Six o'clock, so we'll call the Tuesday, March 16, 2021 meeting of the Oregon County Board in order. Are we certified in compliance with the open meeting law? We are. It was posted at 10.30 a.m. on the 15th of March. All right. With that, please join me for the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Next item of business is roll call. All right. Supervisor Smith. Present. Supervisor Gruber. Supervisor Schneider. Here. Supervisor Montemayor. Here. Supervisor Clark. Here. Supervisor Nelson. Present. Supervisor Procek. In attendance. Supervisor Koch. Here. Supervisor Schobert. Present. Supervisor Brower. Here. Supervisor Jorgensen. Here. Supervisor Ziegelbauer. Present. Supervisor Nenig. Here. Supervisor Obler. Present. Supervisor Coulom. Here. There. Supervisor Damp. Present. Supervisor Wagner. Here. Here. Supervisor Emel. Present. Supervisor Ojay. Supervisor Hoffman. Here. Supervisor Hilblink. Supervisor Bosman. Here. Supervisor Veldman. Here. Supervisor Gehring. Here. Supervisor Tastruti. And just to circle back here. Supervisor Gruber. Supervisor Ojay. Supervisor Hilblink. Here. Supervisor Tastruti. All right, we have 22 Supervisors present. Did you catch Supervisor Gruber? Yes, Supervisor Gruber is present. Okay, thank you. Thank you for that. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, we have a question for our witnesses. Consideration of Memorial Resolution. Regarding honoring the life of former County Board Supervisor Glenn Marcus. Whereas former County Board Supervisor Glenn C. Marcus passed away on January 14th, 2021. And whereas Mr. Marcus served as County Board Supervisor for 12 years from 1996 1998 on the finance committee from 1998 to the year 2000 and on the law committee from 2000 to 2008 and whereas Mr. Marcus also served as community as volunteer for the town of Sheboygan Falls fire department as an economics teacher at UW Sheboygan Lakeland College and Lakeshore Technical College and he taught fire science at Moraine Park Technical College later selling firefighting equipment at Oshkosh Fire and Police and whereas Mr. Marcus will be remembered as always having the public interest in mind who worked as an excellent advocate regarding the wise use of taxpayer funds in government and one who cared enough to check in with department heads after having left county government. Now therefore be it resolved that by passage of this resolution the county board herewith makes public its recognition of Mr. Marcus's dedicated service to the citizens of the county and expresses its heartfelt sympathy to his family and friends and especially his wife Allison and son Christopher be it further resolved that the clerk be directed to forward a copy this resolution to Alice Marcus and Christopher Marcus respectfully submitted the 16th day of March 2021 all right pursuant to county board rule 2.13 this resolution will be on the floor for immediate action you have a motion Supervisor Wagner thank you Mr. Chairman I would move for approval. Thank you Supervisor Wagner thank you Supervisor Hoffman on a voice for all those in favor of honoring former Supervisor Glenn Marcus say aye. Okay next item is the approval of the February 16 2021 journal Supervisor Procek. I so moved to adopt. Thank you Supervisor Procek Supervisor Abler. I'll support that motion Mr. Chair. Thank you Supervisor Abler is there any discussion? Hearing none all those in favor of the journal say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carried. Consideration of appointments by county administrator if there's no objection we'll take all these appointments in one vote. All right Elkhart Lake Public Library Board Mary Farron of Plymouth, Sheboygan County Affirmative Action Commission reappointment Kim Pegel of Sheboygan, Sheboygan County Recreational Facilities Management Advisory Committee reappointments David Smith, David Dearest and Mike Height all of Sheboygan and Sheboygan County Transportation Coordinating Committee reappointments Sarah Lucia of Sheboygan. Thank you. Supervisor Dam. Chairman I catch thank you. I move to approve all the appointments. Thank you Supervisor Dam. Supervisor Imel. Thank you Mr. Chairman. I will second that motion. Thank you Supervisor Imel. Is there any discussion? No discussion if the clerk could take a roll call vote please. You could do voice vote if you choose. Let's try a voice to start with. All those in favor of the appointments by the county administrator say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carried. Are there any presentations? We have none. All right. Public addresses? We have three this evening. The first is Suzanne Speltz and she's taking a seat right here on the phone. Hi my name is Suzanne Speltz and my address is 3811 Heather Valley Road in Sheboygan, Wisconsin. Anyways thank you for allowing me to speak to you tonight. My topic is the issue of close to the public committee meetings along with expenditures for COVID. As a citizen of Sheboygan it is concerning to me that we are not able to attend these meetings in person despite the fact that you have spent all this money time and money to prepare the room to prevent the spread of COVID which includes plexiglass, masks, sanitizers, cleaning, social distancing. These meetings remain closed. The open records request I discovered that $294,330 was spent on medical and protective services and equipment including PPE. Also included is a quarantine equipment such as plexiglass, shields, thermal imaging camera systems in the courthouse, law enforcement center, health and human services, detention center and administration building. I realize that not all this money was for the committee meeting rooms however it shows the excessive spending on COVID preparations. And if all these measures are supposed to work then having the public attendant meetings in person should not be a problem. I find other purchases quite questionable as well. For instance there is an invoice for $8,500 for four thermal imaging cameras with facial recognition, $14,500 spent on marketing and advertising, $8,100 for marketing including geofencing all for Rocky Knoll. Now why would a nursing home need these items to help prevent with COVID, help with COVID spread? Also $503,000 was spent for contact tracing above and beyond those covered by existing state programs. So looking into this further here is the definition of some of these items. A geofence is a virtual geographic boundary defined by GPS or RFID technology that enables software to trigger a response when a mobile device enters or leaves a particular area. They could put up a geofence around the building meaning your phone disables it when you and south when you enter it. Thermal imaging is the technique of using heat given off by an object to produce an image of it or to locate it. A recent report from FDA states that thermal imaging cameras are inaccurate in taking people's temperatures and threaten the health of the American people. Also China has used thermal imaging to track entire populations. Contact tracing is just what it says a method of tracking and tracing its citizens. This brings up major concerns of privacy and intrusive surveillance by the government. Media has described these technologies as creepy. Why does government need to know all these things and all this for a cold flu virus that is almost 100% survivable? When have we had a flu season that has lasted for over a year? We should question these things and not take what the mainstream would like us to believe. Many of these measures to ensure our health and safety as the narrative states flies in the face of our constitutional rights. Whatever happened to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? Some of us have heard these words when they say peace and safety sudden destruction comes upon them. Virtual meetings hinder us from being able to speak with our officials. Communication is not effective behind a computer screen as a public servant. You are not meeting the needs of your constituents by allowing us a voice, a physical presence and the ability to interpret communication beyond oral communication. It appears as if the county can use our taxpayer dollars, but we have no voice in our government. According to your mission, vision and guiding principles on your website, you've stated our mission is to provide courteous, responsive, efficient and effective services to those we serve. Our vision is to be recognized as a leader of responsive and cost effective local government. Encourage regular communication between citizens and county officials. I suggest that you abide by your words. We cannot stay locked up in our homes forever living in fear. It appears to me that the real pandemic is an economic, social emotional and mental health ramifications of all these so called protective measures have caused. It is time for all of us to get back to work and allow the citizens to have an equal say in our government as it was designed. Thank you, Suzanne. Next up will be Judy pool. Hi, my name is Judy pool and I'm at 18 Ashwood Drive in Sheboygan. And I'd like to read the mission statement from the county board website. Mission vision and guiding principles of Sheboygan County Board of Supervisors. The mission of Sheboygan County is to provide courteous, responsive, efficient and effective services to those we serve. One of the principles listed is to be dedicated to the concept of democratic local government. My concern is that many of the policies adopted by this board are coming from state officials, non governmental organizations, and public private partnerships. The Wisconsin County's Association drives the local policies that should be developed in Sheboygan County for Sheboygan County, not as an extension of the state. The WCA provided the wording for our so called local emergency declarations and continues to steer the policies of the board. Why is a county supervisor writing letters to the editors of several newspapers identifying those views as those of a quote Sheboygan County Board Supervisor and Health and Human Services Committee Chairman. We are being told a mass mandate is no longer being considered for Sheboygan County, yet so many resources have gone to pushing this agenda. And now the emphasis is on vaccinating everyone. Some people do not want to take this vaccine period. It is our choice or at least should remain so a political agenda should not be used to override any individuals constitutional rights. Some other principles from the Sheboygan County Board's mission statements, maintain a constructive objective and creative attitude, be dedicated to the highest ideals of honor and integrity and all public and personal relationships. Recognize that the chief function of local government is to serve the best interest of all citizens improve the quality and image of public service, encourage regular communication between citizens and county officials, and emphasize friendly and courteous service to the public. The supervisor alluded to previously did not follow any of the above principles outlined for board members.  