This program is brought to you by cable franchise V's and generous donations from viewers like you I will call upon each counselor by name at that time. They should unmute their mic and say present This will indicate that they can hear me and we can hear them Please remember to mute your mic after saying present. This is also how we will conduct counselor comments throughout the agenda and votes So Counselor Paul mill Yes, president Thank you counselor Brewer present counselor D'Angelo's present counselor Dumont present counselor Griezmer present counselor Hanna key present counselor Pam present counselor Ross present counselor Ryan present Kathy shank counselor Shane present counselor Shriver here counselor Steinberg present counselor Schwartz present Okay, all members are with us Meeting includes audio video and is available live on air Amherst media. It is all media. It is also being recorded There's no chat room for this meeting. If you have technical issues, please let Sean or Athena know To make a comment or ask question click the raised hand button If technical difficulties arise as a result of utilizing remote participation I will decide how to address that situation Discussion may be suspended while we address technical issues and the minutes will note that the disconnection occurred Athena and Sean will be monitoring counselors connections and if necessary, we will pause the meeting until you are reconnected The town in addition to the directions on your screen has also developed a two minute video to help people connect to town council meetings Through the town's website that video is listed at the top of your screen at this time So with no further We'll come back to this when we do public comment, but at the moment, let's just look at announcements The Upping Town Council will meet On Friday, May 1st 2020 at 9 at 10 a.m This is a special meeting of the water and sewer Presentations. It is not to set the rates We will meet again on Monday, May 4th as Meeting and that is at 6 30 and we will have a special meeting where we look at The financial indicators as they now are that meeting will be on May 11th. However, the time is still in flux It may be as early as 5 30 or later We have various committees. They're now up and running And their dates are shown here the community resources committee is on Tuesday, May 4th at 2 Governor's organization and legislation is on May 6th at 10 30 The finance committee is on May 12th at 2 30 Outreach communications and appointments ad hoc is on May 11th at 9 30 Town services and outreach is on May 4th at 9 30 and JCPC joint capital and planning committee is still on hold We're going to move to general public comment. And so I need you to I need to have the participant screen up And I need to just remind people that if you are going to make comment um, you need to raise your hand And I will recognize you at that point. You'll unmute your mic You'll state your name and you will also state where you live And it is really necessary that you do both Um, in addition to that the council will not engage in the dialogue or comment on matters raised during general public comment Uh, to participate in public comment Um, please raise your hand I see one hand. It's associated with a phone number.  Do you want to go to the other person? And then we'll go back and I'll go to the next person. I believe it's Amy Zuckerman. Please unmute your mic and state your um Make your statement Your mic your mic is still muted Sean do you need to unmute the mic? Unmuting now. Can you hear me now? Yes. Thank you. Okay. Great. Thank you council This is very exciting to be able to communicate. Um make it very brief I've been very concerned with what's going on not just at the boulders, but all issues of common spaces in apartment complexes and lodgings and what to do during the corona virus In your I just sent Lynn this today packets of information almost taking place here in photographs that show you That the management in this place does not understand anything to do with common spaces such as a laundry room Need for ventilation leave for sanitation So you have a room that's used by 75 more people without ventilation. There were no wipes out So it's not just this complex which otherwise, but what happens with common spaces today in any Apartment complex the end whaling house Talking to residents there. They have they have laundry rooms that are very tight. There is no ventilation So this is something i'm concerned about That it's something that of course who's ever thought about such things as ventilating a laundry room or having wipes um So i've been dealing with the management not always successfully, but when I do document these issues. I do get Uh, you know some response. Um, i'm at 117 Brittany manor road Apartment a1 in the boulders. Please call me speak to me because I've done taking a lot of notes and taking a Photograph to show you what happens what to do about this again. We're just at the very edge of public policy And once again the end whaling house is a good example where the tenants don't know what to do there to protect themselves So that's about it for night ongoing issues of gas and fire safety. Thank you. Lynn. We have the gas lines marked at the boulders And I won't waste more time Thank you for your comment by any other people who would like to make public comment at this time Please raise your hand Okay, I see no other hands and so we will move on to the rest of our meeting um the first item on our agenda which will be on the consent agenda is um the june 10th proclamation the sponsor for this proclamation is mandy joe hannacky and uh governance organization and legislation has Looked at this proclamation either mandy joe or George, would you like to speak to the proclamation? I can speak quickly. Uh, joel, uh, did review this on april 22nd And voted to declare voted unanimously declare it clear consistent and actionable Hey, thank you. Um, are there any comments at this time? Otherwise, it will just be on the consent agenda mandy joe Thank you. Um, I just wanted to mention a few things normally there is a Celebration at the jones library for june 10th and all um The jennifer moisten has indicated that she's been in contact with the committee that there Will not be that felt celebration this year But that the committee is working on ways to celebrate june 10th while still complying with the current state orders on gatherings and Everything like that. Um, they're hoping to use amherst media and the town website, but all of that is still in process So, um, we'll get more information out as june 10th gets closer Um, they are hoping that whether it's virtually or not that counselors will be willing to join that celebration And to read the proclamation. So I'll get more information out Closer to that with all of that information and they are still planning the bell ringing at town hall at a minimum Thanks for that update mandy joe um Okay, we're moving on then we will take a vote on that later as I mentioned any other comment All right, then we're moving on to the presentations and discussions and I'm going to call on paul bachman Please take down the agenda Thank you, lin So there's a presentation there Sean for you to present So this is another in our regular updates on the town's response to the covet 19 pandemic This is the presentation for april 27th, which is tonight So we see the presentation get up and tonight we're i'm really happy to have with me Our health director julie fetterman again and also Our library director sharon sherry who's going to be talking a little bit about what the library has been doing during the pandemic So you can go to the next slide And so tonight we talk about I'm going to give you a quick status report We talk a little bit about town operations, which I feel it's my responsibility to do for you So you know where we stand again the shelter update That's going to be julie's focus for tonight and then the library update. So next slide Next slide, okay So this is our status report from the mass department of public health Again, these numbers I will update instead of 54,000 total cases. We now have 56,462 total cases Instead of 427 in hampshire county. We have 443 in hampshire county. These are Numbers as of four o'clock this afternoon And the 30 and amherst will be updated tomorrow morning if that's changes at all And I just want to note that these are cumulative What means that they are all the all the all the cases that have been reported deaths and and the in massachusetts is now over 3000 at three thousand and three And total patients tested was 244,887 So next slide So the next couple slides are that are slides that I've taken off of the The state's website So this is this is a Two there are two things going on in this slide First are the the the blue bars are going up and down there There's some that are got scrambled a little bit when we converted this But those are the total cases by date the The number of cases of covet 19 that have been reported by date And then that dark blue line is the cumulative total cases that line will always go up And what you will see in this is that there's a lot of up and down in those blue bars and So for instance you'll if you see look at all the way to the right where it says 1590 and on april 26 That number will be 1524 When if this were updated today So what we want to be seeing on this chart is a steady downward trend And part of this these are just total cases that have been reported Part of it is due to testing so you'll see an increase as more testing is done You'll see an increase in the number of cases But this sort of tells you This is an important thing to look at the other piece of information that that the governor will look at and others will look at It's hospitalizations, which I don't show here tonight, but this is just total confirmed covet 19 cases confirms means they have been tested And confirmed it's not diagnosed you will hear some people say my doctor told me I have covet 19 But I haven't been tested that's not included in these numbers You can go to the next slide So the next slide talks Sort of differentiates between age groups age groups So on the left you see the total confirmed cases by number by age group And you see that the age group 50 to 59 has the most number of of cases And and that is kind of spread out. So the this is telling us that covet 19 has been Has fairly wide distribution The chart on the right, however, shows you the rate of covet 19 per 100,000 people and they are the People who are over 80 have a much higher propensity to to contract covet 19 And be diagnosed with this Go to the next slide, please So the next thing I want to do is give you an operations update This should be relatively quick because I the meat of the matter will be on the next two presentations So the next slide so This is the the sort of Things that we look at on a daily basis with our core team, which we've talked about in the past I'm not going to go through that again We talk about all of our staffing Our people showing up. Are there any issues one of the things that We have noticed is that several of our employees have utilized the testing services that are provided the first responders That's really been important to us because it's really important for our first responders to know if they have covet 19 or not and the state has has set up a A testing center in west springfield That our first responders can go down to and be tested quickly and get results quickly This is important for their own Sense of well-being but also for their families. So they feel like maybe they're they're feeling ill Is it covet 19 or is it not it's it's really critical that our first responders know what they if they have it or not And also we have noticed the only other sort of Thing that we've really noticed on this is that several of our employees are married to Frontline workers who might be in the healthcare industry And so they may have to be quarantined. So our employees have family responsibilities to take care of at home as well Next slide So this is a new slide. You haven't seen this before. So I tried to categorize all of our major challenges into three basic Groups or buckets. So the first is the town challenges that we have And so continuity of operations we talk about We've talked about the budget for f y 20 and f y 21 And we'll talk a whole lot more about that on may 11th When we make a presentation to the council and the school committee and to the library trustees Employee health and safety making sure that our employees have the personal protection equipment that they need to do their jobs That our employees are are in safe spaces when they're working that they have the equipment that they need To do work if they're asked to work remotely. That's a higher priority for us And but it's also something that we're working through on a regular basis The election in september. There's a Primary in september and the normal election in november. Those are things that are on our radar screen Not quite really focused on it yet, but don't want to lose track that this is something that We as a state are going to be grappling with you. You probably some see some things in the national press about Whether we should be going mail-in ballots if there's going to be delay of the election I don't think I think the only congress can delay an election. I don't think you will see that So we have to be prepared For a different type of election if that's the way it happens if it's a mail-in election If it's not a mail-in election if it's a regular election We need to be preparing our employees our volunteers our election workers to how to how to safely conduct that election Committees and boards you know, we've talked about how in March the the governing boards the council The school committee of the library trustees were able to meet in april We opened it up to let some adjudicatory boards like the zoning board of appeals and the planning board begin to meet in april It's we're still not quite there, but yet we're going to start to turn the dial a little bit and let more Committees begin to meet This It's a you know, it's a it's a still we haven't worked all the kinks out of getting these things down without an enormous amount of staff support And so we want to be able to move beyond having it there all the time to support a regular meeting So that our staff are ramped up to be able to support our committees who want to who are anxious to meet actually schools I mentioned because you know The governor has announced that there will be no more the school buildings will not be open for the rest of the academic year And this is a major burden for many people Education is still going on and that's important to remember that schools Students may not be gathering together, but teachers and parents And students are actively working on their homework and they're doing their school work at home And people are doing it in very different ways people have other different capabilities of taking this on And I think that You will see minimal kind of schooling happening this summer But pretty much I think the school department is looking at opening up for k-12 schools in september So the school department and the school leadership of the school department Are working very actively and seeing what does that look like? How are they going to achieve? Social distancing if that's still required at the time How are they going to make sure students are ready to learn and come to school prepared? To learn and have the tools that they need and the And the nourishment that they need in order to learn in a meaningful way And the other thing that we're sort of grappling with a lot lately has been the biggest one We've been talking about lately has been our public spaces Public parks trails puffers pond in particular What to