead I love that I just wanted to add another thing which is you know having done community outreach in law enforcement uh for some time myself I think that part of what's important is also um making it very clear that there's kind of a long-term commitment to this that it isn't just like oh we have a problem this year let's have three or four meetings and then we'll kind of stop doing it I mean that's inevitably kind of a thing that happens but in my observation and experience you have to like keep going past the point when it's a big issue in order to get to a deeper level of trust so I would support that and you know as much as I can continue to be involved on this issue I will try to do that thank you well does it hi I was waiting to say something too I believe that's okay I see Ben has a hand up so go ahead Ben yeah I just had like a clarifying question because there's a something like a red flag that kind of went up there so um with the answer about feedback from the community did the chief mean solicited feedback from the community or was there like the uh I don't know the feeling that that just they don't hear anything from the community because that kind of just blows my mind personally and I've written them copious yeah I that was something that I felt strongly about too Ben because I have tons of friends who have specifically communicated uh how they've been treated here and and uh two town counselors and two school officials so I think that's an important point and I think that um that's that's something for our community to really acknowledge like who is being listened to and who's being seen as giving feedback like when is feedback actually considered feedback and when is it not and and how that is racialized in a lot of instances said it part of it is also you know process right so a lot of times and I'm talking from my experience at UMass we hear all of these you know uh feedback right about the police and sometimes we all know that the way process is set up sometimes it does not allow those voices to get in so at UMass for example this happened some time ago where um you know I was bringing some of these concerns to the police chief not the current police chief and he finally he was like said if the students and faculty and staff don't put a formal complaint in written complaint in then nothing exists right so again processes sometimes I use to exclude people so maybe that's what we may want to do is talk to the police chief or whatever maybe we need to change the process right maybe a verbal just a verbal communication that is something that would be official that is on record you're more the lawyer than I am but you know um but sometimes that's how it was you know if it was not a written complaint you know then he didn't exist and according to disciplinary actions through the UMass system you would have been like nope nothing exists in this person's files well therefore there's nothing we can do to discipline so it's processes right so um so that's that's something that we also may need to take a look at I just want to make two quick points on that uh the first was that I do believe he was talking about a specific uh that chief Livingstone was talking about a specific annual request to the town how are we doing um please give specific feedback uh as opposed to hearing comments from from people throughout the year um that said I don't think that the two are mutually exclusive and I think if you're getting comments from people throughout the year if you're getting letters in that's something that you should be able to work from um that said I I also would point out that we have uh when we get people who come to our meetings and to speak and then they realize oh I don't want to make a complaint or they go to the the human rights director and say you know I want to make a complaint and then when they discuss the fact that that becomes public and uh and that uh you know other people would have access to information regarding the complaint they then say actually there might be a different way for me to handle it and and so when I hear about those things I report generally what I've heard to the commission um but without giving specifics because we're trying to not um identify the individual who's asked not to be identified I don't know if um when people go in and meet with Chief Livingstone and we've talked about this before the fact that while he has a fairly open door policy that people can come in and talk with him if they have a complaint they have to walk through the police station they have they may have to see the officer uh about whom they're making a complaint and that is unnerving disconcerting and it should be um and so we have to come up with with better ways for the the police department to be able to hear uh concerns that we have um Deborah and then Ghasid high um I was just going to say that if people if the police are actually hearing and receiving feedback throughout the year then they would have a better sense of how they're doing that's at the risk of stating the obvious but um also I think that is the benefit of these in-person listening sessions or forums or whatever it is that we want to um describe them there are minutes their people are there witnessing um so you know the feedback that is given is sort of unavoidable and I think that if like folks like Sid or others any of us who are connected to people who really are not going to feel comfortable stepping forward and voicing anything at these meetings or even possibly attending that we could work with them on the side to um help formulate a letter and you know it's an anonymous letter and one of us reads it and um so they're you know so that there definitely are ways that we could support people who just simply don't feel comfortable although I just point out recording um if we are having sessions that are recorded it is very hard um to to express any vulnerabilities um when you know you're being recorded and uh and and so that's something we have to give some thought to the only other thing I do want to say is I want to echo what Elizabeth said that I have also witnessed that um when you host continuous listening sessions over the course of a year by the third or the fourth one people are voicing a lot more so the first one is usually very quiet people are very you know maybe fearful and shy and and they build over time so I I agree with that comment and feel like whatever we do we should we should post this as a series you know I I agree with that as well because it's high I was just gonna say out of respect for the people who have come to the to speak to the agenda items that we have left I would like to encourage us to transition to the community sessions and hear from uh Debra Snow from Bridges Bridge for Unity and the town counselors I was just about to say the same thing um okay so um I am would be happy to have uh an understanding of how organized um engagement or engagement of other organizations might be able to help us so uh for Bridge for Unity um would you put your hand up so I can uh allow you to speak so that's under under the participants do you have access to that to um to click uh raise hand so it's Debra with the D yeah and then Dr. Milcar Chavaz is here as well from Bridge for Unity okay so Debra please hi there can you hear me yes great great uh first thank you for having this commission and also for inviting us um and uh I'm happy to talk about Bridge for Unity uh a little history is uh so that you get us somewhat of an understanding who we are um in 2017 uh my partner Barbara and I we owned the Blue Heron restaurant we took a vacation to South Carolina where we met a uh a woman from the low country a Gullah artist named Sonia Griffin Evans we had an incredible connection and invited her to be part of the Blue Heron's 20th anniversary she came up with some performers and um she's an incredible storyteller and she showed her art told stories and the and uh the performers sang and played the piano and uh we had about a hundred people there and one of the things I really noticed was an incredible desire to talk to learn and to find the true history of of this country we live in and it was from that that um coupled with the rage and sadness and hopelessness that I often felt uh with the killings of black people in the U.S. and dealing with the America's original sin uh and colonization that we needed I needed to do something and but it wasn't my place to decide what that is without conversation and so um it was then a journey to begin that conversation and to seek out people who would be part of it and I would say that's how Bridge for Unity started we uh we have been doing this for almost two years we uh there's about a little over 20 of us from this area uh the Connecticut River Valley from Southwick to probably Maungu where Barbara and I live um and um we've been having these dialogues they include you know and it's not official dialogues but I would say from time to time it's difficult conversations uh it includes having dinner together until we had to meet uh like this so we're breaking bread together there's some socialization you know just socializing and then we go into uh a conversation period we also traveled together to uh Buford South Carolina where we met with the South Carolina Linians and then and also some people from Kentucky who came who are part of Hands Across the Hills and then that was um a year ago in January and then a year ago in June we met we all met here for three-day retreat and we've continued the conversations with the folks in the other two states but we've also continued here something that Elizabeth says that said is a really important part of our uh this group which for unity is commitment it isn't something that can happen once or twice trust has to be formed um so many people have walked down this line before let's have conversation let's have dialogue but we don't get anywhere I feel that our group has gotten to a pretty powerful space um and again here we are filled with rage saying people's names functioning trying to function and each of us having our different amounts of rage for different reasons knowing that I as I look at this group knowing that all the people of color are in much greater danger of living and being harassed than I am as a white woman but I think as a group we have begun to deal with that we have begun to solve the problems in our group in our little community of 20 people to build allyship and that's that's where I find the strength I think of each of these people every day they mentor me they school me and hopefully you know I do the same and and um I think I think we all need to do this I need I certainly think the town people in the town of Amherst I've certainly very connected with the town of Amherst just because so many of our guests in our restaurant are from Amherst um and um it's powerful I think it's powerful but the piece that's powerful is you is the commitment you know there's not a person in this group I wouldn't help I wouldn't be there I would be there for I would fight fight fight for each person in this group every day and I don't know if I would have said that um two years ago but I say that now and I think for most of us it's been life changing please anyone questions uh milk rd I think are on they're part of the group um thanks so much Deborah yeah thank you um I want to ask uh I want to ask oh yes Dr Shabazz one of the doctors Shabazz is is ready to speak and and maybe they can answer as well uh but you know whether this is scalable um so if we're talking about reaching out a larger number of people throughout the town of Amherst giving people a chance to talk with each other um you know whether the model of saying you know we are going to be in community with a relatively small group of people who may have very different views can scale up um to hundreds and and perhaps thousands of of people who may want to engage in that conversation um I'd love to hear what uh the others think about that but um you know I think 20 people is a lot but we had uh I think about 30 in our groups and I think when we were in Amherst uh last June and there are ways that you break those groups down um I think I