I usually talk pretty fast. So if I zip over anything that doesn't make sense, feel free to raise your
hand. But I know last month you got an introduction to a lot of things. But depending on what we talk
about, I feel free to ask questions. Well, OK. Well, speaking of last month's meeting, we're going to
go into the approval of minutes and agenda. So first, we're going to assess this month's agenda. Does
that have anybody?
Thank you, Heidi. Thank you, Shannon. Thank you, Heidi. Thank you, Shannon.
And thanks to everybody who was at last month's meeting. It was a real nail-biter. We've got minutes
from last month to approve. I move we approve large minutes. Thank you, Matt. Bye, Matt. Thank you,
Maggie. Matt Hawley. Yes. Peter Fairfax. Yes. Shannon Guy. Yes. Mitchell Owens. Yes. Carl Weiser. Yes.
Justin Master. Yes. Harry Albright. Yes. Sidey Brown. Yes. Motion passes. Wonderful. OK. I'm going to
put anyone else in their room.
If there's anyone in the hallway, I encourage you to pop in if you'd like. If you have anyone online.
Great. Just the family tonight. Love it. The first thing on the list is working group re-organization
discussion, which I suspect was nominated by Dr. Matt Baldy. Okay. Based on some of the recent questions
we had for legal, one of these was,
was actually read verbatim at a previous meeting, but I essentially get organized, I'm sorry. Read last
week, we're having a lot of trouble with being able to communicate with one another primarily because
a working group could be two members, whereas lots of boards and commissions are able to work
on things together or communicate with a couple of each other as long as it is not a quorum or it is
not like a serial meeting where they reach out to a couple of people and say, you reach out to a couple
of people and anything that's talking, open door laws would also not be allowed. But the reason that
they can do those communications and we can't is because of our tiny working groups. So what I was going
to propose as
I didn't get the asterisk next to it up there at the potential voting battle here. No, it's okay. I
didn't specifically mention it to you, so that's on me. What I was planning to propose today was actually
removing all the working groups except for ECPC. It sounds like the city was headed in this direction
going into next year anyway, which they could be brought back with administration approval that processes
are all changing.
But with our eco heroes pretty much wrapped up in the presentation this weekend, that one as well could
be removed this way. If a couple of people found a flyer that they wanted to get included in tabling
or outreach and education, they could email it to each other without being in violation of the quorum
because at this point, it's not a working group meeting. It's just two people and currently I believe
nine, but up to 12,
person's body communicating. So part of the reason that we had working groups being so formally broken
out is because we had really specific initiatives, like a report, or we had documents, or eco-heroes
was the planet of its own responsibility. So having that formal working group made it easier for us
to stay on top of it. But then we had to put in language about foreign and things like that, which made
sense when we were very small to take two, but then it immediately turns into what kind of exchanges
can we have without violating open door laws.
This moving forward, Matthew, an idea of how we would communicate if there's a water quality report
that people want to work on. That's one of the language surrounding that is one of the biggest hurdles
to me because it is so nice with the working groups have point person. It's like if you want to do water,
talk to Mitchell. I guess we can still just say that if you're going to work on water.
email Mitchell, but as long as the group that is communicating does not reach the quorum of five, this
is okay. And this is what other groups do. If people want to, I have watched other boards and commissions,
if they want to work on a resolution or an ordinance, I can't do an ordinance, a resolution that they're
going to bring before their whole body the following month, people can work on it at the same time,
just not a majority of the commission. And so by formally ending working groups,
We would put ourselves in that, but we're like, we're allowed to communicate about things as long as
it isn't a quorum of the body. Um, we still, if anything's being approved, it would have to come before
the commission for above, but, um, it would be, be the formal ending of all, all working groups,
but he CPC, um, specifically in name, because again, functionally,
could still be people who care about this thing, who are working on this thing. The ECPC is,
I would say, maybe the best one to keep because we meet as a group with our liaison, and then when we
meet separately to write up a memo, the process is a collaborative, we're writing this memo as a group,
so there isn't that need for like, we're going to email him, whatever it's meant to be. Part of the
in-person experience is creating the thing that we need to do.
which the water quality group may not need to have that face-to-face time emailing would be just as
easy. So moving out of working group structure would make sense. So basically because open door laws
define an email as a meeting, if they're a quorum of the body and discuss official business, this would
make it not a quorum of the body. So the email will not constitute a meeting, so we would not be violating
open door laws. This will not. No, that's not what's in the business.
This was 10 ground approved a month ago. Yeah. So, today we met as an education. And then we were productive
in 30 minutes. Is there a way that we could work in like, our group or what we typically talk about
in groups into our regular in person meetings of any non.
forum group of the body is something that I would still need guidance on, but I did specifically from
Lee Willearn that the emails would be okay. However though, if we have the meeting today, when we go
through our working, when we go through what would be formerly working groups, our primary objectives,
we could organize, finally organize so that we can just brief the section of what we might be covering
in working groups. I think it would be under things like,
active topics, like something that's just like, we're just going to talk about this stuff. And if there's
a group that had a conversation about it and you want to bring something to it, perfect timing. But
it would be like, more group updates. Right. The reason why it works is because that collection of people,
not a working group anymore, but those individuals wouldn't be able to prove anything without the commission
as a whole. So there's no harm to be done for that small amount of co-work with a minority of the group.
And what's the de minimis? At this point, the de minimis is five. So we would have to have, yeah, you
wouldn't be able to email five people. Most of our work is done. Which, yeah, they have to be, yeah.
This isn't coming from nowhere. This has been something that I've been kind of painstakingly working
with emails to legal and one with
for a little while now, and it just seems like, especially the people here, is wrapping up this as good
of a time as I need to close the book on the working groups that are not at ECPC. What about the PORC?
How does this sound? I was just going to ask, in terms of ECPC, how is that going to work with the Quorum
stuff? Like, if people are on ECPC together, does that still make emails between them for voting?
Or is it like... It does. My understanding is that if the four of us are on the ECPC, the four of us
can't talk about the half-technical plan because we're all in the same working group and that working
group has a plan of two. We can make the quorum four for the ECPC, but then we can't meet without a
quorum. So it's kind of... Yeah, there's a little bit of a balancing act to be done on what would be
the remaining
working group on the way I've proposed it. I also don't know if collaboration on documents is still
technically allowed or not through this process. I'm always looking back and thinking they're all from
that ecosystem set in 2024 that was passed along to me and they were told no collaboration documents.
I think they got the ball rolling a while ago when I had a Google Doc. Things could actively be covered.
on but I know that since you know resolutions have been brought forward by two individuals so seemingly
they can email each other back and forth until they have their before their commission so I mean it's
when we were originally instructed that basically you know you can work in parallel but you can't work
together at all outside as a meeting from other boards of commissions I am watching there's no way that
that that is the reality of some of these situations. And from my own question to Lee Will about this,
I got a direct answer from Taylor regarding emails that as long as it's not a quorum, it'll be okay.
The council body also works on joint memos and letters together as well, so it must also be memos and
stuff like that. They have their own, you know,
So they have to love sleep of attorney. We are under the executive assurance. So here are your different
balance. That's my original impression. How are you all different? They still also have specific things
like they have to be careful that I have serial meetings. Like, even within this, they're able to go
work, but they still have. Open door laws that they have open door law doesn't differentiate doesn't
between legislative intersecting branches and in terms of.
Yeah, so if you've seen one, the legal background should be the same. I understand it's not real, but
it's kind of relatively the same. The statutes are the same, but they are to be interpreted by any given
body's legal department or individuals. Yeah, and that's part of it, too. The ones with the guidance
that were provided. I wanted to add to that before for a bit.
This is not a voting item, but a handbook that special leader off is, so we still have an opportunity
to vote on this. Is there any, so, I mean, I think we could just like go on about this, but is there
anything specific people need to hear, share, while we're in the second about dissolving the working
group spending? I think I want to make sure we don't lose the activities of the working group spending.
