[Chelli Keshavan]: Okay, cool. I'll go first and then maybe I'll popcorn left or right on my screen. So hi, everybody. I'm Shelly. I've been the chair for a year and change at this point, previously commissioner. Thank you to folks who are here. I'm really glad to have Safe Medford with us tonight. And maybe Kelly, do you want to go next?
[Kelly Cunha]: Hi, I'm Kelly Cunha, vice chair for the same amount of time as Shelly. I'm here with Vera, our special guest, and I'm excited to be here and have everyone here. Diane, you're next to be on my thing, so go for it.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: Great. I'm Diane McDonald. I think I'm probably the newest member on the commission. My first meeting was back in November, so it's such an honor to be here. I'm a mom, I work in higher ed, and I live in West Medford. So I will popcorn over to you, Muneer.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Hi, I'm Munir Jamanis. I think I know everybody around here in this meeting. And I've been here for a while. And it's good to see everybody. And I'll pass it over to my right hand side. That's Kelly.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I think Kelly just went. I have next. Oh, sorry.
[Munir Jirmanus]: My computer sort of put me off. OK, so let's go. Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead, Joe. You do. You call it.
[Chelli Keshavan]: OK. Chief, if you wouldn't mind.
[Jack Buckley]: Hi, everyone. Chief Jack Buckley with the Medford Police Department for 25 or so years. Chief of Police over four years now. So it's going by quickly. Hope everyone is doing well.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you. Steve, do you want to jump in? And then maybe Robin will move to guests.
[Steve Schnapp]: Steve Schnapp. I'm not a commissioner. I'm a volunteer with the HRC, live in Medford Square with my wife, and been a longtime volunteer with the HRC. I'm also a member of Safe in Medford.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Thank you, Steve. I've been on the commission now for about three years, been living in South Medford since 2014. It's coming up on a decade. I did the math for the first time the other day, and it was shocking to me, but very happy to be here and happy to have everybody who was able to join this evening.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thanks, Rob. Medford will get you like that. It creeps up on you. So I see Ellen, Barry, Eileen, and Judy, yes, of Safe Medford. Barry, I have you first on my screen if you want to jump in with an intro.
[Barry Ingber]: Hi, Barry Ingber. I live in North Medford and I'm a member of Safe Medford and just here to observe.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Appreciate you. Thank you. Alan, do you want to go?
[Ellen Epstein]: Sure. Ellen Epstein I live in West Medford, and I'm also here as a member of safe Medford just to observe and support. Thank you to all the commissioners. Thank you.
[Ilene Lerner]: I mean, I'm a member of safe Medford and I've also been coming to human rights commission meetings for years. It's nice to see the new people or to see at least Diane, Nathan. So have a good meeting. I just plan to be quiet and observe.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Well, thanks for being here. Judy, can we close with you?
[SPEAKER_15]: Sure. Hi, everybody. Judy Kaplan, former HRC commissioner, member of St. Medford, and I live in West Medford.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thanks, Judy. Maybe we can just, sorry, Steve, go for it. I didn't see your hand.
[Steve Schnapp]: My apologies. I forgot to mention that today is International Women's Day. I thought it would be important to acknowledge that.
[Chelli Keshavan]: That it is. While we were waiting for folks, I was yelling about intersectional feminism and how no one really heard me today. But yes, it's super important. Thank you for lifting that. Can we get our approval of the notes out of the way so that it's not hanging over our heads? Did folks get a chance to review minutes? Does someone want to make a motion?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Move to approve.
[Chelli Keshavan]: To approve. Seconded. All in favor?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Yes. Aye. Aye.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Awesome. Thank you. Check us out. Great. Diane, I think we'd all love to maybe hear a synopsis of how the Belinda Sutton event went, insofar as your perspective and working with Kiara, et cetera, et cetera. And I don't know if Kelly maybe wants to jump in, but maybe we could just share a little bit about your fantastic event. You guys, you killed it.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: So I feel really proud of the event that took place day of. I would say the lead time to prepare for the event, an event like that was very short and I think because it was a very short lead time, it led to some Some challenges, some logistical challenges. So I know that for future events, I know exactly what to do to get ahead of them. We had 55 people in attendance. I really appreciated, Shelly and Kelly, your leadership and the way you opened to really situate us in the work of the Human Rights Commission. And I really valued having everyone's partnership, including Frances's, who's not here with us. But overall, you know, and I thought it went very well. I felt that the public reading went really well, you know, because again, Belinda's petition really is situated in human rights, as FASTER did a magnificent job with their music selection, you know, like, with their opening songs before the public reading really, you know, situated situated us even historically, with a lot of their music, and then after the public reading, you know swing low treat sweet chariot those particular songs were like a bomb. I'm not going to get into the logistics and some of the last minute changes, but I think that, you know, I know that how to get ahead of them next time, but what's really on my mind right now is a post-event stewardship. And there are a number of people that I'm going to be following up with directly. So do we have stationary and do we have, because I don't know, I thought that we had branded materials of some sort. I didn't get a chance to actually physically look at the pens, but if there's a logo, I would even be happy to put together some sort of stationery and PDF form so we can send letters out to people with our enthusiastic thanks.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Absolutely. I can put you a logo. We don't have stationery per se, but we've kind of just added a JPEG at the top of a lot of our communications. So, yeah, great.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: So, yeah, so I, you know, I work full time and I have had a very busy schedule but there are some key people that, you know, one person in particular that I'm going to be reaching out to. Yeah, but I felt really proud. And I just loved how everyone came together as a team on the day of and just really worked together to meet and greet all of our guests and stay for the reception. And some of you all went on the tour. And then again, when I finished giving the tour of the mansion, you never would have even known that an event had taken place. The HRC really came together to help with all of the cleanup. So I just feel very grateful to be working in partnership with all of you.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I love it. I wonder if Kelly or Steve or Rob, I heard that Munir was able to catch the event virtually, if other folks wanted to weigh in with or share.
