[Frances Nwajei]: All right, I think I'm going to get started. We're at 533. Welcome, everyone. November's meeting, my golly. I can't believe we've gone this long. This is, I think, officially like my sixth month meeting. It's good to see all of you, and I do hope that you are doing well. I'm excited to see our new commissioners joining us today. So I'm Frances, Director of the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the City of Medford, and I sit on the commission on behalf of the administration. And handing it over to the chair, Shelley.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Hi, everybody. My name's Chali. I hate that this is the case tonight in particular, but my internet connection is kind of a mess. So if I cut out, know that I am working to rejoin all of you. Francis, do we just want to start with introductions and then move from there? Yeah, great. Yeah, so I'm Charlie I'm chair, I have held a couple roles in the city of Medford especially throughout lockdown my mom of two who are officially met for public school mustings or wherever we are at this point, product of Medford went to school here. I've done a lot of sort of race equity work. I just came off of running a maternal health equity nonprofit. I'm looking to go back to school myself and sort of dive into education, which is where I started in my undergraduate years. So that's me. Maybe I will just move left to right as far as I see my screen. So for me, I have Steve up next, if you would.
[Steve Schnapp]: Sure, thank you. Steve Schnapp. I am not a commissioner. I volunteer with the Human Rights Commission. I also am a member of Safe Medford. I'm retired. I live in Medford Square with my wife. And I've been engaged in a variety of issues in Medford. for about seven or eight years. And I'll be taking notes, except during the presentation that Safe Medford will make to this group.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Minyar, do you mind sharing your intro?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Sure. I think we've met pretty much everybody. In any case, quickly, I'm Munir Germanus. I'm a retired physicist. I've lived in Medford for a very long time. I have two daughters. Graduated from Medford High, and now I have four grandchildren that are keeping me way too busy. I've been with the Human Rights Commission for about, I think, five years, and glad to be here.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Munir. I have Rebecca Davidson up next. Thank you so much for your time and energy and being here. Welcome.
[Rebecca Davidson]: Hi everyone, Rebecca Davidson, I use she her pronouns, and I am excited to join the commission just as a point of clarification. I work for the Department of agriculture, so I had a few extra steps. to go through as far as clearance, but I think everything will be A-OK. It's just I was not able to be sworn in for this particular meeting, so I'm joining as a member of the public, but hope to be sworn in and officially join as a commissioner very, very soon. My background in Medford is that I've lived here for over 20 years and I really care deeply about the city. I've been involved in political activities in the city, just raising awareness of different issues facing Medford residents. I have two kids, one of which is in the school system and one who will be joining the school system relatively soon. And I'm just very much passionate about human rights in my day work. I work on environmental justice and have done racial and diversity trainings and just looking forward to raising awareness and educating the residents of Medford on the importance of human rights. So happy to be here as a member of the public today and hopefully in a more official capacity very soon.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you so much. We look forward to having you on as a full commissioner. Diane McDonald, I have you next.
[Amanda Centrella]: Thank you. It's so great to be here with all of you. I'm Diane McDonald. I'm a resident of West Medford. I've lived in my house for the last 10 years. We love it here. And then I rented in Medford for five years prior to that. I work at Harvard and I do alumni relations. I manage a small book publishing program that goes back to the mid 1800s, I use stories to build community and and also for social change so in recent years. I've done a lot with storytelling and diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. And I put together an anti-racism program training for our alumni leaders from across the world. So just really honored to be able to share some of what I do for Harvard with the city. And we just really love living in Medford and being part of the community.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Dan. We're so lucky to have you both. Chen Yanko, if you would.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Hello, everyone. I'm glad to be here this evening. I'm here this evening as a representative of Safe Medford. I have lived in West Medford for over 30 years.
[Frances Nwajei]: I'm sorry, Jennifer, the volume is not coming through.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Okay, let me approach my computer and speak up. I have lived in West Medford for over 30 years. I'm semi-retired. I have worked as a linguist in higher education for many years, and I'm still doing some research in linguistics, African languages. I have devoted most of the last more than 20 years to doing anti-racism work and work dismantling white supremacy. And I am pleased to be here this evening and to be part of Safe Medford and to bring our recommendations to you. So thank you for having us.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Jen. Kelly Cunha, you are on my screen next. Thank you.
[Kelly Cunha]: Hi, my name is Kelly. I am I've been on the commission since right before the pandemic hit and I am a licensed clinical independent social worker. I'm a social worker. I work in. Winchester Public Schools. Sorry, I'm getting my charger as we speak because my computer is about to die. I have a daughter in the Medford Public Schools. She just started at the Roberts, so I'm a Medford mom. I am interested and involved in social justice work in both my professional and personal life and my faith life. a big part of what I try to spend my time on when I can in this season of life with young children. And I'm really, really excited about the new commissioners and about Safe Medford being here. And I'm really hoping that we can kind of start really getting stuff done. And I'm excited. And thanks for everybody for being here. And this is Sienna here and she wants to say hi.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Hi, Sienna. Thank you, Kelly. Chief Buckley, I have you up next.