think that you need a level of intimacy I would see that it's scalable and that you would have more than one small group of say 20 15 20 people but that um you know I'm in an organization a business organization and the interesting thing and it it drives me a little crazy too is that we all watched George Floyd died get killed get murdered and now we want to fix it right away and and I have this this business group you know how can we fix it and what I want to say to everyone is you need to put it in your calendar every day that you give a certain amount of time to your racism you learn and you unlearn and you learn and you unlearn and you see what your organization can do or your business can do but you reach out and so that's the kind of commitment that I think a group if you meet once twice no you can't get anywhere so in doing it in Amherst I would think you would need a number of groups that would commit to at least a year every month well I also want to hear from the doctors uh Shabazz but uh I would point out that for many of us um you know raising our kids we have to have those conversations every day and and we have them every day and we say you know you know we're living constricted lives of what we can wear where we can go um how we can carry ourselves when we walk down the street and we're having those conversations because it's a question of survival right and so uh you know it's it's I think it's important for for people who are willing to have the conversation to understand that we're not coming at it from a blank slate we're coming at it from conversations that had to be had with us when we were kids you know I think about my father talking about uh when when he was driving on the highway having to pack his lunch because there was nowhere for him to stop because black people were not allowed to go when when he was growing up he was born in in 32 when he was growing up he was not able to to stop because those public accommodations were not available um and so you know those those conversations are um it's good to have uh everyone wanting to come in and come together but for a lot of us we already know that we're not starting with George Floyd um we'll say his name but there are thousands of names we can say I'm not sure a lot of white people know that though yeah which is part of the issue of trying to have a conversation though uh where other people come in thinking you know I I understand this I saw this um and and I now believe that this is a problem perhaps you've been saying this all your life but I've now seen it now I believe it um there's there's something kind of um erasing of the experience uh of having spoken for years about it and um and and uh asked other people to care about it for years I I'm happy that people are responding now but again um for a lot of us we've seen this moment before we've been in this moment before um you know people are not remembering today Gavin Cato the seven-year-old who was killed in Crown Heights in 1991 when it was hit by uh by a car and an ambulance came and picked up the driver of the car who had bumped his head and left that seven-year-old boy to die um there are again thousands of these stories uh that that some of us are coming to the table with all of that background and so uh you know trying to figure out what it means to have the conversation where even having even talking about it uh kind of raises my blood pressure a little bit and so I I wonder about those people who don't um aren't aware or haven't been made aware of it and do want to see change and so I I'm I welcome them uh to want to to make that change but uh I also am trying to deal with with not adding additional stressors to myself and to my loved ones uh as we engage in this conversation um Dr. Shabazz hopefully you'll chime in here too yeah fine am I on mute it yes you are okay so the the scale question um goes back to the previous meeting that I was in on and when I heard the question come up about whether the human rights commission might be an appropriate party might be an appropriate body to try to help lead or facilitate a virtual town hall discussion of these issues because as Gazette said earlier we were clear that our meeting was not a virtual town hall uh we were very clear that um that is not what was motivating us to set up the meeting uh with the chief it was more of an informational kind of fact gathering getting a baseline understanding of what our department is before you could talk about defunding or disbanding or anything you have to have some understanding of what what you do have in place that's providing your public safety uh or supposed to be providing your sub public safety so we we wanted to have that discussion that conversation in an unmediated in a um unhostile uh a non-contentious way but then along the way there was this great interest and more people wanting to be in as panelists and participants and so on that that's where when we were in the storm of that and hearing that emerge and we had this meeting on of the human rights commission and I was there to talk about civil civil war plaques actually um that's where when I heard the conversation going toward well what might the commission do as a body concerned with human rights in Amherst and uh toward this question of the the sense of desire that's out there for the community to want to be in dialogue with the with the town officials and with the police about our department police department in in light of what is what has happened and what's going on and and and then and so I heard from you all some or some of you some concerns about you know your own um sort of skill set or ability to act as a facilitator for uh for such conversations as might be really needed right now in Amherst and that's where B for you came to my mind because in addition to everything that Deborah has says said what we've done over the two years besides have these deeply meaningful engaging uh uh conversations dialogues uh uh and building up a certain kind of trust and a allyship and and solidarity between us we've also been learning and developing and studying uh the different methods uh and aspects of the process itself of intergroup dialogue um you know my wife taught it and is uh has done research on it and at UMass Himena Zuniga later cooks uh colleague of ours and public health they actually uh I helped to I was in the chancellor's office then gave them support to have an international intergroup dialogue conference here a few years ago so I just all I was jumping off of is that we have abundant expertise that could come in and work with some of you all on the commission if there is the interest and the will to do so that you could for yourself not have to hire out not have to go and get some facilitator out of out of uh Boston or Springfield or or wherever to come here but that you yourselves could you know be could learn some of the the basic techniques to um uh to help to facilitate what I was hearing as this big desire for a virtual town hall all right so that's the background of of it but to the question of scale I think we really have to ask what is what what is the interest and what is what do you as a would you as a commission really be most committed to wanting to facilitate wanting to to help step to this perceived need right now and Amherst for community discussion with and about policing and and and what really is the scale of interest for that what I'm saying is not that you then have to go out to every apartment complex and every home and and beat the bushes and beg people to come out but I mean it's already there the people are already there and if you just set it up they're going to be there what is that what is that number is it 20 is it 30 is it 50 is it thousands I think you have to you have to go into a thinking about that you know and and and what is the real interest level what is the and maybe you'd be right with the with the guests you'd make or or the approximation you'd make and then you start putting it out you set up something and you put out the RSVP and then hey if you thought it's 50 and then all of a sudden you've got 500 RSVP well okay your your estimation your estimates were were off and then you still have to see who actually comes to 500 can check off they'll be there and then and then oftentimes that's not the case for for myriad reasons so I think it's a question of thinking about what is the scale of interest that is here not that HRC has to go and drum up not that embers media has to go and drum up not that any one of us on this call has to go and drum up but what is the scale of interest in having a meaningful conversation meaningful dialogue about policing and about our police department with our town officials and with the police and then from that estimate of the scale you then begin to design the the the type of meeting that will get you at that will that that you hope will best afford a meaningful opportunity for an hour for an hour to have for two hours whatever for that interest to find those officials and and have the meaningful conversation and that can be conversation one in a series that could be one and done who knows I mean that's also part of that's another question you'll have to ask are you committing to this as a series are you committing to this as one and done and let somebody else take it from there what have you so those are some of the kinds of questions beyond just is the methodology scalable because yes the methodology is scalable even now within this tele tele-meeting environment where those of us in intergroup doing intergroup dialogue are confronting the issues of of scalability through this electronic format let alone to whenever we might be able to get back to to face to face or if we can get if the governor and the officials allow us to do face to face as long as it's six feet apart and outdoors or what have you I mean these are all technical questions we have to to look at but I think prior to all of that is really to ask and to try to assess what is the genuine interest level what is the scale of that interest level and then what are the best methods to facilitate that our old town meeting idea where we can get a couple of hundred people together in the middle school you know auditorium that's out we can't we can't operate our mind from from that context at least right now that's that's not safe that's not publicly allowed and so we're not so you got to throw that out of your head but what is what is available to us now that we could do outdoors uh six feet apart or that we can do by tele-meeting and then how best do you uh how do you want to to approach the question of scale do you want to you know have people check in um and and rsvp and then what you know once you get to a certain number you maybe close that session out and say okay for those uh others that are interested we'll look at setting up an additional time or we'll have to set up a a different way of addressing those past that first 30 that check in that first 50 that check in uh but but i'm so i think i've said enough but the first thing is to assess what is the interest to assess whether you as a commission want to uh be part of helping to facilitate that interest level that is there and then figure out what are the methods relative to the scale of that interest level that you want to then uh you want to then address because again if we're if it's in the tele-meeting format or a hybrid of tele-meeting and some people physically uh in uh on an outdoor site six feet apart you know there is um you you can then set what your number would be put the word out and then take the first 30 take the first 50 and and then and then set up the breakout session set up the the format uh talk with the town officials and talk with the police department about how the those from the police department who are going to participate about how you're going to structure there might be different breakout sessions on different topics that then captain ting will be in in the in the topic about use of force with seven people or and and the chief is going to be over here with with a small group addressing the question of setting up a permanent citizen review board civilian review board or