And I think that's, in my opinion, is probably the scariest thing is because when we say you're the
lead on this working group, at least that person has that sense of responsibility of like,
what are we doing? What are we doing? What's the plan? I know I get real nosy about that stuff,
but like, I think that that's my biggest fear is that all this stuff is just kind of kind of their whole
way. That's not so, if it's not important to us, it's not important to us. If we can build it into our
agenda, I mean, what if we just, do we think we're fit best in the,
I mean, we won't have working group updates. It would be that if people want to put it on the agenda,
when Rachel does her call or something, you would just say, hey, I've got something I want to talk about
about diversity. It'd be a lot of fun. Yeah, so individuals every month still have the opportunity to
get things out of the agenda as long as it's 10 days before the meeting. Yep, individuals could still
bring that forward. I mean, I'm as uncomfortable with change as anybody.
But it does seem just kind of like a new chapter, I guess. I mean, we've had working groups as long
before I was on this commission, and through the whole time I was on the commission. But it sounds like
we're going in the direction of what's going away. Anyway, in this instance, it should make our lives
more functional when it comes to work of the body. So instead of waiting until January, I was trying
to get a nervous start. Yeah, I think that's a good one, I think.
Any other thoughts from anybody before we continue? I think this is a great idea only because the winged
episode of now is going to make it impossible to get things done. The point of the commission is to
be able to get stuff done in my view. I'm trying to think of potential downsides. The only thing I can
think of is top
And then I guess you keep it informal as to who's tech and what working group, non-working group. Yeah.
Yeah, so in the meeting, we could see who expresses interest in a thing so that Mitchell knows who the
email. But outside the meeting, you could put out a feeler to everyone and say, hey, who wants to do
water? Because that would be to a quorum of the body about commission business. But you could say, I
would like to talk about creating a water quality report.
If you're interested in joining me, we can schedule something. We can talk about that. We can talk about
schedule and administrative things by email as a forum. We'll just have to be careful about how we phrase
that. Yeah. Yeah. It's been really, really, really intentional, but we're not so exceptional. The other
thing that's great, as I see it, is that if this somehow breaks our ability to function in an unforeseen way,
We're going to the next meeting. Yeah, that's better. Right. You do another amendment. Last year, we
were working really strongly on it. Again, with all apologies, especially to the new members. I am looking
forward to this commission being less legal and more environmental, but I think that this is one of
the big steps in that direction to make. I think it was next year, all in groups first. Yeah, it sounds
like they were going to remove them all and then you could
could shoot for having them again or just be on pending approval. The department then is okay with this.
That was the understanding because I could also see a situation where what we're effectively doing is
creating these working groups that are really working groups and like somebody could just say, hey,
you're kind of business anyway. But if they've approved that, then that's fine by me. They're not working
groups. They're informal gatherings of like-minded people.
on a topic that we'll all see to talk about. This has been a year of learning, very focused attention
to what is legal, what language we can use, how we can do, it's been very, very, very attentive to that.
So I think the goal of this is to figure out what are ways that we can use what we've learned about
the process that we have to function in a way that
views this towards the both of the houses of commission in line with what other commissions and boards
are doing that is perfectly legal. And then it's also being aware of changes that are still coming down
the road. So it is- Yeah, I proposed this directly to legal, or I mean, I sent it to Rachel and she
passed it back and forth for me and I got an affirmative answer. And then I don't think it was last
month, but the previous month. So while Tater was here for us, I read a lot of the question and answer
and he suggested nothing had changed.
So I have confidence that this is about the word. I mean, enthusiastic, yes. Any other thoughts that
people want to share before we move on to the next item? All right. Well then, before we move on, since
Adam isn't here, do we have a secretary taking notes?
Can you even imagine that? We do not. Do we have a volunteer who would like to be the one responsible
for having notes that we share at the end? You can also watch the recording to make sure your notes
are reflective of this conversation. It's good to say in the times that I've done that, I've done it
by re-watching the meeting and taking notes. We just need to be involved here. I can do it. When do
you read the notes? By 10 days before the next meeting. Earlier and better, but based on the next meeting.
I mean, obviously you can see on the packet what the minutes look like. So the process would be, I send
the skeleton minutes to our office manager and she will reach out to you and you can supplement those
minutes with other discussions. Yeah, I agree with that. Awesome. Thank you for bringing that up, Rachel.
Thank you, Carl, for doing that. Speaking of Carl, we have a tree commission application where you serve as the EC
seat. So I know that there was a lively exchange last month about what that might look like. And so,
yeah, this is on the agenda because we need to vote to decide anybody who's going to sit in this position.
And you can all see that, actually, Farah's application is up here. So for discussion amongst the group,
in the past, the person that we were voting on
chose to leave. I don't think we asked them to leave. I think it was like, you can leave if you want,
but you don't have to because this is all public and recorded anyway. But so I'm just repeating the
same thing. Yeah. Even if that's what we want to do. I just have a point of clarification. Is the previous
applicant still interested in serving on the tree commission? No. No. About the tree commission, she's
not applying to the environmental commission. Okay.
There's no clear whether she was asking to draw up her application for the environmental commission
seat. I don't think she's interested in being a quantifier in the environmental commission. Let's get
to you, Carl. Would you guys prefer to leave? You're welcome to stay. You would need to be here for
the vote, but you're welcome to abstain or vote yes or no. I will abstain. No. I'm going to quit. I'm
going to quit.
Any talking points that people would like to work through? Does everyone already know this? I can't
see it for everyone, but I have. You want to summarize it for anyone who has a pie? Yeah. One of my
goals in Surveillance Commission, which I hope
And I think the tree commission is a great way to do that. Um, I actually like, I'm an environmentalist
as a, as all you are.
I would love to be a part of the city's strategy and implementation for putting trees around Wilmington.
And I would have a very ambitious goal of sticking with Hatchville after the second day shift development,
like just, you know, putting trees everywhere in Wilmington. And I think that we really need to be a
part of that. So, and I'm happy to kind of communicate that to you guys. We'd be delighted to.
I can make the time, that's a big plus. I'm not talking about the best reason. In my own life, I don't
have an education in horticulture or trees, but I know some things about trees, I know some things about
landscaping, and more importantly, I think I'm willing to learn more about it as well. That's how I
might be listed.
Any discussion points with those? What's your favorite tune? That's a hard one. If you have to point
me based on that, it's going to be tough. I really like droplets, water droplets. It's a native tree.
They're pretty on campus. I love the color of the flowers. That would be my pick. Yeah, twist of an
arrow. Well, one thing that I, one reason that I have had the idea of having a commissioner as our
seat on the Tree Commission is because for years and years and years, we're always saying, how do we
collaborate better with other boards and commissions? And obviously we keep really busy. There's a lot
going on. Communication is difficult, all that. But I do really appreciate your motivation for helping
bridge those conversations and go onto the Tree Commission and being able to say, this is one thing
that the EC has been talking about lately. I want to share it with you all. And also coming down to
saying, this is something I'm hearing from the Tree Commission. I really like the idea of being eager
to make those connections and see what can go with them.
And that's the end of this section. I also want to bring what we're doing here to other commissions.
I think there's a lot of lost opportunity when when commissions don't work together or they
work independently. Um, but anyway. Yeah, I was gonna say to me, this this seat. Is it about qualifications?
Anyone who cares enough to be on the EC that wanted this seat are in support. So I support your nomination
in this one. I appreciate being able to make those meetings and your desire to attend.
Any other thoughts or comments from folks? Well, it is a voting item, so we'll not move that we will
point Carl Geiser to our treat commission seat. Oh, nice, Michelle. Okay. Yes. Yes. Yes. Abstain. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
I think, Matt, you emailed me about just getting a clearer answer as to whether public comment and public
positions have to be approved by Office of the Mayor to things like VCA, Common Council, as well as
external sources to the State of the Union. The answer is yes, they have to be approved. So a letter
to the VCA, for example, would need to be approved by Office of the Mayor. Then ECPC memos or something separate?
Well, the ECPC memo gets approved by the Environmental Commission, right? The ECPC memo gets approved
by the Environmental Commission. Yeah. So then that would be sent to BZA, but that would need to be
sent to BZA formally to be included in the BZA packet. It would have to be approved by opposite of the
mayor. Does that change our timeline for things? Yeah, makes it tighter. Whenever I'm talking, I talked with
The development services manager, Eric, we looked about it pretty informally yesterday, just because
I wanted to see what everyone's thoughts were about it before I spent too much of his time, is that
we get these bigger developments that have these environmental implications. Usually it takes a couple
months to get everything sorted out. Usually, you know, it's not, we receive something and then it's
getting approved to the first EZ8 goes to. Usually it's continued or we're working on it for a little bit.