do about our fields things like that something that we talk talk a lot about In terms of what's the best thing to do because while people want to recreate and they should be recreating We worry a little bit about them Gathering too closely together And we know that when it starts when that first day hits when it's really 70 75 degrees We're going to be there's going to be a lot of people just with pent up energy wanting to get out And how do we accommodate some of that by but educate people about maintaining social distance? Or physical distance from each other So that's the those are the big things we're focusing on the school on the on the economy side We focus a lot on our local businesses and start we're starting to talk about what does it look like when local businesses reopen How how are they going to accommodate that? And we've just begun into they have we have those conversations. There's a lot of creative ideas out there With the business improvement district and with the chamber of commerce We've talked with the colleges and university about what their plans are coming in the fall Everybody's not sure. They know they're going to be in session. I think they don't know what that looks like though You know as we start to Turn the dial a little bit construction and development activities might be a thing that's the The easiest one to open up because you can achieve physical distancing at a construction site Easier than you can at a restaurant for instance So we'll be talking about what to take to allow more of that and how do we as a town Meet the requirements of the inspections and permitting that we need to do at the same time is making it easy and achievable for applicants to be able to get what they what they need to do And then a major thing is going to be people who just have lost their jobs and have lost wages And how are they going to be meeting meeting their economic needs at home? And that flows into our community concerns, which My estimation is that food security is going to be the long-term issue that we're going to be facing as a town This is not a multi-week thing. It's it's a multi month Maybe multi-year challenge. I think and so I think we will be focusing a lot of energy and we meet pretty regularly with the survivor the director of the survival center because They are going to be swamped with requests. They already are and you know, we've talked a lot about their needs for volunteers and for funds but Look at what assets the town can bring to that to helping with food security either through the survival center or other means housing rental assistance the housing And trust met last thursday and talked a bit about this They have some some ideas that they'd like to see to help people stay in their homes That's the first thing you want to do the best thing you can do to prevent homelessness is to help people stay in their homes Whether it's to meet a utility bill or to make a rental payment fortunately, uh, there is you know, there are eviction Rules that the governor has issued that prevents anyone from being evicted at this moment in time But that's just a stopgap measure. It doesn't solve the problem. So Working on that is a big issue for the town homeless support you know The shelter season ends on april 30th for our shelter, but it doesn't mean People don't need support to who are experiencing homelessness Seniors, you know, we have a dynamic director of senior services who's out there doing all kinds of creative things creative things with our seniors But that's a very vulnerable population. It's a very a population that can be isolated easily And if in congregate settings, they they're very vulnerable into covid-19 And then the digital divide which which the school departments are a really good job at in Engaging with the students who are Experiencing to divide because everything's online. We all know that right now with this entire meeting is being conducted online If you have a telephone you can participate, but otherwise you're online But it also is for our seniors and again, it leads to isolation if you don't have access to the internet or the Tools like zoom to be able to communicate and take your classes and things like that so next slide so It just want to remind everybody that we do our one hour or half an hour. I call it one hour They're half hour actually Collin shows on Tuesdays and Thursdays this Tuesday. I'll be joined by our emergency management director and fire chief tim nelson These are operated. These are Hosted by Brianna sundren our communications manager and then on thursday We typically have our health director julie fetterman with us And she answers all the questions that have built up since the last time she's she was there the previous thursday And I will continue with my virtual cup of joe on friday may 8th at eight o'clock for about an hour as well Next slide So I want to talk a little bit about what lies ahead for us You know last time we talked I said we're entering the most difficult four weeks and I I think we that was that's true. We're now we're I say it's two to four It could be longer than the next two weeks. I think we're there senses that we might be peaking but until you get data He we don't we have there's such a dearth of data. We really Need more testing to know what we're talking about. We are in the middle of the pandemic. We're not on this the downward slope yet Western masses in a better situation than eastern massachusetts, and I don't know if the governor is going to be sort of When he looks at what can happen in the future, whether he's going to be looking at it statewide or if he's going to look at it by regions Um, I will we will continue or continue with our outreach efforts to the to the public because that's really important Because it's important for the public to hear what we're doing and things like that Um, I mentioned the local business impact One thing we've been working on lately, um, which will come to the council is the farmers market in different ways that the farmers market can get up and running We have had our building commissioner and building inspector working with him With the farmers market to create social distancing so the farmers market can be up and running Safely it won't be a social event. It will be a place to purchase food And we have some pretty good plans for how to make that happen Um, also the farmers market is looking to create a virtual farmers market where you could go online Go to all the farmers websites Pick things that you'd like Put them into your cart Check out and then you can go to the farmers market on saturday morning and pick up your box of of Vegetables and it's a really nice way to be able to to Participate in the farmers market with having minimal contact something that the farmers market has been very creative about doing We talked about the financial implications and then the things that I just talked about previously So the next thing we want to talk about is asked julie to unmute and she's going to talk a little bit about the the shelter And where we are on the shelter and uh, what's happening next so julie Thank you paul Next slide Thank you So our local shelter craig's door craig's place run by craig's doors a home association Is a seasonal shelter as you all know november through april And we are very lucky that we've been able to partner with coulee dickinson hospital to Provide testing for all of our all of our guests at the shelter That's going to be tomorrow morning first thing in the morning So residents have been being guests have been being spoken to over the past week About the fact that they will have this opportunity To get tested for covet 19 A couple of weeks ago one of our large shelters in boston pine street in Did testing of all of their guests? and discovered high rates of asymptomatic positive Test results folks who had covet 19 but really weren't exhibiting symptoms including fever That information has really been kind of pivotal for the state. Um, they're now wanting As we have all wanted to have more testing happening, but So one of the places where we're starting and prioritizing is in congregate settings So we've already seen that happening in nursing homes and long-term care facilities This is another cohort for which Testing is bring being prioritized So folks will be tested tomorrow morning And we expect to get those test results back within 24 to 36 hours um When those tests come back Guests will be presented with the results and those who have tested positive Have an opportunity to go to state run Isolation and recovery centers that are in hotels around the state There are two of these state run operations in western mass in two different hotels One of them is in north hampton and one is in pitsfield So This will be explained to folks before they agree to testing so that they know that if they find out that they're ill That they'll have a place to go if they choose to go there Um Transportation is offered. They have their own room their own bathroom. They have three meals a day they're cared for and then When they're better They are also then brought back to where they identify is their home community. So in this example, that would be immersed So the other thing that happens when you test folks is there's all the people who come back negative And so we'll be looking at all of those folks as well as people who've stayed at the shelter in the past several nights And determining who would benefit from quarantine So those are folks who have come in con enough contact with someone who's diagnosed positive That the recommendation just for those of just like those who live in in houses or apartments That they quarantine for two weeks to monitor to see if they develop disease So this will be another opportunity for them to To have a place to shelter and that will be at hampshire college hampshire college Has volunteered weeks ago as we began to Look at what we would do when we had a positive case or two or more at the shelter Which would determine the need for isolation and quarantine and we've been working with them for several weeks And we have developed this quarantine shelter which will open on Thursday When we know what folks would be in need of a quarantine bed So we feel very grateful that we were able to do this before the end of shelter season because Once the shelter is closed. It's harder to Have a group to speak with to talk with them about this kind of opportunity and also to to locate folks so That'll be taking place this week And I think that's all that I have to say about that unless paul you feel I've missed anything No, I think you hit it. Um, I just wonder lind Do you want to stop here for questions or do you want us to go through the entire presentation with Sharon and then open it up for questions? You're muted Yes Fine, why don't we stop here and see if there's questions and I see that we have A question from Dorothy Pam. Please unmute and make take make your statement or question um To one comment. I just read in some material. I believe forwarded by the town manager Or maybe it was boston. I was just reading it before the meeting that harvard has decided not to open in the fall um, I know hcc is still not deciding so Just wanted to bring that up also a thought I was gardening near the sidewalk on amity and it was getting pretty busy and I really did have to put keep my mask on I'm wondering about I haven't used the track when I'm thinking it's time to get out moving What if there were hours for seniors on the track? at the high school That's an interesting idea. So we do not require masks at this moment The only community I think in Massachusetts that does is that as summerville has ordered anybody outside to wear a mask as of Wednesday, and that's a new thing that the The city just put out that means that if you are out in public You need to have a mask on if you are going to a store if you're working in the in the city You need to have a mask on That's the only community i'm aware of that has taken that step We have advisories that it makes sense to wear a mask and julie can speak to the the benefits or Not of a cloth mask, but I think the point that you're making though is to It's a really interesting one which I had not thought of was to take The same approach that the grocery stores have taken that you offer a senior hour In the morning or so at some point much like we do And do that for the tracks if that's where people want to go it's something We'll they've definitely taken a consideration Dorothy. It's a really good idea Because as you know, some people some seniors find the sidewalks Dangerous sure the track would be a good idea Darcy you have your hand raised Please unmute I um kind of assuming that if some people come back a covid positive at at craig's doors that um Everyone else in the shelter That has been there at the same time. They've been there Would need to be quarantined. I'm just wondering maybe that's not true, but um, I'm wondering how many folks you think Would end up sheltering at hampshire college. So that's one question another question or two more questions one is um I actually Think that um the public comment that we heard about uh using laundry rooms and public housing is like hugely legit issue um, if there's 75 people using a laundry room That's a major issue. Um And I I actually have run into it myself with my my my daughter lives in a two family and she shares the laundry room With the basement with the with the neighbors. So I get it. It was just one neighbor So i'm just wondering if there's a way that we can talk to the landlords about that issue and thirdly, um shalini and I heard from a constituent this week about What the homeless people are going to do during the day now that Everything is closed. They can't go into the library cafes are closed Is there a possibility that we could provide some kind of space where people could be Inside and social distance During the day for home or homeless population Thank you. Darcy. I'm going to take a stab at all three of those so um to start with um The fact that when we test folks, um, I think we can be pretty sure we're going to have several who are positive Because that's what we've seen At um the large population of homeless folks they did in boston And so we will definitely have a certain amount who test positive and you're right There's a good chance that basically everyone who has stayed there Has come in contact and will need to be quarantined Um, I think one of the only caveats there is that we do have there's a separate small room for the women And so we'll be evaluating um How much contact everyone had because what's been happening for several weeks now is First of all, everyone is screened as they come into the shelter for any kind of symptoms and temperature checks and all that so, um There's been a good state of health for people at the shelter though. Of course now we know that Doesn't indicate that they are coded negative um, and then what's been happening for several weeks is people No longer sit around communal tables to eat. They each have their own little tiny like tv dinner table tray at their Caught where they eat So there's some possibility that there would be a few people who Weren't didn't really have contact But that being said we have um at this point we're set up for 20 people at craig stores I mean at hampshire college and so um That should be plenty for quarantine If for some reason we had more than that we would be able to work with that So we're definitely prepared for whomever might need quarantine And let me just weigh in here that This is an offer for people they can choose to go for quarantine or isolation They can choose not to this is not a mandatory order or anything like that We could say if they want to be tested it's an option if they want to know the results It's an option. We can if they