[Jack Buckley]: Hey, everybody. Jack Buckley, chief of police. I've been with the police department for 25 years now and chief for four years. Many of you probably haven't recognized me today because I'm growing this beard for charity. I have to tell you, spending, I didn't grow facial hair when I was younger and I'm prohibited from growing facial hair as a police officer for some 35 plus years. I've never had facial hair and it's driving me crazy. I have no idea how you do it, Steve and Barry, but it is, I just, I'll keep plugging along, but if you see me, you may recognize the difference. I'll see it, but welcome everyone.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Chief. Rob, if you would. Do we have Rob with us? Maybe we'll circle back. Judy, do you mind sharing? Maybe we can wait for Rob in the interim.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: Hi, everybody. Judy Kaplan, proud West Medford resident for 33 years. I have been on the longest serving commissioner, I believe, and I'm a member of Safe Medford and I was a member, I am a member of the committee that's going to be presenting tonight.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Judy. Rob, are you with us?
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Yep, I sure am. There we go. Hi. No worries. Not able to see me at the moment, but you will be shortly. My name is Rob Klein, everybody. Welcome to the new commissioners. So happy to have you here. I've been on the commission now for about two and a half years, actually. I've been living in Medford since 2014. I've spent my time before that was out of the state. So 100% of my time in Massachusetts has been in Medford. And it's a lovely community. And I really want to make sure to continue to improve it. I've got a little bit of background in restorative justice, prison abolition and prison reform. And I know that with the addition of the new commissioners, we're in a great place to continue to build the momentum that we've stored up over the last couple of years and really excited to be moving forward with all of that.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Bob. Last but never least, Barry, if you wouldn't mind sharing.
[Barry Ingber]: Thank you, Shelly. Hey, Jack, welcome to the league of the bearded. I'm all lost. Well, if you let it. So I'm Barry Ingber. I live in North Medford. I'm not a member of the HRC. I'm here as a visitor and as a member of SAFE Medford and a member of the committee that's worked on the proposal. I'm also a member of several other community groups. And it's good to see you all. And good to see new members of the commission too.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, Barry. So Francis, my connection is in a place where I haven't even been able to open the agenda. Do we want to approve minutes before we dive into our presentation maybe? Yeah. So we're folks able to review our October minutes and changes. Sounds good. Is someone able to make a motion to approve?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Move to approve.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you. Seconded. All in favor?
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Aye.
[Unidentified]: Perfect. Thank you.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Great. Are we sort of handing the floor over to Saif Medford or?
[Frances Nwajei]: Before that, I just want to make sure that everybody got the update. I received the CCOPS letter and the support of V.S. on 4 from the Human Rights Commissioners. CCOPS letter came through Munir via email. Support of V.S. on 4 came through Shelly. Both letters were given to Mayor Brianna Lunger-Kern. to be forwarded to City Council. And also just to note that you do have the ability to reach out to City Council directly as their email addresses are listed on the website. And I think you did so, Muneer. I think you said you sent your letter that way as well.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: Francis, could you repeat what those two communications were?
[Frances Nwajei]: The communications were what you had requested to have a letter supporting the CPAPs. And then the other one was for the yes on for vote. Thank you. Okay. All right, now handing over to new business, a presentation from SafeMethod regarding recommendations that they have for the Human Rights Commission. So, Jennifer and Steve. Judy, can you take notes as the secretary while Steve is presenting, please? Because he won't be able to take notes.
[Adam Hurtubise]: Thank you, Judy.
[Steve Schnapp]: either uh uh francis uh you need to allow me to share the screen or uh you can put up the document i i sent the slides you should be all set now okay to share okay i'll give that a shot okay let's see if that does it
[Frances Nwajei]: It should be green for you, there you go.
