The O2-3 complex plays a key role in regulating actin polymerization in CD4-T cells. The ARPC-5 subunit isoforms ARPC-5 and ARPC-5-L have distinct roles in this process. ARPC-5-L is necessary for nuclear actin polymerization, while ARPC-5 is needed for cytoplasmic actin polymerization. Both subunits are important for TCR signaling, however only ARPC-5 is involved in DNA replication stress-induced nuclear actin polymerization. This article was authored by Lopamudrasadu, Nikolaos Sopulidis, M.D. Hazanouzaman, and others.


It's a great time to be a Democrat. To be here today and to be able to introduce someone who looks a lot like me. To actually look at the electronic ballot. It has my vote for my president. The show that was on a rerun at that point on MSNBC called Time and Again. Tell me y'all may remember it. It was hosted by a woman named Jane Pauley who had been a journalist. Time and Again was a show that would use the clips, the old clips of NBC news footage from the Today Show or from the Nightly News to tell a story about events or about people. Invariably, before they would go to a commercial break, Jane Pauley would introduce the next section of Time and Again by saying X, Y, and Z and whatever when Time and Again continues. It was sort of a look, a peek at what the future of that person held. And Joaquin and I didn't know at that time what we would do in our professional lives, but I used to kid him and say, you know, I forget what I would say. I forget what I would say first, but I would always say at the end, I would always say at the end, and Time and Again continues. Meaning extraordinary intelligence and ability and vision and someone who has a deep passion for serving the people of San Antonio and of this district. He's someone who has been blessed by a great education and who has fought hard over the last 10 years with his colleagues in the legislature to ensure that all of our children are blessed with those same opportunities. He's someone who understands that when we succeed, we have an obligation to ensure that others succeed as well.  His support has meant so much, not only growing up, but in public service. Somebody asked me today when we were on the street, we were at a few street corners waving signs trying to remind people to vote over on the west side of town. They asked me, is it easier to have a brother there with you? And I said, absolutely. It absolutely has been a godsend to have my twin brother with me throughout my whole life and in a public service. So thank you, Leon, very much. And we can't call it yet, but it looks good for pre-K for SA. I can also say a prayer for that. And it looks good for the President of the United States. I want to say thank you to a few folks. First of all, to my family, to my mom, Rosie, who's here. See people here, nice go in for years and years. Folks that helped we honor me in our first campaigns for public office. It has meant so much to have the undying support of all of you. And it means a lot from the bottom of my heart. Thank you very much for all of it. Since this is the 20th district, it is the main San Antonio district. The only one whose boundaries are completely within Barrett County. It's also appropriate for us to say thank you to Charlie Gonzalez. We and Charlie fought through everything since I announced for the 20th district. You know, this has been a long journey. It has been almost a year and a half since I announced for Congress. And originally I was going to run in the 35th district. A new district that was going to go from Austin to San Antonio. But the day after Thanksgiving, I got a call at about five in the afternoon from Charlie who let me know that he wasn't going to run for office. And my first reaction was a heavy heart because it meant that we would no longer have a Gonzalez representing us in this very special district. But also I knew an excitement because this is the district. This is the area where almost a hundred years ago my grandmother Victoria Castro settled when she moved here from Coahuila, Mexico. So y'all can imagine our roots are very deep. It's very special for us. We were born and raised on the west side of San Antonio. So this district is very special for us and everybody that has helped out. My girlfriend Ana Flores is here also. She's much, you know, my joke with Leon about being better looking. She's better looking than both of us. Incredibly special. You know, I've spoken about building an infrastructure of opportunity in our city. And what I've meant by that is just as there's a system of streets and roads and highways that helps all of us get to where we want to go on the road, let us never forget that in the United States of America there's an infrastructure of opportunity that helps each of us get to where we want to go in life. And our job as people in public service is to help build that infrastructure of opportunity. It's got to include certain things. Great public schools and universities, a strong healthcare system. That's why we support Obamacare. It's built around well-paying jobs so that people can support themselves and their families. And so that kids who graduate from high school and from college here don't have to move to Austin or Houston or Dallas or somewhere else to find the job that they want. We're excited about pre-pay for SA because if we're going to attract the best jobs in the nation we're going to have to be the best educated city in the nation. And that's what we're trying to do. I want to thank all of my campaign staff. Here, Ben Thomas. You guys, I'm sure everybody that's been a big part of it. Matthew Duarte, my state staff that over the years have been so supportive. Cynthia Chapa's here. Cynthia Garizales. Kerry Clack is here somewhere as well. First of all, we won this race with the support not only of Democrats but also of Republicans and independents. We're at 61% of the vote in early vote. We'll probably end up at 63 or 64%. That means we were able to attract other voters. And I want folks to know that as a proud Democrat that my priority will be to represent the people of San Antonio to put the people of San Antonio first over and above everything else. I am willing to work with anyone who is willing to do what is best for our country and for our city. A few more friends that are here in the room. I know Justice Stone from the Fourth Court of Appeals. Our Democrat who's on the Fourth Court of Appeals. I see Diego Bernal out there, the city councilman. A special visitor from Dallas. Where's Rafael? Rafael Lancia. You see this gentleman. You'll want to meet him before the end of the night. He's a state rep from Dallas. And as Democrats, if we're going to come back statewide, and I know we are, he's going to be one of the people that leads that charge. This gentleman will be a senator or a governor or a governor. Thank you all very much. Thank you for the victory. I look forward to serving you. Thank you very much and God bless you. It's awesome being a spirit out. It's true. I'm willing to come back right now. I was on my own. In the state park of Utah, every organization from this morning, it's too much to talk about. It's too early to come back. And it's always the same. The name is in the lead. It's also too early to come back. It's too early to come back. It's too early to come back. It's too early to come back. It's too early to come back. It's not safe to come back. It's too late. It's too late. It's too late.