I think it's the opportunity to, ECPC might not see the finalized plan, but something like 4503 North
Rogers, for example, I think I've sent it to ECPC several times at this point. So it would just be part
of the conversation early on. And so we would just need that discussion to be had, I guess, early on
so that we can work with the developer.
as we move forward, you can still send informal thoughts to me, but a formal letter would have to be
proof-of-signature. Does this also probably send our thoughts to council? Yes. Did in the informal
conversation, is there a justification?
for why even internally, I mean, because when Taylor was here with us the other month, he made it very
clear that his reading of the test was that within cities, we're fine. And for external stuff, whether
that was the state house or federally or state. He was just with a developed sort of standard about
timeline. The response from legal was the department attorneys are in a Dina Casamini, who's came to
the meeting before, as well as Dana Kerr. And I don't think you all have that data.
that Dana and Nadina agreed that from a conservative viewpoint, the EC should obtain approvals including
mayoral approval for any letter they want to send to PCA. I think that would apply to others. Sorry,
Carrie. I don't know, the last time that we did not get approval from the Office of the Mayor, if that
occurred, do we get the edits that are required to
make it something we could, like, is it something where we're able to adjust it and resubmit it, or
is this something where it's like, my fear is that we're gonna hear, I'm not interested in supporting
this letter to the BCA, and that the ECPC is going to deal with it. Right. The deadline for the packet's
the deadline for the packet for something like BCA or Plan Commission. So as far as like an extension
of like being included, I guess we're gonna be included in the packet,
That would be no. I know that there was issues like with the February council meeting. If you all want
to speak at a board of zoning if it was meeting, there's opportunity to run outside. So I did express
that. They acknowledged that. The advice is to work at the time.
If we submit something to the Office of the Mayor and it comes back, will we, do we get context why
it's not approved? No idea, just it's a brand new, and I would still be your liaison, so you would be
sending it to me. I would also, my vision, I would let Planning Development Services know that, hey,
we're going through this process, we're waiting on mayoral approval. What the understanding like, I
know the packet has to go out when it goes out.
that I think just for them to know to expect something would be helpful. Yeah, I know the February council
meeting was the exception of the rule. There was remissness that that one got pushed to there. And that
it was made abundantly clear that the best time for us to be involved is at these earlier stages. But
now this will make it harder to be involved at this step that we were told we had
to get involved at. I also find it to be very empowering as a commission. I watch Bloomington politics
very closely and I repeatedly see the administration say that they want constituents to join and help
out and board some commissions to make your voice heard and these things. And so I have all sorts of
feelings about the
their decision to be able to veto literally anything, even internally. So on the Bloomington website,
it says that the Environmental Commission serves as a voluntary advisory board composed of citizens
appointed by a mayor in common council. So why are we, why is the mayor viewing our documents
Yeah, that's totally fair question. From my understanding, commissions are under the executive branch.
Can you explain that to me a little bit? Because in the VMC, permissions are a subsection heading.
I mean, can you tell me where that authority is survived that we're under control right now? That's just.
The legalist said that commissions are underneath. My issue is that I'm appointed by council. I gave
my authority from council. I'm accountable to council. But as you describe it here, I can't actually
function in a way that represents council's desire because I can be blocked by the office of the mayor.
I find that very problematic. It's neither here nor there, but at the moment.
twice as many of us were appointed by council as by the office of the mayor. While nested under the
mayoral administration, I suppose, I'm sure they will be able to provide the how and the where that
lets us know that at the moment, our current makeup is less executive. I don't know how the office of
the mayor is going to be reviewing this, if it's just for, if they're reviewing the actual
assessment constant and whether that is supportive of an opinion or whether they're just approving something
to ensure that it doesn't make the city be shut in a poor fight or something. So I think there's a spectrum
of how they could review something. I have not received guidance on how they're going to review it.
At this point, we have not had anything not approved. We've had to go through the opposite of the mayor
for communication things for six months, something like that. And we've not, as far as I know, had anything
I think there might be a different scheme that would be approving it. I'm not entirely sure. The people
who are approving it, things like for EPCOS, for example, that's the communication scheme. He does the
press releases, kind of like what does, like not necessarily what design, but the city branding. So
I'm not sure if this would be a different scheme or not. So we don't know who's reviewing it. It could
be opposite in there yet. I believe you're right that nothing we've done so far would have, like has
been shut down. But I also strongly suspect given the way February played out that,
I don't know that I tried to read before counseling and I wouldn't have made it. And I think that that
would be some, I mean, we can talk about this as long as we all want to, but I think that at the end
of the day, we have yet to see what's going to happen. And I think that as soon as something happens
that feels like we are being cycled, I think there is a conversation we can have about exactly how to
deal with that and maybe get visibility to that or navigate that in a way that feels effective for us
as a group. I think right now,
We don't have any answers to almost any of the questions. So it is a little bit. Yeah, we shouldn't
be panicking now. My concern is I think everybody in the room can see where the issue lies and that
if the mayor does not agree with the recommendation, but some of the city's action that has come to
us, he can just block it. Does the city council give any feedback on this? It would be interesting to
know how they feel about this.
Yeah, so I don't meet with the council attorneys. I meet with the city corporation council. So I don't
know how council people would feel about this and I don't have that kind of communication with council
members who talked about that since I'm under the executive branch. I mean, it's in there.
Looking down on road, there's therefore problematic implications of things, were they to go in a certain
direction. It's hard because I think it's important that we are prepared for whatever we encounter.
And my hope is that we continue to be supported and empowered by those that put us in these seats.
But yeah, there's a lot we don't know. And I don't know if this will be an issue with this
mayoral administration, but all this changes, you know, it's the same issue with other
power structures in the city, you know, the flop debacle is one of them, you know, the administration
might be fine now, but that might not always be the case. We should have our system set up in such a
way that there should be no chance for abuse. You know, that's kind of the whole point of the open door
off. I can go on. But. Other thoughts from commissioners who haven't had a chance to share you? I think
it would be interesting to know.
get feedback from the city council on this, if they're, if this is happening with other commissions.
Yeah. Do other commissions have to route their communications through the governor or through the mayor
now? From my understanding, city legal is reviewing law commission bylaws, make them more cohesive across
the board, so. The, so this is,
This update was kind of in response to, I assume, some of the conversation about MOs being approved
or voted on. Is that what the origin? We have a voting item on the list, so I'd be open to transitioning
into the switch of this topic. Yeah. I guess I'd just like to put on record, I understand that legal
has to approve things, and we're not always going to agree. But my general displeasure that we can vote
as a body to change something in our handbook and then have it just not stick because at the end of
the day, it isn't our decision. We had a representative of legal sitting here and tell us the way that
he understood this text in the handbook. And we're now learning that actually legal as a whole does
not see it that way. Again, any position from the commission as a whole, regardless of audience, must
be voted on and approved by a majority of the commission
and the office of the mayor was the sentence that had me bring this back to our agenda. Given what we
had been told the previous month, I said, hey, that sign, it's way near the end. It's fine with me if
the intent of the language is just for external stuff. Let's just make the language reflect the intent.
you know, no representative needed at the meeting. We can just propose the change. But now that I've
learned that that isn't actually possible, I suppose I will use the sorting item on something else.
Was there also talk about doing
the ECPC memo will be approved. Does that need to be discussed as far as I know about this? I think
it's the language in the handbook should already be sufficient. We got informed last time that there
would be no reason that we couldn't. We didn't need to change everything. At this point, since this
language is going to change and the other language doesn't need to be changed, I'm not exactly sure
how much working group
I think it's pretty specific, but I don't know if it names the working groups and if there's any benefit
to saying specifically, we only have one working group for now. It's about the names of the working
group. I think we voted on whatever the response at the time. I think some were just like,
not with anymore. I don't see anything that's a problem so far.
They might be such as eco-heroes. Yeah, seeing no language that I disagree with, I'm going to move to
formally dissolve all working groups except for ECPC. I guess I'll have the language clear. How would
you like the language, I guess? I don't actually see why any of it in the handbook would
Need to be changed to exist for any future working group that appears like we can always, since we have
the names taken off in the past, we can always add and remove as we see fit, but the rules seem totally
fine as written. Okay, so it's less of a handbook movement and more of a. So, yeah, I got my idea about
the agenda and then about to.