[Steve Schnapp]: Okay. So can folks see that? That's the first thing. Yep, yep. Okay, so I'm gonna do a brief introduction and then Jennifer will take over and then I'll wrap up. We were hoping that folks would have had a chance to read the lengthy document upon which these slides are based. And it would be great if you've got it with you. And so you can follow along in more depth. If not, I'm sure there'll be lots of opportunities in the future to really discuss these in greater detail. So I just want to say, give you a who, a why, a how, a what for this project. This committee that's presenting this is the committee of Safe Medford. I realize I have the wrong slide up here. So it should say presented by Safe Medford. So this is a committee that was established sort of at the request of the Human Rights Commission after a proposal came from Safe Medford to the Human Rights Commission in support of looking and examining where the commission has been at and how it can move forward in a much more organized way to address human rights issues in Medford. There were certain challenges that the commission had faced for years, exacerbated by the pandemic. But these are longstanding issues that related to participation. There were many, many times when the commission was unable to even get a vote because a quorum was lacking. And there were projects that the commission wanted to do, but lacked the resources, the people power for it. And then there was the overlay of, you know, a certain rules governing how public entities operate. When the Human Rights Commission wanted to turn its attention to these issues and establish a committee, it created a problem with the open meeting requirements. So that's when Safe MedPrint offered to oversee a process. and I'll tell you, and establish this committee. It began in the spring to meet, and it began with three folks who are current commissioners, three folks who are not, and members of Safe Medford, and the six of us, at least four or five, have met on a regular basis since the spring, since April. The first step that we took was to do an assessment by conducting interviews of both current and past commissioners and other stakeholders who were familiar with the commission or concerned about human rights. I think there were over 20 in-depth interviews. And the second step was to examine through interviews and looking at documents of other human rights commissions in towns around Massachusetts. And so this was a body of material that the committee looked at to address the challenges that the HRC here faces. And we pretty much came up with a document which you should have received a few days ago. I think it's about five or six pages that was two parts. The first part looks at priority roles that we recommend for the Human Rights Commission to take on. I think they'll look quite familiar. And then there are a set of operational recommendations to really put these priorities into a program. So that's basically what this document is. And I'll just finish this brief introduction by saying that this is an exciting time, I think, for the Human Rights Commission. It's exciting because there are new commissioners with energy and expertise and a passion for the issues. And it's also an auspicious time because of what's going on in Medford, in Massachusetts, and in our nation. And perhaps beyond that, the challenges that many folks are facing with regard to a variety of human rights issues, as well as an intensification of polarization in the country. This is challenging, exciting. Oh, the last thing I'll mention is that we're also very much encouraged by the rise of activism in the city, including among some elected officials, to really address these issues. And the Human Rights Commission is in a critical position to really help Medford move forward. And it's in that spirit that we offer these recommendations and we hope to continue supporting what the Human Rights Commission will do. And we know this is just the beginning. This is just an introduction to these things, and you probably will deliberate on these in the future. It's up to you to decide how to do that. So I'm gonna turn this over to Jennifer now, and she will go through the roles and the operational recommendations with you, and then I'll come back.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Hey everyone. It's really exciting to be here. I want to echo what Steve was saying. It's a really exciting moment. I think a real possible moment of a lot of possibilities for the commission as we sort of come out of COVID and all the lockdowns and really have a sort of renewed energy with new commissioners. And so we're hoping that this set of recommendations that we have prepared will be useful to the commissioners as you go forward and figure out exactly what your priorities are and how you can move forward. So we want to begin by talking about the roles. And I'm assuming, hopefully correctly, that you've all had a chance to look at the document. First, I'm just going to tell you what the four roles are, and then we'll look at each of them. So we identified, and this, as Steve mentioned, this is a result of talking in depth with former and current commissioners and others who are stakeholders in the commission, and then talking with and looking at what other human rights commissions around the state are doing. So we identified four roles. The first, and can you put up the slides?
[Frances Nwajei]: I'm sorry, you're showing something else.
[Steve Schnapp]: Yes, I don't, my apologies, I don't know what happened, it just disappeared, and I'll try and find it, so I'll do my best here.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Okay, meanwhile, I'm just gonna name the four, and then hopefully we'll be able to go through each of the four.
[Frances Nwajei]: So the thing- Steve, can you stop sharing, please?
[Jennifer Yanko]: Yes.
[Frances Nwajei]: This can go down, thank you.
[Jennifer Yanko]: So what I'm going to do while we wait to get the slides is to just name the four. So we came up with four rules, one being community education- Jennifer, can you hold on, please, so that I can pull the slides up?
[Frances Nwajei]: Steve had emailed them to me.
[Jennifer Yanko]: That's okay, you can pull them up while I'm just naming these four.
[Frances Nwajei]: Can you hold on, please, so that I can pull the slides up?
[Unidentified]: We have a new participant.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: Maybe he can name himself before and identify himself before we go back to the slideshow.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, I'm showing slide one, it should say community education slash engagement, if everybody can see that. All right, great.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Judy just suggested that the person who has just joined us get to introduce themselves.
[Frances Nwajei]: Kelly, can you take over the viewing? Because I don't have the ability to see who's joined us if I'm doing the screen share. Thank you. Sure.
[Kelly Cunha]: Are they now gone? Yes, because I don't see them anymore. I think we lost them. Yeah, I think they left.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Okay, so there are four. I'll go ahead. There are four roles. I'm going to go through each of them. The first is community engagement. So we're feeling like a community and educational, education and engagement. So we're feeling that a major role of any human rights commission is to educate the community about human rights and to engage people in the defending of human rights. So this would be, you know, organizing forums to talk about human rights. What are human rights? Why should we be concerned about them? To really bring the public in. And to talk, to possibly do some trainings and educational events on specific human rights issues that come up. Doing educational events for the larger Medford population residents to help them understand the concepts and laws and policies, focusing on particular items, to organize community conversations on current or potentially divisive controversies regarding human rights, to bring the community together to really examine these issues, and to research, to devote, energy to research and publication education. And I think this is a really important one on the history of human rights violations in our community and to engage the community in determining how best to acknowledge these past violations and how to repair them. So that's the first, the first role that we saw as an important one for human rights commission, community education and engagement. The second role,
[Unidentified]: If you could move to the next slide. Great, okay.