As is the recommendation to compliment compliment those who wear a mask, as opposed to shaming those who don't. So I'm telling people to only spend their money at places that practice masking and social distancing is discriminating against individuals and businesses who do not agree with you. That is not how a public official should react to their constituents. Finally, turning around and glaring at someone in a public meeting who is 20 feet plus back in the back of the room is childless, childish and unprofessional. This person should resign. I followed the recommended procedures to bring my grievances to the executive committee, as they are also entrusted as the ethics committee for the county. Unfortunately, I've not heard back from one person on the board or executive committee regarding my February 3rd and February 6 2021 emails requesting an investigation and the removal of this member. I am still waiting five weeks later. Sadly, the mission of Sheboygan County to provide courteous, responsive, efficient and effective services to those we serve seems to be forgotten. Thank you very much. Thank you, Judy. Next up we have Stephanie aren't of Sheboygan Falls. Thank you for your time. My name is Stephanie aren't I live at 535 Richmond Avenue in Sheboygan Falls. I would like to address the recommendations that are coming out from the county and HHS. I spoke last August and stated that if you are going to recommend to an entire population, you better have science to back it up because medicine is not one size fits all. There is no science for the recommendations that you continue to put out. There is however report from the CDC that just came out on mask mandates and allowing on premises restaurant dining. That is very revealing. The study found that mask mandates only reduce the cases and death growth rates by 1.8%. So we we shut down economies, ruin businesses, stop people from breathing oxygen for 1.8% with for a virus that has an infection fatality rate of only 0.04% not for 0.04. Do you know the negative effects of these preventative measures?  Here's some numbers for you. Opioid overdoses increased by 117%. The prevalence of depression symptoms in the US tripled. According to an article entitled masking children tragic, unscientific and damaging from the American Institute for Economic Research, which does cite sources and I'll forward to you. It tells us that emergency room visits linked to mental health health problems for children increased by 25% in children aged 5 to 11 increased 31% for those aged 12 to 17 and 25% of people aged 18 to 24 reported suicidal ideation. And I wonder what it was for children younger than that. The CDC's own February 2021 double mask study reported that masking may impede breathing, causing other issues. Scientific evidence also suggests masks are ineffective in reducing transmission transmission sources cited in the article that stated mass did not function after 20 minutes due to saturation. They become saturated and stop doing their job and pass on the droplets. So where is the science recommending that we should be wearing a mask and now double masking you're recommending, which leads me to something that may have catastrophic consequences. In a recent letter from a top vaccine expert and independent virologist, Geert van den Bosch, he wrote to the WHO and called for an immediate halt to all COVID-19 mass vaccinations. He says as a dedicated virologist and vaccine expert, I only make an exception when health authorities allow vaccines to be administered in ways that threaten public health, most certainly when scientific evidence is being ignored. The president the present extremely critical situation forces me to spread this emergency call as the unprecedented extent of human intervention in the COVID-19 pandemic is now at risk of resulting in a global catastrophe without equal. This call cannot sound loudly enough. He says there is at present massive evidence that viral immune escape is now threatening humanity. COVID-19 has already escaped people's innate immunity as reflected by multiple emerging, much more infectious viral variants, most likely due to the global implementation of infection prevention measures. The vaccine is driving these variants and could lead to vaccine resistant virus. Not only will people lose vaccine mediated protection, but also their precious innate immunity will be gone because the vaccinal antibodies are to compete natural antibodies. And this is long lasting. Besides this information, we know they have skipped animal trials which could lead to pathogenic priming where your body when coming into contact with a natural virus could react much worse. And then there are the reports that we already have. As of March 5th, there's the vaccine adverse events reporting system shows 1,524 deaths, 3,477 hospitalizations, 5,806 urgent care visits, 4,748 office visits, 292 cases anaphylaxis, 332 heart attacks, 66 miscarriages, 1,917 severe allergic reactions, 367 reports of Bell's palsy. And speaking of that, did you know that one of your own county workers is suffering with Bell's palsy right now after receiving his first dose of the vaccine and is still suffering as it's been over a month already? These, there are many injuries and reactions happening. And to put these numbers into perspective, a Harvard study found that less than 1% of all adverse reactions are even reported. So take these numbers and multiply that out. And just so you know, seizures are not a normal reaction. This is a vaccine reaction and should be reported to VAERS. Stop recommending to the population to go get an experimental therapy with death listed as a side effect. Take responsibility and do some of your own research instead of listening to those few in charge that say this is the only way. You are not the guardians of health for any man, woman or child in this county, just your own. It is your duty to review new information when it is presented and to answer to your constituents, otherwise you shouldn't be in your position. Any death from COVID is tragic, but so are the deaths or injuries from the vaccine. Thank you for your time. All right, board, that is it for public addresses. Thank you. Letters, communications and announcements. We have none. All right, County Administrators report. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good evening, everyone. I'll start off briefly touching on a question that Supervisor Obler raised just before the meeting started regarding the status of County Board and committee meetings. As I think most of you are aware, if you had a chance to review that email I sent out a week or two ago, and I know we all receive a lot of emails, so don't feel badly if you didn't. But by County Board ordinance, the County Board Chair has the flexibility to hold remote meetings through April of 2022. So at this point, I know Chairman Koch, who's been having discussions with the executive committee on this for the past couple of few months now, has been very mindful of public health recommendations. We're currently at a COVID activity level of high, which obviously recommends few people get together in an indoor environment. So I anticipate Chairman Koch may continue to be holding remote County Board meetings for the next month or two, although that'll depend on the public health guidance that we receive. And obviously we want to lead by example in that regard. Whenever we get the County Board together, we have at least 25 board members and members of staff would have you. So that currently would exceed the capacity limits that our public health, not only at the local but state national level are recommending. As for committee meetings, obviously committee is generally five people. You may have two, three staff, perhaps individuals from the public. And if that number is 10 or less, we do think that we could start having committee meetings. So as you as you may be aware, effective starting in April at the discretion of the liaison committee chairs, either meetings in person remotely or a hybrid thereof will be will be permitted. And of course, our emphasis is airing on the side of safety and making sure that if a committee chooses to meet in person, that there's adequate room, adequate space in that conference room for people to social distance and be sure that they're not only protecting one another as as board members, but the staff involved, the public involved. And of course, mass will continue to need to be worn in county facilities. So I want to thank and acknowledge our deputy administrator administrator Lane Krause, our corporation council, Crystal Fieber and our IT director, Chris Lewinsky, who have been working on some remote participation standards or guidelines. We're going to be sharing that first draft with the executive committee this week, and we intend to forward that on to the entire county board next week so folks can prepare accordingly to start meeting as liaison committees in April if if the chair feels that's appropriate. And of course, board members may continue to call in or participate remotely. So we're allowing for three different approaches there. So that's the latest there. And the second thing I wanted to talk a little bit is the very subject at hand COVID-19 and the year review. So Chris Lewinsky could please prompt the PowerPoint presentation. Thank you for that, Chris. And before I start again, I want to thank and acknowledge our deputy administrator Lane Krause as well as our public health staff who helped prepare this for me. It's for many of us, I think it feels far more than a year has passed since COVID reared its ugly head in our country and since as a community, we've had to contend with it but certainly a lot has transpired the last year and I'm going to quickly go through some slides. Next please. So as everyone may recall, March 2020, we really had a very small case counting not only in the state but certainly in Sheboygan County at this time we were looking only at four active cases, no deaths. And for Sheboygan County I think many of us maybe felt perhaps we're insulated from this or maybe it's really not going to reach us or be as bad as some people were projecting or telling us at the national or global level. And sadly a year later you can see what's happened with our overall confirmed count. The U.S. active case continues to be over 7 million. There's been over 500,000 people who have died as a result of COVID or COVID being one of the key reasons why they passed. The Wisconsin confirmed cases over 500,000. Sadly we've had over 6,000 people pass away and we continue to see that number go up in Sheboygan County. Our current activity is 158 which is a far cry from where we were last November at our peak of 2,600 but we have had 132 residents of Sheboygan County pass away. Next slide please. From time to time you may have heard some comparisons made and I know early on in this process last March April of 2020 we had some people suggest that this was a hoax or that this was no worse than the flu or that we really didn't need to do anything to prepare for this pandemic. And unfortunately that did not turn out to be the case. If you just look at World War 2 alone over 400,000 people were killed or died of disease or gunfire. The Vietnam War, the Korean War, those three wars combined had less deaths