[Kelly Cunha]: I just want to apologize. Spring allergies have sprung. um so i'm not crying, although it looks like I am um but. I just, I wanted to, again, reiterate what Shelly said, Diane, you definitely took the lead on this and did most of the legwork and used your own connections. And it was unbelievable. It was unbelievable anyways, but then when you consider the time lead you had, it was really amazing. And I think it speaks to the fact that we can do amazing things. And if we have a plan and a roadmap so that we have things much more ahead of time, imagine what we can do. For me, the most touching, it was all amazing. The reading of the petition was amazing. I really felt powerfully moved during, they were singing a song, the S-Fact, the Tufts University S-Fact, they were singing a song and one of the young men, young black men started to cry and it was so powerful and emotional and I just couldn't imagine what must've been going through his head, sitting there in these, you know, hollowed halls and knowing what they are and sitting there, singing there, singing about, it was just such a moving, powerful moment that I will never forget. So that's what I wanted to share.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: You really felt the arc of history there. And again, you both just really knocked it out of the park in situating us with your opening and closing and Call to action. So maybe I know we have a lot of things on the agenda, but maybe next next meeting we focus on calendar calendaring for the rest of the year and dig into where we go with the call to action as well.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: I think that's a great idea. And I just want to follow up on the comments that have already been made by Letting everyone know who wasn't able to be there that it was a totally packed house, which is outstanding to see that level of interest and participation, even if it is only being there to occupy the space and consume the event, I think, is a really great representation of the kind of community that we have here in Medford.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I also felt like it was a strong event because we were able to connect with Tufts. I also really respected that Kiara brought in a colleague of her own, and we were able to sort of show off intellectualism and an expertise and teamwork, to your point, Diane. And I didn't, I think leading into it, I didn't understand that there would be a portion that felt like a classroom discussion and schools like my happy place. So I personally loved that, but it also provided for a level of interaction and conversation that I think added a lot of value over just sort of, like a lecture sort of style event for the, you know, for the duration. So kudos. Um, I'm really impressed. I think we are really impressed. So thank you, Dan. Um, great. So maybe we can move on. I think our, um, one of our bullet points today is to discuss our, um, now that Judy is no longer technically commissioner and our secretary, are we going to, continue to lean into Steve's amazing work? Are we going to, I think Francis really would like us to elect a secretary, but at the very least to have a discussion about the pieces and what it would look like and maybe to nominate or, and you know, who it might be or not. So if folks wanna, if people have thoughts and wanna share, go for it.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Well, excuse me. If somebody wants to volunteer, mind you, knowing that there's not going to be a lot of work, not with Steve around. And so we can't just officially have somebody's name in there. So go ahead, someone.
[Steve Schnapp]: Wait a minute. Wait a minute. I do think there is work for the secretary to do. And this is a good opportunity to make clear. As a volunteer, I draft notes. And then I send them to, I've been sending them to Francis before that, to Neil and to the chairs. And I feel it's then up to the chairs and Francis to then oversee the production of the minutes, which is an official, the official documentation of the meeting. So the secretary, I think, should be, the role should be to receive the minutes, I'm sorry, to receive the notes, and then to take it from there, to oversee the path from notes to approved minutes.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Love it. Thank you for sharing the nuance.
[Steve Schnapp]: Sure, thank you.
[SPEAKER_12]: I'm happy to do it if nobody wants to. Diane, maybe you.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: I was going to say, what is the job description? Because I haven't even seen, you know, it's just minutes. I mean, I think that would be helpful when you look, you know, because I mean, I'm the new member, so I'm still learning. And I mean, we've got Rob and we've got Muneer, but it would be helpful to know what the job description is.
[Kelly Cunha]: Is there a job description? Because I don't think there's one for the chairs either. I don't know what the heck. I don't know what I'm doing either. That helps, Diane.
[Steve Schnapp]: You write your own job description. How's that? Well, you know, it's something in the proposal from Safe Medford is to shop in that stuff. But Judy just put a note in the chat that I think is important. While she was secretary, the notes I neglected to say would also go to her. And so she would do a lot of the editing. And she's a good editor. So I'm hoping that the next secretary would have some facility with writing. And I think the folks who already indicated they're interested do.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I mean, I agree with what people are saying that maybe this feels like a time to put some words on paper around a role description and then share that with folks and allow people to decide based on what comes up a definition of this secretary role.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: That sounds right to me, I would say, I, you know, going back to one of those earlier meetings we had with Steve, maybe it was November, December, I know that I would like to have more of a role in helping with public relations of what we're doing and I have, you know, writing and editing, you know, decades of writing and editing background, but, um, I don't know. It doesn't sound exciting to do minutes, but if there's public relations involved, just to try to get out there in the community, I would be happy to help with that in some way.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Go for it, Munir.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I nominate Diane to be the secretary for the HRC.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I'm comfortable with that.
[Kelly Cunha]: That's a move, Munir. That's a move.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah. Second.
[Kelly Cunha]: Okay. Well, Diane, you can, does she have to accept it? I mean, I feel like it's international work day. You do your thing, girl. If you don't want this job, you don't have to take it.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: Okay. I would be thrilled. It would be an honor to accept it. And I think that, and I would be happy to start drafting job descriptions with everyone's feedback too. Right. Just if, if, if that's helpful. All right, thank you. We accept. Thank you, Muneer. That's a lot of trust.
[SPEAKER_12]: Oh, thank you, Dan.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I'll do my best. This is what happens when you go and prove yourself with a large-scale event, and now you're just, now you're secretary. Thank you. Judy, I might get in touch with you. Yeah, Judy, it might be actually just legitimately helpful, given that you were holding this role for so long. Cool. Well, Frances will be thrilled to hear that we have a secretary. Hold on, I'm pulling up the agenda again. Great. Okay, so moving on to old business. Munir, you had shared a really well written sort of statement in the name of Saeed Faisal. And do you want to share on the writing and kind of dissemination maybe?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Yeah, I can mention a few words about it. I don't know. I'm assuming that everybody got a copy of it. It's very brief. Maybe the easiest thing would be to very quickly read it and see if everybody is okay with it or suggest maybe changes and whatnot. So the statement says on December, excuse me, on Wednesday, January 4th, Cambridge police shot and killed Saeed Faisal, a 20-year-old college student and the only child of Bangladeshi immigrants. While the investigation is ongoing, it appears that Saeed was in the midst of a mental health crisis and the effort to stop self-harm ended in Saeed being fatally shot by the police. The Medford Human Rights Commission would like to express its deepest condolences to Sayeed Faisal's family, friends, and community. We stand with other mental health and minority advocates in finding outcomes like these unacceptable. Despite police being trained in de-escalation techniques, less than lethal weapons and tactics meant to prevent the need for shootings, mental health crises, and a disproportionate number of incidents involving BIPOC individuals still result in fatal police shootings. Corrective steps must be taken to ensure that this does not happen again in Cambridge, Medford, or any other community. Local authorities need to invest in the proper training and resources to address mental health crises, including dedicated unarmed experts to help deal with such incidents. We must not relegate Said to an incident, report, or a statistic. It is important to remember that Said Faisal was an individual with a life and a story. We should all work to ensure that mental health crisis episodes do not end in fatal police shootings. And at the end, there's just a list of ways you can help. So I'll open this to comments and whatnot.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I think Matt has his hand raised and also maybe he can share an intro. I think he might've logged on after we finished introductions. Go for it, Matt.