And I am going to read the disclaimer. So, pursuant to chapter 20 of the Acts of 2021, this meeting will be conducted via remote means. Members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so via Zoom or by telephone. See the instructions that were contained in the public meeting notice. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. OK, this is January 4th, 2024. First time I've actually said that. And this is a special meeting of the DAAC called to talk about a variance request from Amherst College. And I believe we have some presenters, but I don't know who they are. So, Pamela, would you want to do any introductions? So we have no first we need a roll call, I guess, right? Even though it's a special meeting we need. Yes, please. OK. So, Elise Link, are you here? Yes, I'm here. Marty Smith, are you here? I'm here. Jim Kruneer, are you here? I am. OK. And Myra Ross, I am here. I know that Sarah and Darren in Rotterham, whatever, I can't say his name, and Cody Rooney are not here. But we do have a quorum. Good. Oh, now he's here. Oh, Cody is there. Yeah. He's snuck in. I didn't. My computer did not announce you. I'm sorry. He's not totally in yet. Oh, he's coming. OK. On his way. OK, so we have Cody. So this is as a special meeting. I don't know if we have public comment or anything. I think we don't, right? Is that right, Pamela? So I think we did have public comment on the agenda. We did. OK. But and you do have one member in the. All right. So we have a public comment person. Who is the public person? So let me just go over to the participants. So it is a member from Representative Dom's office. I don't know if that individual would like to make public comment, but we can invite them to raise their hand if they would like to make public comment and I can bring them over. OK, I'm not seeing a hand raise. So I think that you can proceed with the special meeting. OK, all right. So we have some people from the from a student center project at Amherst College and I guess you sent us a packet of a lot of schematic drawings. But I did not detect any real explanatory text. So if you could give us some explanation, that would be great. Thank you. Before. So our two visitors, two presenters are Tom Davies and Mark Andrews from Amherst College. And I just want to acknowledge that town counselor, Pat DeAngelis is also here with us. Great. Cool. OK. OK. OK, get away. Who's ever taking it? All right. Well, this is Tom Davies and good to see you all. And thank you so much for taking the time to have a special meeting. And much appreciated. And I will I'll refrain from reminiscing about, you know, all the things that many of us have collaborated on in the past, including my son's educations and, you know, all that kind of stuff. But so so our our situation just to kind of zoom out for a second is that we are repurposing the old Science Center here at Amherst College and and building a new Student Center and that will include a dining commons replacing our our current dining commons. And as part of that project, our designers had included in Massachusetts, not compliant stairs, a spiral stair. It's really a communicating stair from the third floor to the fourth floor and not unlike similar situations in the in our new Science Center that have kind of, you know, spiral communicating stairs and also in our new Greenway residence halls. They have a number of spiral communicating stairs. So to be completely transparent, we didn't we didn't anticipate an issue with this. And, you know, I went through the the the process of seeking a variance and again, just full transparency, didn't bother the DAC with it either just based on the experience of the prior two projects. And what what happened, though, is that the Architectural Access Board denied that request for the spiral stair. And so we have we then charged our designers with coming up with a different design that met the, you know, that that addressed some of the concerns that the AAB had expressed, which they've done. And that is what we're here to talk with you about today.  What is a communicating stair? Ah, so it is a convenience stair, if you will. It's it's in addition to the, you know, required stairs that are fully compliant, that are there for egress and, you know, everything that that goes into the life safety aspects of getting up and down through buildings, you know. So there are. So, for example, in this building, like many buildings, right? And most buildings are quite honestly. And in this country, there are two full on stairs that are in two hour rated, you know, enclosures. And and there's absolutely nothing about them that doesn't meet every aspect of code requirement, including accessibility requirements. In addition to those stairs, there is this communicating stair or convenience stair that, you know, kind of spirals up through kind of an open lobby space, right, with a double height ceiling. And that's that's the basic, basic design of that. Does that when would it be used and by whom? Um, it would be used generally and by kind of anyone. You know, the the fully compliant stair is only, I forget, marked like 40 feet away or something like that. It's, you know, it's nearby. But this is kind of more of a, you know, kind of a more well welcoming kind of sculptural, if you will. Um, uh, uh, stair that, um, people, I, I would guess my, you know, would use if they didn't, you know, have a, uh, uh, if there, if there wasn't a rush of people kind of coming out of a, I don't know what, a yoga class or something like that, you know, in which case you might be like, okay, let's use the big stair. Um, but I think that it's a it's something that one or two people would use, um, if they were gone, if it was the kind of the shortest route between two places, you know. Okay. So it's really an auxiliary stair that really doesn't need to be there, but it's there for aesthetic appeal and it has some functional appeal. Is that? You wrapped it up exactly correctly. Yes. Okay. And, and one of, one of the solutions, which we don't want to do is simply not have a stair there because there's, you know, it's not necessary from any, any kind of code perspective. Um, so, but, but, you know, that's something we have to think about. Um, so, uh, okay. So Mark, can we bring up that stair? I assume that we want to talk through the. Sure. So I will need to, um, give Mark access, which I will do now. That was going to be one of my questions. I'll make you a co-host and you will be able to share screen. Okay. Perfect. While we're waiting, Tom, are there still two circular stairs in this project? Um, yes. There is a, there is a, uh, technically there is the spiral