than COVID and for those who continue on to point out the influenza or flu and say this is no worse look at the difference in the death toll in 2718 and 2018-19 in comparison to the past year with COVID-19. I think more people would probably argue today that we should have taken it even more seriously as a country than we did and fortunately things are turning we can see a light at the end of the tunnel but to have over 500,000 people die is truly sad and remarkable. Next slide please. Next slide please. There's been some stimulus packages as you know that have come to to help people in need. A lot of people have been out of work or have had health issues or had to stay home to care for loved ones or had to stay home to care for children so the federal government really stepped up and back in March of 2020 there was a 2.2 trillion dollar stimulus package. Again it's only been a year but I think sometimes people lose perspective and actually the three key actions that the federal government took in the past year and that was the first and made Wisconsin eligible for 2.3 billion and sheboyden county received four and a half million dollars in reimbursement for unexpected expenditures or revenue decreases predominantly on unexpected expenditures or costs associated with fighting the COVID battle. As you know the money was used to help pay for essential employees at Rocky Knoll certainly our first and foremost priority was to get personal protective equipment, sanitizing other steps to protect staff, protect the public and make sure that our health care workers could protect themselves as they were caring for loved ones at Rocky Knoll and nursing homes throughout the county. A testing and contact tracing was critically important to inform people that they were ill and to make sure that they didn't pass that on and again we had four and a half million dollars that I'll touch on in a moment that we were able to get reimbursed because of the federal stimulus. Next slide please. In December of 2020 we saw a second stimulus bill passed by Congress and signed by the president again to help people in need. It was a little different than the first of that 2.3 trillion about 900 billion was for COVID relief stimulus helped to people in need and 1.4 trillion for the federal operations. Wisconsin did not see any of this direct aid nor did Sheboygan county but the money was used for a second round of stimulus checks enhanced unemployment benefits reviving the paycheck protection program for small businesses. I know that was very helpful to a number of small businesses not only in Sheboygan county but throughout the state developing and purchasing the vaccines and the treatments that were all now relying on to get out of this situation and obviously safety enhancements for schools universities childcare facilities again to help people in need so those two rounds of stimulus funds from the federal government without question helped us keep people safe and helped us helped us continue to fight the battle. Next slide please. Most recently we've seen now our third stimulus package entitled the American Rescue Plan Act and this was a 1.9 trillion dollar stimulus package not as much as the first one in March of 2020 but nonetheless a lot of money and Wisconsin is going to be eligible for about 1.1 billion of that and what's really rare first in my career is local units of government across the country are also going to be eligible for direct payments direct payments to counties and a number of municipalities Boyden county is earmarked to receive 22.3 million these two payments will come directly from the U.S. Treasury and as you know the Treasury is currently in the midst of developing guidelines or criteria to provide further guidance on how these dollars can be spent what we do know is what you see at the bottom of the slide obviously this funding is to help respond to this public health emergency navigate the negative economic impacts help small businesses nonprofits people in need focus on our workers especially our essential employees our nurses and doctors and healthcare professionals people that are right in the line of fire helping people and risking their own safety obviously recouping revenue losses is in this package and it was not in the first and that's that's going to be helpful to us and helpful to to certainly local units of government across the state and then making key investments whether it's water sewer broadband and that i think is going to be further fleshed out we're hopeful from a state perspective our wisconsin counties association as you know has been monitoring this very closely as well as the national association of counties and we're hopeful that that may also include broader transportation roads and bridges you know to put this 22 million in perspective though this is this is unique this is new to us you could we could replace two or three bridges or some key segments of transportation and easily utilize 22.3 million so on the grand scheme of things though this is a lot of money coming directly to us from the federal government of all the roles and responsibilities that we have here it won't be difficult to responsibly utilize these funds to benefit our community and as i think about these funds and i know our board feels strongly about it we have to use it responsibly we have to use it to help people in need we need to utilize this to stimulate our local economic our local economy that's what it's for right and we just have a long track record here working in collaboration with others to help make good things happen so i fully expect that we're going going to engage the shiboyden county economic development corporation our business community and make sure that they have input as to how we make these investments also we're going to be looking to help nonprofits that are in the front lines and whether it's united way or other nonprofits we're going to want people's input and be sure that we use these funds in a collaborative and responsible manner to again help our community be successful next slide please so shiboyden county last march when we we saw this coming of course we didn't have many positive cases at that time as i mentioned next slide please but we anticipated it was going to get worse and fortunately we took some action as an organization we just didn't rest on our laurels or hope that it was all going to go away or just magically get better we put we put some expectations amongst our team to hold back on some expenses so we put a hiring freeze in place for non-essential staff it's always difficult in a county because the vast majority of our employees whether it's helping human services people are working at rocky no law enforcement most of our staff are are needed and those positions become vacant they need to be filled but we did hold off on some positions and then of course we cut some spending and contingency structural meals travel training furniture anything we could and ultimately that led to about one point four million dollars in savings when you have about a hundred and fifty million dollar budget that's not a tremendous amount of money but had we not taken any action we wouldn't have seen those savings and it was helpful next slide please the key area that we were concerned was about where the on budget expenses how do we fight this battle how do we hire additional contact tracers how do we purchase the personal protective equipment and ultimately we had four point one million dollars of unplanned expenses no one knew this was coming there's not a roadmap for this unless you want to go back a hundred years so you know when that was dealt with in a similar manner with masks and social distancing but we certainly had to pull together and we had to give our staff and our community some of the tools they needed to fight this pandemic and we did so and fortunately we were able to make adjustments as well as even pivot in the fact on how we hold our meetings staff meetings traveling to madison or meeting with our organizations so much has been done virtually now video conferencing in our five circuit courts has been tremendously successful and has helped keep our staff public and those involved safe so i'm very proud of the work that's been done but it cost some money next slide please we also saw some revenue reductions not as bad as we anticipated i sure that with the previously sales tax revenue actually just modestly exceeded expectations but we did see some delays and and funds to support opening our behavioral health residential facilities oh our market conditions have changed census dropped dramatically iraqi null from around 130 to 99 residents we're starting to see that tick back a little bit now but a number of departments saw less revenue and revenue reductions were not part of what was eligible under the federal stimulus funds next slide please but when it's all said and done we had about six point five million dollars of negative implications between the unbudgeted expenses and the lost revenue and fortunately because of the cost saving measures we took and the reimbursements that we were eligible for when it was all done we saw about a six hundred thousand dollar negative hit to our budget so that hits our fund balance but it's sure six hundred thousand is certainly a lot easier to absorb than six point five million and and uh you know we're grateful for the position that we're in we didn't have to deplete our reserves we didn't have to go back to property tax payers and ask them to shoulder more of this so that's the bottom line next slide next slide please as um one of the three i think citizen presenters mentioned there's been a lot of other impacts associated with this pandemic in this battle uh we're all concerned about fiscal but nothing hits home more than when you lose someone in your family or lose a friend so the deaths have been extensive there have been people that have recovered but will tell you that they're not feeling a hundred percent and without question the stress levels the anxiety has contributed to a need for more mental health services and we're seeing more and more studies and examples of all these these impacts and and the pressure it's going to put on us as an organization to help people in need and and help them recover it's not going to happen overnight i just i just thought the the visitation situation for healthcare facilities nursing homes hospitals when you have a loved one need or dying and you can't surround them with family you can't hold their hand i just thought that was a tremendous challenge for people the past year and continues to be although again we're seeing we're seeing trends turn in a better direction but not being able to attend a funeral for a family member or a friend and and hold them and and support them during that loss tremendous challenging experience for so many of us and the graduations and the weddings and all of the the important things that we've taken for granted for so long just didn't happen in many instances so it was a very impactful year for all of us for all of us and certainly none more so than people who lost a loved one but our our workers whether they're our