citizen oversight committee thinking of strategically about what would that look like how would we do that and having a certain number of people in that session another session may address mental health issues and you'd have the person out of the force who's pinpointed on mental health issues coming in and then talk and then able the people in that one be talking about how do we get more mental health care providers structured in this work rather than it being relatively untrained uh police officers going out to handle people with mental health issues that that are being that are being called that that calls are coming in on so you do do you begin to follow you you you you address what do you want to respond to this need do you then assess what is the scale of it and then you begin to design the the way you want to do this according to the methods and according to the goals and the outcome that you want to have with your town officials with your police department and with the the the citizens the people of the community with this interest that you invite to come into the discussion well thank you um i think that that's it's it's helpful to to see that others are thinking through the concerns i i i don't know if that puts us in a position uh where we're suggesting that it it really needs to be um bottom up driven or grassroots driven um who really wants to talk with our um our governmental leaders um our town leaders with the police officers um and on what issues uh what expertise uh those those uh individuals within the police department for example would need to have to be prepared for those conversations or whether it's uh something where we say these are issues um that as the human rights commission we think we should educate our our town on we think this is an important issue and we're going to ask uh the police department to be prepared to um to open up and have a conversation and we're willing to have um you know a group of people come in to listen and then those who are interested uh go into breakout groups on zoom so that that they can engage in um a conversation and one of the things we talked about in our last meeting uh Petua brought up the the idea of having people who uh might want to first talk amongst a group of people who may have had similar experiences before expanding uh beyond that and and so i think that that's that's something that isn't off the table yet either so uh bridge for unity i think has as a premise that there's going to be intergroup dialogue um and that intergroup dialogue um and please forgive me if i'm misrepresenting in any way the work that bridge for unity is doing um but that that intergroup dialogue um is going to be enriched because of that that variation in in perspective and i'm not sure that we're quite there yet on that being the root that that um that we would suggest but uh again we're trying to come up with something sooner rather than later so that conversations can begin um and and but don't you think that i'm sorry because i don't i can't raise my hand but so don't you think that um even if we just start off with the small group that that small group will get bigger eventually like if we just start off something small and that is if even if we start off first with having these small groups where people feel more comfortable to be able to present it to the next group of people and then perhaps present it to the next group of people i mean kind of got to start somewhere right but that still doesn't answer whether it's us saying or the police department saying here's an issue i know a lot of people are talking about we're ready to present um and therefore we're going to have a webinar discussion which would be top down and would uh perhaps that's not what people want to talk about um but it it might draw a certain number of people and it could be a small group and maybe that'll grow but it might also cycle conversation from those who are really interested in talking about something else right now and in both approaches have reasons to them and are both of them are fine in different circumstances but we have to make a determination of which uh which methodology we want to support pardon me Matthew please the and i um one thing to note our group while there was variation it was very much curated um and while we were people from many different backgrounds and walks of life um it wasn't it wasn't random uh so there there was definitely a level of of curating who was who came into that 2030 uh people but i'd love it if pet you might revisit kind of her thoughts about this with within this group um in in terms of the the experience you of what you're seeing i i love to hear hear hear you hear you speak on things but if you could just revisit what you were addressing um i think yeah i've just been listening to all the conversation which has been um great i think um i think personally i believe that it's important that it starts um like grassroots from bottom up because like we've seen the way that top bottom like governing and ways of facilitating conversations causes harm and silences people and we've like everyone's been talking about that like said was talking about that with the gateverting community in relation to the police like it's not there's not the comfort between those two groups are not there so having like the police host a discussion about policing and how they're going to change may not bring the people the appropriate people to help create actually create that change and instead making it more of a uh like a okay we did something so now you can't come at us for anything because we actually did something um so i think that i personally think that it's important that it's grassroots from bottom up and i also um i appreciate the bridge for unity uh unity's mission of like um relationship building which i think is really important and i think that's lacking in a lot of uh like governments even in the human rights commission we don't really have like a like a established we have established like presence in the community but it's very limited to certain groups of people um and i think that working on that relationship was really important to create the change that we want to see um but then i think that the i think by seeing the images and videos of black people men and women and trans and all those black people that have been killed by the police there's like a shared um experience that we all have whether we are just experiencing it for the first time or not and we must i think um i think i appreciate what matthew was saying about how um like many people have already had their parents talk about this with them or experiencing it themselves and so like we must make sure that their voices are like i don't want to say elevated but like make sure that people know that this isn't just a one-time issue um issue um and then i appreciate what bridge for unity was saying about like how people wanted to learn about the history of the america america and how that influences where we are today um so when thinking about how to like specifically have these discussions i think that it's important that there's a goal in mind and that it's um that the like structure of what we do is centering around people who um have experience and stories to tell and not people who have power or authority to exert onto people because i think that causes some structure problems problems that like prevent people the most important people that need to be heard to be silenced in many ways and we see that with what sid was saying earlier about how like the police don't hear these stories if it's not formal i think we should create it in a way that it's intentional that the process is making sure that all um people are heard and are able to come to these discussions and feel like they they matter in the discussion that we're having and um i think one way in doing that is establishing what the goal is and then making the structure of these conversations match like what our vision is for these conversations that we're going to have so yeah petwood um were the um discussions run through the high school structured in in in that way or were they more free flowing i think that i think that the when i went into discussions i went to the women of young women of color um discussion and a alana group which is like basically a people of color group and in both the women of color group i was the only student that went there were two teachers that were facilitating just me but we had a really great conversation about like what i mean the intersections of like being a woman and a person of color and how that how we can use our power with both of those to move forward and what we did in that conversation was set norms um but the fact like i was the only student that was there so like there's not much i can do at that time and it's um with the other conversation there was like four five or six students and then two adults as well um i think that uh having those things come through like from above because it was from the school that offered these things which is top down in my opinion but it's still the discussions the people that show up can help create more discussions and you know that the people that are showing up to those discussions are ready to have those discussions and move forward and from there we can build leadership from those people that do show up um but i think that the way the the connect like i think for like the school in general the school hasn't created a relationship with their students so that they can just send an email about we're having discussions because someone was killed and we want to talk about and make sure you guys don't feel like you're left behind you can't just do that when someone's killed you have to have that um relationship before and i think that's where the school has failed um deeply but they're trying to make up for it but it's still it like that harm has already been done and so then the commitment and connection between the two um factors or the two people the authority and adults versus the students it's making like a tension that doesn't need to be there but it's created be based off of the structure and the communication between the two groups um so i think they the one the discussions we did have with the people who did show up were great um but the goal is not really i don't think the goal was really there just to talk and i think talking is great it's great to have those discussions to build connections and maybe they will spark um inspiration i know it does for me all the time but for most people especially like knowing that we we grow up in systems and and abide to systems that don't help us like make sure that those systems include everyone where it's like a capitalistic society that we live in um but i don't want to get into that but um i think that uh knowing that we are already engaging in harmful systems and structures we have to acknowledge that and i think that's what matthew was trying to say um and move forward knowing that we have a history of harm and we need to address that harm in a way that centers around those who experience the harm are not not as victims which i think is one of the ways top down um leadership like ends up being we're trying to victimize the people we want to hear your voices but only as a victim i feel like that we should go to people and have spaces for people to come to us that want to come as witnesses and like people who have experienced something and move forward and i think it will start it will start small small like um jennifer was saying but it's it's done place to start i think that's a great uh place to start so yeah both debora and amal kaira have their hands up so i want to give both of them a chance to speak um i i have a question um and so one is our two questions i guess or the general question is the direction so we're here talking about the police and uh wanting to figure out how to go forward on that and we're also talking about community and there's a place where they meet and i don't know in my view i think both have to be dealt with together and separately they're not mutually exclusive but um one of the things i have found in bridge for unity that as we meet we can