[Matthew Page-Lieberman]: No, I really did not have my hand. I just wanted to offer support. I'm really glad that the statement came out. I don't I don't like to talk about myself, but I'm glad to be here very well, you know, just right quickly, you know, so I've been in St. Medford and I just watched the last six months of the meetings, except for, you know, October and November that are online. And I noticed a lot of people, and it was really exciting to watch you all. I think it was really inspiring, especially your responses to the proposal. This is very, very, very nice to watch you all work, and I'm glad to be here live. Thank you.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you. Yeah, so thoughts on this statement, Aziz? I think the goal is to approve it. Go for it, Kel.
[Kelly Cunha]: I think it's lovely. It's well written. It gets to the point and also doesn't brush over the humanity of this young man. And I think that's really important. I'm curious about Chief Buckley's thoughts. And I don't know if he wants to share them, but I thought I would open that up for you, buddy.
[Jack Buckley]: I think you're all waiting for my thoughts and responses. So I read this and, you know, in general I could pick apart a few words here and there, but I think it's a fair statement. You know, I, I think. We constantly have to do work to ensure positive outcomes in all of our communities. I think that entails numerous trainings and reforms in policing. And one of the statements made in this, one of the remarks in this statement basically says that, you know, you call for the, just trying to read it while I'm looking at the screen here. Proper training and resources. And despite a lot of the reforms that were placed on police since 2020 and a lot of the changes, we really are policing in Massachusetts has come a long way. But there's not a whole lot of resources sometimes to support that. And unfortunately, policing sometimes resources means money. But I can tell you that I've met with numerous police groups since this. And together, nobody wants these outcomes. You know, when police interact with individuals in mental health crisis, we want the best of the outcomes. And sometimes, I mean, it is, if someone could invent the perfect resolution and solution to these, the police would be the first to sign up for that. And unfortunately, I dance around some of these issues. I don't know all the detailed facts of this. I don't think any of us know that. It's hard. We supply, in the city of Medford, we have three co-response clinicians, and we're going to take advanced steps in the city of Medford starting on April 3rd, where they will be out in the police cars responding to these immediately. So it's not like a situation happens that we have to call somebody to the scene. They will be with us. So there's a lot of advances happening. This is a tragic case. spoken with a number of Cambridge police officers, my own police officers, the outcomes like this are things that we want to work with the community to prevent and look for them not to happen ever. They do happen though, right and we know that and we recognize that and we recognize that there's not going to be a switch that we could turn off tomorrow and kind of solve these problems but I think you have committed partner in the police to work to resolve some of these instances. So, I mean, as I said before, I think I could argue over a few of these words I think the intent of this statement and on behalf of the Human Rights Commission is is just, and it could go out there. I still debate back and forth. I've had a long standing commitment to when police matters come up to kind of, kind of abstain from voting from them. But I think even if I take that stance, I think my statements, public statements on record here today, stand sort of in support of that. And again, I I think it's fine. I think there's an understanding, though, that I'm really curious as to the outcome when the final statements made by Cambridge Police and the investigation that is ongoing by the district attorney's office and the independent judge, I'm curious as to some of the details. And we learn from that and how we can do better, not just in medicine, but in the entire community of policing. So it is tragic. I do know that I met shortly, very shortly thereafter, and I believe you all know this, but Syed was a member of the Islamic Cultural Center in Medford, and I met with them. I met with some of his friends over there. I had very good conversations with them. you know, very sad conversations too, you know, that go back and forth. So my condolences do go out to the family. And I will say on the record though, because it's tragic all around, my condolences go out to the Cambridge Police Department and the officers, and nobody wants to do this. I can stress to you that nobody comes to work as a police officer who wants to cause harm. We want to do good, and we strive to do good. And if messages like this can push the community members to support the police for the resources and the training,
[Unidentified]: and I'm all for it, so.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Can I add something, just a side note, not really relevant, well, it is hopefully relevant. There is an effort in Cambridge, speaking of resources, there is an effort going to the city council to have them actually hire, add three or more positions of unarmed trained civilians to handle such cases when mental health is concerned. I don't know what the outcome will be. I don't think it has been decided yet, but perhaps in the future we can maybe have a similar effort here in Medford to do something like that.
[Jack Buckley]: And I will say that that's part of our co-response to train clinical social workers who will be responding alongside with police. And if the situation, because the police, we've learned one thing all along, the police are going to get called regardless. When someone's in crisis, they're going to be calling the police. And we're now thinking along the lines of we can bring additional support. And if need be, we can leave a clinical social worker on scene and the police can leave if it's truly a mental health crisis. I do caution in the grand scheme of talking about this Sometimes there is violence that's associated with mental health and those are the things those are the issues that we have to look at hard. Someone who's trying to inflict self harm or somebody out in the public who could harm others. it's hard for an unarmed civilian clinical worker to deal with that while at the same time that the police are trying to protect the public. So there's, there's some really, I don't want to call them gray areas, but there's some really peak areas that, that, that with the two cross and, and, and really create crisis that I don't know that, that we're going to get to right away, just by simply having civilians who can kind of, unarmed civilian can handle things because I mean, there's certain things that we can't just walk away from. I mean, I will tell you today I met with numerous police chiefs, and a lot of the conversation is about what do you do when you have barricaded and armed or unarmed civilians and whether or not they can impact the safety of others and what it actually is going to be causing or resulting in a change in police response sometimes. So there's a lot of conversation on this going and it is all for the good and it's all for the positive. And I mean, it just goes to that we are doing that in Medford now and we're hoping for better outcomes every single day that we go out there and improve.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, Chief, I think you touch on some really important points there. And one of them being that, you know, anytime you try to implement a change or remedy for a situation, you want to be treating the effects, or I'm sorry, the cause rather than the symptoms, right? And I think that fundamentally speaking, Police having to deal with individuals who are having mental health crises, violent or nonviolent, is a symptom of lack of resources being available outside of policing and the justice system for those individuals to rely on. So bringing this actually back full circle to the letter, I wonder if it might be and this is a very small tweak certainly doesn't need to be entered into the, the beautiful writing has already taken place, but just mentioning. giving police and communities the resources they need to support these individuals. Because exactly to your point, the police are only called when there is the expectation that somebody could be harmed or is in some way in danger. And if we can keep folks experiencing mental health crises out of situations where they themselves or the members of their community are in danger by empowering other organizations within the community to provide support to those individuals, I think that's really going to be exponentially more effective than anything the police are able to do, because it's not their main focus. And I don't mean that at all as a negative, just thinking about the purpose of policing in society as it has evolved to exist.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Can people hear me? My screen is frozen.
