[Frances Nwajei]: I'm Frances Wange, Director of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. It's the March 13, 2024 meeting for the Commission on Human Rights. Over to you, Chief Buckley.
[Jack Buckley]: I'm Jack Buckley, Chief of Police, Human Rights Chief for six years, Human Rights Commission an entire time. Maureen.
[SPEAKER_10]: Hi, I'm Maureen Curley. I've lived in Medford for almost 25 years and been on the Commission since the fall. Diane.
[SPEAKER_04]: Hi, I'm Diane McDonald. I've been on the commission since last November or November 2022. Steph.
[SPEAKER_05]: Hey everyone, Stephanie Cornell. I've been a Medford resident for about two years now and on the commission since this fall. I will pass it over to Rob.
[SPEAKER_08]: Hello, Rob Klein, Medford resident since 2014 and I've been on the commission since 2020. I believe I'm the last one of the commissioners. I see Sana on the call as well.
[Frances Nwajei]: Yes. Thank you, Rob. You are the last one of the commissioners. I'm going to hold Sana's introduction until it's time for presentation. Is there a commissioner that wants to read the HRC meeting and touchstones? I can do it. Okay, thank you, Steph.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yep. Be present, presume welcome, and extend welcome. Order of meeting is the commission meets to discuss the agenda first. At conclusion of meeting agenda, members of the public are invited to share comments. Raise your hand before speaking and avoid interrupting others. speak for yourself and speak your truth in ways that respect others' truths, acknowledge others' lived experience to promote human dignity, listen deeply, believe that it's possible to emerge refreshed, surprised, and less burdened, expect and accept a lack of closure when things get difficult, turn to wonder.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you so much. All right, Chief Buckley, You're up next.
[Jack Buckley]: Thank you, Francis and thanks for letting me get on the agenda early. I do apologize tonight. I have at least 1 police issue I'm dealing with and then I have to attend another public meeting. So, I will not be able to stay, but I. I felt it was important to at least attend in the beginning of this meeting tonight because I have a request. It's a need. I'm requesting to move a motion to amend last month's endorsement on the Medford City Council's resolution in support of a ceasefire related to Israel and Gaza. If this commission so votes and allows me to amend my vote, I will be looking to strike my yes vote and insert my vote to abstain. I've had much reflection on this issue since the last month, a little bit of education on the issues, some clearer understandings. It's my opinion that as Chief of Police, cannot nor should I vote on such divisive community issues such as a lot of politics are today. And I know it may not always be possible for me as Chief of Police and sitting on a Human Rights Commission to avoid the divisiveness of politics, but I have to work hard to remain neutral. And the reason is I have to provide policing services, public safety, protection of all members of our community. I want to be clear, my motion, my request for a re-vote, or for my to change my vote, it's not a motion to question the right of this Human Rights Commission to endorse, reject, or make a statement on their own. But I can say we all know each other fairly well, and many of you have known me over the past six years. We all oppose hate, especially anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, as was discussed briefly in these issues. And in some sense, everyone involved in this commission can have personal feelings and do a personal and political opinions on all of this. But I serve as a different role. I may be called to investigate crimes of antisemitism and Islamophobia. And I feel it's very, very important that I continue to remain neutral. And I ask for consideration to just promotion to vote, allow me to just amend my vote to abstain.
[Frances Nwajei]: So Chief Buckley, I just want to be clear, you're putting a motion on the floor to amend your vote to abstain from your previous vote last month regarding the Human Rights Commission's support or endorsement support for the City Council, okay? So we just need somebody else to second that motion, and if nobody seconds it, then you can go on record, Chief.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, second. and we respect that, Chief.
[Jack Buckley]: Thank you. Do we need a vote now, I believe, Diane?
[Frances Nwajei]: Yeah, it's kind of, it's a bit wordy, but I think you all know what I'm saying. So Chief Buckley's motion is to change his vote from February, I can't remember the exact date, I think it was February 14th, to amend that vote to an abstainment of the decision that was made for the HRC to support or endorse blah, blah, blah. I'll get the correct wording. But everybody just needs to go. So I'm just going to popcorn Maureen. Yay or nay? Yay. Diane? Yay. Okay, Steph? Yay. And Rob? Yeah. Okay, thank you. So I don't get to vote as you know in chief there are five of you since it's your motion everybody it's considered unanimous because you've put it forward and you have four yeas.
[Jack Buckley]: Well I just want to say thank you for the consideration and the respect and understanding at least and as it comes to this and it's not sometimes it gets difficult to separate your personal and your But having said that, I have to go. It's kind of been dramatic, but I have to go.
[Frances Nwajei]: One of those days, Chief, we get it.
[Jack Buckley]: I think my next one is in person, too, which makes it jump off and on. Thank you. It's always one of those days. I appreciate it. Have a good night.
[Frances Nwajei]: Bye-bye. Take care. All right, Sanna, thank you so much for bearing with us. Commissioners, are you all right if I bring Sanna up now and then we do meeting minutes and some of the other things after? Okay, thank you. So Sanna, over to you. Go ahead, introduce yourself and share your presentation with us.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you, members of the Human Rights Commission. My name is Sana Fadel. I'm the deputy director at Citizens for Juvenile Justice. We are a statewide organization, a statewide policy organization that advocates for young people who are at risk of or with legal system involvement. We do our work statewide, and I appreciate being able to meet with you all on this. So I'm actually here asking for your support or endorsement of legislation that deals with youth justice reforms called Raise the Age. It is a legal system reform, but I do want to talk about it because it's both an economic and racial justice issue. So this is the bill. It's a bill that was filed by Rep. O'Day from West Boylston, Rep. Cruz from Salem, and Senator Friendly from Lynn. This bill is currently pending in the Judiciary Committee, and what it does, it ends the automatic prosecution of a teenager, older teens, as adults, and moves them into the juvenile justice system. So I'm just gonna give you a little bit of background on why we even have this campaign. This campaign started several years ago, because when we looked at issues of recidivism in Massachusetts, what we saw was that young people have the highest recidivism rate of any age group. So when we talk about recidivism, there's different decision points that young people come back to the system on. So we look at two specific ones. One is rearrangement, which means you come in, you've been convicted of another crime, you've served your time, and now you're back in court again and you have a totally new crime. That's the rearrangement. The second one is reconviction. That means you've come out of the incarceration, you've come out and you have a totally new crime and you've been found guilty of it. So when we looked at this, we say, what is our legal system doing with young people? So we have two systems. One is our juvenile system, which if a young person between the ages of 12 up to 17, right before their 18th birthday, if they're in conflict with the law, they would be part of the juvenile justice system. If they're 18 and over, they wouldn't be in adult criminal justice system. This data looks at, kids who have, young people who have been incarcerated, because that's the deepest end of the system. Every point of the legal system says, are you someone that we want to keep out of society because of a crime you've been alleged to commit? And, you know, from the point of arrest all the way to sentencing, that's the question it asks. So all of these young people have been incarcerated. The legal system says, yes, we found you liable. We're going to incarcerate you. So what are we buying with that legal system, right? We're looking at do young people come out better off, less likely to commit crime. And what I want to show you here is when we look at teenagers, we're doing two very different systems have two very different outcomes. So our juvenile system does serve the incarceration quite does serve young people up until the 21st birthday. So there is some overlap. The data isn't perfect because we're looking at 18 to 24 versus 21 and under. However, overall, when we look at recidivism, young people coming out of the adult system are almost like a one and a half times more likely to be rearranged and more than double the likelihood to be reconvicted. I'm hyper on this because those are all the same young people. They're all adolescents, especially when they're talking about anybody under the age of 21, by pediatric standards, they're all adolescents. Well, not up to that age. But we have two very, so their development is the same, their offense, what they get arrested for is the same. Everything about them is the same, except how do we interact with them as a society? And that's what this campaign is about. So when we look at young people, that age group, like the 18 to 20 year olds is really the heart of this campaign. These are young people who would be in high school or they'd be just starting in college. Their brains, everything in their life is designed to learn. So wherever you put them, they're gonna learn that environment they're in. So if you put them in environments that are more toxic, that prevent them from meeting developmental milestones, you're actually increasing the likelihood of them re-offending. So things like, you know, is our intervention likely to help them or derail them from getting a job, having a family, getting a home, or having stable housing, finishing education, all of those things, if we put barriers to those, we're more likely to have them come back for totally new crime. And this is supported by research. So this pathway to desistance study came out of, It was housed in the University of Pittsburgh, but several universities were involved across the country. They tracked 1,300 young people. All of them were adolescents. Every single one of them committed a serious or violent offense. And they did monthly check-ins with them for a seven-year period. And they asked the question, why do some