[Jennifer Yanko]: The second role that we found to be very important is to assist and advise the city administration and the public school system on matters pertaining to human rights of city residents. So to serve as an advisor to the city on human rights issues. And this would include discussing human rights problem areas with the city administration and making recommendations, arranging for HRC members to participate in meetings of other city bodies and to bring a human rights lens to those other bodies meetings. Requesting information on an ad hoc basis from the mayor and department head, city council and superintendent of schools. Requesting periodic reports from the Department of Human Resources regarding data on human rights complaints in the city. requesting periodic reports from the city detailing employment diversity and employees self-reported race, ethnicity, disability status, gender identity, et cetera. And requesting that the city administration or the city council conduct annual reviews with tables and maps, providing some demographic information, population by age, city neighborhoods by median age, population by race and ethnicity, et cetera. providing a profile of public school students, voting wards and precincts, and you'll see this when you look at the details. So this one is serving, again, as an advisor to the city on human rights issues. The third role that we thought was important for a human rights commission is to advocate, is to do policy advocacy, that is to advocate for laws, policies and practices that support human rights and improve social equity in our city. So this should address not only traditional forms of discrimination, but also cultural and systemic issues that put segments of our community at a disadvantage and even at risk. So we feel that the HRC should be empowered to examine with a human rights lens and weigh in on the full range of policies in the city. We have a various list of suggestions under that. I'm just, again, assuming that you have the document. And the fourth role that we identify for the Human Rights Commission that we recommend as a key one, it has to do with research and recording because we believe that having reliable and up-to-date data on human rights issues is essential to fulfilling the mission of the commission. The HRC should be able to gather information from city, state, and other sources and compile, analyze, synthesize, and disseminate the information to the community. Important information would include data on human rights complaints filed with the city and their disposition, educational data such as disciplinary, school discipline data, dropout rates, data on police stops, data on affordable housing, data on city hiring. So these are the four roles that we feel, as a result of our intensive research, are key roles for the Human Rights Commission. And so looking at these four, we wonder if you could just take a minute and note down anything that you find surprising in these recommendations or that stood out for you. So I'll give you, you know, say three minutes to just think about this, take notes, and then we'll have a few minutes to just look at these. Again, we're just, this is just the tip of the iceberg. We're just introducing this, and we wanna get a chance to you know, just give you a flavor. We're not going to the operational recommendations yet. That's a separate part.
[Unidentified]: If you could go back up. Yeah, thank you. So take a few minutes and just note any of your reactions or thoughts about these four roles. I do want us to share our thoughts I did read the document.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Prior to the meeting and I have some some thoughts or do we want to we're not going to be able to have time to do it in detail, but we do want to hear from people just get an idea of some of the some of your thoughts about it and then we're going to go on to talk about the operational recommendations that we have. I got some, but we want to wait and give people a chance sure yeah. So we'll be back.
[Unidentified]: in a few minutes, three minutes say, 6.09. Bye. Welcome, Jacqueline. I'll give you a chance to introduce yourself when we're done with this portion, okay? Sure, sounds good. Thank you. All right.
[Jennifer Yanko]: That's our three minutes. So we'll just, I mean, we're not gonna have time to hear from everyone, because this is, we're just trying to give you a taste of what this document is and get some discussion going. But we know that Kelly has read it. Thank you, Kelly. Glad that you were able to do that. So let's take, I don't want to go over our time, because we still want to deal with the operational recommendations. But are we OK with five minutes, Frances, Kelly, or Chelly?
[Unidentified]: Yes, go ahead. Sure. OK. All right.
[Jennifer Yanko]: So we just invite people to share their thoughts, what stood out for them, what they found surprising, whatever.
[Kelly Cunha]: I'll just go first, because I already put it out there. Um, I, I actually really, really loved what I loved the four areas. And I liked that it was for it felt like, sorry, my daughter's screaming at the door. Wait, but you've, I apologize. I'm sorry. Um, Five is hard. Five-year-olds have a lot of big families. Sorry. So I liked that there was four. I feel like four feels manageable. I feel like knowing the new commissioners from just having read their stuff, as well as the commissioners that have been on here, I feel like there's a good variation in skill sets that we could utilize over these four categories. So I feel like And also, if we were missing things I feel like it's a good way to know like hey we really need someone who has a strength and X, Y, Z area that we're like lacking or whatever I just really I liked it I like. I felt like this makes sense to me, I feel like it's manageable and also can have an impact, basically, so I appreciate all the hard work you guys did and that's just my initial take on it.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Great, thank you so much, Kelly, really appreciate that. And I think that your point about this helping identify what skills are needed as you go forward is a really good one. Are there others that can chime in?
[Frances Nwajei]: Jen, I see that somebody had a raised hand symbol, I think.
[Jennifer Yanko]: OK, I can't see everyone.
[Rebecca Davidson]: Hi, this is Rebecca.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Okay, great. Thanks, Rebecca.