then plan action we had to build some trust to get there uh but i also see that there are some efforts that need to be done rather quickly to make the community feel safer with the police and furthering discussion there so it so i'm just feeling like there's two two needs here is that everyone's take i think that that's that's certainly a valid point that um you know there are and therefore there may need to be multiple approaches over time but the question of how to frame that and how to start the process is is something i hope we can um move in that direction tonight and and just one other question is isn't it possible to move both grassroots and top down aren't there ways to do that i mean i would hope the um town council people would number one want to do this recognizing need and ask for that to happen i would certainly hope the police chief and other police officers would want to move forward so this community is better and stronger and i know that there are many people within the community who want these discussions whether that's members of of maybe leaders just everybody plus leaders in in religious organizations or or business you know i come from a business and my work is very much on getting businesses to to give to to function properly but what i think is properly and and to work to for social justice i you know how to i think that to to solve or to work on action with the police that everyone has to be involved different members and that there could be some reach out from members of a view all um to get other people then to reach out to their folks who would then join in so that it could be both okay and um uh dr amal karshivas had his hand up it's down now i'm not sure if uh and then after that um uh salin ebal uh who is one of our town counselors is ready to to speak yeah i'm i'm glad to hear from from the counselors my concern that i'm triggered is when we talk about bottom up and then we talk about top top down or whatever other kinds of approaches you know what i'm really concerned about is people want to see action the counselors are wanting to do things for their constituency but then there's the question of legitimacy and what what is legitimate change and whether or not people are going to accept certain things that are done as as legitimate or not because you know they were moving from the bottom up and nobody listened and uh you know other people did things from from the top down and and and and and so now you're picking people you know for a a citizen oversight or civilian review board and uh um you know the town manager gets to pick these people and you know is it the usual suspects or uh is someone in there who does have a linkage to the Cape Verdean community is someone in there who does have a linkage to um you know some of the other immigrant uh uh high immigrant population there is someone in there with the real link to the mentally you know the folks with with mental health issues um and uh you know and is able to and not because it's their job or you know they have some kind of you know um paying gig dealing with it but you know you know for some but have a real connection so yep Shalini how do you see see see this all right can you hear me yes all right so if i may i would just like to start by saying i am sorry i i just want to say it took me all this time and seeing i did it took me thousands and thousands of people suffering dying to wake me up i'm sorry for that and um i just want to say as an individual and who isn't on council that i am committed to continue with the the work and not let this die down that being said i was also wondering if there is a third kind of gathering we could have for healing and i don't come from a background of social justice i don't necessarily understand and i'm asking for forgiveness ahead of time i'm going to make many mistakes along the way but i'm willing to show up i'm willing to listen and learn and i'm wondering if there are other people in the community who feel a similar need to show up and maybe we need a third kind of gathering that's for healing or bringing us together in silent prayer chanting saying sorry i don't know so i just want to say that that's one thing the other thing i'm hearing is that there is a need to fix things you know when we get uncomfortable and you want to fix and i heard deborah say that and i think we need to be able to have the patience to sit with the uncertainty and not jump and take things you know slowly as they're happening and the other thing i'm hearing is that we could have these two different types of gatherings one is the affinity group meetings that are happening at the grassroot levels and and then also having the town hall where we have the breakouts like amilkar suggested where they could be sharing that that information and break out rooms and so forth um to continue with the long-term commitment i feel there needs to be a steering committee with with some of the town leaders involved and community members and residents i really do feel that we have an opportunity right now with very uh committed caring leadership whether it's coming from paul whether it's the town council it's the business some of the business leaders that deborah including deborah and so how do we engage all the stakeholders right now who are willing and able and and so maybe some kind of a steering committee would be helpful and and i just want to thank petua i'm sorry i don't know how to pronounce your name petua is that right kind of right can you put petua yeah petua yes uh i think everything you've said today and at the gathering i believe it was you i could make out who it was but i was so moved when i heard you i was crying i was like wow you've given you've given me like it's really made me think how many times i didn't speak up or because i felt i didn't sound smart enough or and i saw all of you just speaking whether people were fumbling or awkward or but you just spoke up and that really gives me the courage to speak up that's all i have for now i just want to say that the town council is here with alfion we will support you in any capacity that really works for for everyone thank you and i know petua you had your hand up a little while ago and and i i saw you i just wasn't able to get to you but um did you have something you want to say um i think yeah i think i just like when i when i spoke at the rally for educators i i think since it was educators my goal was to make them have them like change their curriculums because that was their role as educators to teach students and the curriculums i said for my experience um it wasn't helping me become a leader that i wanted to be um so that's what i told educators so i think that for us for town for government officials and town council members and people who are responsible for governing and uh like helping show leadership as amherst as an amherst community i think that our our role is a more of i think i'm not actually sure i don't know much about government so i don't know exactly what our role is it's mostly i think mostly with them like policy i think i i don't i don't know very much but having those discussions about like what is our responsibility to the community and like like so with educators like what is our responsibility to the students and what is our um because they are the community that we're serving um i think uh that's important so like hearing the stories of p-town members um civilians um and people in the community is so important to know like what it's missing and how we can we move forward um and i think a part of that for like for the government is a lot about making that making ourselves available and um in ways that are effective and not just saying okay we're available but no one's coming to us like maybe we need to go to communities and try to make use our talents and our commitment our connection to the community to like uh make that change that we want to make and make sure that um our our leadership as governing officials um we can make sure that the they know that the government is working for them because that's that's what we were elected or hired to do and so i think that's what that's what i would say to governing people because that's what we that's what we're supposed to do can i is there before you respond um uh is is there any interest in expanding the role of um our community uh outreach officers um you know i know that we have three wonderful people who are are are uh reaching out to uh community members um i i know that according to uh when when we're looking at the charter part of the the uh logic behind that was to both encourage people to serve on committees and be involved in in town government um and but to also just make sure that we were getting involvement from um all members of of our community um is there is there a room and if there's a cost to it is there a room in the budget to expanding that role human rights commission um uh pat the angel was uh looking to speak um i i like the idea of expanding the role of the community outreach officers but in the past year i've learned something else around that um when we were trying to get the dpw put in an area in amherst we sent the community outreach officers and staff members to talk to the residents and we got called out rightfully so in a meeting of that community that we should have come to speak and talk and knock on doors so i i think that uh padua it seems important to me that you're asking us to figure out what our goals are and and i feel like i'm being asked to actually enter into the community physically um virtually um one on one in in small groups and so i i'm i'm sort of um not at a loss but i just have so much going on about what meetings could be and everything um but i need to get grounded in i need to talk to people in way in ways and places where it's safe for them which means i need to move out and i won't get a raise so we can won't affect the budget and i think that one of the things that the count all the counselors need to find a way to do that and make that commitment but at the same time we're all at different levels of understanding and we have our own work to do in some ways we're trapped by a public um open meeting law rules because what we need to do the 13 of us i think is really find ways to talk about what we've internalized and where we're coming from in in ways that are safe and i'm taking up a lot of space which i was i was not going to speak so i'm gonna get quiet now without giving a legal opinion i would suggest that your the open meeting law is is again focused on what we do in our official rule rules as you know the human rights commission or town council now i know that that's tricky for town counselors because the charter calls on you to have meetings with your constituents um twice per year i think it is um in large groups or something like that but during um having a conversation as a human being um is something that you're probably also able to do um with with and and having multiple town counselors present as as human beings having conversations is probably also something that would be permissible if it leads to your deliberation um as a town counselor that would be a different issue right and so uh i i imagine that you're you're going to get uh an opinion from from uh the town attorney on on what that could look like but uh you know we are very excited at the idea of of getting conversations started the problem that we've got is um you know we we are a component of of the town ourselves so any planning that we do we require um the support of of the town we need the space like the the zoom space to record um if we're going to record something to record it if we're not going to record it we're going to open up for conversations to be able to do that and once we've set it up so that we don't have to make any other decisions or deliberate but we're just letting people speak then as many of us who want to be there can be there because we're not going to be deliberating as the human rights commission we're just creating that space for people to have the conversation that's that's my view of that it is not um advice being given to you um but but i think there should be room for that i have to say