once they know the results and we know the results We can tell them what their options are at that point in time. So there will always be some people who choose no along those paths Correct um Your second question about the laundry rooms. I agree. Um, that was interesting to hear that coming from The person who called in and just this week the state has been sending around um a couple of templates of really good information for Housing complexes a few weeks ago. We had sent out some basic information That did involve surfaces handles laundry rooms, but now we're going to be doing a mailing this week. It's a really nice Document that the places can choose to hang up. They can choose to give to their residents It's also really good information for the property managers and landlords About how they should be addressing some of those common areas. So I think that that That was a good point um, so to your third point For Over a month now. We've been talking about the possibility of the fact that um We were going to be closing down many businesses, which we did and that homeless folks would not have anywhere to go in some ways we're we're getting So much closer to the end of that period of time because we are looking at Not exactly sure when but the point at which we will be slowly opening some businesses So that there will be more places for folks to be able to go inside and at least access Coffee or use a restroom or something like that if not be able to stay for a long time But there have been a lot of conversations about the fact that You know, it's difficult when you bring a lot of people inside Because of the the social distancing that won't happen if people are inside somewhere So we haven't been able to come up with Um an indoor option that seemed um To really meet the need here of a place for folks to go but also a place that would really provide A healthy environment with good social distancing. The other thing that's happening now now is the really good weather is coming So I think we're we're sort of turning our our focus to the fact that we had put porta potties up Um a month ago six weeks ago weeks ago. We'll keep porta potties up all during the pandemic Hopefully an increase in hand washing stations, which are becoming quite hard to get around the country but wanting to increase having some of those so that people have access to hand washing and We have been really focused on on sort of this basic health care need of Who is who might become sick and and where would they be and where would quarantine happen? Now that this is all figured out really the state stepped up over the past several weeks to start opening these isolation centers because Every community was having to think about how are we going to do this ourselves? So we're now at that point where we can start thinking about what other services what other needs are there for homeless folks um During this period of time until next shelter season Thank you Maybe joe you have your hand up Yes, thank you. Um, I was actually going to ask a similar question On the homeless situation in terms of places to go during the day Um, I would just encourage so thank you for the answer julie I would just encourage us to in case this happens again Come next shelter season. Um, but it's not only just shelter season Even on warm weather when it rains in the summer There was always a library to go to or You know a retail establishment to go to in those thunderstorms and all and that At this point even if it's warmer still won't exist so If we can identify some locations where People can stay dry and still social distance during some of that bad weather even in warmer weather That even if it's outside that I think would be a positive and then we have to be thinking in case this happens again Next fall if there's a resurgence um On what we can do because if it's the middle of winter, we've got real problems with With not no sheltering during the day. Um My next question. I think it's mainly for paul and probably mike who's not in attendance tonight schools It occurred to me if the schools are shut down for the rest of this school building year Um, are we working on if construction can start up again getting those projects moving that are already funded through the capital program Earlier than normal so that maybe more Capital construction and improvements in the schools can happen than usual because there is a longer Building closure period. I know on jcpc. We've heard that it can be sometimes really hard to spend the money We allocate because there's such a limited sort of window of time to get projects done and so are we looking at trying to use this Unfortunate time of school building closure to actually accomplish more than might normally be able to be accomplished Um, yes, so they have done that. Um, they are doing that. We are doing that as well you'll note that the You know, we've taken the opportunity that the bank center is close to really redo the senior center In when you come back to town hall, you'll see that there's major changes to town to the first floor of town hall We've uh refinished floors things like that that can be done when there's no one in the building We empty out the building one worker can come in and do the work So in it so that prevents us from having to shut down the building if we are ever to do that in the future So there are certain things like that that we can take on take advantage of and the schools have done the same thing I just talked to the superintendent today about that. So they're in pretty good shape on those things Alyssa, you have your hand up Thank you very much and thank you for all of this julie. I guess In continuing to emphasize we know how hard you've all been working on the homeless shelter situation and ensuring that Testing would happen and results would come back right before the shelter closes is fantastic So thank you for all of that in addition to everything else you've been doing However, I don't think we can emphasize enough that in less Magically the governor does start allowing more businesses to open on the fourth Having homeless people hang out in the grocery stores Which are limited in terms of who's supposed to be in there at any given moment Or having them hang out at I don't know home depot or another large chain store Is going to be challenging for the management of those stores the employees of those stores in ways that it hasn't been in the past Right because if you're going to the grocery store, you're just anybody at the grocery store When there are lines of people being staggered outside at trader joes You're not going to be able to hang out in trader joes if you're a homeless person So between the time the shelter closes and this magical time when perhaps western mass opens up sooner There literally is no place for people to go and so i'm sure you're Emphasizing that in your conversations with folks that it would be a really good idea to take advantage of Either if they're positive they go one place if they need to quarantine they can go another place Because all the options they normally think of are simply not available to them Then on a completely separate note. I wanted to ask about masks. I understand what paul said about summerville being You know doing something pretty special in terms of warnings and then actually finding people for not wearing masks in public What I don't understand however Is why north hampton and holy oak are saying that customers have to wear masks in stores But amherst is choosing to not do that. I don't know why we wouldn't want to send that message I understand we wouldn't want to go to the bother of finding people I'm sure summerville will you know find out how that well that works But I don't understand why we're not doing that and i'm very uncomfortable Suggesting to people that they go to the grocery store when there are customers who are not wearing masks and So why are north hampton and holy oak doing that but we're choosing not to do that It's a very good question alissa and I spent a lot of time keeping myself up to date on this so CDC made A recommendation that it that people could make their own cloth masks Or use something to wrap around their faces um to use when They were concerned that they weren't going to be able to stay six feet apart from other people The department of public health Also says that that is a recommendation That if you cannot stay six feet away from people if you're concerned that there's a situation In which you are going to come into closer contact with people That you could wear A cloth face covering because That may help to Resist transmission And when you put that mask on you are the concept is perhaps you are preventing yourself from Transmitting some virus um to others So In fact, this has been talked about a lot Twice a week. There are statewide conversations between all the local boards of health who get on there and the department of public health and It's it's complex because there are a few communities Such as the ones you mentioned That have decided to require this I have felt that I really didn't want to require this as a to order this as a public health measure Um this this When you make a cloth mask one cloth mask doesn't equal another so We're we're saying we want you to do something that has no Quality measure to it. The other thing is that um There are almost no studies to support the fact that this will actually do anything um And one of the other problems is that when someone uses um a paper a surgical mask a simple mask Um, they're one time use you take them off you throw them away Um what people if you're going to use a cloth face covering it's really important That you put it on appropriately so that you're really covering all over and you don't have any air pockets because otherwise it's really Any capability it has to trap tiny microns is lost and then the other thing is that When you come home, it's a one-time use you take it off very carefully.  Um And I don't know that people are really doing that or will really do that so inadvertently they could be um Collecting a lot of virus and concentrating it in one place So I have not so, you know, if this is something that people feel comfortable doing and they want to do I feel that's one thing The second piece to this is that what is really crucial is the social distancing People should stay home grocery stores should have people six feet apart. Um, there are certain businesses um That I've been to and they're just doing an incredibly good job. So that that is what is happening People are six feet apart and I truly believe that staying home as much as possible and only doing those essential errands is what is really going to um Halt the spread of the virus And so that's why I haven't seen this as something that we would want to order people to do Uh, Dorothy you have your hand up Okay, I'm concerned about uh wireless for several populations Since we were talking about the homeless That's the other thing they're missing with the library being closed and the coffee houses and whatever is access to wireless and yet With this year we're seeing an incredible increase in the quality of the town website and the kinds of Key information that is on it and yet they don't have access to it. So One thought is some public kiosks that are You know have a little teeny-weeny roof, but they don't have sides which are charging stations And wireless and has the town webpage on it um And the other thing is the large, um, you know, Amy was talking about um cleanliness in uh congregate settings uh laundry rooms and um Many of those areas don't really have enough wireless um For people to access and needed information and to do things and um I was talking with a techie friend And he told me that the little hot spots which we've been busy trying to get to our students Are good to do their schoolwork, but if somebody does banking on them, it is not secure And I said well, then what do you do and he talked about vpns virtual private networks Anyway, the whole wireless thing is really really big Now that we've closed down access to free wireless at the library and the coffee shops And it's it's to me. It's a major, um Social inequity thing that I don't know how to solve but I think the town should be thinking about it And I just to respond to that I think you're absolutely right dorthy in the town is thinking about it There are no easy solutions vpns are much more expensive than hot spots um but you know The purpose of the hot spots was to enable students to be able to do their home their work So they weren't totally disengaged. Um, yeah, it speaks highly to the need in this this pandemic more than anything About the need to help what a requirement Um digital access to the internet Well, let's see you have your hand up Thank you. I appreciate that and I appreciate that it's a constantly unfolding thing, julie But i'm going to push back a little and say when we first started having these meetings The those same public health officials who said Well, we don't know that the mask is actually going to help at all Also said well, we don't think asymptomatic is a thing and it is a thing and some of us knew it was going to be a thing Even though officially it wasn't a thing and so one of my concerns remains that if we could be Perhaps more I appreciate all the work you all are doing in terms of reaching out. I know you talked about landlords I know you've worked with grocery stores and I know it was a month ago But I was in a store that I obviously will not name That had things taped off and customers were not following it and no one was telling them to follow it People were not six feet apart. They were literally six inches apart in some parts of the store And that's continuing to this day. You read about this every day happening in amherst as well as worldwide So I guess beyond just saying well, they all think it's a good theory and yes We should all stay home and yes, it's great if we don't go to the grocery store a ton of people are going to the store and It's very difficult if there are not rules put in place by the community that says You will have only one way aisles You will only, you know, line people up the way they do outside trader joes So as much as I normally and very much do what you need to do kind of thing I'm really concerned about this and I know that people are getting into fatigue associated with all of this And they're wondering if they really need to bother Buying groceries online in a really incredibly expensive and unpleasant fashion Versus just go to the store like everybody else does you don't even need to wear a mask and nobody's going to Force you to not stand close to other people. It's it. I'm just worried about how long this fatigue is going to last I think you bring up good points. Alyssa, I do agree that I think there's fatigue setting in I'm working closely with the building commissioner and the health inspectors As we look at And we're even having some conversations with in our core management team with the police department about How will we enforce things? What's the appropriate way to enforce things? How are we going to get some better compliance with social distancing as we see the fatigue setting in And then the good weather coming Again and and uh, I also I hear what you're saying when yes, we looked to those experts and they said, oh You know, we're not concerned about asymptomatic Transmission so what I'm really following most closely is looking for Studies and epidemiologists and infection control experts who might be showing me more data to say that Cloth masks are really that item that we want to push I I feel the place where I really would like to push more is on the social distancing. I agree with you that Maybe there is more that has to happen in some of our retail spaces. Whoops. I don't know what happened So, um, I