healthcare providers or doctors or nurses or cna's or custodians or people who do the cleaning our law enforcement our emergency responders everyone who's been involved fighting this battle and striving to help people help keep people safe help keep our community safe uh we all need that gratitude and for me it was just so disheartening to see some people on kind to to these individuals to these workers who have given so much sacrifice so much put themselves in the line of fire risk their own health and then they would get calls or emails be threatened you know and they're just simply doing the best they can to help people and help our community i'll carry that with me for the rest of my life i just find it remarkable that some people chose that approach but it shows the level of stress and the anxiety and not everybody responds the same way i think most of us strive to lift people up and be supportive of one another and everybody takes that approach so it was a challenging year next slide some silver linings it's tough to think about silver linings when we're still in the battle but there certainly have been some the utilization of remote work we've got about 250 of our 839 employees working remotely some full-time some part-time and it's been well received not only for their ability to take care of their children or loved ones but uh we've learned a lot that people can really work effectively from home and in some cases more effectively more efficiently than they were at the office so that's been a silver lining the expanded technical capabilities Chris Lewinsky and i still chuckle about it and and it's just remarkable i i know all of you as board members how far have we come with our it capabilities i remember when ipads were rolled out a few years ago and was that a watershed moment for our organization and look at us today you know we're meeting virtually we're getting the business done and it's not the same it's not the same as meeting in person but we're continuing to provide critical important services for our community and you're able to continue to make decisions and we're able to continue to hear from the public and just a real credit to all of you and our all of our employees for the job they've done with IT capabilities and and garnering efficiencies to help one another be safe and gain efficiencies truly gain efficiencies i don't think we're going to see the days where people are driving to madison or stevens pointer throughout the state as much as they did in the past when they can have a virtual meeting for 45 minutes or an hour and save four hours of drive time why would we do that uh so it certainly has increased productivity and and and we've seen some benefit there but the perseverance of our of our staff and our community to fight this the collaboration that we've seen the collaboration has been remarkable what we've seen our administrative panel every monday 7 30 same groups still getting together including the presidents of aurora and the president of st nex and school administrators and health professionals and law enforcement i mean we have 30 35 people they give together every monday morning at 7 30 to talk about how can we work more effectively together to beat back this virus and help this community be be safe and get back to some normalcy these people are wonderful and and for anyone who thinks that we just get in a small room and roll our hands together make decisions independently as a county administrator as a county board supervisor doesn't work that way we work as a team in collaboration and during all this expertise from not only people in this community but statewide nationally and and that's been so beneficial and of course seeing the reduction in flu cases flu cases are way down because i think people have changed their behaviors not only wearing the masks which is such a simple thing to do in the grand scheme of things but washing their hands more the social distancing the cleaning hopefully some of those things will continue going forward so that's been a silver lining next slide please i tell you i'm encouraged i am so encouraged with what we're seeing with our vaccination situation a month or two ago we were all beaten the drama about the supply and making sure that we could get it to people who want it and as you know the supply was not there we only have five registered vaccinators here in shaboin county five that jumped to 13 and they they weren't all getting the vaccine and they still aren't getting the vaccine to the extent they want it and the capability they have to administer it but have we made progress over the last four six weeks not only as a country but as a state and as a county and as you can see now at least 65 percent or more of our residents that are 65 years and older the most vulnerable have received at least one dose of the vaccine that's incredible that's terrific and of course we're looking to see that continue to go up and get back to some normalcy so so happy about that the supply continues to be a challenge as i mentioned but slowly but surely it's getting better and that is going to be the difference in returning to normalcy in this county and across the state and country next slide please i lost my looking forward there chris is that right there it is thank you nice work last slide everyone we obviously have a goal as a country and as a state that every adult will be eligible for a vaccine in may so i mean that's a month and a half away or so right that's just fantastic and by june in sheboyton county we're very hopeful that we're going to see at least 60 percent of our residents vaccinated so again feeling hopeful feeling optimistic with this progression i'm i'm i'm feeling more optimistic than i have in the last year without question without question and the reasons are as i shared the support from the business community has been outstanding outstanding some people don't like public health guidelines why don't you take that up with the heads of polar company sargento master gallery johnsonville take that up with the sheboyton county economic development corporation take that up with the county chamber take that up with our hospital presidents and our school administrators and our teachers take that up with the nurses and our doctors we are pulling together in this county and people recognize that the best practices that have been recommended by public health do make a difference and are important a lot of good work the current trends are bearing it out things are looking brighter things are looking much brighter and now that we have 34 registered vaccinators we are poised like never before to get these vaccines in the arms of people that want them and that's a good thing but reached out to some school superintendents today and it's so encouraging to hear that many of our teachers many of our teachers have now been vaccinated and district school district employees critical to getting our kids back in school right i know we've had some hybrid opportunities throughout the county there but hopefully by next fall it's back to normal or at least as normal as it can be i'm concerned that i'm optimistic with the rider cup that's coming up in september and we're in discussions with pga leaders about what that could look like and none of us have a crystal ball they're concerned about variants and strains and what we're seeing globally in other countries but without question these vaccines and the rollout of the vaccines and more and more people taking the vaccine i think that's going to be the difference in a rider cup that has full capacity or near to it versus one that doesn't have many spectators at all so i'm encouraged i hope you're feeling encouraged and i'll end with a shout out to our public health staff the chamber just recently recognized our division of public health for their outstanding leadership they were selected as the service organization of the year our division of public health our county employees the service organization of the year by the county chamber what a wonderful accolade and we know how deserving it is but uh i think it it reflects the support by the business community for our public health staff and all we've tried to do to protect our community and help keep people safe so thank you everybody who's taken personal responsibility out there to be part of the solution and again thank you to the county board and our public health staff and everyone involved who's been fighting so hard to defeat COVID-19 and uh i know we're all looking forward to a a safe and more normal summer and i'll conclude there thank you mr chairman thank you tony administrator pain next is the consideration of committee reports executive committee ordinance number nine regarding amending shoreland ordinance in the town of holland committee recommendation to enact all right so supervisor obler i'll make a motion to approve the enactment of this ordinance nine thank you supervisor obler is there a second supervisor gehring thank you mr chairman i will second that motion thank you supervisor gehring is there any discussion okay hearing no discussion all those in favor of hi hi opposed motion carried in selection of committee reports human resource committee a committee report on classification structure and salary adjustments okay we will accept that for information and with that i hand the gavel over to supervisor zigglebauer good evening to you all for our resolutions interduce resolution number 29 from the finance committee regarding authorizing the finance committee and finance director to balance over budget departmental accounts resolution number 29 will be referred to executive ordinance is interduced ordinance number 10 from finance regarding changing supervisory district boundaries to reflect annexation from supervisory district 25 town of holland ordinance number 10 will be referred to executive ordinance number 11 also from finance regarding changing supervisory district boundaries to reflect annexations in supervisory district 16 and 17 city of plimps ordinance number 11 will also be referred to executive and ordinance number 12 from finance committee regarding changing city of shabuigan supervisory district boundaries to reflect annexations again it will be referred to executives in the absence of supervisor to strudel call on supervisor gehring to start the next order of business thank you mr sherman i move for adjournment may i have a second supervisor hoffman seconds thank you supervisor hoffman all those in favor aye none opposed we're adjourned thank you good night everyone


This paper developed a new dataset for Vietnam with high spatial resolution and temporal accuracy. It was constructed by bias correcting and spatially desegregating the outputs of 35 global climate models from the coupled model intercomparison project Phase 6, CMIP6. This dataset, named CMIP6-VN, covers the present time period 1980 to 2014 and future projections for 2015 to 2099. The results showed that the dataset has good performance for the historical period, making it suitable for studies on climate change assessment and impacts in Vietnam. This article was authored by Quang Tran on, Ton Ngo Duc, Etienne Spain, and others.