stair, uh, which is what we're talking about here. And then there's a curved stair, uh, which also is auxiliary or convenience stair. Um, are you using a mouse? Yes. To, may I ask, unlink the blind and may I ask if you move the mouse to show people things? Can you move it slowly? Absolutely. Thank you. So Tom, did you get a partial approval? I, I'm just, I'm trying to understand this because I expected to see both stairs in this application. Did you get a partial approval for the other stair? Um, great question. And, and the, the answer is kind of, um, so this is actually not a new, um, uh, application. It's an addendum to the existing. Okay. Thank you. I just needed to understand that from a, from a, yeah, the feedback we got from the, the ED, uh, from the AAB, sorry for all the acronyms, is that, um, that, that there didn't seem to be, um, the, and take this for what it's worth because it's not, you know, definitive or in writing or anything like that, but it didn't seem to be concerned about the curved stair. There was really all the commentary and discussion was about the spiral stair that, you know, okay. So that's really good. That's, can I step in for a second? That's really good to understand because the board didn't have a problem with the larger, um, which you're calling a curved stair, but really is a spiral stair, but it's just got a bigger and, uh, it's wider and it's got more tread depth. So, and that's, but this, I would call it an oval stair, you call it the pill stair, um, is grander. Yes. Thank you. That was a wider arc on the one they approved. And this one is more compact. No, actually, um, I can't tell. Is, Tom, is this one the same width as the other as the one that they seem to approve? Oh, Mark, do you have that offhand? I don't, I think it's like, well, it's a different shape, right? The one that they had no issue with was circular, but a larger diameter. And I think the radial dimensions of the treads, if you look kind of down here, I think what we did is we modeled the stair off the other stair a little bit. Okay, that's what I thought you did. Okay. Yeah. So, I can't even see where you're talking to. I can't, this picture is confusing. So, yeah, maybe I can orient you to the, the Johnny. Yeah. If you look at the left side, this is sort of the overall plan, the right side of that left most plan has an extrovert courtyard. This is kind of the upper level. Ah, okay. And then you look at the sort of almost to the bottom of that plan, you have this shaded pill looking thing. That's the stair we're talking about. If you can get a slightly enlarged version of it, as we move to the upper right. And this illustrates a couple of flat landing that's been incorporated in the stair design. And I think more importantly, the fact that unlike what you'd see in a real spiral stair, this, this being a winding stair, it's a more gradual, less abrupt corner that it's taking. Yeah. And then this last plan right here actually shows where the football is supposed to be. 12 inches out from the wall. Nine inches or so, plus or minus from the edge of the handrail. About as close as you'd comfortably walk the handrail anyway.  Yeah. So correct me if I missed anything, Tom, but I think those are the highlights. That's exactly right, Mark. And just to put a finer point on it, the concern that we heard from the AAV was primarily the size of the treads, you know, on the winders, if you will. And the redesign makes those significantly larger, even to the point where it's really kind of too, if you're walking on the outside, it's really kind of two steps per tread, you know, at over two feet of width. So we think, you know, who knows, we'll find out next week, but we think they're gonna be much happier with this, but that's, oh, and I'm sorry, a couple of other things, right? Yeah, maybe can you zoom in on those adjustments there? Because I should mention those as well. Another comment that is that while by kind of the rest of the building code on a spiral stair, you don't need to have a handrail on either side, on both sides, it's obviously better to have a handrail on both sides. So this new design adds a handrail to both sides instead of just one side. And then as Mark mentioned, we have a landing kind of halfway up as well, which we didn't have before. So those are the kind of the general changes associated with it. It still tries to be elegant and curved and kind of sculptural, if you will, but it's trying to be much more kind of gracious from how you'd interact with it and less tricky and even, I don't know, I would, in my opinion anyway, enjoyable that you can really kind of go up those stairs and feel really comfortable with the footfall and be able to, if you are so able, look out into the space below you and whatnot. Yeah. So Tom, I have one more question. So these stairs are only 40 inches wide. So they're really, and in your sketch of the detail of that winder tread, you're only looking at going one way in this. It's not really designed to have two people pass on this stair. Is that correct? Yeah, I think that's a fair statement. Part of the reason that the landing was added was to address the potential for being a little less awkward should you get halfway up it and find somebody coming down the other side. But yeah, it's not intended to be large amounts of people going up and down at the same time. Okay. I think that's kind of one of the puzzling things I had was why would you wanna do that? But that's a whole different bag. This is a much safer stair and it looks more comfortable. All right, Elise has her hand up. Okay, go ahead. So I'm talking from a vision impaired perspective. Since these stairs are, they don't go straight up and they're a bit shaped to them. Do the edges of each stair, are they marked in any kind of color contrast so that people can see the edges of the stairs? There are nosings on each of the stairs. These are poured concrete. So they would have the metal nosings across each of them. Meaning, you mean like a tactile? Yes, I'm not exactly sure what's designed right now in these but typically it's kind of like an angled piece of steel with a tactile surface to it. That's only about two inches by two inches or something like that if you think about the angle. But if you're using a cane like I do or anything you can tell that the edge of the stairs coming up and you're gonna step down. Not necessarily Elise. If you're gonna do it tactually, yeah. But what you were asking was doing it visually. And I don't know that it's built in that it will actually be a contrast, visual contrast with the concrete. It depends on how they're gonna paint it. I mean, even with a guide dog, I sometimes, I mean, I count on her but it's more comforting to kind of have some visual color contrast. Yeah. So I think what she's asking for is like what you would put on any staircase. Sometimes they have that yellow edging or orange edging or whatever contrasted color. You know what? I mean, I'm talking as a blind person but I think they do put those on steps. They put them on some. They don't put them on all. Yeah.  