[SPEAKER_12]: Oh, we can hear you.
[Chelli Keshavan]: And so my thoughts align with what's already been said, but maybe take it a step further. And I actually watched the video that sort of, you know, had the content around his this incident. And I felt like by the time a moment like that happens, there's already been several sort of systemic failures. And so I wonder if there is space to discuss like the role of mental health supports and how one might seek them out. I believe this person was a student. So were there university supports available or are there cultural conversations that can be taken place that like allow for space to consider mental health supports as part of like a health kind of initiative for the individual. And also in full disclosure, when Muneer sent me the email, I was like, this is great. Thank you for writing it. I appreciate you. So these are just recent thoughts that I'm having while listening to folks speaking.
[Unidentified]: Thank you for sharing.
[Jack Buckley]: Sorry, if I could just add one point to that. I think sometimes when we have these tragic incidences, we look from the incident forward, what happened at the incident forward, and we need to start getting people in crisis into care before that, before they rise to the level of the police. And when we study these and we look at, say, we question, oh, did the police have body-worn cameras? Did they do this? What's the action? But we really need to go backwards and tie it to You know, where is the care and how do we get individuals like sayeed into care and professional care prior to this so it doesn't come to crisis level and the police are called and I think there's a totality of it right we can't just look at a one thing we have to kind of spread that out, and then we have to look for community support to provide that care. pre crisis. And I'm trying to think of the, I think it was a Boston Globe and references in the past but Boston Globe in 2016 wrote a really great article about the increase in individuals. under mental health crisis and involvement with the police and the police officers and the police departments. And they tie it all the way back to early 1990s when they shut down a lot of the mental health institutions. And then what have we done since then? A lot of it's outpatient care, and that's great. I mean, I'm not calling for institutionalizing individuals, but there has to be another level of care. And what did happen was, because I started in the 90s, and what did happen is The individuals who were charged with responding to mental, to the individuals with mental health were the police officers first, and then the emergency rooms, right, or the EDs as they call them now. And that was the chain of care for many of these individuals. And families didn't have a lot of places to turn, so they would call the police, the police would send them to the EDs, and it became sort of, I'm not gonna call it a vicious cycle, in a lot of cases it did, because that was the only care they got. And then they'd go home and maybe, with some medication adjustments or whatever, but they would always end up where we're dealing with the same sort of individuals. We are getting better with that as not just police departments, but as communities. But I fear that, you look around, hospitals are closing. And all these institutions where we can get care for individuals are closing. So in general, I think Massachusetts, I think this country needs to start thinking about mental health care on a different level and trying to figure out how to deal with this. It's the lifelong issue that we've all been dealing with in our generations is health care and how to provide better health care for everybody. But it must stop. And every time we have these issues, uh, in discussions, we should always just look at it in both texts. Like what can the police do better, but what can we do as a community to prevent this from getting to the police first? Right. And, and so, uh, I'm always in full support of those kinds of conversations and they're not going to be easy solutions though, because that those are, um, you know, the, the healthcare is, uh, is somewhat in crisis when it comes to mental health.
[Kelly Cunha]: Um, Munir, go ahead.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I was gonna say, just to keep us moving, if we all agree on endorsing this statement, perhaps we should say so, do it, and then keep an item open for discussion of next steps that we can do to address this situation, hopefully in Medford, if that's acceptable to everybody.
[Kelly Cunha]: Motion to approve publication of the letter. Second. All in favor.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: Aye.
[Unidentified]: Aye.
[Jack Buckley]: Aye. And with my comments on record, I'm going to abstain because it's dealing with policing. I've done that. Thank you.