of these young people with these offenses desist from crime? And why do some of them persist in crime? And by the nature of the study, the offense itself is not, the severity of this offense itself is not an indicator of future offending, which is one of the things, you know, our laws are like the more serious offense, the higher the risk that you're presented to society. This, just the premise of the study says, it's actually not the case. And this is what they look for. They look for serious offense, how often they offended, socioeconomic status, education, housing, income, substance use, mental health, race, geography, family status, like everything you can possibly think of. And they found not a single one of them had an impact on future funding. Only two things did. The first was the belief in the legitimacy of authority. And the second is meeting developmental milestones on time. I will translate those into English. The first one is, do you believe that whenever you do something, that you have some kind of control of what happens to you? That the person in authority is going to treat you in what you perceive as fair? That means, every time I go to the store, will I always be followed? You know what? It doesn't matter. I've been labeled as a criminal regardless of my behavior. That is a risk factor of having someone re-effect. So when you say, and I've seen this play out in the young people I work with, they do not, it's not, it's less likely of how harsh the punishment was or the consequence was. It's the was, did I get it, was it fair? So if it was, if I perceived it as fair, even if it was harsh, I will say those young people are much more likely to start reoffending because, you know what, I knew I took that risk and I got what I deserved. That's what this means. So when we do all this work around racial justice and the criminal justice system, it is not just because it's ethical and moral and the right thing to do, it is also a public safety measure in our legal system. The second piece which is relevant for this bill is meeting developmental milestones on time. So do you have any children or adolescents in your lifetime? It means as a baby, can you feed yourself? Can you talk? Can you walk? Can you do full paragraphs? When it comes to adolescents, can you have judgment? Can you think before you act and think about the consequences? Those are all things that young people develop gradually over time. And what the researchers found was if the intervention itself blocks a young person's ability to meet those developmental milestones, they're much more likely to persist in crime. The likelier they are to meet those developmental milestones on time, the much sooner they will desist from re-offending. And those things that young people need to meet developmental milestones are education, employment or skills, family connection, physical or mental health, and civic and social engagement. So when we look at these systems, this is what we're looking at. Those systems, when you're in the adult system, you have a quarry. That's a huge barrier to education and employment. There's no impact, there is, unlike the juvenile system that looks at education as a priority, education in the adult system is pretty rare when it comes to this age population. Family connections, sorry, you're 18, you're on your own, there's no role for family, where even if you're under 21 in the juvenile system, family always has a role. Civic engagement, part of the education, our K through 12 frameworks include civic engagement. That is the kind of, if you're in DYS, that framework is in the education in DYS. So when we're talking about this, that's what we're talking about intervention. And in addition, it's also a racial justice issue. So this is looking at incarceration. Again, the data, we have pretty decent data in the juvenile system. Our adult system data is pretty lacking. So I try to do the best we can. This is looking at rates of incarceration between white men and boys compared to black men and boys. We have data on Latino kids. The federal data does not exist in a usable way. That's the only reason I only look at that. But when we look at this, we see that racial disparities for our 18 and 19-year-olds is the highest of any age group. And that's something that's consistent across the country, not just in Massachusetts. When we look at this one, we know that our legal system, and we're not saying our juvenile justice system is great, right? The difference is, Our juvenile justice system has both federal and state requirements to reduce racial disparities. So we measure it. It's still not fixed, right? Not gonna say it's there, but the requirement does not exist anywhere in the adult system. So when we look at these disparities, we have disparities where it's not just the over-representation and the sheer number, it's the collateral consequences that the class is falling disproportionately falling on young men of color. So it means you have a system that is less developmentally appropriate. So you don't get what you need to mature and get reintegrate back fully into society. The focus on punishment and rather than development means you don't get those skills as you mature. And then you have the collateral consequences that are pretty severe. So there are collateral consequences to juvenile adjudications as well as adult convictions. However, the adult conviction collateral consequences are much more significant and many of them are mandatory. So no matter what, you have those collateral consequences stick no matter what. And then when I talk about this as an economic justice issue, I'm assuming many of you know about, every sector I talk about, That we have a labor crisis, we have a labor crisis. That's always been the case. The labor crisis has actually been, and I was following what economists have been saying, they've been raising that flag at least 2016, 2017, so before COVID. What they said in Massachusetts, we have a rate of baby boomers retiring at a higher rate than young people entering into our workforce. COVID just made it worse. And the recovery from COVID, we just have not been able, there's been some recovery, but we haven't been able to get back to where we were before, where that crisis has been a long time in the coming. So the arguments are, first, let's talk about the young person themselves. If a young person is involved in an adult system, where it does not look at their education and having a quarry limits your ability to get a job. That limits that young person's own lifetime earnings potential. If you look at it from the labor market, when we say all of these young people are less likely to contribute to our labor market, that means our businesses are not able to hire. We have a labor shortage that we say, we need more young people. except those young people, right? You're not, we think those are, and this is, they're just not going to be part of the equation. They're not part of the denominator. And then when we do that, we're basically saying that group So every generation, we have a cohort of young people that just have a lifetime exclusion from fully integrating into our society. And that means us as a commonwealth don't benefit from their economic participation in our economy. And ultimately, our legal system is not an equal opportunity employer. We talked about the fact that the legal system targets low-income communities and communities of color disproportionately. That means when you look at where young people are excluded from our economy, excluded from our education and employment opportunities, they tend to be concentrated in those same communities that they come from, which means those communities, the economic potential of those communities is also diminished. And then finally, Going back to my first slide, we have a potential of reducing crime if we deal with young people in a developmentally appropriate way. Reducing crime also means we're also benefiting our taxpayers as a whole. We have less people who are victimized and require some kind of repair. Our legal system is not going to be as, you know, having all the workings of the legal system, we just won't have as much if we have, Again, it's not a criminal justice panacea, I'm not solving everything, but for those young people, shrinking that potential has an economic impact. And just conclude with just the thought that this is not new. I actually wanna say that our legal system is far behind the rest of our society in looking at young people under the age of 21 as adolescents. I started off by talking about pediatrics. Pediatricians work with young people under 21 and up to 21 and maybe sometimes older, depending on their medical needs, that's been going on for a long, long time. You can't drink, you can't smoke pot or smoke tobacco or gamble or own a gun or be a police officer until you're 21. There's also all sorts of other milestones because You can start a job at 14, you can get your driver's license at 16, but with lots of limitations until you're 18. But you can pre-register to vote because we want you to vote by 18. But then all these other things we want to delay. You can't rent a car until you're 25. You can be on your parents' health insurance until 26. Because our society does not have a hard line of adults. we have a transition to adulthood, which means things that we want young people to grow up and make up into a habit into your adulthood, we want to encourage you to do more of that younger. The younger you are, the more likely you're going to stick. Things that are a risk to yourself or to others, which we believe legal system involvement is one of those, we want to delay so that when you are more mature, you can make those decisions and it's less likely to stick. So, I'm just going to end with just what I would love for this commission to consider ways of supporting. So, like this is legislation that's out there. I shared ahead of time fact sheets about this legislation, but there's many things that you could do to support. And just so you know, I've been trying to meet with all the human rights commissions across the state, and some of them are able to endorse, and some of them are like, oh, we're part of the state government, we can, but there's other ways to support. So these are all just ideas of things you can do if this is something you want to support. They could go from formal endorsement to we'll just make some connections or we'll publicize it to let our constituents know or our residents know about it. But without us, depending on, or we can say yes, we'll support it. We'll send our legislators a letter in support. It's really up to you all. So I just want to thank you for this opportunity. This is my contact information and I would love to open up to any questions.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you so much for this presentation. It looks like one of our commissioners has dropped off. I'm not sure. I'll check in in a minute to see if they're trying to reconnect. But do our other three commissioners have any questions about this? Any questions for Sana?