And my guess, and again, I'm sorry that I don't know the detail. I don't know that there is quite honestly at this point, a defined detail for that nosing. But generally what we do is the concrete, of course, is a light gray color. The nosing is more of a kind of a dark steel color and it would have contrast to it as a result. That's how it was over in the science center. So you're not planning to put any color into the concrete or the nosing? Okay. I mean, sometimes people put color in it when they pour it. I mean, you know, when they mix it. The nosing would be, yeah, a darker color. Well, yeah, all right, well. My question is, what's the difference in the width of the step? You said it could be as much as two feet on the outside. What would it be on the inside? 11 inches where your foot would actually fall. It tapers closer to the center. Don't have that to mention, but you know, kind of the, as Mark was saying, kind of, if you measure nine inches out from the handrail, that's at that location is 11 inches of tread width. Ooh, don't stick along the way. Okay, I mean. Yeah, 11 inches is sort of a standard tread, if you find it. Yeah. So that seems reasonable. I mean, I'm interested in Marty's question about the two way. We've had problems with other people's projects with very narrow staircases that were supposed to go two ways. And this one seems auxiliary and not very far from the main staircase. So if people choose not to use it, they have a pretty reasonable alternative that isn't very far, is that right? That's correct. Yeah, and we're talking four inches less than a standard staircase. A standard staircase is 44 inches wide? Correct. Two way? Yes. Wow. I guess that probably came with those dimensions before people got wider. I mean, when you think about it, that's like two chairs sitting next to each other. Okay. All right, so it does, you want us to give you, I mean, the feedback is, I guess, the questions have been answered, right? Do you have more questions? Jim or Cody, do you have a question? I don't. Let me see where I am here. Can you hear me? Yes. Yes. Okay, yeah, I don't. I mean, as long as the building is fully accessible, this basically seems like a decorative option, which hardly anybody with a disability, any kind of disability is going to use, but it's okay. Okay. I mean, that's sort of how it feels to me unless it is the shortest distance between two very important points and the rest of the people have to go way out of their way. So that's the question about, I don't know where it comes out. I have no idea what the building would be like, but if it's the main entrance to where, if it goes up to the main entrance to the cafeteria line where you swipe your card, then it's not a communication or convenience there. It seems to be by placement, a main stair. You know what I'm saying? It depends what it connects. I'm happy to respond to that. Okay. And I completely agree with your point, but no, this is in addition to the circulating stairs. And so it goes from the third floor. Now, when we say third floor, that's a little bit of a question. That's a little misleading because, you know, this is, if anybody was in the old science center before it was decommissioned, you might remember that from the main quad side of our campus, you could have entered that building. And that's the third floor. Okay. So from the east side, you enter on the first floor and then from the west side, you enter this building at the third floor. And the third floor is kind of largely open studies. It has a number of meeting rooms. It has a cafe. There's, you know, it's kind of the lively hub of the building, if you will, near the, you know, kind of spilling out onto the level at the quad. And what's happening on the fourth floor is some student offices, a screening room, you know, a lounge space. There are some religious spaces there, Muslim prayer room. So it's kind of an extension of the third floor programmatically. But it's not like, you know, the main dining hall or something like that where lots of people are streaming back and forth to it all the time. So that's the first part of the answer I would provide. But the second part of the answer, probably more to the point, is that the fully compliant full stare is just to the south of this. And we should have included it maybe in this drawing, but it's literally like, you know, 20 feet away or something like that. Maybe less than that. Yeah, it's great. There's an elevator right there, correct? Oh, and the elevator, correct. That also is right nearby. Excellent. That's just to the north of this communicating stair. Oh, that's great. So the dining commons is off.  Correct. One floor down or two? One floor down, yep. Okay, so most people will come in, people will come in from the quad, they'll go down the stairs, which does not involve this structure. Or they will go down the elevator. That's correct. And from the other side, they will go up. Yep. Okay. All right. And so this thing is connecting, yeah, it doesn't sound like it impedes anybody's ability to get anywhere. So it sounds like it's fine. To me, I don't know what they will say, but the spiral staircase with the small treads, I can see why they would object to, because all you need is big boots that go over. And yeah, I mean, it's sort of a safety hazard for some people. Yeah. Especially if it's a little slippery. Maybe I shouldn't say this, but I think we're getting a better design as a result of this process. I do too. I like the stair a lot better. Tom, you know, just food for thought next time, when you all do applications, I think one of the most important things you've said today is that these are two relatively limited use floors. You know, when you present the project, it sounds like, oh, this is the entry level, that's where all the things are happening. In reality, everybody's going downstairs for the most part. I mean, you will have people here, but it's gonna be at a much lower use than mealtimes. Yeah, good point. That really helps a lot. Yeah. I'm very pleased with this, Tom. I think you've done, this is a really good solution. Thank you. Sounds good to me too. Yeah. So the board needs to send, Myra, not to tell you what your job is, but the board needs to send a message to the