Do that is the salvation. Yeah. Okay, so we need to. And I move to amend the agenda to add. As a voting
item, uh, dissolving the working groups.
neither voice note before someone can we save the other option. Sorry, I'm. No, it's okay. You can.
I'm definitely not trying to arrest you. I know. Yeah. Okay. Yes. Yes. Oh, yes. Just a master. Yes.
Kerry Albright. Yes. Patty Brown. Yes. Matt Baldy. Yes. Adam Budifer. Yes. Motion passes. Great. So
we're ready to vote on if we want to dissolve the working groups now that we have approved now that
it's on the agenda. I move that we dissolve the working groups with the exception of ECPC. Oh, just in case.
Mitchell Owens. Yes. Paul Weiser. Yes. Just semester. Yes. Harriet Albright. Yes. Heidi Brown. Yes.
Matt Falby. Yes. Adam Budethorpe. Shannon Guy. Yes. Ocean Passes. Great. Good job. So moving forward,
we will not use the words working groups, subcommittees, anything formal. We will talk about topics
of interest.
to the EC, which Rachel, just for the newer folks, Rachel is the one that is reviewing all these different
development proposals and just the ECPC's conversation points come from Rachel. So that would be not
formally announced as it's relevant. But for any other topic that you want to discuss, feel free to
throw it out to the group in our meetings. If you want to talk about it in the meeting on the agenda,
please make sure to reach out to Rachel before our
And then if you want to get people together to chit chat, you can send out just an email to see if people
would like to gather. And you can schedule that way. But again, the forum laws still apply to what we're
sending electronically to a group of five or more, if that anything stops them to. Great. Wonderful. OK.
Before we move on to the next item of business, I want to thank everyone for coming along on that journey.
Rachel Thornton for writing it. Hopefully most of our legal and handbook work is now behind us.
I do have one, and this might have to get redirected to a lawyer, but while we're still on the handbook.
I know this applies to like
PC memos and stuff like that. No, this also apply to like, if somebody from the community comes in as
like, would you as a commission support this thing going on or like, uh, because comes in as like, would
you sign in, sign on this with us or any of those kinds of like things where we're asked to give our
voices support. Uh, does the mayor have to approve that? Signing on the existing thing might not because
that thing would already have to have been approved.
from the other commission. I suspect everything else. When Haskell comes in and says, I'm trying to
get a grant for more trees, we'd have to make sure the city is okay with us approving of Haskell. If
it's considered a public comment, there is a section in here that they also added about receiving the
food bill.
If there are questions about that, please send them at a legal meeting on Thursdays. So I think I was
asked that. Thursdays are the days to get the legal questions. And thank you, Rachel, in advance for
all of the emails. Great. Oh, my friends, I think we are on to topic B on our whole business, which
means we are just buzzing along. And I swear our meetings are filled with all sorts of things besides
legal details. But I really appreciate everyone's patience as we navigate
changes to how we operate. The M&B is the Bloomington Commission on Sustainability and Resilience's
capstone update. So, okay, we're gonna get a little bit more into like the nitty gritty of what we're
allowed to do and not allowed to do, but I think that the idea is to invite folks, but also to confirm
we're not gonna have something of a honest group. Yes, so if we do have a forum, which I guess there
are no more working groups except for easy to see. So if we do reach a forum, then they have to,
jointly notice it. And if they jointly notice it, I would appreciate if everybody actually came because
I don't know what the cancellation process for a joint meeting is like. I don't want to put the whole
meeting at risk if one person doesn't come. So Matt, I know you said you were coming. Heidi, you were
kind of toying around whether you wanted to come. I haven't heard from anybody else. I can confirm I
will not be in attendance for that. Yeah, that would encourage anyone.
who's interested in it to attend. I mean, like, I don't think publicly noticing is a burden, and we
wouldn't be conducting any commission business just by being there anyway. And even if we had tried
to, it obviously has to be approved by the commission as a whole anyway. So this is just learning about
the work that the Capstone students did, trying to figure out the viability of, like, a renewable electric
utility for Wilmington. So just be watching the presentation. That's to stay, right?
Yeah, it should be. Okay. So Matt is the only one attending. We will not point you notice, but that
changes is on now. Thank you. All right. Well, not to be.
updates at this specific naming convention, and maybe just we'll talk about themes and topics that are
of interest to the group in the future. But since we're in this position, the biodiversity working group...
Biodiversity working group did not meet in the last month, though one of our major initiatives at the
moment, the habitat connectivity plan, did get some attention at the garden fair this last weekend,
and so I found that heartening. But no, no updates. Awesome.
Committee is meeting, I think, in a couple weeks. They met, then they meet once a quarter, or we meet
once a quarter. There are two of us that represent the EC on the City Committee. And there are a couple
of events that are happening, I think, primarily in June. There's going to be a screening of a film.
There's going to be, I think, a couple different events that they're hoping to kind of host with, that
are using a lot of resources that we have in the services society.
Yeah, there'll be more to come on that. But yeah, it's just nicely plotting along and there's a bunch
of new members from the hub and stuff like that. So good representation of the city and community. Anything
else about our city? ECO heroes. Well, the ECO heroes, our contest is going to have its
Pointing event on Saturday. Thank you for those of you who are able to come and be part of it. Tabling
or helping with the events. There's a lot of stuff that we could talk about, but this is we're gaining
momentum in our meeting. So I will just say I have a couple quick questions about the. Going to do a
little demo for you, but OK. The logistics of things do we? Is there anybody from the city that will
be representing?
some form of official capacity that will be shaking hands. Personally, I've reached out to Office of
the Mayor, Bernie's staff. I've reached out to a couple of council members. You're going to be our celebrity
then. I feel like I'm really going to have to bring the game, but still. There is a photographer. So in the
When I sent out an email to get a schedule down, and I think after kind of just figuring out what we
can do, it looks like if we can have, I think what will happen is we'll have the event and we'll get
the EC table set up. We'll have two tables with all the different winners on them and the entire event
start button.
or before we start to get ready for the Eco Hero ceremony. It's like a birthday event, so there's lots
of people, lots of things going on. And then in Wacaw, we'll kind of start encouraging the winners to
get nearer the stages. On the 15th, I'm gonna go up there and just say thanks to the city and the folks
who participated and our sponsors, the donors, and really excited to announce the winners and recognize
their contributions with a certificate and a little gift bag, or prize bag. At that point,
I would love, Matt, if you could come up to the podium and read the list of the different winners. And
then I think Heidi, you have volunteered to hand out the gift and certificates. That's the one for you?
OK. And now we all organize. I'm going to have to make things as simple as possible as far as where
things are so you get the right person to read the thing. And then I still want to get them the certificate
in the back. I think what we'll do is, great question.
You read the name, they walk over, I shake their hand, and I'm so happy with it. Actually,
you know what? Yeah, that's probably the best way to do it. And then they'll walk over to you and get
their stuff. And then they take their stuff away. I think it's, I, it's- Can I take a picture? Yeah,
a picture is typically with, like, the shaky hands, but I feel like having, like, your stuff with you,
like, all of a sudden makes it, like, a lot, a lot to manage. We can also give them a certificate when
we name them.
Then it's shaking out and they get a prize. What about names? I think that makes sense. So they can
hold the shirt. So they can get during the picture. Yeah. Excuse me, I'm afraid of mispronouncing everyone's
names, but I'll do my best. Okay. So Matt, do you have a certificate? When do they get the prize? From
whom do they get the prize? I'm handing it out. I'm reading it in, handing it out.
They're taking a picture with you and then they're hitting the press. I love it. This is why we need
to talk about this. Great. Thank you. Is that 1.15? 1.15 is when I will start talking. If you want to
talk to people hoping to have them later. There are two classrooms that are being recognized. There
may or may not be kids from those classrooms. Matt, I'll encourage you to just take your time because
it's fine if we need to just
have a second for folks to shuffle around. And then there'll be a photographer, but I do have Carl or
Justin being able to take photos of the winners. Rachel, do you know for sure that we'll have somebody
who's taking pictures of each of those? That's what I was told. Do you know who it is?
Either way though, when it comes to our annual report before council and stuff, it's just nice to have
photos. It's really nice to have photos. Even if there will be professional ones of the handshake moments,
still just taking some photos of the event, of the table and whatever is the win for us. Yeah, yeah,
that's totally it. That's, we're using, do you think we're using a personal phone for that or? That
might be on the path and I just email everything to Rachel and I just click that.