that um so um but but we're looking to hear from you how we can both plug in and and support um and this deliberation is uh part of of our open meeting uh so you know if if you can let us know and you're speaking to us um you know uh what what you think and um and um on the cards also uh no i i think it's actually debora who's been waiting to to speak as well oh no i don't i'm sorry i'm just listening yeah all right i'll lower all hands all right then uh lin uh if you could speak first of all thank you for um making me aware that they're was this meeting tonight i don't i don't try to go to all the committee meetings of the town um one of the things that i think is most important for the human rights commission and for others who have been involved in this is is in fact what sid was talking about way in the beginning and that is to help other people who do not feel comfortable coming to come forward but to help them make sure there is their voices heard in whatever discussion and and to me that is one of the things that each of us has to do but some are in better position to do so one of i'm i'm one of these people who was always trying to figure out how i can take what i heard and start moving the ball along and so just what the town council can do is make policy or change policy and we can approve budgets or ask for changes in budgets that's really what we do okay what the town manager does is run the town on a day-to-day basis including overseeing the police and if we want to bring about change i think we need to both understand what the police are doing by asking the kinds of questions that does eat cayenne was addressing last week i found that whole session incredibly informative and i think we have a lot more to learn but once we learn then we need to understand what is desired and how to make that work in i hate to say it a bureaucracy otherwise known as the town of amherst and that means changing budgets it means changing negotiating different stuff and personnel contracts it means changing policies and and that's our job but the job we really need is to understand and hear so that we know what we are supposed to do and that's what we need the human rights commission for and the other people who have been involved in this conversation and in the process yes each of us makes needs to make our own commitment to understand the issues at the kind of level that debora and barbara um have been doing with the group that they have formed but i have to my job is to also then keep my eye on the ball of where are we going with this because we do budgets every year we do policy all the time and if we want to make changes we have to understand what's there and what we need to change and we need to help us understand what we need to change that makes sense can you hear me now yes yes okay great sorry about that um so just to lin's last comment um i was going to say i think that another job of the town counselors is to uh to explain to the public what policies are currently in place and what policies are having the opportunity to be created because as a person who's been living here for 15 years i didn't even know there was such a thing as like i was vaguely aware of concepts of democracy but i didn't know that there was like individual policies or that there were town counselors that i could go meet and if i went to meet with them i'd have no idea what to ask for or what to tell them i wanted because i wouldn't know that i even had the right to have that conversation and you know the first town counselor like district meeting i went to shalini and darcy handed out three by five cards and said like what are your questions and the only question i could think of was what are we going to do about racial profiling because that was something that i just heard people talk about in my life as like a problem in amherst um and i didn't know and i still don't understand like how can i say it's really hard to live here because rent is so expensive how can i say like it's really hard to get to the grocery store on the bus and and and sometimes i've tried to say some of those things and i've been told like oh well that's pvta and it's regional and it's not us or oh that's that's you know that's i went to the affordable housing trust and they said oh we really don't know what to do about that because people get to charge whatever they want for rent so i feel like there's an element to which you all like get the information about what's actually what is a policy that the town of amherst has and and we aren't educated in that information in such a way that would allow us to advocate for ourselves so there's got to be a component whether it's through increasing community participation officers or instituting some like consistent resident education that's not in the format of like a three hour meeting at night with no child care no food that is not on the bus line you know that that should allow us the opera empower us to participate i i totally accept what you're saying and understand i government is is complicated stuff but what i'm saying is if we can as a council understand what the police are presently doing and we as a council listen to what the residents are need to be done then we have the job of trying to figure out how to bring about that change with policy and budgets so we don't we're not asking you to understand every little nuance but we need to understand what you want oh can i just say that i um so because i was not i haven't always been a town employee and there is a big discrepancy between being a town employee and a resident of amherst and then the things that happen in town you don't necessarily know about that unless you're raised or around in a culture where people are involved in town so that is something that a as a community participation officers i mean i used to try and tag on with lsse to go to their events trying to get to the parents from the kids when they were doing things but some of those people just don't know and they don't understand as geysi was saying that these things are available and unfortunately there's a lot of folks out here that don't even know there's a human rights commission so all of these things like how to get the word out and how to bridge that gap it's very um complicated almost like it's just you can't just go out and stand aside and say hey like if you want to know about town government i'll let you know that doesn't mean anything to anybody right so it's kind of like and we can talk about this at our excuse my dog the next community participation officer meeting how we can try and improve that or what steps that we can do to try and go back to rebuilding and i think we kind of had some good ideas going on and then pre-covid and then covid came and then everything has just completely stopped not that that's the only reason but i think we were on to the next you know trying to move forward and couldn't move anywhere actually so things are starting to open up now and people are feeling a little more comfortable and um as geysi said and i know like as a single parent like you can't go places where there's it's at dinner time and there's no food for your kids that you had to bring who are sitting on the floor coloring so all of that stuff does is a is a big impact on the community meeting you know connecting with the local government and i'd add one thing which is that you know we as as the human rights commission um we had a plan that we uh came up with in november uh which was to focus in the 2020 year on anti-racism education um and you know uh we were going to meet mid-march and we basically since our last meeting um february 27th to june 4th we are uh were unable to to meet with each other to discuss these issues to move them forward um there are very good reasons for um a body that has to plan a budget to focus on uh questions of budgeting um a body that's got to be concerned about negotiating jobs for next year and uh trying to figure out how to keep stores open um to focus on on shops being open from a revenue perspective on on bringing in the tax taxes on that but also from a maintaining a sense of community perspective but as far as moving forward with with anti-racism some of the plans that we had and if you look at our february 27th meeting you'll see that we said who should we bring in next for our conversations we listed julie fetterman we listed uh chief living stone as people that we were going to work with to try to expand uh community um for for both for us and for uh our our hope of expanding community education and anti-racism um we're we're now behind the eight ball in that um we're trying to respond to it as a component of the town but again we've only come back to this conversation as a group uh in the last two weeks and um and we we would have loved to have been able to continue the discussion uh throughout and and perhaps be in a better place now but we are where we are right now um bless you uh but uh that's unmuting that's that's all right that's all right um all right i'll i'll mute you it's fine okay um just want to give people a chance to speak um but but you know right now uh we're looking for uh some kind of of help from uh the the people who are um elected to have those constituent meetings that are part of the town charter um and and try to figure out if if that's kind of the space where we begin to to reach out to people is that where we have an opportunity for grassroots outreach and and meeting uh so that we could actually allow for conversations when you schedule a constituents meeting uh that is specific uh to dealing with issues of race um that's something that maybe isn't um a policy that is specific but we we've been dealing with those policies when we supported the sanctuary bylaw for example uh one of the things that we had to do was um figure out well what what is the impact going to be on the police and so we had community members come into us talk with us about it um and and work on it have us engage in working on it and then come together with a policy um that the police uh could agree to uh that was acceptable to members of the community uh and that the select board uh was able to support that we could move forward with um and so the the question is how do we now open up the conversation so that we hear all of those voices um which uh I will again say that um as someone who was on the league of women voters committee studying the the town charter one of the goals was that um the uh elected a smaller number of elected officials would have to do all of the homework the concern that that people like um Andy and Alyssa had uh was that those of us who were on town meeting hadn't done all of the homework um and therefore were voting against things that the select board uh that was their year round knew was going to be good for the town um and that therefore um if we had people who could focus on what the policies really should be year round um not to put words in their mouths um but that that those people could help the town reach conclusions more quickly um and would hear more voices because of their their accountability um to to uh their constituents in a way that town meeting uh lacked accountability so um you know the question is now that we're trying to develop a process um what process would you like to to have us work with we would love to try to be supportive of that process um but we don't have the the outreach to kind of amplify all of those voices and reach all of those voices the way that the town counselors do I'm more than glad to continue the conversation and but we're not going to answer that question in one meeting I'm just not um and I pat de angeles and I are the district two counselors and I certainly don't speak for pat but I've known gotten to know pat and if we could hold a district two meeting that was focused on racism and knew that there would be people there who were knowledgeable about the issue and the community's feelings we would hold the meeting tomorrow do it absolutely and but I will tell you right now that's not who comes to the meetings and so we need to figure out how to get that voice to those meetings and that's what I was listening to this tonight and and hearing people