MAAB that if this is true and we need to have an action, so maybe I'll move that we vote to agree to approve this. So actually, why do you need a variance for this? Because the stairs are not compliant. Because they're not 44 inches wide? No, because they are winders. Because they curve. Yeah, okay. Curved stairs aren't allowed in public buildings. Okay. I can tell you, based on my daughter's two-family house that she lives on the second floor, I would tell you it shouldn't be allowed in private buildings either. Yeah. I wish I had a dollar for everybody who's gone down the stairs the wrong way. Yeah. They're very dangerous to do that, because they're very narrow at one end. Well, residential ones are particularly narrow. Because residential ones can be as narrow as 36 inches. But I don't mean that narrow, I mean the tread. Oh, yeah. On the inside, the tread is dangerous. Yeah, well, that's because when you've got a really narrow one. Base, yep. That the width up near the center is really narrow. Yep. Which is why they're not allowed for public egress stairs. Which is a really good idea. Yeah. Okay. Don't do a show at the Shea Theater. Let me tell you, that spiral staircase is deadly. Backstage, yeah. Yeah. Oh, backstage stairs are terrible. Oh, this is like, talk about bad treads and it's iron, it's wrought iron. Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. That's pretty common to get up to the upper level of the theater stair. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, you don't even need winding ones. You can go to the Academy of Music. It's a straight staircase and it is treacherous. Oh, it's bad. It's so treacherous. Anyway, maybe we need to fix that place. All right, I need a motion. Don't get me started on this. So I'll make a motion that the board transmit to the MAAB our approval of this application. I need a second. I'll second the lease. Okay. All those in favor, I guess we'll just do a roll call. Jim? Yes. Yeah. Yes. Cody. I think you're muted, Cody. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Lease? Yes. Marty? Yes. And I will vote yes too. So we have five to zero in favor of your application for the variance for your, what do you call this winding? You don't call this winding. You call this, what's the technical term for what you're calling this? I think it's still called a curved stair. Is that right, Mark? Sure, vote over that one. I don't know why don't we just call it their application for variance because it involves the other stair too because this is in addition. Okay. Okay. So we are approving their application for variance. Yes. Better ought to take no work whatsoever. In fact, Pamela, would you just be willing to stick it on a letterhead that say the DAAC voted on January 4th to support the request for variance? Because that, I mean, I don't even, that doesn't require any writing. That's just like one sentence. I would be happy to do that today because I will be out of the office tomorrow. So I can send that off today.  Right. Right. You just put it on a letterhead. You might as well just write it. Okay. Okay. So thank you for bringing this to us. And if you want to bring any other projects the sooner that you can get them to us, the better. So that we, this isn't about you, but we often feel like accessibility is the afterthought. And of course, we're going to approve. And we don't always. And we've seen a few projects that both of which came from UMass actually, which had some things we considered to be real problems. And if accessibility is an afterthought, there's not a lot that can be done about it. In fact, the state building inspector agreed with us on one of them. But I, so if you want to bring us something further, closer to the beginning of a process, that would be really helpful to us and really sometimes helpful to you because accessibility is too often an afterthought. And sometimes, you know, you need somebody, somebody would not be able to get a job doing X, Y, or Z because they didn't think about that. They didn't think they thought only the public has to go and we'll bring them what they need. But what if somebody wants to work there? So there are, there are all kinds of reasons for accessibility other than what seems apparent sometimes when you're not a person with a disability. And we like to hear from people earlier in the project and we always get heard from too late. We always get consulted too late. So just in the future, that would be helpful. Thank you. Yep, noted. Okay. Okay. This is great. Thank you. I appreciate your time. I appreciate your coming and good luck with the project. When is it going to be? When do you expect it'll be open? Well, you have to wait a little while. Yeah. It should be in operation the fall of 2026. That's not so bad. Two and a half years. Kids who are sophomores in high school. Oh my God. That would be my grandchild. Oh well. Oh wow. Yeah. Well, they can come. No, he's not ready for that. They can Chris in the place. Okay. All right. Thank you very much. We have. Thank you all. We have to put some minutes and then we can adjourn. I need a motion about the November minutes, which was the one about the elementary school. So Myra, I'm sorry to interrupt, but the minutes were sent out to you in advance, but they were not included on the agenda for this meeting. They're part of your regular meeting, which will take place next Tuesday. Oh okay, fine. And Councillor D'Angelo has her hand raised. Oh, okay. Go for it, Pat. Well, this is an apology for disappearing on you all. I did partially that was because of the election and then it was my reaction to the election. And I've put in to be your liaison again. I did get re-elected. And one of the things that I wanted to catch up on is where you are about changing course so that you become a commission. And I had told Myra that I could work on that, but in terms of the role of liaison, I can't. And so I maybe Myra, you and I need to get together for lunch and I can get caught up or something. We didn't do anything. I was waiting for you to talk to Paul. You said you'd do it after the election. And I've been at a commission. I will do that part this week. That's a promise. Okay, so you cannot talk to anyone on our behalf. I can bring questions and concerns. I can talk with, what we had talked about is me possibly writing up the changes in the charge and that I can't do. That really has to come from the committee. Does that make sense? Yeah, okay. So we have to go directly to Paul or directly to the council. What do we have to do? Well, I'm going to talk with Paul and answer your question about his thoughts on becoming, you're becoming a commission and how it would