[SPEAKER_05]: Hey, Sona, it's Steph. Thanks for your presentation. Hi, Sona.
[Frances Nwajei]: This is... Hi, Rob. Steph was just talking. So I'll pop on to you when Steph's done.
[SPEAKER_05]: Thank you for your presentation. When you were talking about kind of the developmental milestones, is that something that the juvenile system currently has in place or is there additional funding and or resources that would need to be added to the juvenile system in order to help support the people in under that age group in those developmental milestones?
[SPEAKER_02]: So our juvenile system has that already in place. So we've So Massachusetts has actually led juvenile justice reforms in the country since the 1970s. So we've had five decades of reforms, where we shut down all of our youth prisons back in the 70s. 90s were bad. We're just bad for the country, bad here as well. But since 2003, DYS specifically has shifted towards this positive youth development, trying to reduce incarceration, recognizing that incarceration has a harm, And it's been building up since that, like first it was like not minimizing the use of incarceration. Then it's like, oh, we need to, education has always been there, but we need to streamline our education. Now we're working on health care. Now we want to have our next strategic, our current strategic plan is around ensuring housing. So all of those things have been in there and every year it just builds up on it. But sort of the concept of positive youth development has been part of our juvenile justice system. And I was just saying not just D.Y.S., probation, the courts, the public defenders and the district attorneys. everyone looks at teenagers and says, our job is to help you mature. So, and then a lot of organizations like us exist because we need to do the advocacy to make sure that these agencies, we hold them accountable to meeting those goals. But at least those are the goals in there. So we have the expertise, we have the capacity. There is a question right now in terms of numbers. The bill itself does not have all the 18 to 20 year olds coming in all at once. We're looking at having 18-year-olds first. It's a smaller number. Building up the system, recognizing where there probably will need to be some funding shifting from the adult system into the juvenile system to meet the 19 and eventually 20-year-olds. That's the model that Vermont did. Vermont's the only state so far that has raised the age past the 18th birthday. They've had their 18-year-olds since 2020, and they're on track to include their 19-year-olds this summer.
[SPEAKER_05]: Thank you.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you, Sanaa. All right, Rob, if you can hear me.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yep, I've got you. Thank you. And apologies about the funky audio before on my end. You already answered one of my questions. It was around other states or commonwealths that have successfully implemented these types of policies. Great to hear that one of our near neighbors is doing something like this because it truly is a very important issue and change. To that end, you mentioned a few different ways that we can help you advocate and express our support. I think you said a formal endorsement or letters to folks in the legislature. Is there a resource you have available that indicates what those different options are for expressing support and advocating? And do we have them or have access to them if they do exist?
[SPEAKER_02]: So Frances, you have that one pager, right, that has the economic impact statement?
[Frances Nwajei]: Yes, I have the one pager. I was actually going to ask if the presentation would be available, because that would be nice to go with our minutes, because we do have people that could be listening in through various means that might have an interest in this.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm happy. I'm happy to send you the PDF version of that PowerPoint after this.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, that would be fabulous. Thank you so much. And then I'll get the PDF. I'll get the version out to all commissioners and I think commissioners already have the 1 page up. I can send it out again if you didn't. Anyone have any other questions.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm used to.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you so much, Sanna. I appreciate you. And I'll be in touch. Thank you all so much. I really appreciate you. Thank you. All right. Take care. All right. So we're going to pivot back to what did we miss? Somebody will need to make a motion to approve the meeting minutes from February 2024. And someone will need to second.
[SPEAKER_04]: Motion to approve last month's minutes. And I will second.
[SPEAKER_06]: Was Maureen second?
[Unidentified]: Yes, that's right.
[Frances Nwajei]: All right, fabulous. So now just a quick vote around. Diane, yay, nay, or abstain? Just a quick roll call for the approval.
[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, a roll call, yay.
[Frances Nwajei]: Yay, okay. Steph? Yay. Oh, this is so interesting, Maureen. There are two of you and one of you was delayed. One of you was walking and the other of you was already at your chair. But that's okay, yay or nay to whichever Maureen is. Immacula and Rob, yay or nay to accepting the February meeting minutes? Yay. Okay, thanks Rob. Immacula? Yes, okay, thank you. Thank you. All right. The next agenda, Diane, you requested a scribe to assist with minutes for March and April. I've already started jotting down some notes for March, so I'll just see it through. Any commissioner available to help support taking notes for April?
[SPEAKER_10]: I may not be able to make the April meeting, which I was going to talk to you about. So I can't volunteer to do it, since I probably won't be here.
[SPEAKER_05]: OK. Give it a try.
[Frances Nwajei]: All right. Thank you, Steph. Thank you, Steph. Thanks, Steph. Yeah. All right, and Sian, over to you for calendar review. I'm so sorry, I did not bring the calendar up from the folder. Do you have it?
[SPEAKER_04]: Oh, it's fine. I do have it open, so I'll just click share screen and then just pop over to my Word file. So give me one second. Can you see this, everyone? No.
[Frances Nwajei]: No, do you have the ability to share?
[SPEAKER_04]: I don't know. Oh, I thought I clicked the button. Oh, no, it says host disabled screen sharing, sorry.
[Frances Nwajei]: All right, try now.
[SPEAKER_04]: Perfect. Okay, now can you see it? Yes. So we were originally pivoting to do the commemorating Belinda event with Royal House and Slave Quarters at the end of this month for Women's History Month. However, honestly, I've been a bit underwater. This is my busiest time at work. And I also met with Kiera Singleton, and she has a lot going on. If you've been paying attention to the news, she was recruited to the City of Boston's task force on reparations. So she's been incredibly busy. We talked about a pivot to Juneteenth, which is a holiday in June. On June 19th, it falls on a Wednesday. Would you all be open to hosting the event then? It really sits well with the emancipation and also our history of slavery here in the North.
[SPEAKER_10]: So just a clarification, Diane, we're not hosting, the Royal House is hosting, right?
[SPEAKER_04]: So we would be- So we would be, right. So in the same way that we did the event last year in February for Black History Month, I don't know if I'm using the right words, Frances, so feel free to correct me because sometimes, I think last year, is it a partnership or a sponsor?
[Frances Nwajei]: The HRC would essentially be partnering with the Royal House to bring this event together. I can tell you right now that as great as the date sounds, that is the date that the West Medford Community Center is holding its observance of Juneteenth. So I would strongly encourage to either save the event until next year or look for another date because the city's raising the Juneteenth flag the day before because Juneteenth is a holiday. It's a pity that the West Medford Community Center and the Royal House went across the street from each other, where we could have this three-way partnership and do one beautiful day.
[SPEAKER_04]: It's on June 18th. If we hosted this on the 19th on the actual holiday, is that a possibility?
[Frances Nwajei]: The actual holiday is the day that the West Medford Community Center is hosting. Oh. The day before is the day that the city's raising the Juneteenth flag. Oh, okay. We raise the flag the day before because the day of, the city is closed.
[SPEAKER_10]: Okay, got it. Do you know what the hours are for the West Medford Community Center's event?