If you do any post-production on your Zoom meeting recordings then you might be interested to know that you can actually record separate audio tracks for all of your guests. It's quite easy to do, all you need to do is head over to your settings in Zoom, click on the little tab and then what we want to do is come down into the recording section in the left hand side and then you just toggle on this option here to record separate audio file of each participant. One little thing to note, if you do have people calling in on phone, they will all be combined into a single track. For more tips like this and to become a Zoom master, head over to zoommasterclass.com.


And based upon our projections of future prison needs, we may well have a need for a prison in that district or elsewhere in the future. But again, the tough budget choice that we made here is that given the current volume of inmates in the prison and given the projections for the future, the Bureau of Prisons just didn't feel that we needed that facility at this time. The Congress decided this, and it's the Congress that controls the purse strings of the country. It's been passed. It's the law. The money is there, appropriated, authorized, everything in order. We recognize there's a problem. We've got terrific overcrowding. Yes, we've made some reductions in recent years, but not enough. But this has been decided, and we expect it to be carried out.


Good morning everybody the guy in front of me and myself are in the gate Just like they said they would they open the gate at exactly 6 30 a.m. They're gonna open the door so we can start unloading inside at about 7 So we can take our tarps off out here because the weather is good. It's not raining Be ready for them and we'll be out of here in no time Shouldn't have any problem getting to my reload appointment south of Minneapolis Once I reload there, then I head back to Winnipeg I'm hoping if everything goes well I can be in Winnipeg tonight yet But the last couple of times I've picked up these loads. It's taken a little bit longer than that for It to clear for customs so I should be able to get up to the border And maybe we'll have to cross in the morning, but hopefully they're a little quicker clearing customs today so that I Can be on my way. All right, I'm gonna get up to take my tarps off And we're out of here Not bad And off we go My appointment in Minneapolis is at 11 a.m. No We moved it from 10 a.m. To 11 Which is good because now I'll get there just in time I have about two and a half hours of driving to go and I have two hours and 45 minutes to get there Let's hope for no big traffic jams in Minneapolis Nothing but the best Minneapolis nothing but the best of the street check-in It's moving pretty quickly though.   All those were the days all you show up there You just back into a door they throw it in you close the doors boom. You're gone Don't have to worry about it.  Don't even look at it. Forget about it Flatbed is not the same. I like flatbed a lot better actually I've really grown to love it. I don't know if I'd go back to drive-ins Why not but drive-ins meers gravy now super easy we'll see I'm 35. I got a lot of career ahead of me yet a lot of years ahead of me Who knows what's gonna happen? I can't see myself doing anything other than open deck But never say never I've learned that I've learned that Never say never Except when you say never to say never don't say never Hopefully tonight all depending on customs clearance and if they can get my load cleared before I get there It's still pretty pretty good time in the afternoon. So the brokers should have lots of time to do their thing Make me a happy trucker and get my load cleared And then I have another reload in canora. I got to get to tomorrow afternoon yet. So busy busy busy. I like it awesome truck stop Got all kinds of chrome goodies inside here I'm just stopping here check my load open inch. That's good. I'll put another notch on these ones though Just tighten these guys up just a little bit Yeah, I could I could use one more notch Just crossed back into Manitoba, Canada That's awesome, that's a proper welcome, you know This guy here the Great North Dakota We both fueled up there Sadie gaff Manitoba It was a it was a rush day today and tomorrow is gonna be another day just like it From here. I got a I got a stop for my 10 hours. So I'm going back into the US tomorrow And I've stopped 10 hours like you know and From here, I'm gonna rush to Winnipeg right after my 10 hours are up Get this stuff off my trailer unload it rush back to canora Put more lumber on my trailer tarp it and rush back down to Brainerd because I got to unload there the next day First thing in the morning and then I don't know what my reload is But maybe I'll do another one of these Minneapolis runs but in that case I'm gonna have to rush down to Minneapolis that day again and then Rush back to Winnipeg. So it's it's been a rush rush week, but that's the way you like it, right? You don't want to be sitting around with nothing to do Busy is good during the week as long as you got some days off to look forward to or something You don't want to be rushing day after day after day after day after day after day after day after day but This has been a good week. We've been running hard and I like it I'm gonna keep me busy, but I'm tired now. I've got all my stuff up front here. I'm gonna go to bed Thanks for watching today everybody. I appreciate it a little bit of a short vlog I'll see you tomorrow. Don't forget to subscribe hit that like button I've been making videos for about 12 years here on YouTube if you go to my playlists on my main page Go and like click my username go to my main page You can see my playlists that go all the way back to like 2011. I believe I Got them all organized there for you too. So it's easy to follow along And every day every day when I upload a new video I add that video into the current playlist as well There's one playlist where it's like all the way from the beginning till now and then I also have each season Which is each year of vlogging Listed separately there you'll find it. I'll see you tomorrow. Take care


Welcome! This meditation is designed to support you to embrace the gifts and talents within you. This is also designed to guide you into relaxation with the music and images. So please make sure you are not driving, operating heavy machinery, or doing any other activity that requires your focused attention while listening to this meditation. It's always recommended to set aside time to relax in a quiet place where you can focus in a comfortable position either sitting or lying down and where you can be uninterrupted for a while. Now I'm inviting you to get yourself comfortable, soften your gaze, and begin by taking a nice big deep breath and let it out slowly, taking another deep breath. And as you release it, allow yourself to get very comfortable and relaxed with your eyes closed with each breath you're taking, you're breathing a calming and relaxing energy.  Focus all of your attention on your own breathing and the sound of my voice and music if at any time you become aware of any sounds or movements outside of experience, any of the awareness simply helps you relax even more, feel free to adjust your body and move to remain completely comfortable and relaxed and continuing to sink deeper and deeper down. In a moment I'm going to describe some images to you, however you experience these images is just perfect, if at any time you struggle with the images being suggested just simply pretend they are happening for your greatest benefit, so now imagine a pretender you are relaxing some place comfortable and say in a house this house might be familiar to you, well this might be one just in your imagination, however the house appears is absolutely perfect, imagine the way you are at the house, you are sitting on a comfortable chair and you are enjoying a relaxed and laid back day, it's a beautiful day and the temperature is just the way you like, you enjoy this relaxing moment with the refreshment of your choice and reddish peace, the soft and gentle sunlight is shining down on you and you feel warm and calming fresh air, it's soothing and relaxing breathing the calming fresh air and enjoy a feeling of pleasant relaxation, continue to take in the fresh air with a big deep breath and you let all the muscles in the top of your head and your forehead soften and relax and you feel your mind winding down and becoming peaceful taking another deep breath and you let all the muscles in your cheeks and your jaws relax and let go another deep breathing and you let all the muscles in your shoulders soften and relax another deep breathing and you let all the muscles in your arms your elbows your wrists your hands and your fingertips relax and let go sinking deeper and deeper down taking another deep breath and feeling your lungs and your heart with this soothing and relaxing fresh air allowing you to breathe even deeper now and feel even more relaxed another deep breathing and you let any tension and any discomfort in your back ease away continue to breathe in the calming fresh air and you let all the muscles in your stomach soften and relax a big deep breathing and you let all the muscles in your hips your legs your feet and