be funded, et cetera. I can do that. There doesn't need to be any funding. Yeah, I know parking isn't gonna. And then I can bring back that response to the committee and then you can move forward however you need to be able to do that. Well, there are two things you have to adapt as a council. One of them has nothing to do with any money except that we can accept it. The other one has to do with getting the parking fines directly. Yeah. So they're independent of each other. You have to have one before the other but you can have one without the other. That's true on many things. No, but I mean, you don't have to have the approval of the council to receive parking fines in order to become a commission. Huh, so that would be a town manager decision. Whether or not we become a commission. Yeah. I think I'm not sure what it is. Yeah, we can try to find out. We can contact the disability, the MOD and find out. Yeah, and if you could forward anything to find out to me so I can clarify stuff, talk with Paul. So I am gonna be out of commission tomorrow but early next week I could try to forward the PowerPoint presentation that Jeff Dugan did from the Mass Office of Disability on this topic. That would be very helpful Pamela who'd get me back in the groove. Thank you very much. Thank you. And I don't know if we've met before and I haven't met Jim before. So I'm glad you're on the committee, both of you. All right, that's enough to hear from me. I'm glad to have you back. Yep. No, this is good. Yeah, I like you guys a lot. So. So one ask for me before you guys adjourn is agenda items for next week. So. Yeah, the last I talked to Kathy Shane and I had a interchange last month because we weren't all that happy that they went ahead and voted on the playground without talking to us again about it. And they had a miscommunication and she didn't know they were supposed to come back about it. And so I guess they decided on their playground surface without us. And she was going to get back to them and find out if they wanted to come again. And so I still don't know. I don't, does anybody have any agenda? We can talk about the commission thing. Oh, that's next week, isn't it? Yeah, it's two, yeah. Yeah, with this whole business with my mother I've just been so completely consumed with the thinking about it. I mean, I'm not doing direct caregiving because she's still in a facility but God, there's so much to figure out. Anyway, it's just like, I can't, I'm not thinking about anything very well. It's not good. I know that experience myself. I mean, like even if you're not, your hands aren't in it 24 seven, you just, it's on your mind all the time and did I do this and did I contact that person? And what about that as a caregiver? And should we trust this guy? Cause she says no, and I don't know. Anyway, does the public reading know the feeling? So I'm gonna list for agenda items discussion on the commission becoming, or the committee becoming a commission. And we still did not have an update. I'll reach out to Ian on the collaboration with the Northampton disability. All right, so those are the only two items I have though. I can't think of anything unless we need to know. I mean, the parking around the center of town is still difficult, but there's nothing we can do until they finish it, correct? I believe that's correct. There was a department head meeting today and a Guilford mooring did state that they have completed for the season, the work on the common. They were working basically up until the end of December because of the warm and seasonally warm weather, but they're stopped for the season. All right. All right, well, happy new year, everybody. Happy new year. Well, Jim has something that he's trying to say. Okay, go ahead. I'm sorry, Jim. I also mentioned in the discussion about the North common there, exploring the use of that door into the town hall from the parking lot behind the town hall as a long-term solution to access in that building. And so I'm not exactly sure where that stood. I know we talked about it. We wanted to look at that more closely. Yeah, I think Marty did a walk around with that so we can talk about that. Yeah, the town. Because that stair goes into employee-only areas, the town isn't excited about it, but we're gonna have to deal with the town hall at some point. Exactly. I agree with you. It's just a matter of forcing the issue and finding the funds, but... Well, isn't that a really steep ramp down? It is, it is a little steeper, but... It's really steep, from what I recall. It's, I've forgotten what percentage. It's not 10%, it might be 9%, which is slightly higher than, it's not that bad. Okay. And if you're in a motorized chair, which a lot of people are, it's not bad. And it's also a narrow one, so you can grab the handrails to slow yourself if you need to. So I'd rather have a steeper ramp and have it more accessible. Because the problem right now is, it's just not accessible. You can't get there. You can't get there safely. Yep. You know, if you could get to the door, that's one thing, but you just can't get there safely from a parking space. Okay, let's put it on the agenda. Let's put it on the agenda and let's see if we can come up with something concrete as a next step. Treat. Because they are doing a lot of work around town hall and they absolutely should be doing this. I was just under the impression that it was way too steep, but if I'm wrong, that's great. Well, I have to say, I was really disturbed that we did not see an application for variance for replacement of those front stairs. That should have been a variance. And I was told that it was supplied, but you know what? We never got a copy. How could that have benefited people getting in though? Well, they would have had to have gone to the board because they were replacing an existing stair and gotten a variance for not putting in a chair lift or some are providing an accessible entrance. And I think they assumed that the existing entrance is accessible. That's typical. And I've been quiet about this, but you just put me, I'm in a mood today. And that's my soapbox for today. Yeah, soapbox. I'm just trying to figure out once they got in the door whether it would have been feasible. Maybe it would have been. Well, that's the design problem. That's why you hire designers. Yep. To solve that problem. Well. Because if I had done that at UMass, I would have had to have made an accessible entrance. Okay, this is a big agenda item for Tuesday, right? So we need an action plan about what we're going to do, which might have to do with the rear entrance. And it might have to do with further work on the front. If you think that- I agree. I mean, I don't think we should give them the solution. They need to find a real solution that's safe. Right now, we don't have a safe solution. Okay. So that's what I'm going to talk about. I'm sorry about that. Yeah. No, I think you're absolutely right. And they are doing all kinds of things around that structure. And they, again, afterthought didn't think of it, didn't care, didn't whatever you want to use as a verb. I agree. Yeah. There is an assumption because there's a sign outside that says that entrance on the north side is accessible. Right.  