saying how can we meaning all of the people here get those voices heard so that we can have the conversation that's what we need that's what we need from you all yeah it's a lot of it's a lot of like legwork right that we're we don't usually do and I mean personally I'm okay with that kind of like that thing but it's it's a lot of hands on out in the community work that more than just town council more than the hrc and more than the cpo's need to do I mean it needs to be a bigger uh body because there's such a large space to cover right and there's so many different groups to cover not groups but individuals of different ethnicities and capabilities and abilities so um I know shalini and pat have had their hands up as well and and so I want them to be heard and then I guess it hi as well um I also want to point out that it's it's getting a little bit late in the evening um I had asked that we recognize two hours and ten minutes from six and we thought we were going to be able to start and technology did not cooperate um but I also want to uh at least talk about a process for moving forward with the civil war plaques uh and um make sure that we are moving forward uh in support of juneteenth tomorrow um yay juneteenth and uh and uh Frederick Douglass uh what what's the slave is the fourth of july reading so um so there's a few more things for us to do but um shalini if you uh would speak and then uh and then pat and then guzzi hi and then devra okay i think i've learned uh i've got a couple of new things that i've learned today and guzzi hi i think i thank you for bringing up that idea of education using and i we've been having district meetings regularly and we're looking for topics and i think that's a great idea that we sort of tried to do that but i we can have more focus where we use the district meetings to educate people and get feedback on specific topics like we can just talk about affordable housing these are the policies that are in place in the government right now in town council or in our town and so i think that could be one avenue the other thing i'm hearing again is that we need to coordinate so when you are hrc is having a meeting then we need to know and we district councilors have lists email lists that we can send out to people and then when we are having district meetings about certain topics we could be sending them out to you so that's why having a steering committee of sorts where the key people are in and then we spread out the information and receive information and share that is one thing that's coming to mind the other thing very quickly is that i feel we need to have a conversation after we've had with the police because it is a systemic issue and as petua mentioned that it's you know the inequities that exist in school maybe they exist in in the business world or housing and so again looking at and getting people's lived experiences understanding from that is important and the conversation to be had in the future but i think right now having this focus on having the town hall meeting with the police chief of the town manager and then also having those affinity groups i think that's an immediate kind of thing that i think we can focus on thank you thank you pat she's muted thank you thank you i don't want to sneeze again i have allergies um i'm involved with a group a community group that has created a mobile market and gotten a grant to bring it to amherst as part of the originators we're healthy hampshire this is a grassroots organization the direction etc for the market and what's going to be happening has risen up from the people who are there and what guzzit hyah is saying makes this group possible because we do it at lunch time and we provide lunch we have child care and transportation um and that's something that yeah and and so i think that we need to win an eye as our district meeting but also for town council meetings we may need to begin to think about that and find a way to budget funds for that work or and for that food that's all i have to say and i'm grateful for uh you're allowing me to attend the meeting thanks thank you um i believe uh debora you had your hand up as well yeah yeah i just i'm going to have to leave the meeting um but thanks for having um me here and uh boy i just love that last idea about having a meeting that uh deals with the issues of child care and getting people to a meeting it could make a huge difference i think but um that's the other thing we provide translation yeah sorry um but bridge for unity we we'd love to help in any way we can and uh so please feel free to contact me um guzzit hyah has my my email on such so thanks so much well thank you thanks for coming debora sure visit hyah yeah so just um another reminder about the rest of our agenda and if we want to um i i know we've talked about a lot of different versions again um and in light of that i have heard consistently people want something to be done within the next chunk of time before our next meeting could happen um is there something that we could it sounds like the town counselors are willing to have a town hall to open up it may may be not the long-term vision that we have but it could be something that could be offered to the community and um would we be willing to co-sponsor that with them and then would we like to set about an effort to have a few trial affinity groups um knowing that again it may need to shift depending on response so um i i guess there's there's a question of whether that is um a particular motion right whether you've you've moved that uh that we um you know support uh the use of town counselor constituent meetings to allow these conversation conversations and that we as the human rights commission will try to share with our networks when those are occurring so that um there's there's room for those conversations to at least begin to occur um through the town uh town council constituent meetings and then second no no yeah i was i was making a motion that we co-sponsor a specific town hall not in addition to their regular constituent constituent meetings not like under the context of their regular ones that would be for the entire community to address uh all right i'm a little bit unclear then because um you know there's the the different districts and so um i'm i'm not sure if you're talking about having like a really huge kind of um town council town hall discussion with all of the town counselors all 13 or if we're talking about um about supporting um you know for district two um lin and pat um saying they're going to set up a specific conversation in their district in the first instance about um and have it be geared towards discussions around race and representation and pretend and being able to live safely um in amherst um and hear from constituents there but us kind of amplifying that request that community members go out to those meetings um because those are those are two different events yeah i don't think it matters whether we do like in the districts or a big one but i'm just thinking that that should be done above and beyond what they're doing in specific response to what's going on in the community right now yeah i i yeah i i'm happy to let one of the um town counselors speak to that but i think um you know i i wasn't suggesting that we just say they're having a meeting go if you're interested and and be heard by your town counselors and that we'd promote that but rather that if the town counselors are saying i'm going to have a constituent meeting on this topic i would like the human rights commission to notify um to um their networks uh because i really do want the those voices to come out um that i'm not hearing so that we we can move forward but um so is am i getting closer to getting the motion right i think my motion is let's plan a meeting open it up to the community for community questions so a listening section like in other words a town hall let's have a town hall and let's be co-sponsors with the town counselors and it would be for all of those questions that came in during the meeting with the police chief and for any and all question and it could be a starting point so that we can leave this meeting with something i i open that to the town counselors to speak i um i am concerned that um you might feel the need to punt if it's something about the police chief which uh linn you've just noted um you do not specifically oversee uh the the police department you oversee the budget for the police department and the policy and policy issues that might come up in relation to through the town manager our police chief and his staff have expressed strong interest in participating in a meeting like this they're more than ready they've even given us a couple dates and um the real issue is um for us to come up with a good format that allows voices to be heard so perhaps even if we can't like i i did make a motion i'm wondering if i could hear from anybody else on the commission other than matthew deborah is trying to speak yeah can i just ask a question because i feel like these are um and i might just be misunderstanding you guys itaia that it seems like there's the listening session with the police but then there's also an open forum on race in our town and those are two different i i mean in my mind those are two different town hall listening sessions so i'm not sure which you're proposing i'm proposing the one that's an open listening session right not a not a discussion with the police but that it would be an opportunity for people in our community to come together and talk about what they're experiencing right now right yeah yeah i was gonna say like i i support that idea and and like within the context of like so that it's not an issue for the town counselors you know we would have less than six and a half of them present so that they could speak freely that's just my two cents on that thank you then so uh second or was that just a comment deborah that was the preface to my second i second it can i also ask is there anything matthew that prevents the human rights commission from taking the lead on hosting that open forum that gazitaia is suggesting do we need the town council to necessarily take the lead on that or is there or are we technically allowed to do that so uh as far as creating space again we are we're a town body so we would be asking for whether we're doing it through a zoom webinar whatever whatever structure we want to put in place we could do that as long as we have town support to do it as the point that i raised in our june fourth meeting was whatever conversation we have whatever listening session we have you can choose to have something where people are in community with each other and they just express how they feel you can also choose to have something where that expression is heard by someone who can act on it immediately and the the question i posed on june fourth was whether we really wanted to make sure we could organize something with those who would be able to to act and respond and and that's one of the reasons that i wanted us to look at the kind of discussions that the schools had as one example and the discussion with the police chief as another example of people who are trying to allow for conversations to happen with the schools and to ask questions and try to get information and express concern with the police chief those are two different models and i am agnostic on what we do as long as we are educating and and helping people and i think if we just set up a listening session where we're not really saying anything but we're letting people speak then we need someone who would be able to facilitate that so that we're making sure that the voices are being fully heard um if we do that with the town council such that they are hearing what those concerns are um i don't think that that's a bad thing uh because i think people view them as no offense to us a lot of people have no idea who we are um they voted for their town counselors um and they have some idea who they are and and they believe that their town counselors are are responsible for and and accountable to them and so i think it it has a different feel um but depends on what you want to do so if we go back to what