the tips of your toes relax and let go now taking another deep breath and you let all the muscles throughout your entire body every nerve every cell every muscle and every organ soften and relax and sinking even more deeper and deeper down continue to breathe in the relaxing air and with each descending number your level of relaxation will double you want that to happen allow that to happen five deeper and deeper down four so calm so peaceful and so relaxed three letting go if it's so good to just let go two you are sinking even more deeper and deeper down one you are almost there relaxing even more and continue the deep breathing process and reaching and maintaining the most beneficial and harmonious level of relaxation as we continue here you are at the house sinking into the chair and enjoying the feeling of pleasant relaxation with your refreshment at some point you decide to refill your refreshment so you easily stand up and walk into the kitchen then you pour yourself another drink and you get yourself ready to go back to the sea and you casually open the cabinet when you reach up into it you notice that there is a small envelope meant for you you become curious to see inside of it and you feel the envelope with your fingers and notice that it's safe to open up as you open it you find the key in the envelope the key seems familiar and you wonder what it is for and become curious to figure it out so you begin to look around throughout the house after a while you notice a door in the house it has always been there and you have spent time in the house with little concern for it somehow you know the the key will fit the key for you take the key and fit it in you turn the key and feel the latch release then the door opens you peek inside through the door and you are aware of a room there is enough light coming through curtain windows to see this room seems so familiar perhaps you played and had fun in this room as a child perhaps as a child you kept and hid all of your treasures things that were the most important for you in this room whatever it is you have a wonderful memory of this room and you know that this room is safe and comfortable imagine now that you step into this room and focus your attention on the room you notice that there are a lot of goods and items in this room and you need to pick your way through them you give closer attention to them and you realize that some of them are yours and some are left behind from other people they take up so much space in this room you notice that this is part of you and your life that you have overlooked and neglected and you have a thought that if you can clean this room up you may find treasures that are meaningful for your joy your happiness your love your greatness and your well-being things that you might have kept were hidden in this room then you bring to mind something that is really important to you and your life you feel that you are meant to clear away these goods and items that have been holding you back from your greatness you become more eager to clear them and organize this room to make more space available for your highest good you know that you have all resources and tools to clean and organize this room if you need there is assistance from the universe that is happy to support you in this process you have everything you need and you move into action with ease and with grace you focus on the goods and items and begin to clear them out in any way you choose as you clear them out you may become aware of specific objects thoughts were fixed ideas comments or opinions self-limitations were high expectations feelings or emotions experiences were memories outside energies and anything that has been keeping you from your greatest desires you may just experience them as objects tied up continue to clear them out and each time you clear an object allow yourself to breathe a sigh of relief and release remove and resolve negative energy and unwanted emotions and stress attached to those goods and items i'll be quiet for a moment allowing you to complete the clearing process imagine now that you have fully and completely clear the object out and organize this room this room now has more space than before you now have room to move easily and feel free to move around so you find yourself opening the curtains and windows all the way to let more sunlight and fresh air into this room the light shines through the windows all over the room and the fresh air flows into this room this room is now filled and embraced with more light and more love you can breathe even deeper now as you look all around this room you notice that some things are bathed in golden sunlight you know instantly that they are all of your treasures they had been hidden behind and beneath all the goods and items you just cleared these treasures mean the most to you they are a symbol of gifts talents thoughts and feelings that help you in accomplishing any of your goals and your greatest desires they are now uncovered and right there for you you begin to become excited to uncover all of your treasures and you begin to explore and find and collect each one each time you collect the treasure with a pure heart you become more excited and embrace the treasures continue to collect all of your treasures bathed in the golden sunlight and allow the feeding of excitement joy happiness any well-being to be right here with you now imagine now that you completely have all of your treasures within you and you are filled with all the possibilities you've embraced you know that you are gifted talented and variable you now possess limitless possibilities for your best self and have a pure mind and heart open to all the possibilities you now have complete access to all of your treasures and the ability to use your gifts talents creativity wisdom and love for your greatest benefit and your well-being you now have a stronger sense of accomplishment and self as you leave this room you catch sight of a mirror in the hallway you now see yourself with all the possibilities you've discovered and embraced you see yourself with joy love peace compassion courage strength and prosperity this is a new reality for yourself you become more excited to share all of your possibilities with yourself your loved ones and the world for your highest good shortly we are returning to from this experience and you are going to bring back all the possibilities available they remind you of how amazing how wonderful and how exciting you are like we now breathing all the possibilities you embraced today you realize that you are competent to create a wonderful reality for yourself with all the possibilities available to you in the most beneficial and harmonious ways you now know that you have the key to access this room you can return to this experience anytime you choose anytime you have a hard time to see and feel your possibilities or any other time that is beneficial to your well-being just take a few moments and imagine yourself revisiting this room as you take some nice deep breaths and release them slowly clear away anything that you have been holding onto while that has been left behind in you and then you embrace all the possibilities within you to create a wonderful reality for yourself so now i'm inviting you to return from this experience take a few big deep breaths few calm and refreshed feeling returning to all the limbs moving your fingers and toes all energies incomplete balance and a thick body closed feeling more alive and more aware remembering your complete experience realizing now that you are competent to create a wonderful reality with all the possibilities available to you so now your eyes are open fully aware and fully present feeling so good


Friendship over. But I felt pressure. I complain a lot about how books do exposition. That's not a reasonable bar for anybody. It's not all. So I'm Jen and Rainbows. Friendship saved. So when you have a friend who's written a book, what do you do? If you hate it, friendship over. But if you don't read it, then you're not supporting them. Friendship over. So my solution was to read it secretly. And if I didn't like it, then I would never tell anyone that I read it. And if I like it, well then I'll do a review. So I'm very happy to report that I liked Voice of War by Zach Argyle. I'm not gonna claim to be friends with Zach, but I am friends with Hillary from Bookport. She had no point pressured me to read the book, which I appreciate, but I felt pressure, especially because I do see this book hyped a lot or this series hyped a lot. And I wanna be supportive, but I also, I hate a lot of books that people like. So I was like, oh, it's super risky. So as I said, I'm happy to report that I really liked Voice of War. This is gonna be a proper review with pros and cons and the whole kit and caboodle. It's not just me being like, hey, I read it, okay, bye. So I'm gonna start with the pros, then the cons, and then we're gonna kind of wrap it all up at the end. First pro, immediate hook. When the book starts, I personally felt immediately invested in wanting to find out what happens next and invested in these characters. That's half the battle right there. Someone picks up a book and they wanna keep reading it. Well, that's good news. There is a strong mystery component to the