[Rebecca Davidson]: So I just wanted to echo what Kelly was saying about the four major areas. I also agree that when I was reading the general scope of those areas, they seem to fit well within what the Human Rights Commission would be dealing with. There were a few items that did stand out to me as far as more concerns that I had. Although I really, again, do appreciate all the thought that went into this. And I think having a roadmap will be very helpful to the commission. But some of them I was thinking may fall more within HR for the city, for example, under 1B, the educational events for city employees. I just didn't know if having that role as far as training city employees would really fall within the scope. But again, as a new, not yet sworn in, but hope to be new member of the commission, that was something that stood out to me. The other thing had to do with the reporting recommendations and collecting data reports, doing that Partly in my day-to-day work, it's a lot of time and it's something that you wanna make sure that you're doing consistently and consistently well in order for it to be relevant and applicable. And that was just something that I thought we would want to evaluate as a commission to make sure that we have the capacity to be regularly digesting and analyzing reports that are coming from the city. Although that data that was presented in this, I think is very relevant. to the Human Rights Commission.
[Unidentified]: Great, great. Thank you so much, Rebecca. I don't see other hands, but that doesn't mean they're not there.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I just have a... I think Diana's waiting to share. Oh, okay.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Actually, Shelley, if you just call on people, that'll be better, because I think you can see them and I can't.
[Amanda Centrella]: Sure. Diane, why don't you go for it? Sure. So I love all of the work that has gone into this and the level of organization and detail. And I can already feel that we've got some wins already in terms of community education and engagement. So I think I would love to see us all sort of come up with what our one-year plan is and then our two-year and three-year plan. And then like Rebecca, I think a little bit of a red flag for me came up when I read, you know, when I skimmed the research and reporting because even at Harvard, we have a lot of our alumni say they want all of this research and reporting and it can be a heavy lift. So I would say we need to just be really crystal clear on what that will be and what the role is and who would do it because it can be pretty heavy.
[Unidentified]: Good point. Munir, I do see that you have a hand.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I just want to briefly say that, I mean, this is simply an introduction. I'm sure that in the next coming meetings, we will have more chance to discuss whatever things we like, things we think are important. So Again, so just keep this in mind. Hopefully we'll have a lot more discussions in the coming meetings. Thanks.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Thank you, Munir. I think that's a good segue into the next section. So our recommendations come in two parts. Roles that we are recommending as appropriate and necessary to the Human Rights Commission. And then we have a number of operational recommendations, because we realized that in order to fulfill those roles, there's a certain operational capacity that needs to be met. So we here have 12. Unfortunately, you can't see them all at once in this format. But again, to get you looking at them, we wanted to just ask you to take a few minutes I'll give you a little bit longer this time, in four minutes, say, to just read through these. I realize some people have already read through them, but to read through them again, and then we'll just take a few comments. If you just note down which one of these really speaks to you as a key item, or as a problematic item, whatever, something that stands out for you, among these. And again, we have made these recommendations because we realized that in order for the commission to fulfill the roles that we have recommended, there's certain capacity issues that have to be addressed. And so we felt that these operational recommendations would, if they were able to be operationalized, as it were, would put the commission in a good position to actually fulfill those roles effectively. So I don't know if there's a way that we can see all of these on the screen. Right now, I only see nine and a half.
[Unidentified]: There are 12.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Actually, if you scroll it up slightly so that we don't see operational recommendations, the title, we might be able to get them all.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: No, you only get 11. Okay. Well, let us change the view.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Yeah, is there a way to see the whole screen? Yeah. I might be able to do that.
[Steve Schnapp]: I just want to add that several of these recommendations are based on comments that we heard from the stakeholders, including current and past commissioners.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Um, if I made the, um, if you can make me a cohost, I can share my screen and I think I can get all of them.
[Unidentified]: Okay. Let me try it here.
[Frances Nwajei]: Well, Jennifer is pulling up the document. I know this project was started before I was onboarded. Can you just let me know who exactly were the stakeholders? I've heard past commissioners. Are we talking about past commissioners over a decade? Are we talking about X number of people? When we say stakeholders, who are we referring to?
[Steve Schnapp]: Good question. I don't have a list in front of me. I think there might have been one or two who had served as much as 10 years ago, like Judy. Most were more recent, as well as I think we talked with just about all the current commissioners, not the new ones, of course, as well as others in the city. I can try and do some research and come up with names, if you like, and make sure you get that. Make sure all the commissioners can see who was interviewed and which other human rights commissions we talked with as well.
[Frances Nwajei]: Yeah, thank you, Steve. I'm not so concerned about the names. I'm just concerned about the equity factor. I'm looking at this, and this to me is not representative of the Medford community that I know of the last six months, the language and style. So I'm trying to figure out where was the broad reach? Do we need to go to some targeted and specific populations? you know, did we just have a certain social economic group without even recognizing that that was what was happening? Does that make sense?
[Jennifer Yanko]: Among the commissioners?
[Frances Nwajei]: I'm not talking about the commissioners. We're the Human Rights Commission for the city of Medford. So when you say that, you know, you interviewed a variety of stakeholders, I'm trying to figure out who those stakeholders were beyond the commissioners. were they members of the community? And if so, how diverse, how broad base was that community group?