[Frances Nwajei]: I don't know at this time, but it is going to be a big event. And again, I strongly urge you not to put it on the same day. They have been, yeah, they're planning on doing... I don't want to reveal too much because it's not set in stone. It's just all part of like, you know, conversations that we're having to make sure that our events complement each other versus become... It would be like, I think it would be like a long day. I think it would be an afternoon, like maybe a 12 to four, which is when they usually, yeah. Yeah.
[SPEAKER_04]: So I'll talk to Kiara and maybe there's another pivot or maybe we put a pin in it until next year. Does that sound good, everyone? Sure. How's that sound, Francis?
[Frances Nwajei]: I mean, I think it's I think it's really up to you guys. I would support putting you know, I would support moving it on to next year or maybe there is another observance that's happened, you know, later on in the year with this, you know, where this fits. Right, right. There could be some days of significance where this fits. I'd have to look at the national today calendar to be able to provide some suggestions.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, so we'll sort it all out. So maybe I'll have an update at the next meeting. So thank you, everyone. because people actually really loved that. Yes, yes, exactly. All right, great. So then the other items on this calendar are pretty straightforward with April, there's Earth Day, and then Frances, I added in all of the upcoming Black Health series to this calendar that are being hosted at the Medford Public Library. So that's it.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, fantastic, thank you so much for that, Diane. I just, I wanted to make sure all the commissioners gave some sort of signal as to being okay with moving this off the table for right now for the month of June, the Belinda Sutton event. Is that okay with all of you? Sure, yeah. All right, so So Diane and Francis, we'll look at other dates. I'll share some suggestions and then I'll just send it out to the team so that you're prepared for the April meeting. Because remember, you go on holiday after the June meeting and you don't come back again till September. Okay, Maureen, I think I have three minutes before Attorney Austin is scheduled to join us. So I'm going to bring you up to talk about PRIDE.
[SPEAKER_10]: Yeah, this was actually a very small item. I was just there was a mention at the last meeting that we had been involved in sponsoring a pride event in the past. And I was just curious as to what that was. I couldn't find anything on the city calendar or so I was just trying to seek information about it. And I didn't know if anybody knew that was my only admission at that point. It seems like a logical thing to be involved with. but I'm not proposing anything. It may even be too late to try to do something this year. Does anybody have any background on that?
[Frances Nwajei]: So the HRC did not sponsor a pride event. In 2022, when the city hosted its first annual board-based events, the HRC selected two members to write a statement to read during the pride flag raising. And that was after some negotiation, so I think those, you know, you can go back. I want to say April, April, April, 2022. And may 2022 meeting footage. You will see, but it was really just being part of the speakers series during the flag raising. And so that is something that the HRC can think through. If the HRC wants a far greater part, if the HRC wants a minimal part. But bear in mind when you say sponsorship, it means that you are actually doing something. So i.e. you are buying the food. So like the lunch is sponsored by the HRC or you are actually hosting the event. So that's separate. but if the HRC is interested in having a part during the flag raising, that by all means is something that you can discuss and let me know how you envision your involvement.
[SPEAKER_10]: One of the things I was trying to look for and I couldn't find it on the city calendar this year was any mention of even any city activity going on. Where might I find that?
[Frances Nwajei]: You wouldn't find it on the calendar because I work with the mayor's schedule and this year Pride is actually on a Saturday, which makes things more difficult. Pride month kicks off on a Saturday. So if the mayor is not available, well City Hall is closed on Saturday and you know having a flag raising on a Saturday is much more difficult. I also like to be very intentional. with these events. It's not just about people getting together. You know, there has to be purpose and meaning. So there are different people that I connect with behind the scenes. Once I get from a date from the mayor that, yeah, mayor will be available that day, that time, certain timeframe, then I now have to connect all the other dots behind the scenes and move things around and tweak things around before we can say, okay, this is a firm yes. But the city would, I can definitely say that the city would be looking to not, I would just say, save the day pride flag raising slash event and leave it at that for March 31st. You know, which it sounds, you know, it sounds silly, but there are other people beyond these groups. There's my DPW crew. I have to make sure that they're ready, that the signs, the paint has not chipped and they're repainted and we got new paint and somebody's putting those signs up first thing in the morning. So there are lots of things that go on behind the scenes before that date is on the email. I mean, it's on the calendar. I don't know as far as what the city did before. I don't know. But that's how it's worked in the past 2 years.
[SPEAKER_10]: So, I guess what I would just like to. Suggest is that perhaps not for this year. It seems very. I don't know up in the air I can't quite wrap my head around it perhaps I would say that it would be good if this body did something next year then if we can if it's too late for this year or unsure what's going sounds all very unsure. We could. do something ourselves, I'm assuming. We wouldn't have to do it around what the city parameters are. And so I'm just suggesting to my colleagues that in fact, it's something we think about that we could do next year, either finding other nonprofit groups, or I don't know if there's any interest. I'm kind of looking to everybody to see if there's any interest at all in trying to pull something together. This all seems, you know, right now it seems like I'm not sure. sort of like when we try to schedule something, it's the coordination of all these other groups kind of, you know, provides more of a challenge.
[Frances Nwajei]: Is any- Yes, Maureen, I'm actually unsure of what the actual ask is. Are you, because you're saying things seem up in the air. I just want to be clear that the flag raising that the city has hosted for the last two years is not up in the air. That is actually happening. So before we have people that are listening and people that could be listening through other means, I want to make sure that that is very, very clear. The reason that you don't see a date yet is because this year it falls on a weekend. So I have to shift tactics. But the Human Rights Commission is more than welcome to A, do something on its own, be a part of the city event as it has in the past, or support other needs?
[SPEAKER_10]: Okay, I'm just asking my colleagues whether or not they would be interested in doing something perhaps next year on our own. I don't know whether any, or maybe, you know, I'm just,
[SPEAKER_05]: throwing it I can I can yeah so I think either for participating in what the flag raising this year as a individual and then for next year yeah looking at something another partnership opportunity we can certainly see if that can evolve next year I'm I'm open and with you on that Maureen yeah
[SPEAKER_10]: And I think it would be great if we can participate any way we can this year once it's clear, like kind of when it's gonna be or the hours or whatever. Okay, great. I would love to just work on what we might be able to do.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah, and I'm in full support of helping out at this year's event and helping out at next year's. And if I recall correctly, Frances, I think last year, You choreographed a lot of events throughout June across the city to lift up Pride, right?
[Frances Nwajei]: Yep. In 2022 and 2023, Pride is a month-long celebration. Pride is celebrated in June, but really Pride is actually an October thing, which is why certain states actually celebrate Pride in October. So it's a lot deeper than just raising a flag. There is a civil rights component to that. And if I'm being true to my role and the body of my professional work, great. I recognize the civil rights movement. And behind that, pride, the disability rights, you're all linked in one way, shape, or form. So when we have a month-long event, for me, it is important to have something that is happening throughout that month. It doesn't necessarily mean that I have to do all the activities, but even if we're compiling a calendar that, you know, showcases and gives people options of different things that are happening in the 02155, I think that it is also healthy helpful for those that are healing through traumas that have been caused by being a member of the LGBTQ community, or people who think they might want to come and live in Mexico, right? Since I've been here, those two years, it has happened every, you know, something has happened every, at least every week, if not twice a week. But I haven't done, I haven't been responsible for every single one.
[SPEAKER_10]: The first year, yes, but the second... I think that's what I was trying to get at, something more than a flag raising. Not that the flag raising isn't great, but I was just wondering if this group would be interested in, you know, taking a look at perhaps something else that we might be able to do through June next year. And I think at least one person has a couple of people have suggested that they're interested. So that would be great.