Okay, the photographer's name, I believe, is Lisa. I don't have her last name. No, Lisa Wilson.
Lisa Wilson. And there is on the to-do list of all the planners. It says photographers hired a general
capture the event but can go to the stage specifically to capture eco-heroes. Yes. Thank you. Okay,
great. And then after the ceremony is over, there will be continued tabling
by, so Carl will be there to set it all up and just kind of get things rolling. We have some stuff that
we can share on the table and do on the table and stuff, so that'll be available. And then Carl and
Matt will be behind the table until two o'clock. And then Justin and Heidi have offered to help from
two to like 3.30 and then whatever the time is. And I'll be there the whole day, so yeah. Anybody else
who wants to come just for fun, high five, any of us if you are more than welcome.
Check out other people's tables, too. There's a lot that happens at their day celebrations, so there
really is a lot to do. Yeah, anybody have any questions? I have a couple of updates. So the booth will
be inside, so art will not be flying away. There's still CBA on whether they're going to be using the
outdoor stage or not. It looks like it's going to be cooler, but windy, but no rain. So if I go tomorrow
before I leave, I will
then you can email Ferry just so you know if you accept. So the art tables are inside no matter what
the ECS table is also inside or? Inside. Okay. And they're adjacent to each other. Okay. Just the actual
stage and presentation of the ceremony. And then I wanted to ask when should, sorry,
uh, for increase. Um, when is our, when are the art pieces going to be brought back to City Hall? When
is the art going to be brought back? Yes, for anything not picked up at the Earth Day event. So people
can have a couple weeks to help them out. Um, I will have the tote and stuff too, so I can kind of have
whatever day works for us. It can be Monday or Thursday or whatever. Okay. Uh, so, I don't know, I'll
post on Tuesdays and Thursdays, but, um, somebody else, if Monday is better for you,
we can have stuff brought in on Monday at our Labor's staff and just bring it back. Do we say in our
email when they should pick it up? I think that whenever the draft Adam sent out or sent to me, I sent
it out for Tuesday. They can start picking it up on Tuesday. So then there would be on Monday,
all day Monday, maybe Tuesday morning. OK. I'll make a note to bring it on Monday if possible. But if
nothing else, the first thing on Tuesday. Good question. Anything else?
Uh, no, that's all for me. Anything else from any of you else? Did you all get to see? Did you all judge
the stuff? It's all funny and so cute. Look at these adorable community members. Love it. I need some.
I need a little song for an option. I'm trying to find my moment. I love it. Um, Rachel, do you know
if we are allowed to play the songs? I mean, Sydney technically owns them, so.
I love the question about what happens with the ownership. I don't think the city is going to go after
any royalties. Well, thanks for everybody who's built in many different ways. It's been quite the process,
but I'm super excited to have us strap up to see.
Next thing is the PC, which I'll have a question. Oh, this process. You've already met to that district.
Yeah. Yeah. We work on basically, we got a bunch of donations and then we also have a budget that we
use to kind of supplement if there are certain age groups that aren't covered very well by like a bunch
of copyists or something like that for the school. But yeah, so we've got and we've got, yeah,
Little kiddos, we've got lots of grown-ups. We've got a nice, tighter head-printing group, so. There
are at least two people that weren't able to make it. We've had a couple people not RSVP, so if they
are unable to come and pick up those prizes, just put a post-it note or something for me to know who
to give those prizes to whenever we've got those offers. I'm not sure. Can you share with me at some
point the ones we've been making? I think I'm good. Well, I think it would be possible.
Okay, perfect. I am really eager to hear what the group wants to do. This year has been a lot of change
for us and a change in commissioners, change in processes, so many processes. We have a planning meeting
in November where we decide what we want to do for the year to come. I'd be really eager to hear what
people think would be the best use of our time next year. I think ours is like maybe 14 years in or
something.
And all the different ways that we've done it, it's looked different, you know, many of those years.
So yeah, I don't know. Do you know how many answers you've gotten over the 15 years? I mean, do you
speak to that or not? I have no idea, because I know that when COVID hit, the numbers dropped significantly.
I mean, the first few years, like 2003 or whatever it was,
No, we're in 2010, actually. But the early years, we had tons, like 50 or something like that,
like separate, separate entries. And a couple years ago, we had probably 50, like it's a lot of like
ones and things. Somewhere in the late 20 teens, I remember like two full tables of 4th to 5th graders.
Yeah. And sometimes it's, you know, a dozen, like it really depends.
I think it also depends on the outreach that goes into it. I think it depends on how we position it
to community members, to educators, to different organizations in town. I think it depends on the theme
to be totally honest, because nature at night versus, I think storm water is really important, but like
storm water, it's like people really getting signed by different things, and so. This year, we have
heard last year more
Yeah, not really interesting. Like I think that's really fun just to see how different submissions are.
I think that the average piece of it and. I think that's a big part of it and this year I think we were
really, really hard to overcome some of the possible that we had last year. We just like weren't ready
for them. So this year a little more clear, but it was very fine. There was a lot of like just split
staff turnover with me starting my position and then how much
The department, my position changed whenever they, for my predecessors, whenever I was hired, they just
threw your position. So just the amount of time allocated for something like Eco-Heroes changed. And
then the intern time was also changed. So, oh, we do have another one next year though. So, but her
kind has been focused on more department rather than environmental commission activities. So that was
a big change.
So, here's, you're very. No, but so that was a big change. I think, like, if this was, if you guys all
want to be yours next year. Working with, sorry, bring them up again. We go, they going through the
sponsor process. They really wanted to see something like by January or February even so.
just starting early in the year. And I know everyone's kind of really busy that time of year anyway,
so personal obligations. So I'd be out there though. Yeah, I think some of the changes, even like the
type of financial space you can have with the city has changed. And so we can't just ask lots of people
because there might be limits on what people can go in. Just like the little things that we either didn't
have in place, that weren't in place before, or that we just
weren't having to work through or didn't know about it or whatever. So yeah, I'm ready just to follow
in the community. Like that's it. Yeah. But again, I'm super excited. I mean, I'm excited for all these
new or newer faces to be open plan we want to do next year. Because it really is like, this is just
volunteering. So whatever you want to do, whatever you've got time for and are willing to put your own
personal time into is super exciting for me.
If it's equal here, it's awesome. If it's not, I mean, you're gonna hear what we do. Any questions?
I was wondering, well, what are the prices? I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure.
I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm
not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure.
I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not
Okay. The next couple of meetings are May 7 at 1130 a.m. and May 12th at 530 p.m. I will be on the 7th,
the May 7th meeting, not the May 12th meeting.
I wanted to ask, since these memos have to be created, would there be a volunteer who, we can also do
ad hoc, whoever needs to sit, whoever is attending the meetings, is there a volunteer who generally
wants to do those memos? I'm usually helping present, so then it's hard to do both at the same time.
So are there folks who know that they'd be interested in going to the
The CCPC meeting, the one that's at 1130, that is the introduction to whatever the experiences or whatever.
And so that would be whoever wants to learn the information live, ask questions live, engage with typically
either the developer or whoever the planner is, something like that. And then the 530 one, the next
week is where we write a memo that has any, and if we want to write a memo, we can decide we don't want
to. But if we do want to write a memo, it would be where we
together ideas about what are the things that we want to articulate on behalf of the ECPC and the EC,
what are the specific things that we are suggesting or recommending, and presuming it's going to the
developer, not to, like, I think that maybe clarifying, like, who it's going to. I think it would be
the same thing, like, if you, or like the meeting you're in the day with me, it's expressing thoughts
during that meeting, like verbal thoughts, I can definitely pass that along.
the planner signed for that case manager. If you had written a letter of any kind, I guess, even if
that was passed directly to the developer, I think that's still kind of a public position. So that would
still need to be approved, I think, from the way I'm understanding it. OK. And so then if we have that
530 meeting, it would be constructing whatever and then having to go through the process of submitting
it. So the 1130 meeting is good because it's
The goal is to get this information or recommendations and concerns to the developers so that they can
alter whatever they're doing so that we don't have to write a memo because they've already sort of fixed
it or adapted to it or accommodated it in some way. That's the dream. So the May 7th, when the meeting
is to listen to the developer talk about the site plan? But if they want to come to the meeting,
at minimum, I invite the, and the memo will be me, but I invite the planner assigned to that case.
to come present a pretty holistic concept of whatever plan is being proposed. We've had a developer
come in the past to help supplement that, and they were interested in hearing what the commission had
to say. Some developers aren't local, so it's harder for them to attend. But sometimes it's just me,
sometimes it's another staff member, sometimes it's a developer. And then you invite someone from the EC
So right now, I have on, Matt, I did see your name, or is that you? I've not heard about you.