I can't tell you the number of people I've said to in town. You know, town hall isn't accessible. Oh, yes it is. We did all that big project. And I go, no, it's not. There's no safe way to get to that entrance. So they're not us. They don't think. Yes. They're not us. They're just not, they don't see it. Nope. But everybody says, you know, we spent all that money to make town hall accessible. It's accessible. Well, once you're in the door, they made it accessible. Yeah. The problem is that the sidewalk, the sidewalk doesn't allow you to make, to get to the door. Yeah, right. That's a big agenda, yeah. Yeah, so let's. Okay. Let's do that. Pamela, that's, I think we're going to, we have to have some kind of an action plan. Maybe some kind of a letter to the town. So I now have, I have four agenda items. So committee to commission update from Northampton access to town hall from the rear parking lot. And just access to town hall. Okay. Access to town hall. Yeah. And, yeah. And is all this still being recorded? It is still being recorded. And we like cut the recording after the, after you said about the minutes not being part of this meeting. Are you allowed to do that? No, I am. No, I am not. No. But we can. You're not. We have to adjourn before she can do that. Oh God. But we're fine. We are, we're perfectly in compliance with the, with the open meeting law and we will have the discussion about the minutes on the next meeting on Tuesday. I just sent those, the information out in advance. So, and shortly after I'll say the last thing, and then we can ask to adjourn shortly after this meeting, sometime this afternoon, you should receive a zoom invite for our meeting on Tuesday. So. Okay. Okay. Uh, why Tuesday? Yeah, that's fine. My brain was not here. Okay. Mine either. All right. Thank you very much everybody. Thank you everyone. Have a nice snowstorm on Saturday, Sunday. Oh God. Oh, I wonder how much we're gonna get. Okay. Marty has just made a motion to adjourn. Thank you. Second, somebody? I did. I just did. All in favor of adjourning. Hi. Hi. Hi. All in favor of adjourning. No. Okay. Okay. So this is a fascinating meeting next time we'll adjourn earlier. Okay. All right. All right. Have a nice weekend everybody. Bye. Bye.


The study found that exogenous enzyme supplementation did not significantly increase digestibility of a typical commercial dry diet in healthy adult dogs. This article was offered by Cecilia Velovede, Edgar G. Manzanilla, Jennifer Molina, and others.


Thank you so much Chuck, thank you Thea, thank you the organizers of this conference. I have to say this has been quite an amazing day. The speakers as everybody knows have just been extraordinary but the seldom have I been at a conference where the attendees have been as interesting and important and doing such compelling work as the speakers and it's just been a fantastic day. So thank you so much. Wonderful to be a part of it. Because I want everyone to be able to focus on my comments in the next six minutes, I don't want people to be distracted by thoughts. Is she or isn't she? Not related. It was a little gift from Ellis Island that's the gift that keeps on giving. Okay, so my topic today is about philanthropy. And the topic is called corrupting philanthropy, fixing the rules to curb billionaire influence. And I want to start by talking about this idea of what is philanthropy, right? What is philanthropy? Because as Chuck was saying, we have this idea that philanthropy is this kind of just fantastic sort of hazy glow, what the rich people are doing for the rest of us. And a lot of times it's true, a lot of good things happen through philanthropy and we're gonna talk about that. But I want to dig a little bit more deeply into this. So first let's start with the, what I will call the popular conception of philanthropy and we all know what it starts with. This guy or somebody like it, right? Very rich person, anybody know who that is? What, Uncle Pennybags from Monopoly? Yes, he's very, very rich and he's not just rich. He's giving his money away, okay? And he's gonna give, and this is what we see as philanthropy, right? It's a very rich person. They give their money and they give their money to charitable causes. So here we have education, arts institutions, scientific research, healthcare, all these important things. There's so many more we could add. Charitable organizations do so much important work including organizations in this room. So, and in this way we see philanthropy as an act of generosity. We see it as an act of private giving and we see it as something that sometimes acts as a form of wealth distribution, right? Single rich person takes this wealth and shares it for the betterment of all of us. And I think what's important to know is how strongly this vision of philanthropy takes hold in people's minds and causes the general public to have certain attitudes about philanthropy. One is that other people's philanthropic giving is not really our business, right? If somebody chooses to set up a trust for the benefit of dogs like Leona Helmsley did or they wanna give huge amounts of money to an already well, well-endowed prep school, you know, that's their business, not our business. And what I wanna do is talk today about how the story is in fact a little bit more complicated than how this story appears. And that's because this isn't really an accurate and full depiction of philanthropy. If we wanna get the full depiction of philanthropy, we have to start with two donors. It's the donor of the Uncle Penny bags or whatever our rich person is and it's the donor of the American taxpayer because of our availability of tax benefits for charitable giving, the American taxpayer is a partner in every charitable gift that receives tax benefits. Now that means everybody in this room. So when somebody decides to give money for the benefit of dogs or they give money to a school that's already overfunded, it's not just their money they're spending, they're also spending our money. How much do you think that we kick in for these gifts? Anybody wanna guess? 