[Frances Nwajei]: Put that on the agenda. I'm going to say, and I'm going to leave it to you to put it like on the calendar. I'm going to put it on the in the parking lot so that we have it continuously rotate. But attorney Austin is with us now, and I'd like to turn it over to attorney Austin of KP law. For a review on open meeting laws and a discussion on the same topic as you all should have already received the 48 page document of the updated open meeting law. So I hope you have your questions ready and yeah.
[Austin]: Thank you all for having me here this evening. And thank you, Francis, as well. Nice to see all of you. Thought it was a good opportunity. As you know, there's a new attorney general in office and the attorney general's office has recently updated its open meeting law guide. I always think it's a good idea to do a little refresher, both to members that have served for a while, but also to any new members and really just provide sort of the basics of open meeting law. We are seeing across the state just an increase in open meeting law questions and complaints. I say that just so everyone's really cognizant of the landscape that we live in, particularly in an environment that thrives on the use of technology. I handle a lot of open meeting law matters with cities and towns throughout the entire Commonwealth, and I've done that work really since 2006. I want this to be a really informal session, you know, be able to answer anyone's questions. Certainly I can provide an overview and I know Francis has distributed some materials as well. I always start and I think about open meeting training or an overview very chronologically from. the meeting notice being posted to the approval of the meeting minutes. And so that's really how I think about it in terms of a continuum. So we have the notice, we know that anything discussed by a quorum of a public body such as yourself needs to be done generally in what we call open session, not executive session, which means open to members of the public to be able to see your work in real time. And that can be done on Zoom as we're on tonight. It can be done in person. We do have an extension of the remote order that started in 2020, now four years ago, until March 31st, 2025. And there is a lot of pending legislation that we think will kind of go from there to extend it. There's a lot of negotiations. in terms of what processes should be in place to continue that. And so we're closely monitoring that and we'll keep you all updated. But for right now, we can meet on Zoom. And so we start with the agenda. Everything has to be put on the agenda with reasonable specificity in terms of what should be discussed. And what does that mean? Well, it means that a member of the public sitting at home would pick up or look at the meeting notice on their screen and really analyze Do I want to go to this meeting? Is this a topic that I would like that I'm interested in? Do I want to see the open and transparent discussion of this particular topic? So, I always say we do work when you work, or you volunteer for a community, you understand the language that's used or an acronym for instance, that's used, but we want to really be, you know. present information to members of the public so that they can, you know, decide on their own whether they want to participate. So that's sort of the fundamentals of the meeting notice. We know that it, unless there's an emergency, it has to be posted 48 business hours in advance and really ensure that there's, you know, not discussion that isn't otherwise posted in terms of the public body's business. So that's sort of the overview on meeting notices. Then we get to deliberation and what is discussed at a meeting. We know that absent reasons to go into executive session, and I'm happy to answer any questions on that. We know that the public body's business has to be conducted in open session. And that means that any quorum of the public body can't discuss matters either in a group or serially one member to another to another member. outside of a properly posted meeting. And if we step back, you know, the public records law and the open meeting law are both the purpose of that is to, you know, we call them sunshine laws to increase transparency and ensure members of the public know what's happening in their communities. And so to that goal, we are seeing an increase given the use of technology. I always caution And this is just an overview, so we're not going to get into any specifics tonight. But I always caution about not using email or cell phone or text to communicate with fellow members. There are legal implications for that, both under the open meeting law and the public records law. So just to be cognizant of that. And we do have a lot of guidance from the Attorney General's Division of Open Government on that particular point. including many determinations for many years now that say one member emailing or texting another member and then responding to that either serially or again in a group format outside of a properly posted meeting could constitute a deliberation. So just to be something to be aware of. In terms of votes and discussions, we know that the public body's business is conducted by a quorum of the public body. And without a quorum, certainly the business can't be conducted in its full nature. The Attorney General's Office does recommend that if there isn't a quorum, that the meeting not be conducted and be postponed to another time in which a quorum of the public body can meet and gather, either in person or remotely, whatever the preferences of the Commission. And then from there, we know that meeting minutes have to be drafted and timely approved. We usually say that's about within the next 30 days or three meetings, whichever is earlier based on your schedule of meetings. But certainly, again, similar to with the meeting notice or the agenda, care should be taken that someone sitting at home would pick up a copy of the meeting minutes and really understand what took place. We know it has to have some basic facts, you know, the date and the time of the meeting, the members present or absent. If you're meeting remotely, it has to be done by roll call vote, any votes taken. And again, someone, I call it the four corners rule, someone picking up those meeting minutes and really understanding what votes were taken, what was conducted, you know, would someone have a sense of really what transpired at that meeting? And then from there, those meeting minutes are subject to the open meeting law and the public records law. They can certainly be requested by members of the community. If there is an executive session, there's a separate process for those meeting minutes. But again, they should be both accurate and detailed in the manner in which they're put together. I am happy to answer any specifics. I know this is a public meeting. So I always say where we're this is for general informational purposes. And if there are specific questions you have where we serve as legal counsel to the city, I would just ask that you correspond either directly with me or through Francis, relative to those specific questions, given the privileged nature, but happy to answer or provide an overview of any topic.
[Frances Nwajei]: Janelle, thank you so much for that. You've mentioned executive session a couple of times, and since I've been in this space, I've not had to take the meetings to executive sessions. Could you share a little differently for people who may be joining us or who may not be familiar with what an executive session is and why an executive session would be called and some of the parameters that would take place if we were to go into executive session using virtual technology, which we didn't have. Sure.
[Austin]: Good question. We start from the proposition, so to speak, that the public body needs an open session. Again, transparent sunshine laws. There are enumerated reasons, and I can provide a summary to all the members through Francis, of the specific reasons in which a public body may enter into executive session. An executive session is really a secret or confidential session where basically the legislature has decided that there are confidentiality or privacy considerations at stake, and we'll talk about what that means, warranting a non-public discussion of a specific topic. I will say that that is, they're very narrowly construed in my opinion. So for instance, is there pending litigation that may impact, if publicly discussed, the commission's litigation position? and there's a determination that a public discussion of that would impact the case or a potential case. Is there a specific complaint at issue that would trigger someone's privacy rights? That would be purpose one. And if that's the case, you do need to provide notice to that individual. Usually we see that more in the employment context. Is there a specific law that requires you to meet an executive session. And one of those reasons is review of your executive session meeting minutes. We know that you can meet an executive session to review those. So they are very, very narrowly tailored. An executive session does need to be posted just in the same way that an open session is posted, 48 hours, 48 business hours in advance, unless there's an emergency. And essentially, you need to meet and post an open session and an executive session. You start your meeting in open session, you go through your open session and members of the public can then see you voting to adjourn to go into executive session. How it's done using an electronic or virtual platform like Zoom, like we're on tonight, is usually there's a public open session through the chair, you know, the board, the commission votes and says, we're going to enter into executive session. There's a roll call vote done. And then there's either a breakout room that's conducted or a separate Zoom link that's provided. And then assurances are on the tech side, so to speak, made that there's no members of the public given the confidentiality at stake. And then those meeting minutes for an executive session remain confidential or not subject to public disclosure under the open meeting law until that purpose of the executive session expires. And depending on the nature of the discussion, it could be fairly quick if you have litigation that resolves, for instance, for some public bodies, or it could be much longer, depending on what the privacy interests are that are implicated. Thanks, Frances. Thank you, Janelle. Thank you. Any other questions or topics, for instance? I know there's usually a lot of questions about electronics Discuss our electronic, the use of electronics. So happy to go over that or if there's any other topic that anyone would like guidance on. I know it's a, I know you've been provided with a copy of the guide, but there's a lot to digest.
[SPEAKER_08]: Just very generally speaking, one of the challenges we sometimes run into is that... Hold on one second.
[Frances Nwajei]: I'm so sorry, Rob. Maureen had unmuted and raised. I don't know, is anybody else sensing a delay of some sort? Okay, you're good. No, Rob, go ahead. Okay, go ahead, Rob, and then Maureen.