Right now, the ECPC members are Sherry, Matt, Adam Martinez, Mitch, and Heidi. So it would be the working
group that we still have, the one working group we still have. We're not always like any other working
group expected to go to this meeting today. We can't all attend it because it's tough. Yeah.
But it would be. But that way, if someone's unavailable, there's nothing special.
You want to? That's where my question is. Are there any new projects or petitioners or anything? Is
there a reason to do the mail-in? I think the filing deadline is made first. I have not heard of anything
yet. At this point, since I haven't heard anything, it's likely to get canceled. However, there's some
things I don't always know about where things are popping up.
Logistical question for you as well, given that will we have to make it a monthly regular meeting ritual
of approving whatever memo we may choose to write is? Because we won't know until May 1st, potentially,
if there's anything we even want to speak on, then it would be before our next regular meeting that
we would have to wrap it up. I guess what I'm saying is as much as working group updates won't have
to be a regular
Agenda item anymore. ECPC and approval of a memo will have to be a voting item every month, right? Yeah.
And I think, if my memory serves me correctly, which it doesn't always. And I think Taylor said that
as long as the instance of the memo was stated during, and that's what the instant was voted on, the
actual letter formation could occur at the meeting.
So that would be hard to do if we didn't. So presuming that we do have them, I mean, if we don't have
the meeting. That's not like Heidi is interested. Matt's interested. Is anybody else feeling pretty
committed to going to the meeting on the 7th at 1130? Yes.
Yeah, I mean, for what it's worth, I expect it to be canceled. But if it isn't, I'm sorry. Yeah,
thank you. And it comes through as an announcement, like a meeting. Yes. It's in McCloskey, so it will
be downstairs. But yeah, also, if there's a better time, like I said, in office on Tuesdays and Thursdays,
so that's the best time.
said or something. I tried to make it around lunchtime so people weren't hopefully taking off work.
But if there is a better time throughout the day that works. Right. And when did you say it was the
major larger letter? That would be May 12th. 5.30? Yeah, 5.30. Also, I think it must be. If we have it.
Yeah, it's only if we have the seventh meeting, then we'll have to swap one. And speaking of working
groups, and since I'm talking of a meeting that I will not be at, I did pass along the ITS concern of
the HDMI cords sometimes hopping in the room. I haven't heard anything back that I didn't want to sit
on in a long session. You know, like three minutes, I'm like, oh, you're going to be a doctor for it.
So thank you for sharing. OK, anything else from ECPC? No. OK, light pollution working group.
Then Martinez is typically the one that speaks to this, but Matt, do you have anything you want to share?
Did we read them? I don't think we have an update at this time. Okay. No update. Sounds good. I'd like
to mention something on this topic. The ECOPS permission on sustainability, I don't think they got to
it in the last reading, but they're actually
Proposing a resolution to adopt to the city of Wilmington to adopt dark sky certification. I mean, the
whole mayor approval thing is very complicated. I would like to suggest that perhaps we think about
doing together with them, joining them, talking with them, just suit the thought. I know this isn't
exactly on the agenda, but it would be a bit more helpful to have another permission that is kind of
And especially like the system that should be on this topic. It's just saying that they're doing that
because I know that a group has been talking about it for like a year now, but it's interesting that
because like leads with resolution versus having a working group that's talking about it or, you know,
leads thinking through, it's really, that's something to think about. Yeah. I mean, that's something
to think about like is, are there things that would be more assertive that makes sense for us? Are there
things that are more of a process that we think are more
important to move through before gently do it. That's really interesting. I personally prefer a slow
and a thoughtful approach. I think that's more scientific. But at the same time, I appreciate that they
care about this stuff. I think it would be helpful if we, I don't know what the mechanism would be,
but if we had one of our representatives, we chart them and maybe we could work on joint resolution
if that's possible.
you know, maybe we could add some of the information. I know we're still pretty preliminary in our research,
but it would be, if we did talk about resolution, I just think as we're both advisory boards, it would
be very helpful or be more persuasive if we have joint permission composed of how many people, the city
council, the mayor, you know, given our recommendations versus us acting individually. That's just something
I was thinking, because I actually,
watch their meeting for a different reason, which maybe I'll address in the next working version update.
But yeah, I don't know if we want to reach out to them, if we want to motion to that effect, if we just
support what they want. Yeah, I don't think we need to. And I know how to get in touch with them. Or
I would be even there if they're doing that at all. Yeah, I mean, I think if they, I mean, given their
agendas lately, I would be surprised if they get to it even next month.
So we've got some time, but I'm happy to reach out and say, hey, we're also looking into dark sky. Maybe
we can do a joint message. And then, Matt, you could email Adam and the other Adam, because they're
on our fingers. And Carl, if you- Maybe we could do a range in light pollution, or use it again. Yeah,
I think that would be good. The odds are on her email with virtual interests, and she turned on email.
I went to one meeting, but then it wasn't technically on mine.
I'm during a meeting and then we're involved and I'm not working with you. But yeah, there is something
I'm very interested in. People in my neighborhood have talked about the dark or the lights, and it's
something that I would be interested in pushing forward. Sweet. Well, yeah. We'll continue the conversation
and let us know where you was going. Awesome. Well, okay. Well, then great. Thank you. Light pollution.
folks. Okay, so our final meeting of the Outreach and Education Working Group officially. Kim, do you
want to do anything on that? Sure, you can start. We met just before this meeting and we're still in
sort of the stages. This working group really just started in the last four months. So right now we're
focusing on getting the materials updated, getting the
website cleaned up a little bit. And so Carrie raised the sort of show that sets the brochures. Factors
and facts on our website. All the resources have been taken off as part of the accessibility updating.
And this is a good opportunity for us to re-evaluate what we actually have up there to create some new
brochures for the tabling that we do. So we talked a little bit about how we're going to push that,
what we're going to
I think we're going to reach out to working groups and ask them for resources. Hopefully, we can have
a couple of brochures, but we can also have some hyperlinks on the website to reputable sources
on biodiversity, water, things like that. We talked about that, and then we briefly mentioned maybe
doing some sort of, what is it called?
press release for the eagle hairs contest. Sorry, I remember in the shot. Yeah, so that was basically
it. And is it possible for us to have, do you know if the press had Fiona's presentation or document
that she had worked on for the natural landscaping stuff?
Can we put that on the website for now, since there aren't any brochures or statutes? Sorry. I have
not had time to fully check that it's 100% accessible. Once I do, I don't want to make a deadline. We
drink that. I'm not going to make the next Friday deadline of it. But once I do, I can put it on the
website. I might bring it to the next commission meeting just to vote on it officially, I guess. Yeah.
OK, that's perfect. Yeah. We're just thinking like, oh, we've already got a digital thing. Yeah,
so it's fine. Awesome.
I'm speaking of press releases. Do you take pictures of the winners artwork and can we put that in the
press release or did you not talk about that? We didn't, but I think it would be great if we did have
some images. I don't know. Again, we tried to do the same. Yeah, I don't know if we've put photos with
press releases. I know we've put images on the website of the winners or we put in our Facebook posts
or whatever. I'm like, yeah, I typically take pictures of the art and stuff. I can ask a press release.
Yeah, I can ask.
And I'll draft that or one of us will draft that and then send it to you and then you'll go to the city
or the city will draft it. I think I was going to check with the comms team and see if there's anything
super city specific in the press release guidance that staff has. I'm going to send that out and you
all could write it and then I'll send it to you. And it should be people talking about ideas for things.
Okay, that sounds great. Is there anything else for the outreach education? Cool. Special projects working
group. Well, I haven't done anything with that. We're going to keep moving along because April and it's
eco heroes month. The last thing then though is the water quality. It was going to be that I had a meeting
schedule finally for us to get the main people up to date.