[Jennifer Yanko]: It was mainly, it was primarily people who had served on the commission or who had been engaged with the commission. So if you're asking, were we talking with people in particular communities that have historically or consistently had their human rights violated. No, we did not.
[Frances Nwajei]: Can I add something? This was created from a lens of speaking with people who have previously served on a Human Rights Commission group. It is not created with input from a community lens of what community people either think or would like to see. Okay.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: Can I speak to that? We interviewed a pretty broad range of people who have had some involvement with or interest in, or as we said, membership on the commission, past chairs of the commission, uh, activists in the community who have an interest in human rights. Um, so it, it was pretty broad. Was it, um, you know, everyday people from South Medford? No. Or, you know, or any other part of the community? No. but it was people who we identified as having an interest in the issue of human rights and or some past involvement with the commission. I think we interviewed some city Councilors, is that right? Anybody remember? I don't think so.
[Steve Schnapp]: I have a bad memory, but I'll make sure, as I said before, you'll get a list of who was interviewed and which Human Rights Commission. I just looked at the list.
[Barry Ingber]: There were no city councilors interviewed. No. I'll just chime in that exactly what Judy just said. We actually talked about whether we should do outreach to the community, and we thought that that would be a very worthwhile effort, but that it wasn't, that it was a worthwhile effort that maybe the HRC should at some point take. That we were looking for, we were not looking to do outreach to folks who didn't, who might not even know what, that the HRC existed or what it did or anything about its history. We were looking to talk to people who would have knowledge about the HRC's history and functions, because we were trying to get an assessment from those folks about how it was working and how it might work better. So, yeah, I mean, and I will grant personally, Frances, that that is a shortcoming, but it's, you know, It was just a different type of research than the type of research we were doing. The group of people that we interviewed was ethnically fairly representative of the city for what that's worth, but it was not socioeconomically reflective of the city.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you, Barry. I ask because when I look at this, I look at this from multiple lenses. And from reading the document, it read more as an established group document versus a community document. And I have to remember, right, this is HRC for the community. So I was trying to understand where these recommendations were coming from. Because a lot of times I'm not speaking about this group in particular. But committees and things like that get formed, and then the community starts driving what it thinks needs to be done, but the community committee is really working on behalf of the community, but the community has not added its voice. You know, so I'm sure that there is a way that we can. revamp, recircle using community liaisons that speak the languages that are immersed in the culture to add and get more fruitful communication and fruitful expectation so that we can truly say that we are serving as broad a base of the community as possible. I think I see.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Oh, sorry, Jennifer, go ahead and respond briefly to what you just said, Francis, I think that the first item among roles. It really addresses that and it would be pretty much up to the Commission to do that to really engage the population of Medford. it's diverse populations in like the discussion, what are human rights? Why are they important? Why should we care? Have they been violated? What does it mean to violate human rights? What can the city, what can a human rights commission do to protect human rights and defend them so that the larger community and communities become involved in this question? Because I think for a lot of people, it's like human rights, I don't know what that is. I mean, there is a Declaration of Human Rights. I mean, to be able to talk about those things and find out what different communities feel about them and how they feel that a commission might be effective in addressing them. It seems that that's a place, that first role is a place where some of that could happen.
[Kelly Cunha]: What I wanted to say, thank you, Francis, for what you said and what you brought up, and I think it's definitely an important discussion topic. I'm looking at this as very realistic, having been on here for two years now, and I know people have been on longer and they may have different history. We don't have a budget. Since I've been on, no one has ever trained me to handle discrimination complaints. So it always felt really weird. Like when we would ever talk about that being a part of this commission, I was like, well, where's the training for that? Like, you know, if we're going to be doing this, this is people's lives. This is important. I want to make sure that we're the right place for it. And, you know, I mean, maybe my training as a social worker could come in handy for that, but like in this capacity, I think, you know, so basically what I'm trying to say is I think we have to build up. who we are and make ourselves more known and do things that are doable. And I'm not trying to say we should set the bar low by any means, but like we should, because the bar has been really low and we've barely been meeting it, if we're being honest. And I think we have some some fresh blood and I think that's going to be helpful and I'm really excited about that and I just feel like we have to earn the communities trust we have to earn the communities like they need to know who we are what we stand for and I feel like this. This this these the starting point for me at least looked looked like a place to start and I think there's lots of nuance that we could talk about but I just think we also have to really be realistic about what we're capable of doing as volunteers and as people with busy lives and and again it's all important work. And also just looking at what's already being done in the community and what, where there's pockets that we can fit into because there is a lot of great advocacy and work being done by community organizations and groups that we can partner with, we can, you know, so that it's not all falling on us. I just, I just feel like I want to reset and remind everyone like we got to be realistic too because at the end of the day, things often fall to certain people that are willing to do a lot of work outside of these meetings, and then there are people that can't or won't, and we have to be realistic about that. Thank you.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Those are some of the things that we hope to have addressed in the operational recommendations. A budget, having more commissioners, having certain job descriptions for commissioners that include what you actually need to do in addition to coming to meetings. So these operational recommendations are meant to make it possible to do more, to do more effectively what the commission takes on by having partially more resources. But we also, as you've noticed, the first recommendation is to drop the role of hearing individual discrimination complaints simply because the capacity is not there. There's no legal or legal capacity. No, as you just mentioned, like training in mediation and so on. Anyway, I'm sorry, Munir, you have your hand up.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay, I mean, I think Frances's point is quite important. but I'll also mention that we have had trouble recruiting people from various sections of the community. In the past, we've had one or two from people who served on the commission, African Americans, Arab Americans, Brazilian Americans, and East Asian Americans. But as you can see, even from the current commissioners, we are having, obviously, trouble communicating and recruiting people from those various communities to serve on that commission. So that will be a challenge that we will have to consider in the future.