[SPEAKER_08]: Thanks, Maureen. I'll be quick. Just thinking about email information that may come out, and then if there's something that we want to respond to the group as a whole. To this point, we've refrained from doing that for fear of running afoul of the open meeting rules, given that it's such a narrow and contained communication, not typically a deliberation. Curious to get your input. on if that's appropriate or something we should continue to refrain from doing. Again, the example would be, you know, some piece of information is sent out, we want to reply to the whole group. And at this point, we're replying to Frances, and then she's communicating back to the group, is that the process we need to be following?
[Austin]: Good question. So what the Attorney General's Office would say is under the open meeting law, the only appropriate use of email by or among a forum of the public body should be limited to scheduling purposes. Are you available on March 13th for a meeting at six o'clock? Are you available at this particular time? Any expression of the opinion, even if it's sharing materials, and someone replies, I think this is a good idea, has the potential to constitute an open meeting law violation. If there's discussion of you know, should we meet on this particular, you know, can we put this on the meeting agenda? Perhaps that email goes to Francis and the chair. In terms of communicating about documents, I have seen determinations where that can, depending on how substantive, but I think any expression of opinion or belief can give rise to an open meeting law violation. It's pretty strict. And the thought process behind that is, and usually we're all busy and we all use email and communications for a lot of things, is it can somehow devolve into a substantive conversation or members can form opinions based on other members' positions over email that the public doesn't have the opportunity to see. So I always talk about best practices. In my opinion, the best practice in that case would be to only communicate you know, directly to Francis or to maybe Francis and one other member, but that there can't be forwarding back and forth on any sort of opinion based email. And I understand it's hard. You know, the question comes in all the time, like, can we, you know, can people use Google document sharing or can we, you know, everyone is so used to using technology and the open meeting are really wants business to be conducted like this. So members of the public can see. Does that answer your question, Rob? It does, thank you.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, great. I'm sorry, just very quickly. There's a lot of information that comes through like a commissioner, whether it's this commissioner or another commission could be somewhere and see an upcoming training or see something that they feel the group would be interested in. Usually that information is sent to me or it's in my inbox somehow. I send it out. to all and I CC the sender and I say sharing on behalf of so and so, no response needed, feel free to register if you're interested. And I know sometimes people feel like I'm shutting them down because I say no response needed, but it's just, I don't even need a received to a reply all. And that is so that we can avoid just even the most innocent, oh my gosh, I went to that event, it was great. because that is where the opinion comes in.
[Austin]: Or something as innocent as, I think this event was great and I really think it would be beneficial to the city and we should think about implementing it. Then someone else replies all saying, I agree with that. That in and of itself is expression of opinion. In that case, I think the best practice would be to have Francis send it out And then some public bodies that I work with have language at the bottom, which is due to open meeting law considerations, please do not reply all. And that can serve as a reminder, sort of a gentle reminder to people that it's not that people don't want to respond or provide feedback to constituents or residents in the community, but really that it would be something to be discussed at an upcoming meeting. And sometimes it's something on an agenda that says training opportunities or commissioners updates. And then there'll be a section for that where this can, you know, these types of matters can be discussed and members of the public can see that discussion. Some public bodies also will list, you know, correspondence between meetings and then they'll list different correspondence that comes in. And then again, there can be discussion amongst the members in terms of that particular correspondent. So that's another option as well. But many, many public bodies I work with have that cautionary language at the bottom of their meeting or any email to say, please, you know, please refrain from responding exactly like that, because it can, it can be very inadvertent, but it can, if someone does a public records request, and then They see several people responding to it. Was it an open meeting law violation? So all things to be acutely aware of. Maureen, did you have a question?
[SPEAKER_10]: Yes, I did. I actually have a couple, but I'll take what I want to get in the way of anyone else. So I did read through, you know, the open meeting law that Francis connected us to. And I didn't see any mention of what I will call a committee. So take, for example, that we decide that there is a particular event we want to plan or something that is going to be sponsored. And two people, less than the majority decide that they are going to work on this. We can't get a lot done in an hour and a half once a month. It's kind of frustrating that we don't have a lot of time. Is that subject to open meeting law if in fact the intent, there are less people than majority and the intent is to provide information to the greater body at the next meeting so that deliberation can take place?
[Austin]: So what the attorney general's office would analyze that question through is whether or not a subcommittee has been created by a public body. And so usually it doesn't matter if it's a quorum of the main public body, if there's members that form, and it can be, you know, it doesn't have to be a subcommittee formally, it can be a working group, a task force, any type of, subset of the committee, if there's a vote to say, we're going to have Rob and Maureen work on this particular event, you're now making a subcommittee or a working group, which is then likely subject to the public records law, right? You know, certainly people need to understand and be able to get work done. Some communities I work with will designate one particular, there'll be a public meeting and they'll say, Maureen is gonna work on this particular point, Rob is gonna work on this particular point, and then we'll come back together at our next meeting and regroup. But if there's a particular decision by a public body to then delegate that work to a subset of that public body, then the open meeting law would likely apply in my opinion.
[SPEAKER_10]: So you're saying that, let me just clarify, you're saying that if this body said we vote for Maureen and Rob to work on this, that would be subject to open meeting. If they didn't take a vote, but they said, yeah, Maureen, why don't you look into it? Can they say Maureen and Rob can take it?
[Austin]: Well, I think we need to look at it. I think we need to look at it pretty liberally. I mean, the only exception would be if the mayor, right, who is not subject to the open meeting law, said I'm going to have, you know, Francis and Maureen and Rob work on something on my behalf, right? It comes down to, and I'm happy to research this and provide some written guidance, but it essentially comes down to what work, what is the purpose? The purpose in that case would be to advise the entire public body, right? In your sort of hypothetical example, And I think in light of that, the attorney general's office would say that a working group or a subcommittee has been created invoking the provisions of the open meeting law. I'm happy to research if it's one member or two members, but it's pretty broad in terms of its application and it flows. I always think about it like a flow chart, like who is creating this working group? And because of how public body is creating it, if you have yourself or maybe Francis is working with you, it is likely subject to the requirements of the open meeting law.
[SPEAKER_10]: I was thinking though that the group was not necessarily the purpose was to advise, but to bring back research, which is not, I don't think the same as advising. I'm not saying that they would take a stand and say, okay, we've done the research and we think you should do this. It's more like, They've, it's like what committees do a lot. They don't necessarily, but you're saying even that would imply that they're advising and therefore, but so if we did that, we could say to people, give 48 hour notice, invite them to this gathering of two people to talk about, an event and then we would be okay. Then we would go forward and then bring any information that we may have pulled together to the overall body.
[Austin]: Yes, so I would essentially I would draw your attention to page seven of the Attorney General's guide that goes through what constitutes a public body. And the Attorney General, she has specifically said that while there's no comprehensive list of public bodies, any multi-member board, commission, committee, or subcommittee within executive or legislative branches. This includes any multi-member body created to revise or make recommendations to a public body. So it's pretty broad. And then this is what I was saying in terms of who is that group reporting back to. And again, there's only exceptions usually for like a working group, a school superintendent would establish or the mayor because they themselves are not subject to the provisions of the open meeting law.
[SPEAKER_10]: But the critical thing is that the body, whatever you call it, is in fact making a recommendation. That's what I keep hearing you say. But if you're just, if it's not a recommendation, if it's research, you're saying that that in itself is a recommendation?
[Austin]: Well, we'd have to research where the line is drawn, but I can tell you in my experience in dealing with open meeting law complaints for our task groups and working groups, it's pretty broad in terms of what that applies to. I do have specific determinations on that point, so I'm happy to share them with Francis so that you all can get some real clarity on the direction for that. If that's something that's of interest, Maureen, I'm happy to do that.