But now I can just email a guest and like, you know, what I've been thinking about and talk about it
if you want to help us. So yes. Before I move on from working groups as a whole, I will double check
that without working groups that you all can still use city rooms if you want. Oh, that's good enough.
Yeah. Because I'm not sure how that works. And like, I assume I don't need a public loanist and non-working
group, but I don't know how.
I guess I'm sure this was already on your radar. You can cancel all of the outreach working group meetings
before the regular meetings. Unless you'd like to use the room here. It may be that there's a recurring
casual conversation.
But I think moving forward, we have a lot of flexibility with how we communicate, which is kind of what
that really means. And that was everything from me and Mitchell. Great. Okay. We're on Susan's board.
So pre-commission. So I have every intention of attending the meeting. The meeting doesn't happen to us.
These are two meetings since the tree commission last met. So tell me now, I think on the 20th. Yeah,
I'll go with that. I'll update them then as well. Perfect. That's great. Thank you for doing that. Have
you been able to learn something else? I was not able to learn anything. No worries at all. Friends
of Lake Monroe, I don't know.
Rachel, do you have any insight from that? Do we have any emails? I was in the last meeting. They had
a couple of their grants that they approved. They missed one of them. One of them was they were redoing
a concrete path for a water tank on Brown County.
Oh, and I also had a, they've been working with a nine-year-old student in the professor's lab, and
has been doing some work with data from the Salt Creek shrinkage. The data has been collected out there,
and it shows that the Indian Lake meeting happened a month or two ago. We're hoping to get that
Booster. Salt Creek coming out of a lake or in front of branches. North Fork, Salt Creek. We're sorry,
South Fork. Oh, thanks for being here, Donna. Beacons and beacons
That we call it now? B plus R? It was for our princess B plus C or B plus R in an email today. So that
R is kind of the acronym. In not this month, but last month's meeting, they discussed exactly that,
but didn't formally land anywhere. So they're there, but for the moment, I feel okay still saying B
plus. Still until they know exactly how they're identifying. Due to last month's meeting here being
what it was, I think I
We skipped reports. So last month, they talked about how they're tabling at Earth Day. They did their
elections, and they adopted their resolution against flock cameras. Then they kind of introduced and
advanced to a second reading, a resolution about pedestrianization of Kirkwood and sustainable
transportation, and also one to restrict or dissipate use
So both on to their second reading so that they would officially be able to take action on those. However,
this month's meeting, the resolution on Glyphosate was the entire meeting. They had a couple of subject
area experts in, a representative from Parks, Mary, I can't remember her last name, and an L and J card
from MCIRIS were there, and they had question and answer.
That was a robust conversation for a while and basically postponed the resolution there. May meeting
kind of anticipating some kind of amendment. So yeah, they had a very productive meeting just two days
ago, but didn't actually go through any of the resolutions. So that's not what I wanted to talk about
because that's not what we thought we needed virtually anyway.
I've had a surprising number of people come up to talk to me about the environmental conditions that
we should investigate. And I'm wondering if we would want to pick up on that topic at all, either,
you know, or if you just want to let it kind of do their thing. I just, I bring it up because the, like,
I don't want people to be confused to thinking that we're the one pushing this resolution.
But at the same time, I know everybody's busy and I don't really want to pick up the topic, but maybe
if it would, I don't know, I feel like our thinking is different than theirs, although I will say that
the last meeting, they kind of got more nuanced in their approach, it seemed like. Right, so
while environmental quality indicators and our environmental expertise does certainly fall under the
sustainability umbrella, they also, so do a whole bunch of other things, which is why, you know, most people
are generally opposed to the merger that was proposed way back when. On this resolution, I have no personal
interest in joining them on it. I'm satisfied the city's use of pesticides. I know that they are herbicides
that they minimize their use. I know they're all definitely about to update their integrated pest management
plan because Bee City resources can make it even better.
And joining them, I was just in making our position clear, which is likely a rebuild from the people
I talked to on this. So, you know, because actually has a proposed opposition to the because amazing.
I mean, yeah, for the reasons you might expect in a city for dealing with invasive species that are
in the way that they apply it.
Yeah, I very much didn't care for it as written, but it sounds pretty evident that a very new version
of it is probably what's going to come up next month. So I'm in no hurry to weigh in because they're
going through their process. Sorry. No, no, no. I was just going to say, I appreciate you updating us
on it and promptly bringing it up just to say, is this something that we want to have in more concentrated
conversations?
opening it to the group to say, do we want to, how do people feel about, do we want to say anything
in any one direction? And if we do want to do something more formalized and just talk amongst ourselves,
like I think that's, I think that's a really valuable talking point is people ever want to have those
kinds of discussions, especially with because being very good at their resolution, uh, creations. I
would say that, I mean, this is definitely something that probably would benefit from like having, you know,
making sure that we all know where to find their draft of their resolution so we can read it or research
if we need to ask questions. Like, get some understanding because bring it up at the, you know,
the top. It's a little hard to wrap our brains around. How do I feel about it? What is our role?
Is there, on the city's website, a statement about the approximate increase in use? I think in the integrated
best management field, is it the best way, best resource? I don't know. Go ahead. I was just wondering,
you know, thinking about updating your
that our website and people are going to come to us to inform that information that might be used at
the rest time. If we want to sort of take a stand. Yeah. And if nothing else, it's like, here are the
resources. Yeah. That's a really good idea, Shannon, to put that on the list of your website adjustments.
Well, MCIers must deal with that issue.
Yes, I believe they have some guidance. They have a calendar of control of how to treat certain invasives
at certain times of the year and what you should be treating them with. And I imagine Blackness State
is on there. I've been told by MCIRIS to use that last, as I've been saying, in my area. So that whole
meeting was the Q&A with MCIRIS members controlling itself. I mean, they're master learners,
aren't they? And they're possibly good at the means on it.
Is there a certified Master Gardener? Is that because there are bigger groups? I don't know what that
is, but. Dr. Andrews-Gardner, her research has been invasive species and biodiversity and treating invasive
species. I have it here, if anyone at some point wants to look at it. There are just two main points.
Resolution 202604 states that what widespread use of glucose
glyphosate may lead to the development of herbicide-resistant weeds. However, I'm not aware of any studies
that show this in areas where glyphosate is used to manage invasive species. It's only been reported
in agricultural fields where glyphosate is sprayed regularly throughout the year on glyphosate-resistant
crop plants.
they there there there's an argument to each of the concerns so to I haven't read the because this letter
but it sounds like the two main concerns are about the overuse of it and the argument is that we don't
overuse it the way that we apply it is no how what what the concern is usually for um and then um then
they also mentioned and all the
BCOS mentioned using alternative methods for pest and weed control. However, in some situations, methods
such as manual removal cause more harm than benefit, and some manifestations are simply too large. And
then also that they can cause direct, manual removal can cause direct harm to human health. For example,
poison hemlock and poison ointment. So they've done in their label, like they've made themselves the
main arguments that BCOS thinks.
Thanks for sharing me. Any other thoughts that people want to share about this before we move on to
the next update report? Cool. Thanks for the discussion on that. Oh, I know. MC Iris, which is Rachel.
I was not able to attend the meeting this month, so I don't have an update. Whenever I skim to minutes,
it was mostly about preparing for the plant sale in October or September and running their replacement
program of removing evasive and
receiving a voucher to that reason of the data. Yeah. Cool. All right. Mitchell, anything from that
home community program? Still not resolved yet? Okay, so yeah. A bunch of things to the list that I
haven't taken a chance to look from this yet, because every time I remember, I'm on a work computer
and I can't get on Google Drive. That's where they happen.
Are you familiar with the Clean Community Program? It would be helpful to get a recap. Yeah, I would
appreciate a recap. It is a program through IDEM for basically encouraging cities, counties, mostly
cities and counties, I think, to partake in various environmental initiatives and things. And if you
do enough of them, you get recognition.
Currently three tiers, bronze is you've signed up. And you've shown a commitment to doing this.
Silver is, and there's like a list of like currently prescribed activities you can do that would get
you credit for moving up the tiers of like having a greenhouse gas, what's the word? Inventory. Inventory,
yes. Or like things similar to that or just like
Updating practices doing more being like a certified trees. What's the trees and trees? Yeah, like getting
that certification or anything. That's what I want. Yeah. Thank you. That's part of sorry. That's almost
part of the problem, but part of why we haven't reached silver yet because we can do a lot of these
initiatives.