[Unidentified]: Thanks.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thanks, um, I just want to a couple points resonated with me, and I appreciate number 11 I just wanted to lift that discussion. I think a lot of these, maybe all of the recommendations could eventually come to fruition or become best practice, but I wonder if there's not capacity for that unless folks sort of understand that there is some version of monetary compensation involved. I think this is, a valiant sort of, we need to be having this conversation, we need to operationalize, we need to grow and build and earn trust. But I don't know, and especially if we're talking about voices who are marginalized in whatever other ways, I'm not sure if we can feel comfortable equitably to sort of Um, I don't know. I don't know if we're going to be able to. Perform outreach that asks for their time and energy. If we're sort of not able to show up with money. Um, especially given that we also, we already have a couple of roles in this conversation that are salaried to be here. And then a lot of roles that aren't. Um, so I think just the design of the space feels inequitable to begin with. Um, Yeah, I don't know. Um, you know, you follow your dollars to understand what you believe in. What's important is maybe one of the beginning places, but thank you for the work.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Thank you, Shelley. I mean, we did talk about that, like who can be a commission, who is able to be a commission. I mean, if you need childcare, not everyone has that possibility. So if you, you would do it, but you have need to have childcare and that's a big expense. So, um, So it's the idea of a stipend or a reimbursement or both to make it equitable. Because right now, it's people who can afford to do it. Then you lose all the voices of those who can't afford to do it, many of which are the ones that are most likely to have problems in terms of their human rights being violated. Diane?
[Amanda Centrella]: Thank you. So as a very new member of this commission, I mean, I would share what really is striking to me of these recommendations is, you know, going to number 12, revisiting and updating the commission's mission statement so that we're all on the same page at the onset of the work that we're coming forward to do together. And then, you know, next I would love to have this work on, you know, our role and responsibilities together so that it's just crystal clear. So we can, you know, once we're just, you know, as a new member, once I'm really crystal clear on what, what is expected of me, because I'm absolutely willing to do the work, um, number 10, you know, a detailed description of our responsibilities and, and then the time commitment is, you know, it's eight hours a month, 10 hours a month. And I think when we get clear on our mission and our role and responsibilities, then that'll just help us move into creating what our annual plan is, you know, like what are our goals for the year ahead, and then let's distill them into these tactical pieces. And then once we know what all of these are, then we'll be able to make the case for a budget, right? And then go to the city and HR to say, all right, well, these are our needs. We need to become a group of 15 that will require this. And because we wanna accomplish X, Y, Z to recruit new voices. you know, these are the funds that we'll need because if we're going to be representative, we're going to need people of all ages. And that includes, you know, young parents or even, you know, high school students bringing the youth voice and some ambassadorship. So I would just love to see us just for my own selfish benefit, you know, even just like start at 12 and then move to our roles and responsibilities and then and then create our action plan for the year and get tactical.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Exciting.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you so much for that. That is actually a great place to pause the conversation for now and to think on it. As you know, the meeting prior to this, We had been scurrying around trying to find the previous brochures. And I thankfully have found them. They were emailed to me. Unfortunately, it's the PDF version that's not editable. So I will ensure that everybody gets a copy by email so that you can look at what was created. I don't know when. You can review, make edits. Let those edits resonate with you and come ready to share because we have talked about creating a mission statement that is more in tune and in line with who the commission is today and how the commission sees itself. And at least we have a foundation in which to work from. Thank you very much, Jennifer.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: May I just make two comments?
[Jennifer Yanko]: Actually, I think Steve has a few comments before we close out.
[Kelly Cunha]: Chief Buckley had his hand up. And Rob also had his hand up, too. I just want to make sure, like, everyone sees. I don't see any hands up.
[Frances Nwajei]: The only hand raised message I got was for Diane.
[Jennifer Yanko]: Well, Rob and Chief Buckley had their hands up also.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: Oh, the other thing I was going to say, may I just say two more things. One is that the current mission statement is incorporated into our report. And two is that we still haven't given Jacqueline a chance to introduce herself.