[Unidentified]: Great. Sorry, can people hear me now? Yes.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Okay, my fault. Sounds good, thank you for the approval. I think we can now maybe move on. We've got some Safe Medford folks here and Munir maybe if you want to lead a conversation around some of the work that's been being done around ordinance stuff and Safe Medford support of that conversation. Can I just ask a clarifying question
[Kelly Cunha]: Before maybe just so your response you might get it might get answered. So, when I was looking at the proposal. I was really my brain was focused more on just like the what we're going to do because that's like been my constant question like what's our role what's our scope. what the heck are we supposed to do? We need a roadmap, whatever. The ordinance piece for me, I haven't, can you explain specifically why, what that, how that would potentially help or hurt or whatever? I'm just trying to figure out the, cause I'm really more, I was more interested in that piece. So I don't even know if I understand the connection for the ordinance piece. And if someone could just briefly explain that to me, it would be super helpful.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I can make a few comments. I don't know if they're going to be helpful or not. But if folks have gone through the recommendations, there's an introductory section, and then there are a list of priority roles for the Human Rights Commission. And finally, there is a list of operational recommendations. There's a lot in there. There's a lot of information involved, a lot of hard work to put it together. One suggestion has been made that perhaps we as a commission can start by looking at the operational recommendations. and go through them and select which ones we think are doable. Now, this is understanding that we have right now six members in the Human Rights Commission. We're supposed to have nine members. So we're still lacking the personnel to handle a lot of these recommendations. As far as the ordinance itself, you know, as everybody knows, there's an existing ordinance. And part what this commission, what this committee from Safe Medford basically said and looked at, they said, well, this ordinance leaves a lot to be desired. So eventually what we should really do or what somebody should really do is work on an updated ordinance that includes, you know, some or all or most of these recommendations in it. and then submit it through whatever the regular channels going to the, for instance, the city council and having them look at it, move on it and write up an updated ordinance. That's a lot of work still that needs to be done. And we're not gonna be able to do this ourselves right now No, we could decide, for instance, that maybe if there is the Safe Medford Commission or the group in Safe Medford who worked on this, if they are up to it, maybe we can ask them to revisit the ordinance and then do the hard work and then bring it back to the Human Rights Commission to study, approve, and whatnot. So I don't know if that makes things a little clearer, but I'm open to comments, suggestions, and whatnot.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: I think that before we rewrite the ordinance, we need to get, you know, all nine people onto the commission. And so that we're getting full feedback from everyone. And so I wonder, if the starting point is just, you know, trying to recruit those three extra people and bringing more diversity onto the commission. And then trying to, you know, and maybe we, I think we so need a roadmap, you know, so what I'm hearing, you know, the ordinance and I hear governance. And so maybe we start with working within the current ordinance and trying to fully staff the commission and see how we're all working together and then make movement to expanding it to the 15 or whatever. And we've got to get the youth voice in. But I think that we need to just be fully staffed with all of the right people and get some new new voices and new fresh perspectives and talent, and maybe we can work on governance and pushing out what we think, at least in the meantime, are roles and responsibilities.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Kelly, sorry, I'm calling on people. I'm not trying to take over the chair of this meeting, but since I'm just leading this portion, I'll call on people. Kelly, please go ahead.
[Kelly Cunha]: That makes it easier, Munir. Thank you. OK, three things. One is an easy one. I have never actually been fully sent the proposal I just checked in my email again I think every time i've read it someone has put it in the chat and then I think i'm haven't saved it because I usually just assume it's in my email. If someone could email that to me i'll put my email in the chat just so that I have it there, because I think that way that's one of the things that keeps happening. To is. I think, Diane, 1 million percent hear you. We need to be fully staffed if we're going to be able to do anything more. And also, I don't know. I have this thing about I don't even know what I'm asking of people right now. I don't even understand what I'm asking someone to do. I think that the amount of participation varies very widely based on everyone's personal and professional needs. at any given time right so we all have these you know ins and outs like you know I was on maternity leave for a few months like stuff happens, some people are just unable to give workout. I wonder if we if that's putting the cart before the horse, because if we don't know what we're asking of people, how are we going to onboard people? I think people need to know what they're signing up for. They need to know, you know, this is the expectation. This is how much hours you should be expected to do. And I also would love to see us be more diverse. But I just have a real issue with asking BIPOC people for labor that a is unpaid, which is fine. It's a volunteer job. We all do volunteer work. That's why we're here, but also so scattered and unfocused. And we've had a lot of turnover with particularly with BIPOC people on the commission. And I, I wonder about, you know, the why behind that and like, what are we, are we setting people up for failure? Are we setting people? I don't know. I'm not, I'm just curious. But I just, how do we ask people to come on board when we don't even know what we are, what we're doing? And I think that the Safe Medford proposal is a roadmap. I think they've done so much legwork. I think the major issue I see with it is that we don't, thank you, Steve, for sending it. I think the major issue is that we don't have the capacity as we are right now to actually do all the things. So I think we need to prioritize what we can do first And then what we want to do going forward with more commissioners and more commissioners that have, you know, time and.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay. Thanks, Kelly. So I understand that Steve sent you, emailed you the copy of it. Okay. If there's anybody else who would like to receive the ordinance one more time or for the first time, I'll be, okay, I'll be glad to send it to you, Diane, or Steve can do that. Okay. Thank you, Steve. Yes.
[Kelly Cunha]: It actually wasn't the proposal. It was just a one sheet letter. So if someone has the full thing, sorry, Steve.
[Steve Schnapp]: Sure. Give me another chance.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I'll get it to everybody. Okay. I have it on my computer, but I can send it to anybody. But anyway, uh, maybe I'll double up and, uh, send another one. Just, just to make sure that everybody gets it. How's that? Okay. Um, so, so yeah, I mean, uh, what you say is absolutely correct, Kelly. We've had difficulty recruiting, you know, people from various communities. And when we have, when we are able to do so, they eventually either lose interest or whatever reason. We have not been able to maintain a membership in here. And right now, the way the application for joining the HRC is, it's basically through the city, through the city website. And this is one thing that, I mean, I know that a few years ago, while I was serving as chair, I made, I sort of, I worked with Neil, who was the director for diversity and inclusivity, and we started contacting various groups within Medford to see if they can recommend people. And sometimes it worked, sometimes the people who they recommended expressed interest and then they sort of backed out. So it's not gonna be an easy job, but I mean, maybe we can also seek the help of other community organizations, like for instance, Safe Metro, and have them say also, see if they can help in this effort to recruit more members. In the meantime, what I was thinking is that looking at the recommendations, when I mentioned that somebody had suggested looking at operational procedures, I mean, we certainly, you're absolutely right, we cannot handle all of them, certainly with the current membership, but we can sort of look at them and maybe pick out a few and work along those lines, work with these recommendations within the existing ordinance. And then at the same time, you know, be having some kind of a plan to after we recruit successfully more people to actually work on a real relevant ordinance. I don't know if that makes sense to everybody.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: No, I think it makes excellent sense, Muneer. And I think that we're going to talk about calendaring next month and try to just create the flow of the next year. That speaks to the operational recommendation number two, an annual action plan. based on clearly defined organizational goals. And really that's a two-part process. So, maybe next meeting, we all come with what we believe an organizational goal is for the Human Rights Commission, and we start putting together what our action plan is, but we have to be in alignment with our goals. And then I think with that, and then putting together the action plan, it can also help guide roles and responsibilities. I think number two is just a really key piece here.
[Kelly Cunha]: Do you want me to share my screen so that everyone can be looking at what the operational recommendations that Diane's referring to, would that be helpful? Sure, Kelly, thank you.
[Unidentified]: You can do that, yeah.
[Kelly Cunha]: Yeah, I'll do that. Oh, Shell, you have to make me able to, sorry.