[SPEAKER_10]: Okay, I had one other question and that is what I read was it said that minutes were to be made available to public within 10 days, whether they have been approved or in draft form. And so my question is. How are those made available? And I'm wondering whether the opening law determines that. For example, our meeting moments are not on the website of the city. So for example, as a new member, if I wanted to know what went on in June, or if I was a member of the public and say, gee, what did they talk about? I'm not quite sure where the acceptable place is with where they would be and whether or not yeah I mean that's the main thing and and the other thing is if they're made be whether or not they've been approved or in draft form then we would then they then would be replaced with the finally approved uh minutes once they are approved yes so the minutes are drafted I don't know how you all
[Austin]: designate who's going to draft them, if people take turns or there's one person that drafts them, but the minutes would be drafted. And when they're drafted, even if they're not approved, which we know is a requirement under the open meeting law, if they're in draft form and a member of the public sent a public records request or request under the open meeting law for those minutes, even if they're not approved, sometimes you meet once a month, those minutes would need to be provided in draft form. They are public records, so any record, let me step back, any record created or received by a city employee, official, volunteer, board member, commission member, committee member, is subject to the public records law. That includes documents created on your personal computer, it includes text messages, it includes emails, as long as it relates to city business. And so someone from the public says, usually they'll send it to the law department and say, you know, Janice, who's a records access officer, I would like a copy of these meeting minutes. If they're in draft form, Janice would reach out to you and say, do you have a copy of these meeting minutes? Oh, we do, they're only in draft form. Okay, here they are, right? Assuming they're open session and not executive session minutes. Once they're approved, if the same request comes in and the meeting minutes are approved, then the member of the public would get those approved meeting minutes. There is not a requirement to put those meeting minutes on the city's website. Some communities do. Some put not all of their minutes online. It's usually an exercise in municipal resources. But that being said, they are still subject to the public records law and the open meeting law.
[SPEAKER_10]: So that means that if somebody wants something, they have to request it. That's the short answer of it.
[Austin]: Correct. So there's two pieces here. One, there's the requirement under the open meeting law to draft, approve, and approve those meeting minutes. And that's under the open meeting law. Then the other piece is, yes, a member of the public can request them, and it would be subject to the requirements of the public records law and the open meeting law.
[SPEAKER_10]: Okay, so there's no requirement about where that might be. It just requires people to go to the city and say, I would like these minutes, please. So that's what I would have to do if I want to look at minutes from last year. I would have to formally request them.
[Austin]: I mean, yes, or I don't know who has, I don't know who has the meeting minutes, but you would be able to, yeah, I mean, usually you wouldn't have to do a formal public records request for those, but, you know, I think that can be handled internally as a, you know, a member of the public body, Maureen, but I think we want to, there usually is kind of consistency because the minutes must be maintained permanently. And you might want to just check in terms of, you know, their filing and whether they're filed or what the practice has been with regard to that.
[SPEAKER_10]: I was actually thinking more of the general public and not so much of myself. You know, somebody said, gee, I'd like to see what what they're doing. I'm just trying to figure out how people find them. That's all.
[Austin]: Yeah, and I think there's usually I see it come in either through a specific public records request to the records access officer or alternatively to the chair of the public body under the open law for a request for those meeting minutes that usually has. how I see those come in.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, thanks. So I just want to clarify and state that the minutes are stored in three different places. So you have the electronic version, which takes a little bit longer because that goes to Medford Community Media. So you've got that, that's our video footage. But the city clerk, what happens is at the end of this meeting, I, you know, if the minutes have been approved, I mean if the notes have been approved and there are no changes, I go down to the hall, I stamp the pages with the date stamp, I make seven copies. eight copies now and I take one. One remains here with me and the original and the rest of the copies are with the city clerk. One is always at the city clerk's office. Anybody can show up and request to review meeting minutes. I can only speak from April of 2022 to this point. But what I haven't been very good at are the notes. I usually send your drafts out as notes and then they convert to meetings. So that's something that we'll all have to like um start tying in. That clarify for you Maureen? All right Rob and then Diane.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, thank you. And I'll be quite quick, I guess to the root of the conversation around subcommittees and recommendations and information sharing. Curious to know what the guidance would be from the Attorney General's office on how to make any progress with aspects that. fall within the remit of the commission outside of the 90 minutes that we meet once a month? What would be the office's recommendation for making any progress on those items between sessions?
[Austin]: So I think if there are a group of members that want to individually or in a group work on things in the interim, that would be done in consultation with You know, non public body members so city staff and certainly there's always the option of 2 or 3 members want to get together to have these working group sessions. I would just note that they would be public right? And subject to the open meeting law. Alternatively, I think. It would be the recommendation or best practice to just schedule additional meetings. Um, but obviously that's a policy decision that members would need to, um, to vet in terms of moving things based on their schedules, et cetera. Um, there are some public bodies that will meet, you know, particularly busy times of the year will meet more regularly. And then we'll change the meeting schedule based on if there's, you know, significant work that needs to be done, but those are some different options. And there is always, like I said, the option to have people do work kind of on their own or with a non-public body member, and then report back to the full public body as necessary.
[SPEAKER_08]: Got it. I think one of the challenges we run into there is that the meeting schedules articulated pretty specifically in our founding bylaws. Would it be fair to interpret that as a minimum rather than specific guidance?
[Austin]: Sure. I mean, I think that I can certainly look at the bylaw establishing establishing the public body to see what the flexibility is but in terms of open meeting while compliance all it would require is in is posting right and notice to the public to schedule additional meetings. And so, you know, we can, we can look at the bylaw language. I'm happy to do that and report back to Francis on that particular point. But from an open meeting law perspective, as long as it's posted in a timely manner, and there are some public bodies that will post and then cancel, right, if they don't have a quorum, or they'll post and say, we really don't need this meeting. So we're going to cancel it. But at least it's kind of on the book, so to speak, Rob. And again, sometimes there's ebbs and flows in terms of how busy a public body is at any particular point of the year.
[SPEAKER_08]: Got it. Thank you. Yeah, if you could take a look at that, that'd be great.
[Austin]: Yeah, I'm happy to do that.
[SPEAKER_06]: All right, Diane.
[SPEAKER_04]: Thank you. Great. So I noticed you flagged Google sharing when you were giving your presentation, and I just wanted you know, crystal clear clarity on that, because I have noticed in my research of other human rights commissions in the state that they appear, you know, they post their minutes, you know, nicely organized in folders by years and months. I've heard that some will collaborate, you know, they'll post the meeting in advance, and then they'll use a Google Doc to collaborate. on making a special statement or something. I just wanted to get really clear on what the rules are on sharing via Google. Perhaps if the Google Drive was disclosed on the Human Rights Commission webpage, would that solve having sunlight? I would just like to understand that.
[Austin]: So this is obviously a newer evolving technology that we've seen in the past several years. And, you know, in my opinion, and in light of the open meeting laws, enforcement, and also the guidance that we've reviewed to date, any collaboration in terms of a Google Doc could constitute an improper deliberation if it's either done at the same time, but more likely using Google Docs or any sort of collaboration tool, it would be in a serial fashion. So the example I always use is, there's a particular set of meeting minutes, for instance, and Rob goes in first and makes his changes. And then Diane goes in and makes her changes, but you can see Rob's changes and then all of this is done, not at a public meeting. And so then, by the time you get to the meeting, you've seen other or other public body members opinions on those particular. meeting minutes. And so what the open meeting law requires is that really someone can draft the meeting minutes or draft a document, but the discussion and the deliberation about a particular document should really be done, again, in open session so that members of the public can see the deliberative process of the public body itself. The technology is tricky, Diane.