[Frances Nwajei]: Yes, that's why I am ending this session of the conversation. Rob,
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Very quickly, just want to double down on everything that Diane said. I think that each and every one of these points is highly laudable, and there's certainly things that we should endeavor to achieve, but they will be made exponentially more realistic to achieve if we all have a clear and concise direction in which we're rowing together in the form of a mission and a vision statement. I think it'll make getting funds much easier. It'll make articulating the responsibilities of commissioners much easier. And quite honestly, it'll make it much more difficult for those folks that were asking for commitments from within the city government to either brush them off or not take them seriously because they will then be disregarding whatever our mission statement comes to be.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, thank you for that, Rob. All right, over to you, Chief.
[Jack Buckley]: Real quick I just wanted to touch, I think, Francis's point is very valid as to the capacity issues I think we should be thinking about not only the capacity of the Human Rights Commission but the capacity of the city that capacity of the department hits the information that is going to be asked for. I mean, it's been said already, we can compile a whole lot of information. What are we going to do about it? But it takes a lot of, on our end, as a department head myself, it takes capital resources and hours of work to do all this. And we shouldn't do it just to do it. We should actually have a plan in play and take some steps forward. But more importantly, and it's mostly a question that I think this subcommittee can answer, a lot of the stuff we're talking about rules are already defined in a city ordinance and I just want to ask why are they compared was the city ordinance compared to does their plan going forward as it relates to what we want to do and then uh sort of uh sort of codifying it or moving forward uh in a legal standard. Thank you.
[Barry Ingber]: We've actually spent a lot of time. I see you've raised your hand. I can respond to the chief's question um Chief is right. A new ordinance is necessary, and that is in the third paragraph of our draft recommendation, which I can read. paraphrase. I mean, in the course of our work, we concluded that to a significant extent, the HRC has been hampered by its current enabling ordinance, which is outdated, and which fails to provide the HRC with the resources and independence that it would need in order to carry out the mandate that the ordinance defines. We believe that effective reform of the HRC would involve a new carefully written ordinance that clearly outlines the HRC's composition, roles, and responsibilities and that would provide the HRC with the independence and resources required to fulfill those responsibilities. Those resources being, for instance, the stipends that folks were talking about. And Safe Medford is willing to work on drafting a replacement for that enabling ordinance if the HRC would like us to do that.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you for that, Barry. All right, I don't see on my screen any more hands raised. I'm going to hand it over to Jacqueline for introduction. Welcome, Jacqueline.
[Jacqueline Torres]: Hi, sorry, I was a little bit late. I had to get caught up in a work thing. I'm Jacqueline. I am a new member. So this is my first meeting. I'm also part of the Solid Waste Task Force and the Medford Arts Council.
[Unidentified]: Welcome, Jacqueline. Good to have you on. All right, next on the agenda, we have
[Frances Nwajei]: Any announcements, any correspondence that anybody would like to share? Based on this conversation, I would like to revert past commissioners to please go back and review meeting minutes from April up until current. as many of the conversations that were had today were already discussed. So, any members of the public have anything that they would like to add? I'm sorry, Frances, what do you want us to look in the, I'm confused about what- Review the past meeting minutes. Meeting minutes from April- But what though? meeting.
[Kelly Cunha]: I just I want to make sure I'm not missing something that I'm supposed to do it. Confused.
[Frances Nwajei]: It's from April, May, June. What am I missing about them? No, I'm familiar with them. I voted on conversation about things that we had said that we were going to do looking at the mission statement doing drafts about the Oh, yeah.
[Kelly Cunha]: No, we've been talking about this. We've been talking about this for like three years. No, no, this is long before you ever you were here. This is Shelly and I have been screaming this from the rooftop. We've had lots of discussion about it. This is the first time I've seen a plan. That's what I'm not and I hope this is nothing to do with you. This is what I've done.
[Frances Nwajei]: review the past meeting minutes because it will help you be able to pull out things that you can start to bullet, because a lot of the work has already been done. Well, not all of it, but things that were discussed, Steve, it has a way of capturing Those, you know, things that we discussed in like bullet forms. So, when we're talking about, oh we want to pick up from number 12. Some of those ideas and suggestions could be embedded. in the past meeting minutes.
[Kelly Cunha]: Okay, I see what you're saying. Thank you for clarifying. No, absolutely. I'm just really appreciative of this work. And I think having it concisely in this document is really helpful for me and how my brain works. So that's all it's definitely not any dig at anybody or anything, because honestly, we're all in this together. We're all here for the same reason. So I'm just happy that it's we're moving.
[Frances Nwajei]: Wonderful. Does anybody else have anything else that they would like to add? Well, I thank you all very much. I will make sure that you all receive a copy of the previous brochures for the previous HRC brochures that I was able to get my hands on so that we can review that, make notations and edits for ourselves. And when we reconvene next month, be able to share that as a good foundation of redrafting our mission statement or however you view it. I thank you all for your time this evening. Steve, I'm gonna put it in your hands to share the brochures with Jennifer and Barry since they were a part of the meeting with us today.
[Unidentified]: Okay. Thank you all so much. Over to you, Shelly.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Francis, were you saying my name? I'm hearing every third syllable. We need a motion to adjourn. That I can do. Motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Second.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you, everybody. Appreciate your time and energy.