[Munir Jirmanus]: You know, in the meantime, let me make a suggestion. I happen to start looking at some previous notes from several years ago, and I found some notes where we had an example of a plan that was put in place by the Human Rights Commission in that year. So if people are interested, I can send a copy out to everybody. And just to have something to look at, maybe it'll give us ideas. If people are interested, I can do that.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Sure, thank you, Munir.
[Munir Jirmanus]: OK, go ahead, Kelly. Thank you for putting this up.
[Kelly Cunha]: So I'm wondering like what we have, like, can we vote on stuff? Cause like, I'm like, I'm ready for number one, let's drop it. Let's draft a letter and be like, we're done with that. We don't do that. We haven't done that. We, no one ever trained us to do that. Number one is the hearing individual discrimination complaints. There was way too many conflicts of interests. It was just a nightmare when the few times that it did try to potentially happen, like, Without Francis here. I'm not, I don't want to like overstep, but I'm like, I'm watching. I'm just ready to like, let's go. Let's do this because we've been sitting on this and talking about it. And some of this stuff is, is easy. Like we can easily just say that's not on our, that's not in our capabilities. It's something we haven't been trained for. we can put on our agenda for next time to look at an annual action plan and start small, like Diane mentioned, like picking specific events that we want to do some community events and education for. Like, let's just do what we can and see what we can go from there. Chief Buckley has his hand raised, go for it.
[Jack Buckley]: Just learned how to do that, so I'm not going to worry. So number one was one of the, I think we've talked about this in the past, that's one that we all agree with, but that is where we are gonna come up with a problem. Because when it all comes down to is that we are a commission established by the city of Medford through an ordinance and law, and that dictates what we should be doing. We're, I think, trying to recommend changes to that. Number one, I believe is in that ordinance and I don't think we can just take a vote to change that on the HRC, I just don't think it would be legal. And so, way back when we had a very quick discussion, but I think we should bring it back up is parallel to what we're discussing here. Should we request of the city some legal assistance in what the role is of a commission is not just the commissioners, but what is a commission versus a committee? What steps should we take if we want to modify how the commission acts? I think we're going to need some legal guidance on this. We may have to approach Francis on that. That doesn't mean we can't keep going down this track, but we should also look into that because I don't know that we could take a vote and have it have any standing at all because it's done by ordinance.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay so let me let me make just one comment on that. We don't have to take a vote on dropping the roll but what we can take a vote on is a recommendation to drop the roll. In other words, and basically say to ourselves that that is not a priority of ours. We're not gonna, as you know, it may be unlawful to completely remove it, but we can make a recommendation that it be removed from the ordinance. So if that makes sense.
[Jack Buckley]: It does make sense in my opinion. I do think it tempers that somewhat. But if the city creates a commission and by ordinance and law directs it to do something, do we have that legal authority to say, eh, I don't want to do it? I don't think it works. I mean, I have my opinions on all of this. I'm just saying that we have a legal standard we have to meet here. And those are some of the things that are going to need to be changed if this HRC is going to advance and grow. I just think we probably should get some legal advice on this as we move forward.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I don't disagree, Jack, at all. But the way it stands right now, is that the city, a couple of years ago, established a procedure for handling individual complaints. And actually in that procedure, the HRC does not have a role. So it's as if the city negated the role of the HRC. The only thing they did, they said, if you'd like, you can send a copy of this complaint to the HRC. but it did not even define what the HRC can do or not do about it. But that's just for clarification. Now, I have a couple of hands raised. At one point, Barry raised your hand. Are you still interested in saying something, Barry? No, thanks. Okay. Matt, I see you have your hand up.
[Matthew Page-Lieberman]: Yeah, just to clarify, I mean, this is kind of, I guess why it's a good idea if we have the ordinance right in front of us or the commission does. You all have a right to an attorney. That's the city solicitor. That's right in the current ordinance. And, you know, because if you're tasked to go and, you know, check out complaints, you definitely have to have an attorney can kind of tell you, give you some guidance and stuff like that. Muneer, I completely agree with you. I mean, this is just a recommendation. The commission can recommend whatever y'all want. There's no problem with that and then like legal can just say, we can't we're not going to fight state on this because this is coming down from state, and all these commissions are established specifically for these purposes. But the fact that you all do have an attorney, and we don't have a sitting you know city solicitor or whatever and there's all this controversy at City Hall about KP law. That's still your right. That's your right that's established. You can call the attorney for every single meeting, and you can say, we need the attorney. It's our right, and you need to fulfill that. And I just kind of think sometimes that's something that's missed, and you all should really take advantage of that. I mean, you don't have to request for an attorney to come down and get clarification. We have a meeting this month, and we need the attorney there, period.
[Munir Jirmanus]: OK, thanks. Thanks, Matt. OK, so yeah, Kelly, I know you're putting the ordinance and it's a long ordinance. I'm not sure. But if people, if people, anybody here who does not have a copy of the ordinance, the current ordinance, one of us will be glad to send it out to you just for reference.
[Kelly Cunha]: I just linked it in the chat. Yeah, it's eight pages. We're going to read this right now.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so do you want to go ahead, Kelly and then go through the quickly through at least some of the points while we have time. So at least do we do we well, first of all, do we want a motion to make a recommendation if it is to satisfy Jack if it is legal to relieve the HRC from handling those complaints? Is that something that we want to suggest and vote on?
[Kelly Cunha]: Are we going to get in trouble? I don't want to get in trouble. I mean, I'm all about doing the thing, but I also, I don't want to piss anyone off. Although since I've been on this, we haven't done it. So it's kind of weird that we don't do it anyways. You know what I mean?
[Munir Jirmanus]: We don't do it and the city almost doesn't want us to do it. So, so it's it's both these, I mean, but there's nothing wrong with making a recommendation, it's not illegal to make a recommendation. Okay, the city can come back to us and say no no you can't do that fine let them do that, but we can always make a recommendation.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: So I will just say, I remember when we went over this a while ago, like I was always confused by that first one. And I'd always meant to reach out to you, Chelly or Kelly or someone and to say, what exactly does that mean? So I just, I don't even feel that I could vote because I just need more information. I don't even understand. I mean, if someone was making a complaint to the city about something human rights related, they were directed to speak to the whole entire commission? Or like, is that like, how did it work?