appreciate that it's um And I I've I've got my ear to the ground on on the on the cloth face masks And the other thing that we're doing and I guess we should we could mention this here Is the community participation? excuse me our community participation officers Angela mills and Jen moisten are starting up a big project To collect materials and to find folks to make masks because the other issue too is for people who want masks Those really should be available. You know, if you don't have the time to make them Or you don't know how or you don't have the materials we want to be able to offer those to people So that anyone who wants these kind of masks can have them to use um and so I guess That that's where I feel we are for now, but I will continue to be paying a lot of attention to this issue and and you know And change it if that seems like the best thing to do Sarah, you have your hand up So yeah, I kind of want to follow up on what Alyssa said and and I'm trying to Try to keep this as clear as I can as far as I realize that what happens in an ideal world To solve a pandemic versus what you know local or federal government can do to stop it is a different thing, but I'm seeing that people who who don't have a certain amount of money Who can't necessarily pay to have someone Bring their groceries or to do online shopping And may have children or teenage children that eat a lot going to the grocery store isn't is a necessity and I would echo what Alyssa says is is that um I feel like we're kind of really looking at while we're finding out that a lot of homeless people are asymptomatic But that's really larger. That means that obviously a lot of people period are asymptomatic And while I understand, um, you know the masks Some people can't they don't have the materials. They can't afford to go online and Buy them at a certain price. I would be more than happy to work with Our community participation officers to help in that because I think that we need to try to keep things As equal for people as we possibly can I just think from um, um looking at what The local governments want to do to to make sure that you know, we don't see this huge rebound in the fall is Social distancing. I mean, I was just out this weekend In a car when it was just minimally nice and I can tell you that In stores stores are that are open or the ones that I have been in are not enforcing social distancing People are people. I live in a neighborhood. That's all young people and there were parties outside Lots of kids and they weren't social distancing. They're young kids So I guess it just for me It's it's comforting to hear that Julie saying she's really trying to figure things out And I just think that well, we live in the united states of america We want to give people freedoms that we're also sort of looking at Gentle ways that we can help everybody to social distance because I I am finding it somewhat worrisome. So I'm not sure if that was helpful or not No, I appreciate it sarah. I um I've been locked in my house for weeks because I'm trying to not go anywhere and uh, it was a beautiful day on saturday and um I went for one of the few walks. I've been on and I was I was pretty concerned too. I could see the people were so happy to be out and I just felt like wow, there's a lot of social distancing not happening and um, so Again, we're really talking about this in our team about, um You know How are we going to really help people to keep doing this? Get people to do it who haven't been doing it? Um, and how are we going to do some, um I don't even really want to use the word enforcement But I I think I will some enforcement of you know, you really need to be social distancing And so we're talking about the best way to do that the most effective way Because we all know that when we're talking about making any kind of rules Unless we have the enforcement in place to help people come into compliance It's not very helpful. Um, and also we also know that that's what we really want is to get people to come into compliance With things because the minute we're gone people do do what they want to do on their own So it's it's how do we approach this in a way that we really get Some change in behaviors Some real understanding that this is Important to do and to keep doing for a while here So I really appreciate hearing from all of you because Um, it's helpful to get all those perspectives Thanks, Julie. Uh, Shalini you you have your hand up Um, so two things that uh, I want to add to the discussion One is have you considered the language of advisory versus order? It seems that when I look at the different states, we're doing kind of the same thing But just the word order versus oh, it's an advisory Seems to carry more weight Um, so maybe sending out like there's an order Or framing the message around it being an order around with respect to physical distancing And the second thing I think there is still some ambiguity Around how many people can gather? Is it 10? Is it eight? I think some clarity Would be great for for the community that what are we expecting from them? And third is just another general question. Do we have a Okay, never mind just these two. Thank you Thank you, Shalini. Well, so that's kind of the nuts and bolts of it an advisory or or guidance that is strongly recommended is just that um as public health in massachusetts when we say something is an order um our power actually comes directly from the legislature and it's It's um it then makes it mandatory and then we have to enforce it some way So if we come out and say this is an order and then That means we've got to have people out there saying You didn't do this. You must do this. We will find you or there will be some consequence for what you're doing And so I think that's kind of the difference is that we haven't moved to this being an order um And I I do think that In the communities where they have made it an order There's you know, I don't think that They've found necessarily 100 compliance and they're not finding and they're not You know, they don't have the capacity to then set to follow up with every complaint Um, so so that's sort of that piece in there about that commitment you make when you make an order um, and then the other piece about um public gatherings Um, correct me if I'm wrong paul, but it is um 10 people or more. I'm not sure that I've seen the number eight anywhere It's 10. Yes And and we actually were on the call with the university representative represented us from the university today identifying some households that seem to be having gatherings Up by sarah's way on main street and they are going to be reinforcing the message to their off-campus students Assuming assuming that these are students of the university to encourage them not to Um have large parties now There's really hard to say if there are eight people living in a household and they all happen to be outside They're sharing bathrooms and kitchen facilities anyway So that's but it's when you have cross fertilization from households to households that we really worry about Steve schreiber you have your hand up yeah, so Maybe everyone has seen this youtube sensation where the person's talking about everything we know about And it's you know, everyone should wear a mask. No everyone should not wear a mask So this is such a if you haven't seen it. It's worth finding but this is um You know so evolving situation especially regarding the mask so I don't like living in a world where Everyone's a Covid vector and I don't like living in a world where it's scary to go to the grocery store but I also live in live in a world Where we know that this conflicting information about say the mask and you just gave us some A very good reason to not wear a mask or to wear a mask so um I I don't know. I mean it's I I if I see someone not wearing a mask I give them 12 feet of clearance even at the grocery store or I don't go into the grocery store But um, I think that in a weird way The lack of a mask actually causes people to social distance more Rather than less so Yeah now I was going to say one more thing that um I think dorthy mentioned earlier on that harvard had announced its closing The chronicle for higher education has a list of colleges plans for the fall and harvard had just uploaded and they said that we're going to Indicate that there will be open But they may be online. So they've given a very ambiguous answer to that but none of the Schools in western massachusetts have weighed in to the chronicle. Yeah Uh dorthy you have your hand up dorthy You need to unmute I don't think her microphone's working. She doesn't have a microphone icon You're right All right, we'll come back later for that. So um, see no other questions at this time Let's go on to the uh presentation from the library all Yes, and sharon. Thanks for your patience for being here and A library has been working really hard and if you go online you see all of the um things that they're doing And so sharon agreed to join us tonight. So if you want to go to the next slide shon You're there shon. Thank you I lost connection for a second. Okay So we could just start and say sharon. How are you doing and Everybody I am fatigued. That is a great word Julie, you're awesome. Really? Wow Thank you shon. Thank you so much. Um, well first off I want to thank you all for having me tonight and I want to thank you for everything that you're doing I know based on the conversations that I've had that the community is really appreciating You and what you're doing. You're moving mountains right now. Um, so thank you for that I want to thank hank allen So he is known to many in the community as pc dr. Hank Along with the town's it department for helping library staff during this time with all our technological requirements and our struggles Library services continue during this stay-at-home order Entirely because of them and their patience and perseverance and their expertise I also have to thank the staff of the library. They're really taking care of one another and To me, that's my primary concern We check in with each other daily and every day they're coming up with new ideas Of of virtually serving their patrons Next slide That's not the next slide How about the slide before no that one? Yeah. Thank you. No. Yes. Well, we're closed So next I want to talk about what the library is able to do right now Even though staff and patrons are not allowed in the buildings But I got to say as your conversation was just pointing out what a difference a building makes So without our buildings the jones library system right now is really only able to serve the privileged in our community If you're lucky enough to be at home right now watching me from the comfort of your living room with your bunny slippers on The jones library can serve you So for members of our community with access to a device and the internet you can utilize all our electronic resources Databases such as value line morning star consumer reports and ancestry.com You can stream movies and canopy stream classical music and naxos You can download ebooks and e-audios through overdrive liby and tumble books You can get magazines through rv digital You can get newspapers local and national like the gazette the republican and the new york times Educational and recreational software such as muggy muzzy gale courses creative bug and artist works You can watch our weekly live author interviews on facebook You can participate in our weekly teen art and cooking challenges Participate in our months in memorial library zoom book discussions You can participate in our youth social media photo challenges Participate in our weekly ukulele strum alongs even if you don't have a ukulele We can still issue you a lot you a library card either either through the phone or or email We can answer your reference questions. You can call us or email us and we'll help you with our digital collections We can help students with their homework And we can still provide you with personalized reading lists and we do all of this for free For our homebound patrons, we have entered into an agreement with Amherst books So that if you contact us at the library with one or two book titles that you would like We will order and pay for those books and Amherst books will have them sent directly to your home Once the stay at home order is lifted. Those books will be returned to the library For our esl patrons, we are able to utilize zoom for weekly conversation circles But again, that only works for people with access to the technology Lynn Weintraub has been producing videos targeted to seniors who are learning English and it really helps them with their feelings of isolation You can follow us on facebook instagram and twitter to see all the things that we're up to And we're also also posting our programs to our event calendar on the library's website Next slide No finances Yes, thank you So as of march 31st, our endowment was valued at 7.2 million dollars And this is down from 7.9 million dollars on february 29th Thankfully we're in this for the long run and because our annual draws are based on a trailing 12 quarter average We're not going to start to feel this loss for a couple of years The friends of the jones library system continues to mail out annual fund letters Fundraising accounts for six percent of the library's annual operating budget. So we are very appreciative of those who donate We had to cancel sammys 2020 And it probably will not occur until april of 2021 And that's a loss of about 18 000 dollars for the library. Um, and that's just an enormous amount of money for us We were certified to receive state aid for fiscal year 2020 the fiscal year that we're in now We received our final payment just before the stay at home order So we are all set for f y 20 What i'm nervous about is certification for next fiscal year f y 21 Because there is a municipal appropriation requirement Um, so I include anxiously await the may 11th town council meeting about the town's budget for next year Next slide Building project. Thank you So I have been invited to be on a zoom call tomorrow morning It's going to be hosted by the massachusetts board of library commissioners about their construction program Both current and wait listed library projects have been invited to attend. So it'll be a big meeting As of now the mblc is still planning on either a july or august 2020 vote Uh, we have asked we are not allowed to submit a reduced project A building that's of a reduced size So if the vote does occur in july or august We would have six months for the town to accept the grant with the possibility of a six month extension The mblc vote however does depend on legislature approval of the 20 million dollar capital bond bill There is a feeling that library projects would be a great way to jump start the economy in the fall And provide much needed hope to residents. So it's possible that that bond bill Could be approved In which case you could think of our library project as a beacon of light Fine gold alexander architects is all set with their design work for now until we hit the design development phase of the project And that comes after the town accepts the grant Fine gold alexander is continuing to work on their sustainability study for the new library Because it just didn't make sense for them to stop. They were almost done As of now the expanded library is going to have an eui of 32 And the architects are looking to decrease that number even further eui stands for energy use intensity And the lower the number the more energy efficient the building is The current jones building eui is 72 and kind of to put it into context I wanted to give you a list of other building spaces. So restaurant euis are usually in the low 300s hospitals in the 200s Supermarkets in the 190s Libraries are usually in the 70s, which is where the