story throughout, which is set up early on in the book and continues to become more complex as it goes. Now, for a mystery to work, you kind of have to know the status quo so that you can then be surprised by a revelation that alters the status quo or alters your understanding of or makes you question your assumptions about the status quo. So again, the book did a really good job of setting up this baseline status quo. And then you get more information at a steady trickle that continues to complicate and surprise and subvert your expectations, which leads into my next pro, which is the exposition. I complain a lot about how books do exposition. So I'm happy to report that the book does a very good job at delivering exposition, not perfect. There are moments of info-dumping. There are moments of like an expository dialogue that's a little clunky where characters are talking in a kind of a natural way so that they can tell you something important about the world or the plot or something. But overall, it does a really good job of just kind of like dumping you into the world and letting you kind of like watch stuff happen and have learned about stuff as it comes up and kind of figure it out as you go. So that just feels much more organic than if the book stops to explain everything to you or if the characters stopped explaining to each other in ways that they wouldn't. So you're kind of left to defend and discover for yourself, but there are some handrails, so to speak, provided by the book to guide you, some bits of information that are given to you. My next pro is the characters. I am a very character-driven reader, so I'm gonna be most interested in and most harsh about characters. Oh, these aren't the best characters that I've ever seen. I'm not gonna say that. It's not Job or Cromby, it's not Robin Hobb, but who is? That's not a reasonable bar for anybody. That said, I was surprised by the depth and darkness of the characters, their situations, their choices, and how quickly I was invested in seeing their stories unfold. I'm definitely liking the direction that it's going with the characters kind of being confronted by their assumptions and by what they think they know and watching them to see how they handle that. Again, a pleasant surprise for me is the sort of general grayness of the world, the plot, the characters, kind of everything. From the initial, initial setup, I just kind of assumed that I would be getting a kind of, for lack of a better term or phrase, a kind of like video gamey plot with like just kind of like puzzles and mysteries and kind of questions to occupy the characters as they like piece together the answer to the question. Some magical mystery, some device they need, some MacGuffin they need to find, some something like that, leveling up in their magic abilities, just like that kind of thing. So I was pleasantly surprised. When it quickly became clear that this world has no clear good guys and whatever our characters think they know, they're probably wrong. And it's not just that like our main character or main characters like think they know something and then some other characters who have the real truth tell them the real truth about the situation. I mean, that kind of happens, but the characters who are these, you know, other characters who then tell these characters the like the truth or this like, this information that alters their perspective, those characters providing this information, they themselves are misinformed or are being surprised by other information. So there's nobody that's, it's not like our character that didn't know the truth and now they get told it by someone else. The people giving them new information also are not fully aware of what's going on and also are having their assumptions challenged and their worldview challenged. So that's what I mean by pretty much every character, whatever they're assuming they're probably wrong. And the ending of the first book certainly leaves you wanting more and wanting to know what happens next. There's lots of mystery set up, some of which have been, it's not just questions all the time, because if it was only questions all the time, that would be frustrating and unsatisfying. When the answers to your questions give you fresh questions, which is to say you're not answering questions with questions, but you are answering questions with revelations that create new questions. That I think is a very satisfying reading experience and is a compulsive reading experience that makes you want to read on. Okay, so I do have some cons. It's not all, it's not Jen and Rainbows. So my first and probably the biggest con for me personally is the pros. It's not bad. It's definitely not bad. It was bad I wouldn't be filming this review. But I personally tend to prefer more formal, more lyrical, more verbose, more purple pros. That's just my taste, but particularly in more kind of like high fantasy stories. It isn't, there isn't actually any reason they would have to speak in a more formal way, but that always helps me to kind of like take more seriously this fantasy world if they kind of speak in this sort of like watered down Shakespearean way. I like characters in fantasy to sound like they're in historical fiction. That's my preference. So the pros and voice of war is serviceable. It's fine, but it's very kind of casual and modern, which is not my preferred. A lot of people would view this as a pro and not a con. So for me personally, that's a con. There's nothing wrong with the pros. It's not like a grammatically incorrect. The Lord knows I complain about that in books sometimes. So it's fine. I just would rather have characters sound more Hamlet and less Iron Man if it's up to me. I'm not saying it legitimately sounds like Iron Man, but like the terms of phrase, the expressions, the conversations between characters, they're just much more casual and modern and simple using words that sound more like something what a modern person would say than someone from historical fiction. My next con is, I'm gonna say it's the magic, but it's not actually the magic. It's more that I don't feel that I know the magic. So like the way that it's explained or not explained in the book, I just have kind of trouble picturing it. So for the most part it's fine and for most of what's going on in the plot, it would see you to follow along. But like I can't really visualize how the magic's supposed to look when it's being used, if that makes sense. So again, for the most part, when they're just kind of talking about who has magic, who has access to magic, what they think they know about magic, like then it doesn't really matter. But when it comes to sort of like the action set pieces or action scenes, I personally found it difficult to imagine how that is all supposed to look when they're using their magic. I don't know if that was my fault, but that was not totally clear to me. I wasn't totally getting how I should picture that. And my last con is some telling over showing. So I did already praise it for doing exposition quite well and doing characterization and then the development of the plot really well. But in particular with like the main, there's several POVs, but I would say there's a main character, especially in this first book. I don't know how it goes from there in terms of who gets most of the spotlight, but arguably the main character, his relationship with his wife is definitely more told to you than shown to you. So I would rather have had much, like a lot of scenes that made me go, oh, they really love each other. Oh, he really loves her so much. Then having a lot of him thinking to himself how much he loves his wife. So like I get it that he loves his wife. I would rather have come to that conclusion myself and have him, it doesn't mean he can never think to himself that he loves her. But you know what I mean? Like it felt to me that I was told that they love each other. I didn't really witness it or like come to that belief myself. So overall I would say I had a really good time. It was a zippy plot that kept having twists and turns and new questions that made me maybe interesting in what would happen, but also again, surprised me with how kind of gray and dark and morally nebulous everything was, which you know, you know me, I love gray stories. I wouldn't say this book is grim dark, but like it was surprisingly dark and gritty and violent. Definitely more than I expected it to be. Definitely, I would say a promising first book both in terms of like from an author and also for a series makes me wanna read more. And I has to be said the audio book narrator has a gorgeous voice. Just like he could read me a grocery list and that would be a quite pleasant experience. I definitely plan to continue with the series. As I said, abandoning of the first one made me wanna read more. Most important of all, I'm so relieved that I liked it. Friendship saved. So let me know in the comments down below if you've already read Voice of War, how you found it. If you also enjoyed it, if you haven't read it, if I've now convinced you to read it. Whenever you wanna let me know, I post videos on Saturdays, other random times as well, don't leave Saturdays, like and subscribe. Join my Patreon if you feel so inclined and I'll see you when I see you. Bye.