[Munir Jirmanus]: I can comment very briefly on that, and then perhaps we should move on. Okay, at one point, several years ago, the Human Rights Commission established actually a procedure for handling these complaints. and we worked on it, mind you, we never get a lot of complaints, maybe one or two or something like that a year, but we established a procedure that was with the previous administration. When the current administration came in, they basically ignore that and put their own procedure for handling complaints. And that's what I sort of, if you look at the website, you'll see that there is a form that somebody who has a complaint can fill, okay, and send it to the city. And if they are interested at the end, there's a box, they say, do you want a copy to go to the Human Rights Commission? And then you can check that box. And so in a sense, you know, they put on their own procedure. So right now we're in this limbo position where we don't know whether we really can handle the complaints or whether it's meaningful for the Human Rights Commission. And we can, when we get a copy of the complaint, we can discuss it and make a comment on it. For instance, in the past, such a complaint was placed and it was investigated by the city. And in that particular case, the complaint, they said, okay, no, this is not legitimate. Some of us in the Human Rights Commission thought that it might be legitimate. And we sort of expressed that opinion, but it was irrelevant because the city had already made the decision. So we are practically right now in a situation where the Human Rights Commission does not really have much power or any power in handling complaints in spite of what the ordinance said or might say. So I don't know if we've discussed this first point enough or whether we want to take a definite recommendation or not. Let me see, I see Steve and then Mary.
[Barry Ingber]: Okay, I just wanted to say that this was the reason that our committee, our Safe Medford committee, came to the conclusion that a new ordinance was needed because Chief Buckley is right. about the mandate that you're given by the current ordinance is that it's largely revolves around two tasks. One is taking individual complaints and the other is fair housing. Neither of these are things that you do, that you have training to do, that you have resources to do or that you want to do. The issue that Kelly brought up about If you want to truly get a diverse commission, you need to compensate people that can't be done outside of changing the ordinance that's in the ordinance that's in our recommendations as well. The independence from. the city administration that Munir just alluded to that doesn't exist that would require a change in the ordinance as well. So all of the things that I think that we can agree on seem to require a change in the ordinance. The ordinance was last updated in 2014. It was probably written long before that. If not, it was written in language that was really old for 2014. And it needs to be redone, in our opinion. So we came to you with a report and hope for an endorsement of that report. You can take it in a different direction if you want to. It's totally your That's totally up to you.
[Unidentified]: I know I've answered Diane's question.
[Barry Ingber]: Sorry. Are you finished, Barry? I'm done. You can answer Diane's question, sure.
[Munir Jirmanus]: OK. Steve. Let's see what has his hands raised up. Oh, OK. One more, Steve. Just let me answer Diane's question that you put on the chat.
[Steve Schnapp]: I've never been a member. Go ahead, Steve. Okay, Diane. I've never been a member of the HR. Can you hear me? My apologies. Similar to Kelly, I've been having on and off internet connection. Can you hear me? Yeah, now we can hear you right now. Yeah. Okay. These are good questions. I've never been a member of the HRC, but I've been to, I think, every meeting for the last six years, except for two. And I was a volunteer with Neil's office for several years, even before working on the HRC. So just to disclose that about myself. What I want to say is directly respond to Diane's question about these cases. I think there are several kinds. Some from individuals who feel that their rights have been compromised either by a business or another resident or something like that. But in addition to that, there are complaints that have come to the Human Rights Commission where people feel that they have been treated unfairly by their boss, the city of Medford. This is a particularly complex arena for the Human Rights Commission. So the sort of complaints of discrimination that the Human Rights Commission has received, they're diverse. And I just wanted to share that so Diane is clear about that. And what I have heard year after year, even when there was a committee set up to try and mediate a particular incident conflict between a couple of people, individuals or between an individual and an entity, the city or a private organization. Folks have said they do not have the expertise to mediate these kinds of complaints. That has been the chief comment that I have heard in about seven years with the HRC and hearing these kinds of complaints. So I just wanted, I hope that adds something to Diane's question about what are the nature of these complaints that the HRC receives.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay, thank you, Steve. And just to answer Diane's question, there are only two people on the Safe Metro group who were or are commissioners. Judy was a commissioner and now her term is off, and I'm still a commissioner. I was on that committee, but nobody else is. Let's see, Matt, do you have any comments?
[Matthew Page-Lieberman]: Yeah, so there is this item in the proposal, which I just I completely absolutely support. It's incredibly it's justified. It's necessary, which is to get that money for the stipends and to pay for people to do work and everything like that, especially because, you know, ultimately, I mean, I would hope and I imagine all of us would hope that there'd be people working commission beyond the nine. you'd bring on a lot of people contributing to really the community being part of participating in commission, just as, you know, people like myself are not in commission, we're able to participate tonight. But there is this kind of question when you go through the current establishment document or the ordinance as we refer to it, and that is the ability to raise money for the commission without the ordinance being changed. Now, when I look through it, I look through it, my father, I won't get it, but we look through it and we try to find, we try to find, is there any ability for you all to raise money. Now there's nothing within the current ordinance saying that you have the ability to do so, but obviously there's nothing in the ordinance saying that you're forbidden from doing so. There are some nice things in the ordinance sometimes I think the current one that we overlook, which is that it says that in the current one, it should be interpreted expansively. That if there's anything that you all believe that you need to do in order to carry out your work, you should err on the side of saying yes, we will do this, and so one thing that I sometimes I look at I try to wonder. can you all do grant proposals and see about outside organizations or something if in the meantime, they can give you provide you with funds so you can carry out that work, you know, so that you could like hire people even if you can't yet fill up those three vacancies. And that's something I think that the commission should be looking at and if anybody here doesn't have any grant writing experience, I can put you all in touch with people, and that's something you can possibly explore. And I imagine that there are some people on the call that have grant writing experience. Just something to consider. Don't leave off the table. Thank you.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Great. Thanks, Judy.