jones is right now Post offices are usually in the upper 40s and churches are usually in the low 30s The expected completion date for this project is May 8 Regarding our capital campaign Solicitations are in a holding pattern right now because the town and library finances are so unsure And because of the severe economic impact of this pandemic We are however continuing to do preparation work As justified on an as-need basis so that when the restrictions are lifted we can promptly proceed Cune riddle architects they finished their narrative assessment of what needs to be done to the jones library In terms of making it handicapped accessible and bringing it up to code So examples of changes needed are The interior doors need to be wider all their hardware needs to be switched out Our stairs need handrails The power and data outlets and the light switches need to be relocated The front entrance has stairs that need to be removed Our front vestibule is too small to handle A wheelchair All of our public service desks are too high and all of the library signage needs to have braille So I just wanted to give you those examples because they're Things that people you may not necessarily think about it's different from you know the the front elevator, which is obviously too small So western builders has begun working on updating their original deferred maintenance estimates They're going to bring it up to today's dollars And then they'll add the costs for making the jones building accessible And the resulting cost estimate will be a phased approach for the work to occur over three to five years And it will include the moving costs for when we have to be out of the building It's important for people to understand what this cost estimate will not be It's not going to be an energy efficient building Except in instances where energy code requirements have to kick in It's not going to include a space for teens or more space in the children's room or in the esl room or the special collections department There aren't going to be any more public restrooms and there will be no efficiencies to the workflow So if the town turns down the state grant And chooses this path instead you you'll only be fixing the building's immediate needs May 8th is the planned completion date for that report And we'll post it to the library's website when it when it's done And then when when all is said and done when the timing makes sense The library trustees fine gold alexander architects and cune rental architects We will all come to town council and present all of this information to you all Next line No re-entry. Yeah. Thank you. Sean So staff are super excited about being able to get back into the building and being with their patrons But when it's time for re-entry it will have to happen in a phased manner The american library association the massachusetts board of library commissioners and the massachusetts library system are all working with experts On the safest way for libraries to reopen. We will follow the science So first we imagine that the staff will come back into the building They'll work in staggered shifts. They'll wear masks and gloves and they will remain socially distant But what's it's there's still one strange thing Which is Then at some point the return of materials will happen When they do come back into the building, uh, we'll put them into the woodbury room They're they will be dated and they will remain quarantined there for at least three days Um, and this will include all the statewide interlibrary loan deliveries that will be coming back to us We're going to be assuming that each item being returned to us is infected and it's really primarily the The shiny book covers that are because they're made of plastic that concern us At some point curbside pickup will begin patrons can place holds either online or by telephone staff Once they're notified that the patron is coming Staff will check the item out and and bring it out to the patrons in their cars So at some point patrons will be able to return to the inside of the library We are envisioning limiting the number of patrons that are in the building at one time Having plastic shields at the service desks Not allowing computers or in-person programs right away And constant disinfection of surfaces and bathrooms We are also considering having separate open hours for vulnerable populations And eventually the use of computers in meeting rooms will be allowed again Um as is the case for uh in-person public programming And at this point we have no idea what the timeline will be for this kind of phased approach Next slide So here is what I'm most excited to share with you tonight So the purpose of any town archive is to collect preserve and share that town's history And so what we're experiencing right now in Amherst and the world is astounding And it's the job of the jones library special collections department to document it and we need your help So we are asking that residents complete a questionnaire ask ant Answering very basic questions. So what are your days like now? Who are you home with? Are you working outside the home? Where do you get your groceries from? How much are you paying for gas and toilet paper? What do you do for fun? And what are you struggling with? Our archivists are also looking for your photos of Amherst You could take pictures of empty playgrounds and parks and churches and parking lots Closed signs at local businesses pictures of gas prices anything that's different from what life was like Six months ago a year ago We will also be targeting specific members of the community to participate in this project So for example you the town counselors the town manager paul the police and fire chiefs Julie the health director. So all of you on the front lines You have unique experiences with this pandemic and we'd really love for you to document this experience And um, we'll be creating special questionnaires for you all That's everything that I have for you tonight. Again, thank you for everything that you're doing and thank you for having me Thanks, um, I'd like to frame the town counselors questions at this point the focus on the services now and the plans for reopening and the Survey There will be a time in the future When we know more where we will actually discuss the library plans So I really don't feel that we're sitting here with all the information that allows us to get into that tonight So are there questions about the present services? Uh the survey or the plans for reopening? I don't see any questions. So as usual, you've done your wonderful job Sharon. Thank you so much. Thank you all So, uh, we're going to now move on to our action items We start with the consent agenda And just to remind you, uh, the following items were selected because they were considered to be routine And it was reasonable to expect that they would pass. We know controversy um To remove any item from the consent agenda for discussion later in the meeting Ask, could it be removed when I list the items? And the request to remove an item from a consent agenda does not require a second So the basically the consent agenda includes the following First, it's the juneteenth proclamation Second, it's to suspend the need to have two readings for various items Those items include the extension of the budget details Deadlines, sorry deadlines the intermunicipal agreements and the selection of auditor for fiscal year 2021 However, we are going to have an actual session where we discuss the intermural agreements And the selection of auditor for fiscal year 2021 as a separate item And what we're suspending the rule so we don't have to bring it back to a second meeting The extension of the budget deadlines. We do not plan to unless the counselor asks us to Um, so therefore the extension of the budget deadlines there and then the approval of minutes april 13 2020 special town council meeting minutes and april 14 2020 special joint town council and school committee meetings meeting minutes I see one hand up pat de angeles Yes, but um, you're saying the intermunicipal agreement is going to be coming up later It's not no longer in the consent agenda It the only thing that's in the consent agenda allows us to approve That the town manager move forward on those tonight without coming back for a second reading Okay I have a question that needs to be answered. So I'd like to take it out of the consent agenda Thank you. Okay. Any other questions about the consent agenda So again, I'm looking for a second to the following To move the following items and the printed motions there under and approve those items as a single unit number 5a Juneteenth proclamation To suspend the town council rules of procedure rule 8.4 for the following agenda items So we Well, we will discuss Set two of them later extension of budget deadlines Intermunicipal agreements and selection of auditor for fiscal year 2021 We will ask whether you want item 7b 1 to 3 extension of budget budget deadlines And the approval of the minutes 10 a and b April 13th 2020 special town council meeting minutes and april 14th 2020 special joint town council and school committee meeting minutes Is there a second This is the energy second. Thank you. Okay. Is there any further discussion? Okay, then hearing none. I'm going to do a roll call vote Uh, and this time I will start with Um, elissa brewer Hi Pat de angeles I Dorothy demont Darcy demont. Yes Thank you. Lynn greasmer's. Yes, mandy joe hannacky yes Dorothy pam yes, ebb and ross Yes George ryan Yes Kathy shane Yes Steve schreiber Yes Andy steinberg Yes Sarah schwarz Hi Uh, shallony ball millen Yes And it's unanimous. We're going to move on then to our next item I'm sorry. It's unanimous 13 00 and nobody absent um, the next Item on the agenda is actually um Hold on to join the page Is actually the inter municipal agreements And paul, would you please introduce this and I know pat you had a question Sure. Thank you, Lynn. Um, so um Under the state laws any inter municipal agreement, which is an agreement between the town of amherst and any other community requires the authorization Of the town council for the town manager to act on it And so that's what this these agreements are There are three agreements in front of you and all was to do with water and sewer One is with with the south steerfield water supply district And we had helped them out last year because they had trouble with staffing and we had an inter municipal agreement with them To provide staffing if they needed it and they would compensate us for the people who were there staffing It didn't they didn't need that much of it But we think it's important for them to provide additional staff for us to provide staffing if they needed And vice versa that they can provide staffing to us if we needed these types of things are important at this time when um licensed um operators are becoming Harder and harder to find and so we think having this redundancy and this backup plans is a good thing And it's sort of the same thing with the town of hadley with water Again, uh supporting each other on term in terms of support, but also with hadley Being able to supply them with water Or them us with or if they could provide us with water If the time if the need was was if there's ever the need for that and right now we do have a connection with hadley that Is is serviceable and this would allow us if either side said we need to do it It lays out the ground rules for how we would provide water to each other or provide services to each other If if there ever was again was the need and the third is with the town of hadley wastewater um One of the things that they have been struggling the town of hadley has been struggling with is Um their wastewater treatment facility is nearing its end of its useful life And they're sort of looking at what needs to happen with that We have excess capacity uh in our wastewater treatment plant We can take some additional flow and gain some revenue from it without adding significant significant costs to our operations and again This is something that we do at our discretion and you know both sides have to say this is a good thing for us to do So those are the three agreements uh that are in front of you. These are draft agreements They haven't been vetted totally yet. These are sort of just Just to give you a sense of what we're talking about so I actually put the actual agreements and typically we might not do that so Pat you have your hand up Yes, I'm uh have a question about The water agreement with hadley if you go down to fee structure in the document that was in our packet Uh section b the amherst minimum charge Is there but when you drop down to c it says hadley minimum and then it's got some question marks and it says note So it seems like there's no information about Hadley's minimum charge and I don't feel comfortable Going forward without that being clarified Okay I do support these agreements in in in In the but I am concerned about that Okay Um Kathy Hi, um, I Just I have a question about hadley water but not about rates when we were um Talking a year ago or maybe a half a year ago about water supply and uh Issues with what we charge for UMass and could they turn to another source of water if they wanted to I think we were told that hadley doesn't fluoridate its water But amherst does so it wouldn't be easy To switch out the two water supplies. So it's just a question of whether I heard that right or I might be wrong and whether it then becomes an issue of us Um co-mingling supplies. So not the staffing side, but the actual water supply side So I don't know the answer about fluoridation honestly, um That has not come up and has not been presented by the dpw superintendent as being an issue of concern. So I If that were an issue of concern, we would know about that. I think um So I just don't know the answer to your question. I can get the answer for you though Okay, so that was just it was a piece of information. We got at a meeting from from Mr. Moran, um, just I don't know whether it was specific water or and it was a relationship could UMass switch um to an alternative supply is how it came up Okay Are there other questions? All right, so Paul my question to you, uh, since there was A desire to have some of the blanks filled in when do you want to be executing these? We can do that at the convenience of the council. There's no rush on these. Um, we're just sort of moving them through the process Okay, so why don't we have that clarified and bring it back for the vote at that time? Sure. Okay Um Andy we're going on to the selection of the otter auditor for fiscal year 2021 this is item that has been discussed by the finance committee. And so I need Andy Steinberg Speak to that well in our uh, not at our most recent meeting but in the week before and that um, I think it was the 13th state Uh report was placed back in the packet um That's where it was reported and the recommendation was made And so what the reminder is is simply this that we know that there's a lot of work ahead of our fiscal staff in our staff in the finance department and We're trying and that's good. That's what those change in dates was all about and what was reported most recently in great detail with the budget coordinating group If we are going to have a competitive process for the f y 21 audit year Which was what the original plan was then that um finance department staff would be needing to get the bid documents together And work with us on the bid documents at the same time that they would be putting together The 12 month budget in the one month budget for july under these Very difficult circumstances and it was for that reason that the finance committee felt That it was appropriate with a lot of regret because we had really been planning on doing a budget or an audit selection process For the f y 21 audit