dr shabazz was saying it really depends on what our goal is if our goal is policy change then in my mind we would want to have a series like a series of many listening sessions because policy flows out of understanding right so it's not going to be like we're going to set up a listening session and boom we're going to get to policy change um we're going to we're going to need a series of um listening sessions where voices can be articulated and heard and understood and then the town council is able to chew on that and translate that into policy change and bring that back to the community is this what you said is this what you meant and so to me this is like a year plan this is like many listening sessions stacked up one after another after another where people and my sense is they probably will start small as jennifer said a while ago and they will grow because um you know as people feel heard and then the other ideas that the goal is within the community more at the grassroots level that there is understanding amongst members of the community who don't share the same lived experiences right and again then i go back to that is a series of many conversations that is not a one and done so i guess i would like to propose this is my feeling it's 840 i've worked all day i know i'm tired and kind of brained out at this point that maybe we set up another meeting and we continue to chew on this in a in a rapid way i'm not saying to postpone this for much longer but i don't know that we're ready to say this is what it is this is what we're proposing right now i would like to see us have like start something soon but have it a long-range plan where actually both of those goals could be met listening and understanding amongst community members who do not share the same lived experience and have that witnessed and heard by the town council and those who are in positions of power and have that translate ultimately into policy change so process wise where we are right now is that there's a motion on the floor that has been made and seconded which is specific to creating a particular meeting with town councilors to hear from voices in the community i i'm not entirely sure how that is structured and therefore i i imagine that there must be some kind of delegation of someone who if it's going to happen prior to our next meeting who would be able to talk with town councilors about what that would look like but it would the vote is whether we would support such an event prior to our next meeting am i correct that that's the motion yeah and i think that the town councilors are capable of seeking out a facilitator um so uh shalini you you want wanted to speak to this before we take a vote is that correct yes i was just a suggestion that we firstly i think it would be great to co-sponsor it because because if i mentioned because it shows solidarity it gives you know people who don't know about hrc get a chance to know about it because we do have access to more people and it just shows that we're working together and and so that's one and the second thing is we we can say this is one of the many we don't have to have everything figured out at the outset but we can at least say this is one of the many conversations we're gonna have and but here is this so at least we have one thing in place and i do feel there is a need for people to unhear like what some of it started to hear in the last conversation from the chief of police so having him and town manager to be there but that's totally your discretion and i think we as counselors are there to support you in whatever ways that you think is going to be most skillful but i think to mark the date and get that would be great that's all thank you um so i i don't know now if um if that means having something with the police chief and and town manager or or uh just with town counselors or or or what exactly we're looking to do and i too am uh i'm tired um it's been a long day um i think maybe petwa were you gonna say something um yeah i think that i was reading what l smith was saying and uh i think they were saying that uh to challenge it for us all to capture how the community members feel in its most raw form however possible and then deliver those feeling those feeling messages to those who need to hear them as needed um and it doesn't have to happen at all all at once and likely shouldn't um and then he said the good points for all of us i think that um i don't think we have it's late like we can't like start planning the meeting the town hall that we want to have now but i think that i don't think we should be starting with organizing leadership i think we should because i've been hearing from a lot of people that we don't know what the community is feeling and experiencing in these times and that's why i think um because that was saying that it's important to have a town hall to like um make sure that the community is heard and uh i think the goal for us knowing who's in the like room today is most it's mostly policymakers and council members and i think that i think policies where where where the people in the room today are like have the most power to make change and we don't really have that connection with the community so i think that the town hall should be about hearing what the community has to say to make the policy changes or to think about our next steps afterward that's what i think is what's going on thanks petra i agree not a time for responses and specific actions but just a listening time um all right so uh do we support uh therefore just um arranging with the town council to uh to cosponsor this type of event and um and therefore who is going to kind of get confirmation of what the dates are and um and be able to to explain the format so that we can share that with our networks so that they actually do show up and so that their voices are heard and so that everyone can hear from the community and uh to go to amikar shabazz's point earlier i don't know that we are aware of what the number of people would be of what the interest would be um but you know is is there a need to do follow up with town council so that we can actually just get it done and and reach out to our own communities so i just say because i've kind of heard like um i i'm not quite sure why we just don't have like an open forum and let people just come and speak and then take that and bring that to the councillors and then have another meeting at another time with the councillors there and then another time another meeting with the police chief if that's how it goes but if we just start off with just the hrc having this meeting trying to open up to the community um i don't not and this is no disrespect to the councillors by far because you know you guys are wonderful um i don't know that every but like some of the people who i have in mind who would be very good who we need to hear their voices from or i think we should hear their voices from don't necessarily know about the town councillors so like and they don't necessarily know about us but we have to start somewhere right like we we have to grab these people not well i don't mean to sound like that i'm trying we need to somehow hug them in hug them in welcome them in right with open arms so that we can get what what is needed and then move like slow not slow but then move to the next step like we just don't know i mean if councillors want to be there that's fine but i think i don't understand why we can't just say okay on this date we're going to have this open forum meeting and yes somebody does need to facilitate that i'm not saying that they don't but i think this is a wonderful opportunity for the hrc to get out and be involved in their community is negative okay i'm sorry to deba's question earlier i think we can just schedule a zoom meeting for that right is there is there a harm to us doing it in conjunction with the town council there's no harm in it doing it with the town council i'm just saying that this is a great opportunity for the hrc to get out and be involved in their community i actually really like that idea too because it just is easy we schedule our hrc meetings i don't know if we're going to do another two-week meeting or a four-week meeting but we are a smaller group the human rights commission wants to hear from you please you know like to to just use our own meeting as an open forum on on race a discussion of race and amherst what is your experience we want to hear from you is that what you're suggesting jennifer yes i love it gives us a little bit of an idea of how to how to everybody works in and again i'm not saying that the council just the council doesn't need to be there they're more than welcome to be there i'm just saying why can't we just throw out it'll make it a little bit easier finding dates and so forth i love it and they can come to listen you know but not to to like manage it right it's a little more personable that way i think i just feel like people might be a little more comfortable i also think it is the like kind of the natural place for this initial discussion to take place and once we do start to hear from community member that we might get more ideas for hosting either larger or different kinds of events looks like ben wants to say something yeah so should we like have a new motion rolling here yes i'm getting hangry let's go i second your new motion whatever it is again i'm just managing a meeting here and so if you give me the motion and i put it out someone seconds we vote that's all i do i think we've got it i think we've got a motion to have a hrc sponsored open listening session where town counselors are welcome to come and a second emotion i was taking ben as the first motion maker that's a super way to have a motion in a second yeah um so uh i i don't i don't know that we necessarily are going to get more people coming to to something that is meeting with hrc then meeting with hrc in town council but before we get sidetracked could we just vote on it i was saying that's the motion we've got so i'm gonna ask for a vote on that motion all in favor all right all opposed abstentions all right then then we will plan to do that we are going to ask the the town for help with facilitation if if we're going to try to make sure that they're we're encouraging voices to be heard we are going to invite i understand town counselors to to be present but this way we're going to try to work on something that is a date that that we we can make at the very least yeah and i also just think that um and again no disrespect to the counselors when i say this but it i don't i'm not looking at this as like they can bring more i'm looking at a different group of people actually because it's a different group of people that we're trying to get and and it's it's kind of complicated or too complicated for me to really explain in the next 30 seconds because again i'm getting angry but it it's a different group of people that we're trying to welcome like when i go out and work with lsse it's a different group of people that i'm trying to attract than it is when i'm trying to recruit for you know when i'm in boards and committee meetings like it's just a different group of people and we need them and we need their voices and they are the ones that are being more affected and the ones that are less likely to report because they don't know who to report to they don't know how to report or they're scared to report so that is the group that i'm trying to to grab i don't know about anybody else and i and i don't mean to grab like we can just grab people but you know what i'm trying to say like can i just say one thing whenever i just quick i just want to say that i'm not offended at all that we're in fact i would suggest that this be just a community gathering and not have any counselors because then if it is intimidating or you know and it is i know it is for some people that having any kind of this level of involvement so let's keep this really just a community thing with none of us officials there so you'll everyone feel safe and then you will be there to tell us afterwards what we can what are the next steps where the people want to speak with us whether they want to speak with the police whether