Aaron, obviously, this was a game that had a lot I'm sure to feel good about from your perspective But Nester Cortez might be the guy who shined the brightest I mean, how would you describe what he did today and how much he meant to this victory? Huge, you know just got the belt in there for good reason you he kept us kept us in the game and gave us a chance and a Lot of really good good at bats in the second half of that game to kind of crawl crawl back into it So Nester was you know was terrific obviously getting out of the jam in the fifth to limit the damage, you know for what first and third No outs to get out of that Then get you know at some point in the outing another big pitch to get out of it another jam He was he was really really on today and and we needed it So many things to like about what your lineup did today But specifically in the seventh inning when you can see judge and Stanton kind of just do the little things right and not trying to do too much in that spot What does that say to you about them and where your lineups out right now?  It would look like he had a really good stuff today Yeah, he told me the last one was low and I didn't think it was Justin shackle go ahead Now Aaron there were like you were saying a lot of elements that kind of came together to fuel this comeback What stand out the most here? First of all, I think you got a highlight nester and what he did to To limit the damage in an inning where they're about to break the game open there in the fifth to get out of that jam Was huge And then beat and then him keeping us in the game, but guys doing enough and again, you know, you know Whether it's going back to Toronto Today, you know, it's it's everyone in the in the offense kind of contributing to you know Frazier was some really good at bats to start rallies and You know DJ with a big hit off a tough righty there to pad the lead there in the ninth You know Gary another homer, you know another good at bat off the bench by giddy, you know Brett Gardner executing a bunt You know to to to put DJ in that position to tack on just so many things up and down the line


It's The Cube. Here is your host, Jeff Frick. Hi, Jeff Frick here with The Cube. We are on the ground in Silicon Valley at the Anita Borg Institute Women of Vision Awards at the Santa Clara Convention Center. We're really excited to come down and talk to some of the guests, the award winners as well, some of the folks from Anita Borg. So we're really psyched for this segment to be joined by Elizabeth Ames of EP. Strategic Marketing and Alliance is welcome. Thank you. I'm delighted that you're here and I'm delighted to be talking to you. Absolutely. So, Anita Borg is giving out some great awards. You're giving out Women of Vision Awards. We just talked to some of the student award winners, but you're also giving away a top company award. Talk a little bit about that program. Yeah, that program is really set up to look at quantitative metrics. So what we're looking at is what is the representation of women at the entry level, the mid-level, the senior level, executive level in technical roles within companies and the percent of women that they're bringing in and they're recruiting and also their promotion. And so we score quantitatively, we add up all of those scores and we announce a winner. And this year we also announced for the first time a leadership index of companies and there's 12 companies on that leadership index. So do you just query a broad range of companies or do they apply to be part of the program or how do you select which companies you're drawing data from? You know, companies choose to participate. And so I would like to say that there were 35 companies that participated this year and I think all 35 deserve a round of applause because, you know, quite frankly, there are a lot of companies out there that aren't willing to talk about what they're doing or share their numbers and really be quantitative and think about it and really understand where they are. Right.   They fill out a form. I mean, how do you, what are some of the metrics that you guys are pulling data around? Yeah. That's a really great question. They submit data to us. That data is all handled confidentially. That's part of the reason that they're willing to do that. The metrics that we look at are the percent of women at entry, mid, senior and executive level in their technical organizations. We give them very specific definitions of technical and what that means so that they're all measuring the same type of technical workers. Then we give them definition of what is entry level, what's mid, what's senior executive, so that we're really comparing apples to apples. Okay.   Yeah. We use a widely accepted statistical methodology called Zscores. They get a Zscore for every single metric. We sum up the Zscores, the one with the highest score is the winner. The ones that are on the leadership index are the companies that were above the mean. So they're top performers within the industry. Okay. And then do you aggregate the data and deliver it back like, you know, it's kind of typical best practices for a survey so people can see, you know, here's your score, here's the mean, or here's the average? Yes. Yes, we do. We actually spend time reporting back with every single one of the companies. We show them how they scored on every metric against the industry mean and also against higher performing companies. And we help guide them in terms of the things that they might want to consider working on. Okay. So highlight what a good company looks like. Where are they scoring high? How does what they do get reflected in not only their score, but actually being the type of company that you guys are trying to encourage? Yeah, you know, that's a great question because really the best companies, they're scoring significantly higher than the industry mean. So what you see a lot of times is you see a total number of 21% of women in technical roles within the U.S. But the best companies, they're at 30 or over 30% of women in their technical workforce. And usually those companies see pretty consistent performance from entry level all the way through executive level. It might not be 30% all the way through, but it gets pretty close for those top companies. Whereas in the industry mean, what you see is you see a significant fall off from entry level all the way through to executive level. So the percentage of women at the entry level is around 25%, but the percentage of women at the executive level is closer to 12% or 13%. So you literally have a fall off of 50%, right? And we know from research that that fall off is really why women leave and not only did they leave those companies, but they leave the industry. So 13 companies above the mean out of 35, that means there was a lot that weren't doing so well, but they volunteered to participate. So when you communicate back to those companies, what's their reaction and say, you thought you were doing okay? That's why you put your thing in, but we've got not bad news. Are they receptive? Are they looking for ways to get better? What's kind of their reception to the data? For a lot of these companies, some of them are participating because they want to benchmark where they are. And they want to understand where they are relative to the industry. So this is really great information for them. And for almost every company that participates, there is something that they're doing well and there is some bright spot. And for all of them, there's probably areas that they can work on, whether they're on the leadership index or they're not on the leadership index. I mean, nobody's completely cracked the code. We're not at 50-50. We all got lots of work to do. Okay, good. And so talk about trends. You've been doing this for a while. Within the aggregate of the data, what are some of the things you can report back that you guys are seeing, trends, changes, encouraging things? Well, sort of, I refer to this as the good news and the bad news all at once. We saw an absolute increase in women from 2013 to 2014 in technical roles. It didn't change the industry percentage. We're still stuck at 21%. And to be honest with you, that's the number that we've been at for four years. So one could look at that and say, four years and we're stuck at 21%. One could also say, well, at least it's stable and it's not going backwards. So we have something to work with here to move forward. It's hard to move that industry percentage, but really, that's what we're after. We really want to move that industry percentage. Right. Well, do you cover it all, because there are women in technical firms that aren't necessarily in technical roles, and that's something we cover a lot. There's a lot of jobs to do at Google. There's a lot of jobs to do at Facebook and at Yahoo and on and on and on. There aren't necessarily CS based jobs. Do you look at those as well as part of the process in terms of women and tech that are just not in the tech tech? We really focus on women in technical roles. So while there may be women who have CS degrees that are in marketing or whatever, some other department within these companies, we don't actually count them in this case. We're really looking for women that are doing technical work, that they're in technical jobs. That really is our mission to increase that percentage, that number. Great. Last word, Anita Borg does a lot of great stuff. We went to our first Grace Hopper Celebration on Women Computing last year. It was eye-opening. We hope to go back again. What are some of the other initiatives that Anita Borg is doing to help this cause? Well, we have quite a few things. We have a fabulous online network for technical women called Sisters. It's existed for quite a long time, and it's a global online network. I think we have about seven or eight thousand women in that network around the world. It's really kind of a great mutual support kind of thing for them. We also have a program that we launched this year called ABI.Local, which is location-based communities. We have one in New York that's up and running. They do all kinds of events in their local area, including a GHC-1, which is sort of a one-day version of a mini Grace Hopper. And we'll be launching other cities this year, five other cities in the U.S., including Boston, Silicon Valley, Los Angeles, Austin, Washington D.C. So mini Grace Hoppers. Sort of, yeah. Like, well, local communities that can put on different events. And little one-day Grace Hoppers are kind of one of that one-day GHCs. Well, Elizabeth, thanks for taking a minute. Congratulations on the awards tonight. Really a fantastic event. Thank you so much. We're really glad you're here. Absolutely. So I'm Jeff Frick. We're on the ground with Elizabeth Ames from the Anita Borg Institute. It's the Anita Borg Institute Women of Vision Awards here in Silicon Valley. If you want to know how your company's doing, are you doing a good job? Reach out to Elizabeth. Get involved in the survey. If even if you're not doing a good job, as you said, you can get benchmarked and do a better job next year. I'm Jeff Frick. You're watching The Cube. Thanks for watching.