that it was not a good idea It can't be put off later because There's a need to go through the entire bidding first development of the criteria advertisement bidding interviewing selection And to get that started we really needed to get moving on it During the months ahead and that was what the plan had been And that's the basis of the recommendation Are there questions about this? Okay, I don't see any so i'm going to put place the following motion and i'll need a second Do not engage in an auditor selection process for fiscal year 2021 and to continue to use audit services provided by melonson health as recommended by the finance committee report on of april 13th 2020 you have a second Okay, thank you. We have a motion that's been made and seconded any further discussion Then i'll do the roll call vote this time starting with hot de angeles Yes Darcy duMont Yes Lynn greece mersey. Yes, mandy joe hannacky. Yes Dorothy pamm. Yes, evan ross. Yes, george ryan Yes, kathy shane. Yes, sieve schreiber. Yes, andy steinberg. Yes, sarah schwarz. Yes Shallony ball mill. Yes, elissa brewer. Yes It's unanimous 13-0-0 and no absences. Thank you very much We're now going to move on to appointments and we have actually a number of them We're going to start with the town manager appointments and All of these appointments Um under the town manager have been approved by The tso and so i'm going to make sure that darcy you've unmuted and you're ready to Move forward with us. Let's start paul. However, we're the first appointment Uh, do you want me to speak to it? Please. Okay. Uh, so first, um, this is for the Director of finance director appointment that I have referred to tso and they considered it last tuesday Before we get there. I do want to say a few words about sonia aldridge I mean, I have a lot of words to say about sonia But I also want to extend a heartfelt debt of gratitude for all she's done for the town for the past three decades She's not retiring. She's sticking with us, which is really good She's been serving as finance directors Or co finance director since I've been here first as a shared role and then taking on the full responsibility of the finance director and um Let me just say even though she was listed as interim. She was the finance director for the town in many ways Her management management approach has been both authoritative and collaborative She knows her stuff and her staff and she knows her staff and she's brought both of those to the to the table and I think you've seen them when she's made presentations as a group with her whole team and I've never depended on her more than I have them in the past few weeks under these during these turbulent times She she and I just are very tight on where we are in the budget and I can rely on her. She knows her numbers She grew into this position out of necessity But recognized that the long-term future of the town laid with someone else that she had her eye on for quite some time as you can read in her Memo to you and and so totally supports the appointment of sean mangano to be the finance director for the town So I am subject to your approval or vote have Put forward sean mangano's name is the finance director for the town um For many of you, you know sean from his previous employment when he worked as the finance director for the Amherst regional public school system um He in december he decided to pursue an opportunity in the private sector and basically missed what he what we were doing in the public sector and Was interested when we were looking again For our finance director. He put his name into the the mix He knows the financial systems from the town from the ground up. He started as a as a budget analyst for the school department and and has grown through the position It's we really have a very crucial team a really important team right now. I think because We have a really with your your approval A really strong person on the town side who really knows the the finances of the school department and the regional school district And the school department has a really strong finance person on their side Doug slaughter who really knows the town side and all the things that we think about from a town's point of view This kind of cross fertilization is really powerful during this time when when cooperation and high level of communication is Of utmost importance as we work through this very trying times that that many of us have never had um, i'm really pleased to have sean as as an as the um Finance director for the town. I think he will you will be satisfied and pleased with his work We need the additional Brain power to work through many many alternatives that we're working on right now Sonya needs to support as She works through plus doing a lot of other things I can tell you that all the staff in the finance department are thrilled with this appointment. So I Ask you for your approval as well Darcy as chair of tso. Would you please tell us their vote? uh the vote uh at our april 21st meeting was um unanimous uh to recommend that the town council approve uh, sean mangano's appointment as finance director Okay Is there any other question? If not, i'm going to go ahead and make the motion A motion is to approve The town manager's appointment under charter section 2.11 a of sean mangano as finance director Is there a second second de angeles? Thank you pat. Um any further discussion Motion's been made in seconded This time I will start with Darcy duMont Yes Lynn greece murr is yes, mandy joe hannacky. Yes Dorothy pamm affirmative Evan ross Yes George ryan Yes Kathy shane yes Steve schreiber Steve schreiber Yes Thank you Andy steinberg Yes Sarah schwarz Yes Shalini balmoun Yes Alyssa brewer Yes And pat de angeles Yes It's unanimous 13 00 and no absences And let me just conclude this by saying I know we all have appreciated what sonia has been doing We look forward to our continued work with her And uh we're glad we could bring in the person she's been trying to recruit for a while now So uh paul thank you for that one um Next is going on the board of license commissions paul Thank you. Um, so we have one vacancy and the board of license commissioners because we had a member of the board of license commissioners who resigned and relocated And we have one reappointment and I presented these two appointments to the tso committee on tuesday as well The for the two-year term ending june 30th 2022 is not really two years, but that's what we're calling it Dylan maxfield of 308 north pleasant street Dylan is an information technology specialist who has previous experience working in the food and beverage industry in amherst So he understands what it's like to be in the in the in the trenches of our food and beverage industry And I think that was a perspective that I was eager to bring to the board of license commissioners We have a pretty broad array of talent on the board of license commissioners. I think he will complement that as well In addition, um, I'm asking for the reappointment of miss hallie hues Who is an attorney and has been sitting on the board of license commissioners Since it began and she's interested in being reappointed as well Okay, um, darcy, uh, would you like to discuss the tso vote and any other comments? Uh, no, I think all just uh gave the description that I would have given. Um, we voted unanimously to um, recommend both candidates Okay, would Darcy do you have the motions in front of you? I do Why don't you make the motion then I believe I do let's see. Um I move to um Approve now if we're doing this by roll call. I'm giving people a Choice right of what they're doing I see on the motion. I'm supposed to say I think you want to just say to move to approve and confirm Okay, move to approve and confirm the following on manager appointments under charter sections 2.11 b and 6.3 to the charter section 6.3 board of license commissioners For a two-year term term to expire on june 30th 2022 dillon maxfield And for a three-year term to expire on june 30th 2023 hally hues to the reappointment Is there a second? Kathy shane has seconded that any further discussion Okay, then this time I will start with greasmer and it's a yes Kanaki. Yes Dorothy Pam. Yes Evan Ross Yes George ryan Yes Kathy shane Yes Steve schreiber Yes indy steinberg Yes Sarah schwarz Yes Charlie balmoum Yes Alyssa brewer Yes Pat de angeles Yes And darsie demont Yes It's unanimous 13 00 no absences We're moving on to the conservation commission Paul, why don't you give a brief on that and then I will have Darcy call for the motion Okay, thank you. So again, we have a vacancy on the conservation commission Leroy gainer is a Massachusetts certified arborist who also attended the stock bridge school at the university of massachusetts He's been working in production as an arborist and has Not really experienced local government, but was eager to participate He's already shown an interest in the conservation commission's work and was A very excellent candidate for us to add so I recommend have this appointment before you for your review And Darcy your uh, tell us about TSO Right, this is a another vote that we took to uh unanimously recommend Mr. Gainer for the conservation commission Um, and so I moved to approve The following town manager appointment under charter section 2.11 b to the conservation commission For two-year term to expire on june 30th 2022 leroy gainer Is there a second? Second second Okay pat de angeles seconded um and Any further discussion? Then we will go on and this time I will begin with mandy joe hannity Yes garthie pam yes evan ross yes george ryan yes kathy shane yes steve schreiber yes indy steinberg yes sarah schwarz yes shallony ball millen yes elissa brewer yes pat de angeles yes garcy demont yes annlyn greesmer is yes votes 13-0-0 no absences Okay, we're going to move on to town council appointments and this is the zoning board of appeals and evan it's your turn Great, thank you. Um, so you have a report in your packet. It is uh, my apologies somewhat lengthy But hopefully provided you with all the information you need. I want to recognize two things first This has been a fairly long and winding process to get to this point. We had our first resignation from the zba on september 10th of 2019 That followed was followed by subsequent resignations in march and again in april To the point that by the time we actually held these interviews, uh, we had lost Four members of the zba Or am I saying that right four members of the zba in about seven months and it actually put their membership Below the number needed to actually hold a zba panel And so getting to this point took quite a bit of effort Um, we were very lucky in that when we and well actually, no, I'm going to take that back. Um, it wasn't luck We entered the interviews on april 16th with six Sorry seven potential seats on the zba and we had seven potential candidates for the zba Anyone who has looked at zba appointments in the past Can tell you that finding seven people who are willing to serve on the zba is a feat In fact, keith langsdale who had previously served on the zba before the meeting started when he saw all of the people on the Zoom screen said are all of these people here to interview for zba? And I said yes, and he said that's fantastic. We could never get anyone to serve on the zba And so it was really great. Um, but I do want to say that that wasn't a fluke. That was a result of Really focused Outreach and recruitment that was done by members of the council by members of the committee and even The town manager who was asked by the committee if he could reach out to people who he had interviewed who he would think Good, so I want to thank everyone who is involved because having seven people to appoint to the zba Is not an easy thing to do. I also want to thank the members of uh, Oka because it was a challenge getting here with lots of little twists and turns Um, and it was also a very lengthy meeting. Uh, we had our interviews on thursday april 16th They started at 7 30 the interviews concluded at 9 p.m. We started the deliberations shortly after and that concluded just shy of 11 p.m Um, I also want to thank athena and angela who were there Until 11 p.m. With us to listen about Who we think we should appoint to the zba? I'm sure there are literally millions of things they could have been and would rather have been doing during that time But I really appreciate their their support So we're bringing to you tonight Recommendations for seven appointments Two of the appointments are people who already serve on the zba as associate members One of whom we are recommending Be appointed as a regular member. Uh, she expressed interest in in being appointed to a regular membership The other we are recommending be reappointed to associate membership That individual indicated that she would prefer at this time to remain an associate member Um, I'm not going to go through why we decided what we did because that is all articulated In the report And so at this point I want to ask if there are any questions from the council regarding the recommendation And then I think I sent you some so they're not going up We had some visuals to help you all Uh, I see no hands at this time Okay, okay. All right So motion Yep, so if there are no questions, then I will make the motion I moved to appoint to the zoning board of appeals under charter section 2.9c Effective immediately as recommended by the outreach communications and appointments committee for terms expiring june 30th 2023 Dillon maxfield and hemi parks for a term expiring june 30th 2021 keith langsdale As associate members for terms expiring june 30th 2021 Sharon waldman reappointment peter barrick robert greeny and craig meadows I second We've the motion's been made in second. Is there any further discussion? Okay, then this time I will begin with dorthy pam Yes, yeah I'm sorry. Did I hear you? Yes, thank you. Evan ross. Yes George ryan. Yes Kathy shane yes Steve schreiber Yes indy steinberg yes Sarah schwarz yes shallony ball millen yes elissa brewer yes pat de angeles yes Darcy domont yes Lynn greesmer's yes mendy joe hannacky yes Thank you. It's 13-0-0 nobody absent So, uh, there was a one other A Vote to come before the council it is regarded to ecac are the environmental and climate action committee um I We had a resignation A while back before we kind of went into the most recent um spiral and um Evan ross decided that he no longer was able to serve on this committee So I took a poll of counselors and then I kind of dropped it because we were a little too busy with other things But I went back and repolled counselors to determine if there was interest and one counselor has come forward This isn't the vote tonight is to have is to recommend to the town manager That he appoint this person to ecac But the council Selects the person whose name they want to forward from the council Okay, so the vote tonight is to recommend the town manager appoint under charter section 3.3c counselor shara schwarz To the energy and climate action committee. Is there a second? Second de angeles The angeles. Thank you. And are there any questions? Okay, seeing none the vote's been made and seconded. We'll begin the vote with Evan ross Yes George ryan yes Kathy chain Yes Steve schreiber Steve schreiber Unmute steed. I know. I know the space bar is not working. Um, yes Please hey Andy steinberg Yes Sarah schwarz Yes Chaloney ball mill. Yes Um, elissa brewer Yes Kathy angeles Delighted to vote. Yes Darcy duMont Yes Lynn greesmer is yes Mandy panicky Yes And darthy pamm Yes Thank you. It's 13 00 no absences And That concludes the votes for the evening Just to put a fine point on it. Um, so we are now going to go on to our Midi reports and we start with community resources committee Mandy job Um, I don't really have much to report today. We'll have