[MCM00001270_SPEAKER_03]: Well, I wasn't going to talk because I think it's more important for the commissioners to talk than for St. Bedford to talk. But I do want to reiterate what Munir said, which is the city put in place a complaint process that excluded the HRC from processing complaints, other than a confusing and ambiguous statement at the end of their policy that says, you know, people can be offered the opportunity to bring their case to the HRC, which kind of makes no sense. Really, they should be offered the opportunity to take their case to the Mass Commission against discrimination. But okay, so I'm just reiterating what Munir said. The other thing is many, many, many years ago, we did have a case before that, before that new city policy, which isn't so new anymore, was put in place, we did have somebody come directly to us, which was allowable and appropriate at the time, and complained about religious a crash, actually a Christmas crash on city property. And Neil, who was our city liaison at the time and our chairperson, talked to appropriate people. The complainant made his case at a meeting. The chairperson and Neil followed up on it and a you know, an acceptable solution to all was achieved. So that's the kind of thing we could do, but we can't, not we, sorry, bad habit, but that's the kind of thing the commission could do, but it would be too difficult to define, you know, which kind of cases the commission could address and couldn't. And basically the city has preempted that anyway. So it's, So the issue is that it's in the ordinance and the other issue is that there is that weird little sentence that says you could go to the HRC if you want to. OK, that's all.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Thank you, Judy. All right. So we're getting close to the end of our meeting time, but I just wanted to again, go back to the page that Kelly has on our screens.
[Kelly Cunha]: And- I just have a question.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Yeah.
[Kelly Cunha]: Can we do any of this without changing the ordinance? So do we need to pivot and just say, okay, how do we go about changing the ordinance? Because like, it sounds like to me, that's what we have to do if we want to actually accomplish this. And if that's the case, what's step one in doing that is my thoughts.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Let me see. I will express an opinion on that. I don't know that it's the law. I mean, if we wanted to go through these and see the points that we think we would like to actually, you know, really work on, we can do that. And some of them will line up within the ordinance, some might not. Okay, so but we can work on those that do line up with the ordinance. And in the meantime, have some committee, whether it's through the HRC or through Safe Metro or any other organization, some committee work on actual rewriting the ordinance so that we don't have to just sit there and wait for the ordinance to be rewritten, you know, before we start working on some of these recommendations.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Sorry, is it okay if I jump in?
[Unidentified]: Please, by all means.
[Chelli Keshavan]: I'm also sort of while folks are speaking wondering how and if there is a way to kind of distill the operational recommendations into an abstract or a sales pitch of sorts so that if and when we have the opportunity to connect with potential new commissioners that we have a way of sharing that there's going to be an avenue of moving forward. I think they're really strong and I remember as a new commissioner feeling like there's no budget there's no stipend but we're supposed there's no power but we're supposed to offer deliverables to the city, like how is that possible? So I just wonder if to what extent can we share this as we're trying to grow? So sorry if that wasn't cohesive.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I think that's a great idea. We can look at these if you want. We can have, I'll be happy to work with someone on condensing the things that we want to highlight to new applicants. And I'm not sure how the actual process will work. We'd have to work with Frances on that since right now she is, I mean, that's the only venue for applying for, you know, for new folks. who are interested in applying to the Human Rights Commission. So we can send that to her and see if there is a way that she can communicate or put that on the website or something to entice or whatever to inform applicants or potential applicants who are interested in being part of the Human Rights Commission.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Sure, I can partner with you around that if helpful.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay, that's great.
[Kelly Cunha]: Like look and see if the ordinance allows us to to or pull from the ordinance detail descriptions of the responsibility of commissioners, because I think in order to get new people, we need to explain what they're signing up for. So if we check the ordinance and see that it's and then we can kind of write right. Does that make sense?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Um, are you volunteering to look at the ordinance and checking that Kelly?
[Kelly Cunha]: I'm not, I'm, I will volunteer to help create a detailed description of the responsibilities of all the commissioners and all that stuff. So that when we like, kind of like Diane wrote an elevator pitch, I feel like ordinance, I don't know. It looks like it's in another language to me. I don't speak legalese. Maybe someone else does not my area of expertise.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_08]: I'm happy to take a swing at reviewing. did 795, page 1392, proceeds from about eight pages. That's right?
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay, that's great. So maybe then we have some assignments for our next meeting. Rob will look at the ordinance. Chelly and I will try to condense these operation recommendations and then communicate them to Francis.
[Kelly Cunha]: And let's see, maybe me and Diane can work on the elevator pitch. Diane, I don't want to sign you up for anything, but it sounds like both of us were interested in that and we can kind of sure. Yeah, they're OK. Yeah. You need to make official. What are those little things called?
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: Subgroup committees, subcommittee.
[Kelly Cunha]: Yeah. And I mean, you know, Kelly rules or whatever they're called.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and I'm even happy, you know, to take a look at your, you know, your past example of an action plan many year and start to think about that in terms of a calendar.
[Munir Jirmanus]: I think, I think it's, it's perfectly legitimate to send it to everybody. I can also pass it by Francis, because it's just an example of something that has been on record many years ago. So it's nothing new. It's just public information anyway. Okay.
[Unidentified]: Sorry. Oh, Judy put a comment.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Don't forget about the open meeting law.
[Kelly Cunha]: I also found subcommittees for the the sidewalk.
[Munir Jirmanus]: So we have we have three subcommittees basically right now that we are establishing right. Although one of the subcommittees happened to be one person. So Rob subcommittee will look at the ordinance. Kelly and Diane will look at the what is the wording that you chose roles and responsibilities slash elevator pitch to get new people. Okay. And Charlie and I will look at condensing the operational procedures. And since Judy brought this up, I also found out that that same year in my files and my notes, I had a copy of the link of the open meeting law. So I will also send it out to people. It is, I mean, it's there, it should be followed, but it really is not that restricted. Okay, the word that they use all the time is that quorum, quorum, quorum. If there is a quorum, then it has to be an open meeting. If there's no quorum, then it's not subject to the open meeting law. So just keep that in mind, please. But I will send these out hopefully the next day or two, both the plans and these other two documents.
[MCM00001269_SPEAKER_04]: And I'm happy to work with you on the ordinance so that it'll just help me get an understanding of it. And so happy to help there too. So you're not alone.
[Munir Jirmanus]: Okay. Very good. And I'll send a copy to Eileen since she requested it. Okay. I'm done.
[Chelli Keshavan]: Thank you so much. I think, um, I think this has been a really fruitful discussion, and I'm grateful for the folks who joined us. I think in respect of everyone's Wednesday evening, we should likely motion to close for tonight.
[Kelly Cunha]: Motion to adjourn. Second. There we go. Bye, everybody. Thanks for coming. Great having you. Safe method. Bye.