[Frances Nwajei]: Technology is tricky and I know I came from a, we don't use Google anything. So I've just really, really stuck to that. There are concerns with Google and now as we have AI, so my ADA side is like, yes, we have improved accessibility, we have this. My DEI side is like, oh no. So it's a battle right now and there are, There are so many great things, and there are so many not so great things, and I just want somebody to help make a decision so that I'm like, okay, this is what we're doing. Do any of the commissioners have further questions? Because we do have members of the public present, and I would love to open up the opportunity for them to ask their questions. I see no questions from the commissioners. Barry, would you like to go ahead and ask your question?
[Barry Ingber]: I was hoping that somebody else would just read it. I actually have to go and it seemed to just highlight the sort of questions that Rob was bringing up. Could you just introduce yourself, please? I'm Barry Ingber. I live in North Medford. But regarding the Google documents, I wonder if that view would change if that document was publicly accessible so that the public could view the deliberations as they took place.
[Austin]: I don't think my opinion would change on that. And the reason why is because even though the public may be able to view the comments in real time, it wouldn't be something that was posted in accordance with the open meeting law. And so members of the public would essentially have to go on the Google Drive or go online, you know, just repeatedly to see if anyone has updated a particular document. And so I go back to the chronological view of the open meeting law that starts you know, first and foremost with that meeting notice and agenda to alert members of the public, this is the public body's business, this is what will be conducted. And so absent that to kind of, you know, essentially analyze whether or not a member of the public would wanna do it, you would essentially shift the onus to members of the public to say, here's the website, this may or may not happen at any given time. And so that would be problematic in my opinion, under the open meeting laws requirements. Good question. And I do have the other question in here, and I'm happy to read it. Francis, if that works for you. Hypothetically, a location needs to be found for an event. Rob and Steph volunteer to look into options but not make a decision. They need to coordinate their outreach so they don't call the same venues. Is that subject to the open meeting law? So let's play this out, best practice. There's a meeting like tonight, and Rob and Steph each volunteer. They, it's not a quorum of the public body in terms of communicating it, but the public can see that they have both volunteered for that. And so they would each do their own independent work, right? And then report back to the full public body in terms of next steps. And I'm happy to provide, of the top five questions I get, the biggest, I would say number two is probably working groups, subcommittees. and task forces. So I understand it's very difficult for people to navigate. So I'm happy to follow up with some specific determinations to show you the fact patterns that come into play so you can perform your functions, right? Because it is very complicated. And the Attorney General's Office has issued some really good guidance on that to help public bodies be able to do their work.
[SPEAKER_10]: Because we have that situation tonight even where we talked about should we in fact plan next year to do something for pride month. Two people on this committee are interested in looking in that. So what does that require? First of all, find out what's happening in the city. Second of all, What are some of the ideas that we could come up with? And then to, in fact, continue to work and report to this group about what we have found, not what we've determined, but what we have found is. Is that again, do we have to do it separately and then come back? Is that what you're saying?
[Austin]: Yes, so you would do it separately and coordinate or communicate you know, through Francis really, in terms of providing updates and then report back to the entire public body in terms of next steps.
[SPEAKER_10]: Kind of interesting, because it doesn't really build community at all.
[Austin]: It just sort of separates. I know.
[SPEAKER_10]: I think it's really discouraging.
[Austin]: The goal is really, again, to have, we know that public comment isn't technically required under the open meeting law, but what we know is that the open meeting law, and this has come up, you know, millions of times in the past four years, the public is entitled to be able to observe what transpires, you know, in essentially real time. And so the goal is really to be able to balance all of that. But let me, I'll circulate that particular guidance so everyone's clear in terms of what the line is in work that can be done. amongst a non quorum portion of the public body, of course, and that way you'll have some specific guidance on that Maureen.
[Frances Nwajei]: Like, I just wanted to give another example. If you remember, last month, Diane attended, we all received the same information as part of the Massachusetts Human Rights Coalition. There was a Zoom thing that they were doing. Diane attended on her own. Diane didn't email the committee. Diane didn't ask Frances if she could attend. Diane attended on her own, but Diane said, Renters, can you put me on the agenda? I want to share my experience. Any commission member is able to do that. You don't have as much of the different types of conference or training opportunities that are external as my other commission because there's stuff that the MBTA is doing and some of them are, more interested in that. So if I get it, I email it out and people go on their own. They reach out to me to ask to be put on the agenda if they feel like they have something valuable that they want to share with the rest of the other commissioners. Or sometimes they'll say to me, Frances, can you share this? I can't make this time, but maybe one of my commissioners can. And that's when you'll get the sharing on behalf of so-and-so, no need to respond. email.
[Austin]: And I think just to be clear, too, in my opinion, if all of you wanted to go to a training opportunity, you could. That doesn't run afoul of the open meeting law. I'm sure you're all very involved in the city and in community events. And you're certainly allowed to do that. You know, you one have First Amendment rights to do that. And two, you know, the open meeting law doesn't prohibit that. You know, you can go to a social gathering or a city event. The line is really, you know, are members of a public body deliberating on topics outside of that meeting? And so I've seen numerous complaints over the years that say, well, these two people were at this community event, you know, honoring this individual. Um, but I saw them whispering in the hallway. And so I know they were talking about something that they should have been talking about at a meeting, right. Or these people were at a social gathering, but, you know, it appeared that they were talking where I overheard something about X, Y, or Z, and that shouldn't have happened. Um, and so it's really just, or there's a conference and many of you are interested in the topic professionally, personally. And so you may go to that. That's fine. I mean, you're allowed to go to training opportunities. The question is really, are there, does it kind of cross the line, so to speak, in terms of discussing matters that are pending within your jurisdiction as members at this point? So I just wanted to make sure that was clear too. The open meeting law tries to balance people, you know, balance all of this as best as it can. Good questions.
[Frances Nwajei]: Thank you, Janelle. Does anybody else have any questions? Any commissioners? Okay, I only see two members of the public with us. Do those two members of the public have any questions in regards to the open meeting law? What constitutes a forum? When meetings get to be canceled? Okay, I don't see any hands raised. So at this time, it is 709. Atty. Austin, thank you so much for your time and your explanation.
[Austin]: Thank you, it was nice seeing you all. I will follow up on the bylaw question and the subcommittee working group question as well. It was nice seeing you all. And if you need anything, Frances has my contact information. I'm always happy to discuss any questions you have. I thank you for your time this evening. Have a good night. Thank you so much. Take care. Thank you.
[SPEAKER_08]: You as well.
[Frances Nwajei]: Okay, so it's a lot to digest, but I hope that we can You know, the document was a lot because I had to, I was under a deadline in which to read it to make sure that I didn't have any questions in case you had questions before the attorney could get here. But, you know, try to digest the information and think about it from a perspective of trying to be more transparent with the community in terms of how we do our work. If we get caught in the mindset of, oh, we only have X number of meetings or we can't do this, then we'll actually create the barriers ourselves that will prevent us from doing stuff. Again, the agenda is open for all, right? We don't need three people to find out who is doing what event. If Frances is passionate about something, Frances can go and check that thing out and then ask to be put on the agenda and give feedback. It doesn't always have to be done in groups. And if we get to a place where we need bigger subcommittees, working groups, and we need additional meetings as long as those meetings are posted with ample notice. It's really more about the transparency and the accessibility that the public has. So I hope you found that helpful. Does anyone have any other questions? I'm just keeping an eye on the time because I got to run down to the clerk's office before 7.30. If not, our stamp will be for tomorrow's date.
[SPEAKER_06]: Can I say something? Okay. I thank you all. All right, Immacula. I think, yeah. Okay. I say thank you all and the meeting tonight is very, very good.
[Frances Nwajei]: okay thank you so much all right thank you all right so at this um at this point i'm going to hit the stop record meet uh button uh but prior to doing that somebody needs to call the adjournment motion to adjourn the meeting i so called for adjournment of the meeting okay who's seconding i second Thank you, Steph. Does anybody really want to stay on all night? OK. I don't see any volunteers. All right. Thank you, everyone. Take care.