probably a larger report in the coming weeks. Um, we had a nice discussion with um The the chris breast drop and rob mora about zoning bylaws and process and all of that And we had a good discussion that many of you guys were at with Economic development and cove it with our chamber and bid directors. So, you know, you all were mostly at that meeting So you've heard what we've done. Um, we'll be following up on stuff as information comes in and we'll keep you updated Let me just mention for the full council At our meeting next week, which is may 4th. It's a regular meeting of the council The bid and the chamber are going to be coming back with a list of things that they would like the town to do as well as the council with regard to potential consideration of Awesome bylaw changes and that would be a referred then to crc Okay And also gol who puts bylaw changes. Okay So, thank you. I was it was an excellent meeting me joe. Thank you and I appreciate Uh The group for having put it together and for making the council the whole it was I believe there were 10 of us there So uh finance committee indy steinberg Andy you need to unmute Sorry about that. My uh mouse was not uh commanding my computer as well as it should um, so under tab seven b Of the material that you received. There was a there was a finance committee report from our meeting in april 27th And it followed immediately upon a budget coordinating group meeting and the two The material was provided on both probably need to be read together because the Um major presentation That we talked about and also received with the griefer Presentation and it was made to budget coordinating group was From the town manager and is a series of slides that is available to you that Emphasizes the depth of the Problem that we faced for fiscal year 21 for our budget and the In a plan on how we can approach it And basically what the plan is that you have already approved with a prior vote Is to Buy some time by having a one month budget which we're permitted to do and has been reported to you For the month of july and work on a fiscal year 21 budget Which would then encompass the entire fiscal year With the expectation that we Will be able to adopt that by the end of july If the Legislature is still not completing this budget or there are other things that are uncertain We would have the opportunity to come back and ask for The council to agree to an additional month by month budget for up to three months But that was not anticipated and is therefore A hopefully unnecessary thing to do It is going to be a difficult process and It will begin on May 11th with the presentation that we're going to receive from the town manager So that was reported in fairly extensive set of material from both budget coordinating group and the finance committee and the report And i'll just respond to questions if there are questions The only other thing that came up Because there was a little bit in there about regional school district But it is all attached together because there's really Three separate budgets that we're working on not to we're working on the one month town budget The fiscal year town budget and we need to work with three other towns in the regional school district on the regional school budget all of that Is in a very different timeline that would have been Had it not been for the covid-19 crisis but because of the unusual circumstances we're in in the financial uncertainty that goes with it we have Been placed in that position The other thing that we talked about And it is very briefly reported in three last paragraphs, but it is important as you recall when we appointed the three members of the Committee who were non voting resident members Back in july of 2019 There was a motion that was added Our piece that was added to the motion at the time that the council will evaluate the finance committee process and committee charge prior to Considering appointments to the vacancy that will occur on july 1 2020 to assess how The addition of non voting resident members has affected the committee and its work GOL committee as the gol chair will later report was very interested in having the finance committee Discuss this and report back at the earliest possible date, which was the next day Because we were planning to meet the next day In order to move forward with its process, which is really up to the gol chair to report on The committee did discuss it and I think that what we have found is that it has been a very successful enterprise We didn't know that's purpose of an evaluation So the finance committee voted five to zero to adopt the motion As follows from the perspective of the finance committee members We've evaluated and continue to see the value of having non voting residents on the finance committee So, um, I will leave the report with that respond to questions and otherwise Turn it back over to gol and then the council president to Finish out that process of a council Evaluation of the Proceedings, but that is the input from the finance committee Okay, um, are there any questions about the finance committee report? um And is there a desire on the behalf of the council to bring the evaluation to the full council for a vote with regard to resident non voting members of the finance committee If there is somebody needs to make that motion, otherwise We'll we'll go with the finance committee's recommendation We see no hands andy. So I'd say that's going to go forward To, um, gol as is, okay And now we're going to move on to um, gol george Thank you, lin gol met on april 22nd and at that meeting The committee re-elected yours truly as chair and pat de enchilis was chosen as vice chair Um, as andy mentioned in his report one of the things that is On our agenda at the moment on our radar screen is the task of Of of making a recommendation to the council Regarding the resident non voting members of finance and so at our next meeting That's going to take up at least a good portion of our meeting Agreeing on a process we're going to be following I think largely the ochre process that's sort of the template, but it'll be up to the committee to decide What that process actually will be and also the chair Also is committed to getting that process started at least the initial stage Of posting a vacancy notice and reaching out to the current Occupant of that position to see where they stand We'll be taking up at our next meeting also the issue of consent agenda and Seeing if that can be brought into the rules of procedure in a formal way And we're going to be looking at a couple of bylaws single use plastic bag band And a possible amendment to the noise ordinance And we'll continue our steady Review of bylaws for future consideration, which you so kindly sent to us many many weeks ago Other questions Thank you, george and congratulations to both you and pat Jcpc kathy shane anything that you want to say at this time Uh Basically lin as she announced later that um jcpc hasn't met in its meetings on hold, but i'm a member of both finance and the budget coordinating group and the issue of capital did come up And what based on what we're anticipating we're going to be hearing about um f y 21 budget in terms of revenue We're unlikely to be able to adhere to a strict percent policy of of allocating up to 10 percent of General revenues for capital and we're more likely to be building up What we have to spend including that service and what's essential to do next year So we haven't scheduled another meeting of jcpc until we hear more about The overall budget situation, but we will be in that climate dealing with a very different picture than we would have been four months ago Thanks kathy that's a very good summation And Okay anything further evan Yeah, so just to update the council um since this wasn't necessarily part of the written report which was focused on the zba appointments So as you'll know Oka has been operating as an ad hoc committee essentially charged with recommending appointments to zba and planning board With the appointments that the council approved tonight Uh, we are done with zba. And so um, hopefully everyone who just appointment we just appointed stays there And if they do so the council won't have any zba appointments until uh this time next year We are now moving on to planning board And so there are three members of the planning board whose terms are expiring on june 30 And so we are uh moving forward with those there has been a vacancy notice that has been published on the bolton board for about a week now And so you can expect that we will be holding interviews for planning board likely in late may The one other piece of this is uh, oka has over the past Nine months or so been talking about community activity forms and ways to make them more useful We have had some fairly Detailed and in-depth discussions about how to improve the situation with community activity forms Both how to make them more useful to us in appointments and also trying to find Some agreement some compromise in this debate over whether or not community activity forms should be personnel records or public records I believe we've gotten to that point. We took a vote on recommendation and an amendment to our current process this morning I will put that in a report That I will send out to the council as part of the meeting packet for our next meeting But you can expect to see in the near term some recommendations around community activity forms and later this month uh some movement on planning board appointments Okay, any questions? Then moving on to the town services and outreach committee darcy Yeah, um I uh don't have that much to add to what is in the report, but um We did at our second meeting we spent Um a fair amount of time on the town manager appointments and we're going to be getting Uh a number of additional appointments before the end of june because of the fact that of our board and committee Um memberships expire at the end of um june So we'll we'll be spending a fair amount of time on that in the next month or two and um We're looking at our process or what we're going to use as our process for review of items that come on our agenda So that's another piece that's coming up And we did we did take up our first substantive agenda item, which was um The wage theft bylaws that were put forward by three of our counselor colleagues and um, we put that forward as um an early item on our agenda because of the connection To covet 19 and the fact that you know, we um the potential that it might affect um low wage earners in town so um We will be hearing for the second time from the counselors and uh possibly some of the advocates again on the at our next meeting um And we'll be slowly getting more agenda items substantive agenda items up and going Thank you. Um I'm going to just briefly talk about the budget coordinating group and ask andy to chime in The budget coordinating group is a consensus group. It's a committee of the town manager Uh at the at its meeting this past week of paul Appointed myself as president of the council and andy steinberg as chair of finance To be co-chairs. This is a tradition that has happened in the past We're the chair of the select board and the chair of the finance committee Co-chaired it in the past We met there's two representatives from the library two representatives from the schools and four from the council um Our consensus is written in your report. It's in your packet And it basically has already been discussed to some extent when andy was talking about the budget deadlines But let me just add two other things um The town will try to follow the schedule it was as it was presented In the slide presentation with a full understanding that it may change We just have no idea at this point. Well, what could change? There were significant There would be significant consequences if we don't adopt an annual budget by july 31st 220 And the town will make significant significant efforts to provide for public comment and questions both through hearings and through forums And possibly some other ways about the budget during the budget process Other than that paul may speak more to it during his report We've already approved the minutes. Are there any questions from that? And you've already approved the minutes. So we'll go on to the town manager report paul Uh, thank you lin. I know it's getting late. So I have six things and not as long as you think they might be First I want to note that coming up on the council's agenda will be approval of the farmers market Our staff is working with uh, the manager of the farmers market to come up with a some options that they can Do to have proper social distancing And maintain the current location on spring street We've also explored other other locations with them if they choose to do that we could explore that as well and also Talk with them about having a virtual farmers market where people could participate Um by calling in I mentioned that earlier and then be able to pick up their their goods without With a no contact pickup On friday may 1st at 10 a.m. We will be talking about block rates. It's something that For water and sewer. It's something that we have been requested to do and required to do actually by the state department of environmental protection as part of our water and sewer process It's a little it's it's important to for the council to understand what this means um It's a little complicated for us because it will have Gigantic impacts on the university and the two colleges because they are our three largest water users But it is something that we we wanted to start to educate ourselves and you on By having tata and howard who is our consultant come in and talk about this And have sort of a free flowing sort of q and a with our consultant So everybody starts to get ramped up on what this means You know dpw understands it. Well, I understand it somewhat, but I think we all could use a little bit more information from our consultants Uh speaking of dpw. They are out preparing road Roads on pelham road and on southeast street getting ready to pave those and uh east hadley road the consultant the Contractor still is working on that multi-use path And speaking again of dpw. They had a sewer break on redgate lane, which they replaced and they also I don't know if they've quite finished yet, but they have a culvert under southeast street near near mechanic street, I think it is Where they are replacing it and they thought it would be better to get that done before they paved the road And so that's that that's our crew working on that A few more things Just I put a lot of information in about our senior center, so I encourage you to read what's in there Really amazing stuff being done by our director of senior services and connecting with seniors connecting with food contacting with entertainment connecting just on social up Um Upkeep with everybody so appreciate all the things that she is doing on that end And lastly the kendrick park playground continues to move forward in a virtual way And I put all the dates in the town manager report The next date is on may 6 public hearing before the planning board that will review the site plan That had already been reviewed by the design review board And again, this is a public hearing so anybody can weigh in on this We are moving this forward as we are on Some grant deadlines that have not been extended So we want to just keep it moving forward anyway, so That concludes my report Other questions. Yes, andy andy You need to mute unmute Sorry, I keep bringing the problems with the mouse. But anyway, um, well, can you hear me now? Yes? Okay, uh, three questions and they all relate to the lsse section of the Report that you provided in writing and as usual it was very It was a great report because it provided a lot of information but the three questions are as follows