they want us you know whatever comes out of it we're here ready and willing and no offense taken i think it makes complete sense totally respect that okay so as far as making sure that we're getting a facilitator and and choosing a date i'm on that's okay and you can communicate to all of us we just cannot deliberate together yes respond individually to me yes that's the way we can make that date and whether you know we have any individual concerns not as a commission that that you can take into account when speaking with the rest of the commissioners all right so we i i think that we are going to have to move off of the topic of the conversations at this point there were three other things although one was ways that we can engage in leadership at this time and i think this is one of the things that we're doing so i'm going to take that offer right now and and that leaves the civil war plaques statement proposal and upcoming events i'm also wondering if there are comments that need to be made with regard to the civil war plaques statement proposal you know so i was going to ask about what it means for us to pledge full support what it would mean um for uh for us to call this as part of of reparations to the african-american families in our community um just what these things mean that's going to take at least a few minutes for us to discuss um if if we're going to do that right now uh all together um i really appreciate uh guys working on this and and pulling something together for us to look at um um so uh there's there's a question of whether it would make more sense to kind of gather um kind of track changes or something in a document um with with questions so that we are focused specifically on if it's something that one person cares about nobody else cares about we can just move off of it fairly quickly um but there's a question of whether we should wait on this this statement or whether there's a reason that we need to to get to it now because of the the historical commission or or some other body that is looking at it now gezi kafer i'm just wondering it went out already to you all so um does anyone have any specific concerns or i'd like to make a motion to just you know if we're able to to just go ahead and pass it because it's a statement a general statement of support well i right now it says pledge full support of the installation and long-term maintenance and public display um and you know i i don't know if there are other ways for us to have i know that this marble thing was made i don't know if there are better practices today where you would use something that um can be out in the rain can be you know um that that would be relatively cheaper to have up but that would have the same kind of sense of of community and respect uh as what was made in the 1950s uh what was originally commissioned in 1893 um but that has been in the town hall since 1950s at least whether whether we need this particular piece of marble um or whether we support anything that would just recognize this community um with the same degree of gravitas so can i just say that the civil war plaque committee or commission or whatever we are met today that's the meeting that i had the zoom meeting that went fine that i had before this one and um so there's just a lot of stuff going on there right now and i think all we're really looking for and mr shabbat dr shabbas has gotten off is really just whether or not people are in support of it it's like are you it's not so complicated about the structure i mean we have to present that i mean i think at this point it's just whether or not people feel the need for this to come out into the community and do they stand behind that and support that then down the line i mean i can't see that they would do anything that would make it so people don't support it i i don't quite understand and they're not asking for our opinion on if these are if this is the memorial that's the most worthwhile for the community this is a memorial that's already in amherst ready to be put up and and they're asking to make sure that it comes from fruition because it's been just sort of lost in the stream of consciousness three times right and so they're not asking for logistical support they're not asking for financial support they're just asking for like an endorsement from us like yeah we we are philosophically and emotionally in support of your efforts because it's all the logistics and finances are handled by the town and and they're not asking us to do something on that friend and as long as the town believes it has the money to do it and wants to do it that's that's so the money's coming from multiple sources and we're not asking for anyone to donate for the hrc to give any funds we're just asking for general support of whether or not this is something which it seems like it would fit in our mission that we would support or that you guys would support i should say um all right so i guess i guess hi you have a move that we accept it as is um i i would make some just small tweaks but that's that's me i would always do that no matter like even if i had written it myself i'd look at it now and be like i'm gonna make some changes so um but uh so uh was there a second for accepting it as as is second all right all in favor all right all right it's everybody um so i won't um so that that passes then we can send that out in support um to the the committee that's dealing with that uh that only leaves then our um Juneteenth is tomorrow a reminder that it starts up at four o'clock um and uh and so um if if you can um sign on it's channel 12 or watch uh that's it starts up at four o'clock tomorrow it's supposed to go to about five thirty uh and everyone drive to town hall be safe and distant but get your book from jennifer um because she's she's got them uh and jennifer just to check in on what the slave is the fourth of july um you know i understand that there was arrangement of young people who would be doing the reading um or we moving forward with that we are still going to move forward with that i can't guarantee that it'll be the young children um the shabazzas and we all just need to kind of get over juneteenth first and then we will go i mean it's it's a reading and so i guess there's you know we just have to kind of figure what it's not as complicated as planning a full outblown event but there is a lot of um important work to be done towards it and which it will get done and um i don't know that we should go another month without meeting i don't know that that seems very logical at this point i just feel like with everything that's going on right now we kind of need to meet a little bit earlier but i can understand if we if everybody's schedule cannot commit to that so either way i will keep you guys well informed either via meetings or via email okay um i guess one thing um so we've two other things left really quick first um when we next meet um so do you do you want to try i i am not available two weeks from tonight um i am actually traveling um but it's within massachusetts so it should be okay um uh do we want to schedule for um for that date and someone else will will uh will run the meeting i can do the zoom part isn't said like our vice chair sure and i think that we can i think that we can we can follow the agenda without a design and and i won't have a password with that till i second would be the date okay so July third is the holiday so people so people know uh so that's that's that's the observance of July fourth is going to be observed on that friday so okay that could be other people traveling too so um we need at least four and and ideally it would be um five of you who are here who would say yeah i'm gonna be there um in order to make sure that we can go forward with it it's possible i may have a conflict but i will do my best okay so i mean so we don't have to meet on a thursday right should we go to three weeks instead of two um i don't know about three weeks but we could do it a different day if that earlier in the day might no i can't do earlier no can you do a different day i could do a different evening but i can't do earlier in the day yeah i got work too so what about the thursday the 30th or wednesday the first july i'm okay any of those days you guys just let me know i'm okay any day that's not a tuesday other than that i'm impartial just like so when's the wednesday what about wednesday the first yeah i actually i have a conflict both of those nights but it's um and then the next week i'm not available on so that's not going to week so then we have to then we just go to our regular meeting time yeah i mean i yeah i can i can try to figure it out but no we can just wait till the next meeting time i mean i can get everything set up for or as much as i can for the listening session well and i think that a listening session maybe we could do on a weekend hopefully so that i can be more available to everyone and and we don't we're just going to go ahead with planning that right that's not waiting on our next meeting no yeah yeah um and you know we've seen a lot of things come together very quickly in the last few weeks uh last two weeks since we've met we've seen a couple of events a few events come together very quickly so um i think people are getting used to that um all right then that um that leaves one other thing Elizabeth cotton yes thank you thank you thank you for your service thank you i i just um thank you for giving me a few minutes here and i'll keep it short because i know we're all tired and hangry and um so i'm at the end of my three-year term and i actually started attending meetings about six months before i officially got on the commission and um Matthew knows i've been sort of struggling with this decision for a while and i'm struggling with it tonight because i always feel so energized and so hopeful um and so like proud of our town that we do these things in this wonderful way and i'm feeling like oh i'm not going to be able to be involved in in this particular way with all these great projects but i promise you i will continue to be present as much as i can and the reason i'm going off is really covid related um my mom is 88 and she's doing well but she lives in a senior residence and like she can't go out and grocery shop and i need to you know have some time to take on some things um that are going to be helpful to her and in my job at cancer connection where i'm the program director we've had to move all of our programming onto you know remote conferencing and we're probably going to keep it there for quite a while because we work with folks who have compromised immune systems and that has just been absolutely flattening me um and i i need to be able to really pay attention to that and i also feel like this is a big equity issue for the kind of work that we do and i want to be able to do it well so um so i particularly want to thank you Matthew for kind of like bleeding from behind for steering the ship um so thoughtfully and uh jennifer to you because i think that as a town we're just so lucky to have you um as one of our staff people and every other person on the commission i'm not going to take the time but i really appreciate the way you are connected to your own communities and the beautiful kind of voices and vision that you um bring into the space and i think that's the most important thing that that the human rights commission does is hold the space to make sure that these conversations keep happening so thank you very much and i will not be a stranger but it might be just a little while until i get these other things kind of sorted out then i can come back and just be a community member participating so thank you Matthew hey carol asbest thank you look forward to seeing everybody around town with our masks hey the meeting's definitely run past time look at that hopefully you'll recognize us um is there is there a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn second all right all in favor all right great seeing everyone thank you for your service thank you so much all right thank you alizabeth for our visitors thank you for coming our listeners thank you for listening in yep i should stop recording now right anytime