Do you need me already? It's like three years statute of limitations was, I think, like the person who
runs the program set in the original meetings. And you have to do so many of these activities depending
on the size of your city. Bloomington, I think we got in at a slightly smaller tier because of the permanent
population of the city versus the college adjusted population of the city.
So we have to get six things to get to the silver tier. We've been sitting on five for a while. So I
think it's, again, just a matter of figuring out the proper paperwork or whenever something moves and
comes back up again, then we'll get to that point. And then gold will be another six. And when we have
the original meetings, I know. I'm forgetting her name, city council. Is it Wizzetoff?
Yes. She was really gung-ho about stuff that a lot of other communities hadn't even gotten into yet,
like a lot of kind of agronomic studies and things like that. And we're like, oh, can we go above gold?
Because I think we can get to gold pretty easily. Yeah, maybe we can call them platinum. So let's see.
But we're still making good progress. It's an accounting process at this point, I think. Thanks for
the breakdown of that. It was a newer program, so it's exciting.
that you can figure out. Great, welcome to staff report. We've got a couple of items listed here. Yeah,
so you see this email, and I use it a lot. It often emails me a few times a year about if the EC wants
to promote something on Facebook. I don't know if you all had a chance to review this email, but they
basically are asking if they provided some social media content to put this on Facebook. So I just wanted to check
to see if you all were interested in having this. Does that pass accessibility? That's for the 25th.
This requires about, doesn't it? I move that we approve this graphic for our social media. Thank you.
It's not the only place I don't receive an issue, but yeah, it's a fair question. I haven't tested all
of that. Okay, so we had a need to vote.
Okay. Mitchell. Yeah. Provider. Yes. That's the master. Carry. All right. Yes. Heidi Brown. Yes. Yes.
Motion passes. Settle.
I'm just going to move from school next week. Congratulations. Great. Well then, we're at the part evening
where we go through commissioner announcements. This is where you can share whatever you want. We're
still in our meeting. So typically, it is environmentally related or somehow adjacent to EC. But honestly,
it is an open floor. I had a couple of things that I was going to share, including two things to put
on our agenda for next month, which are social media posts,
votes around the garden fair. We have a photo of our lovely commissioners at the table. It'd be great
to be able to share that and say something positive about the impact of, you know, the community gathering,
and then also another one for the Earth Day's eco-hero stuff, which we'll want to share about too. So
that'll be on the list. Additionally, on the agenda, I'll try and remember to say something, Rachel,
but the annual report
or last year is something that I will present to council at some point, but I need y'all's input and
also your vote to approve that. So that would be something that I bring. It's basically a recap of what
we did last year. It's also a short comment on what we're doing this year and we're going with it and
it can be whatever we want it to be. So we've gone through a lot of different stuff just in 2026 already,
which is great and we can share about or talk about. Does that mean they are all approval?
Uh, it's presented to council. I mean, I guess so. It's a thing we'd have to approve as a commission.
So, it's really good because it's baked into our rules, but okay. I don't understand why the council
also doesn't have to approve. Don't ask for more, please. I think it's just because of the flow chart
of legislative, executive, judicial commissions around your executive.
So yeah, so next month we'll talk about the annual report and hold on hopefully. But the thing that's
actually really important is that we will be naming new officers in June, which means we will be needing
people to self-nominate or to suggest others to be in the role of chair, vice chair, secretary,
and treasurer. Right now our vice chair and treasurer is the same role because last year someone we did
every now and again, but the treasure is an important one to have. And you all are welcome to raise
your hand expressing interest in any of these roles. This role could be yours. I'm so down to let somebody
else try their hand. They're all really different. We're allowed to individually email each other. So
if any of these three officers, you'd like to know what the actual burden of that job is, you can ask them.
and they would be happy to share with you. Yeah, I was going to make, as a commissioner announcement,
the fact that I'm looking to no longer be an officer. I'm not planning to step off of the commission,
but I have some other possible very challenging time constraints heading into the new year. So I would
like to not be an officer on this commission. So if anyone wants to know anything about how it's gone,
I'm happy to chat with them.
Yeah, just putting that out there. And then lastly, I'm gonna bring snacks to our next meeting.
I love snacks. And so I'm super excited to have something that kind of like keeps us going as we're
moving into the summer months where, you know, it's nice to have a little thing to lower sense. So if
you wanna bring group snacks, feel free. I'm gonna bring snacks to share. I know we're in the
like semi-dinner hour, so who knows what they'll be, but that's my advice. Yeah, I have an event and
I'm done, so I have my father here. So David George Haskell, who,
is an environmental writer. His newest book just came out, How Flowers Made the World. We're bringing
him next week. He's in a finalist of the Pulitzer Prize in nonfiction twice. He has a book called The
Forest Unseen, which I love, which is all about forest ecology. So he'll be doing a reading and talk
on campus next Friday afternoon, then a book signing and conversation with Jen Liao in biology.
6 o'clock at Morgan's Towers. He's also doing some other stuff. And then the next morning, on Saturday
morning, fingers crossed I can get Ross to commit. But he's going to walk, do a walk and talk to Ross
Gatti. That's close to the buildings and community orchard and the Linslow Nature Trail about flowers
and evolution. He's funny and delightful. So come to something or other. It should be really great.
His books are great. He had them read.
The invitation for this year's Indiana Academy of Sciences Biohits event came out recently. I coordinate
but I wanted to pass along the information to all of you as well, because it's a really fun event. These
bioblitzes are basically once a year, a bunch of people will just go and descend onto one location and
sample, just sample the hell out of it, for every kind of taxon you can imagine, just trying to find
everything within an area that you can in a day, basically.
This year's event will be taking place at Harmony State Park, which is about 20 minutes west of Evansville
along the Val Vash River. Seems like a really cool spot. They have, you don't need to have any kind
of expertise or training or knowledge you're doing at all. There are plenty of people who shepherd you
through that process if you're interested.
There are people sampling every kind of taxidermy group if you want to do some birding, or just go to
plants, or traps, or mammals, or herbs, or if you want to do aquatic insects with me, I'll give you
a dad. I want you to work. It'll be fun, I promise. If you want to know more about it, I can forward
you the registration link and information. Just send me an e-mail and send all the cool details. What's
the date on that again? Oh yeah, I didn't say that. June 4th.
Saturday, June. If June 20th isn't a Saturday, just go to the closest Saturday. That's great. That'll
be very useful. So much data. It is a long way of saying, oh, I need to do insights that try to out-sample
and they're not. So much data. Cool. That's great. Any other announcements from folks?
If you haven't been to the IU Museum, they have a very cool exhibit now, Fire Ecosystems. It's a portal
piece, the life cycle in human impact on a portal, and it's all made out of fiber. It's a really cool
exhibit. And then part of that on May 12th, or Tuesday in the evening,
If you have kids, they're doing a coordinated event with the City of Utilities where we're doing a little
bit of a Hootra River Watch stream lesson in partnership with the bioligal depot systems. And then in
their arts classroom, they're doing some kind of building, you know, fibrous things that kind of match
the example itself.
Which means the utilities that you're designed with, where is that happening? So there's a, we're using
one of the streams. And it's kind of in partnership, we do some river watch stream ecosystem and stream
health gauging.
Part of it is to go through the exhibit and then we walk outside through the stream right there and
kids can look for different bugs and kind of read some chemistry and like chemistry stuff, VHS and stuff.
And then they get to either, you know, draw a correct math or build something similar to the.
As I'm not sure if the signups are live, I checked last week, it wasn't up yet, but I think they're
capping them 30 to 40 children. And then parents will just be there with them. I think it was about
30. If people want to keep an eye out for where to register for that. I will have to go back and maybe
don't find that link. I think it's on the...
different exhibits. I think it's under the exhibit for one that are outreach programs. Well, good job.
Other folks? We've got 16 minutes. Nothing? Nothing? Yeah. I mean, I don't have 40 minutes to go. You
know that, right? It's been a long time. It's been a while. It's been a long time. It's been a long time.
Okay, well then we can confirm that we've got the upcoming events, as you know, we're doing the Earth
Day event. We've got everybody figured out in their spots. If you have any change in your plan or any
questions, please please reach out to me. I will have my device nearby. And then next month our meeting
is on May 21, right here in the other room.
All right, I think it is 744. Nice job, team. Oh, two seconds.