one is Regarding summer camps. She said Staff is also working with the american camping association in examining ways that summer camp might be delivered on a virtual platform now I was curious about that because You know, one of the major reasons to have summer camp is To allow working parents to have some way of having their kids engage in healthy and important activities During the time that Schools not in session They need to be working and they need to know that their kids have proper care So that was the one question is I just didn't understand how that could possibly Help our community the second is You mentioned the golf course And I was wondering if there's any plan for reopening the golf course And then the third and a similar question to the second is whether Um, any preparations are being made to get the swimming pools opens in this summer Great. So the um, we don't know what the summer is going to hold for us in terms of If we're going to be able to put on programs or not So the reason for the camping association is suppose we aren't able to bring children together We want we still want to be able able to offer programming for Children That they can participate in an LSE program from if they have to do that remotely through through The comfort of their home basically In terms of the golf course we are we have one employee out there who's maintaining the golf course So it's a it's a big investment for us. So we are maintaining the golf course My sense is that if we start to you know, they talk about dialing back to allow people To be engaged golf might be one of those things one of the first things that opens up for people because it's kind of a distance It's you usually have some distance between some people so We we're not going we're not shutting down the golf course for the entire summer We are maintaining it and if if we determine that it is okay to open up some recreational facilities That might be one of them And then the swimming pools there's a lot of conversation around the country about what to do about swimming pools And we have a little bit of time to work with it That a lot of the people things i've been reading on my manager's list serves are people in the south They open their swimming pools in may And they're really debating what's the best practice for that We'll be watching what happens with those, you know chlorinated water is not an issue typically but the The people being together is a is an issue So we haven't had a real active conversation within our core team about swimming pools But we've identified it as something that we need to talk about and whether we're going to open up the pools this summer or not I feel like we are going to need things for people to do And but you might see pools open without the locker rooms available in with with some minimum Reducing the occupancy limit for the pools. That's where i'm thinking we're going to wind up going at this point in time Darcy Yeah, um, I just Wanted to repeat how much I appreciate your report paul and how valuable I think it is and how meaty I think that if um I I actually sent it out to my constituents yesterday and I got so much back from Different questions about different things But it really was engaging to people and I wonder if there's any way that we can I use it even more or make it even more available to the public Sure, it's a you know, I appreciate that you shared out because I do put a fair amount of work into it as due to the department had to put work into it And having the questions come to us actually is very helpful because we know what people are wondering about And we can answer those and that helps me to pre-answer things like that going forward in the next town manager report So feeding those questions to us Even if you're not looking for an answer right away if there are things that you're hearing from your constituents It's helpful for me to know. Oh, there's a lot of people talking about pools or whatever it is and I can pre-answer some of those questions Um, yeah, I'll look into how we can spread it out. Yes get it out a little bit more. It's um, it is kind of dense so I'm not sure it's really in readable format, but um You know, I also use it just so you know with my department head So they get to see what everybody else is doing as well sort of a communication tool internally as well Melissa Thank you Just a couple of follow-ups one and and they're really just more As we continue to frame our responses to people's questions So I really appreciate what you just added there Paul about how it helps you answer people's questions And I know that these are things you're thinking about but they're things that I'm thinking about too Which is that I appreciate the concept of golf being theoretically social distancing and please For all that is wholly do not lecture me on social distancing at this point But let's understand that basket if basketball is not allowed, but golf is there's a socio economic Optics issue here that's going to come up. So let's just try and find ways to engage people around that conversation Rather than just saying oh, by the way, cherry hills open for golf It just doesn't sound right And so if we can find ways to help people understand that we understand And that we're doing the best we can under the circumstances I think that will continue to be really helpful to people as they're desperate to get outside And recreate in the ways that they've been wanting to and then the other Thing associated with that is with the Kendrick park playground, which you know is not a popular topic with me But is that I want us to be clear and I think this came up in a in an informal conversation as well That no matter what we do with zoom, it's not going to be the same As real life meetings plus emails. We have a great website that we're doing with Kendrick park. That's terrific And it's the very best we can do under the circumstances But given that the deadline hasn't been extended given that For what various reasons it makes sense to staff to move forward on that You're not hearing from as wide a range of people because just because a lot of people can stay home A lot of people are busy with kids and other responsibilities too And they're not going to be able to participate in those conversations So it's putting kind of an additional burden on staff to Figure out how to incorporate the comments that have been made so far And then move forward without having perhaps as wide a view of the community as they normally would And I think just informs us as we continue to do things we have to do to move forward Is how to continue to find ways to engage people that aren't the traditional ways We used to always complain that the same people would come to meetings Well, now we've really reduced the number of people who can participate We can say it's a public hearing all we want, but it's not the same And so in fact, we've actually reduced access and so as we continue to think of creative ways Perhaps as we reach out as counselors as the cpo's work on this not just on Kendrick park But on everything else including the budget moving forward so people feel like they still have an easy way to be engaged Darcy Okay Following up on that community engagement I already heard that people were happy with Darcy sending out the town manager's report So with Barbara Pearson's help, we got it out to my constituents today. I'm already getting back positive comments Um, nobody's complaining about the style. So I think it's pretty clear most of it So then I want to go to the other thing to do with community engagement I guess I heard a great find that 40 our consultants are going to be giving a report And just wondering how we're going to do a hearing to you know to get the kind of community involvement that we need for that um, so that's you know something that's very much on my mind, but now I'm going to go back to recreation And kendrick park after I discussed the park with my husband about some of the features that I thought were great He said yeah, the skateboarders will like it too And I have to tell you I am the mother the mother-in-law and the grandmother of three skateboarders So I know that some people don't like skateboarders, but it's a wonderful Social distancing sport You really do kind of keep your distance around the skateboarder And then I heard that the town meeting approved a skateboard park years ago And I thought gee where is that? And um, just wondered if any action had been taken on that because I do think that we do need a skateboard park Those are my four four points So just I don't know the 40 are scheduled so I can look that up and get or find out about that I don't know about the skateboard park. I mean some of your colleagues probably have a lot more information than I do on that So yeah, those are the two things I have thank kathy um, I have two different comments one is in The golf course came up, but the tennis courts are another thing to think about um, let us For those of us who play Maximum of four people on a court and there are only two courts in some places You're never going to get more than 10, but thinking about opening up some things earlier because you're More than six feet apart if you're playing with people so just on what pieces could open up and In conjunction with kids um The town has offered tennis lessons on some of these courts in the past and trying to think of how you could do them with smaller groups So you don't have large groups, but it will get kids out and to address what elissa said, you know, it's free So, you know, especially if you don't charge for simple lessons the second thing is on the Playground design on the how we get input and The staff gets all around this tight deadline I think it's going to be really important given our budget situation For the next few years to bring the budget in On or below the forecast budget so not be in the situation like we were with the north commons where we did the design but it was More than we had budgeted for and secondly to take into consideration maintenance costs you know that It's there's a proposed poured rubber mat That would be going under some of the play equipment. That's a a couple hundred thousand dollars potentially of an expenditure If we are not going to have the resources to maintain it We should be thinking of what are the most sustainable kinds of things we should put in the playground That that even if they have wear and tear they won't be worn out And I don't know how much the planning Board will be asking these questions, but internally just to be able to think of those pieces that What's this going to look like five years from now or 10 years from now? Would be important not just to talk about The current budget so that those kinds of opportunities for participation There weren't that that many people listening in on the design review board discussion There were only a few On the first planning board so how to get those kinds of input I think is really important because people understand that things deteriorate and We don't always fix them So letting them deteriorate, but still be great would be fine, you know in terms of what materials we use That's it. Thank you Okay, any other questions at this time All right, then I do have a couple comments First of all, we have talked about the meeting on May 11th I have sent out an email and need to know whether people can join us at 5 30 that night The second thing is We begin a discussion today between myself and Athena and Sean about Doing district meetings and I would like to make sure that I get back to all of you To talk about some guidelines for district meetings as well as office hours and Because I know that some of you are very anxious as am I and my co-district to person To have a district meeting, but we need to make sure we do it in a way that we don't overwhelm Staff and also staff requests and then finally We did start a practice of counselors attending the agenda setting and then somehow or another that got kind of mixed up Kathy was finally able to attend some agenda setting meeting The other day and I just want to say that I will Go back check dates Be back in touch with all of you because some of you may now want to do that And the some of you have already expressed interest and we'll try to get back to that schedule Um, unless there's questions we'll go on to future agenda items And let me just mention I did mention that the bid and chamber we hope will be with us next week um, and then on the 11th is when we really dive into Um the stage we've been setting from last week on and that's the budget So are there other agenda items that people would like to bring up? Garcy I do have my hand up My virtual hand is also up um, I I just had a comment from earlier and that is that I I feel A little bit of relief that the town Is starting starting having a lot more of the town meetings and of our regular meetings, um, and if you know that feels like We're entering into a little bit of a semi recovery era and um, I I'm wondering if you can I know I've asked you this question a couple of times then if you could talk about whether you think that we're going to go back to meeting every two weeks You know, I thought we were headed there, uh, and then we really decided we need We need a serious budget meeting. So we are meeting May 4th may 11th and may 18th, and then we have the uh, Memorial Day weekend so we will not be meeting then and uh, I will look The the trade-off is going to here's the issue right now The trade-off right now is we're going to be entering into budget season and in some ways That's not council business until it comes to the council and that will be as right now as we plan Mostly in June and July so it's possible that we can slack off some and The only concern I have looking at the clock right now. We've now been at this for Two and a half hours a little more and it does become fatiguing. So I hate to see us try to Jam in to one evening a four-hour council meeting. So that's it's the trade-off but I'm trying to get there and everybody is really cooperating and I totally appreciate that Keeping comments down also keeping the agenda Appropriately focused on the things we need to get done and the consent agenda that we've put in place Alyssa Oh, I think we can all guess what Alyssa's going to say I wonder if you could publish for us a list no matter how scribbly or You know specific Upcoming agenda items between now and the end of the year and I mean the calendar year Not the fiscal year just so we have a sense of what it is all the different things We are seeing that are feeling like we're going to be time pressure to do them others You know just depending on how all this shakes out What because obviously you talk about this with paul regularly and the rest of us don't have a clue and I appreciate Very much what you said about trying to incorporate us into meetings But just having some general sense of what are the things that are going to be in front of us over the next three months Six months eight months that would be really helpful And I think we were getting very close to that and then the world changed So we will get back to it. We do have and it's um partially in your report from the budget coordinating But there's even more of an extensive calendar that gets at some of the meetings that will be involved with The budget including hearings and public forums Which right now our choice is to do them online or not do them so We will be conducting them and frankly the planning board has been conducting hearings Um by Zoom and so forth so We'll just have to see what our skills are like for doing those as well Um other comments at this time Any other councilor comments in general? Okay, we have no other additional topics and no executive session And so I am adjourning the meeting at 9 11 p.m Thank you very much