50%, 40%, up to 74%. And that's because the income tax benefits are 37%. But if somebody, that's if somebody makes a contribution of cash and then they get a 37% gift. But anybody who's in the know, knows that you don't make a contribution of cash. This group might not know, this may not be as smart as this group is, you might not be the financiers, but I suspect some of the funders in this room know because then you only get that 37% benefit but you can get an additional benefit of up to 20% if you give appreciated property because you also avoid capital gains on that property. So that gets us from 37% up to 57%, assuming you have highly appreciated property. Add on top of that the fact that there's an unlimited estate and gift tax exception, which would, if somebody makes a transfer of death, it would say 40%, but here we don't wanna do double counting so by the time you apply to the net taxes it gets us up to 74%, okay? So what that means is that when rich person makes a gift of $10 million, they're only spending 2.6 million of their own money. They're spending 7.4 million of ours.  Do I really only have one minute left? Okay, good. So how we're spending this money matters, right? Because this is our money. I wanna talk about a couple of issues that come up. So sometimes these charities are not doing great work. Sometimes they're actually doing affirmatively harmful activities, right? You have the people that are pushing for supply side economics, or people who are pushing for anti-vaccination policies. Those are charities. You have people that are pushing anti-Muslim hate groups. Those are charitable organizations, right? So there's a lot of bad things that happen in the charitable world, which is something we might be concerned about. The other thing is that even legitimate charities raise concern because of the tendency for wealthy people to give to a small number of elite institutions that tend to concentrate power amongst the wealthy rather than disperse it. There's been some interesting work about that. And like the old joke about the two women in the cat skills and one woman complains that the food is terrible, to which her friend responds, I know, and the portions are so small. That too is a problem with philanthropy because increasingly, we don't actually have the gifts going directly to charitable organizations. Instead, oh, that's the littlest contribution is 26. Instead, we have the money going to charitable intermediaries, private foundations and donor advice funds. These are essentially ways that a wealthy person puts their money aside for future charitable spending, but they don't have to wait to get their tax benefits. They get their tax benefits as soon as the money goes in. Now you might say, well, when's the money gonna come out? They decide. The donor decides because in fact, our rules provide no requirements that the money come out. First of all, donor advice funds have no payout requirement at all. So you get all the tax benefits upfront. I don't have time to talk about donor advice funds, but I'd like to. And the other is that private foundations, you might say, no, private foundations have a 5% payout requirement. However, people can meet the 5% payout requirement by making a contribution to a donor advice fund, think of it as a charitable checking account, from which there is no further payout requirement, okay? So we have no payout requirements from these entities. All right, so I want to just make two points about possible paths forward. First of all, there is room for improvement in our system. I think it's very difficult to push for rules that would try to define what's a good charity and what's a bad charity. I think it would be a losing battle to do that. However, I think it's a winning battle to try to tie charitable tax benefits with money actually getting to charity. And there's a lot of people interested in promoting those types of rules. The problem is, and I suggest that we put forth a proposal, there's a number of proposals that one could have, and I'm happy to talk to anyone about how to address those situations. Proposing payout requirements, things like that. However, a big problem is going to be who is going to push for these policies. Under our system, the organizations that are harmed by these rules that have the accumulation are the non-profits. However, the spokespeople for the non-profits are not, the spokes do not represent the interests of the charities themselves. They represent the interests of the donors. And therefore, they are consistently pushing for a legislative agenda that gives more powers to donors. No payout requirement.  We know best how to spend it or not spend it, right? So it's very important that people in this room, progressives, join the battle that philanthropy be required to put those resources to active charitable use. Because otherwise we're just giving huge concentrations of power and wealth, all at our expense, right? This is, we are paying for this and we are getting nothing for it. So I urge people to join with me and others in promoting this agenda and I thank you very much.


I'm Ryan Baxter, a professor for the Penn State course Environmental Applications of GIS. If you're interested in the natural world and how people interact with it and how we might use GIS to study it, then I really recommend you take this class. I imagine that the word environmental means different things to different people. So, we'll have discussions about what exactly environmental GIS is and work through exercises that approach the environment from a variety of angles. For example, sewage treatment plants produce a great deal of solid waste and it has to go somewhere. So, we'll use GIS to create a map of groundwater vulnerability so the waste can be disposed in areas where it won't impact sources of drinking water. Or maybe we know that a certain species of bird prefers habitat just along the edges of forests. We'll use GIS to measure the amount of forest edge that's created or lost by deforestation to identify critical areas. There are lots of ways GIS can be used to help us interact with the natural world in an informed way. So, in these and other topics, we'll discuss the kinds of data we need, where to get it, and the GIS tools that are best suited to help us answer these questions. This course is a lot of fun and it'll challenge you to deploy GIS in ways that perhaps you hadn't before. After taking it, you'll be well equipped to develop databases and GIS workflows in your own application areas, and also help you think about how best to communicate your results to what is very likely a diverse and complex group of stakeholders. I really look forward to seeing you in class.