Okay.

We'll call the meeting to order.

And for the interpreters, I don't know what to say.

Um, welcome to stay.

Is that the way it usually works?

In case they come 15 or 20 minutes and then okay, okay.

Um, I do want to do one thing before we get to the first item on the agenda.

Um, rule call.

I forgot to put it on here.

Okay, yes.

Council member Conan.

Present in plenty of time.

Councilmember Harrison.

Councilmember Clark.

Okay, I'm here.

Present.

Thank you.

Okay, so I want to do two things now that we have a quorum and the agenda.

One is to introduce Ian McLean who's sitting in the front row.

He's going to be the newest member of our council starting next week, next Wednesday.

Yes, a little bit.

Um, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

That's one of the reasons why I'm here.

Yeah, that's okay.

And then the second thing is too.

This is Shibana's last day.

So I wanted to give you some hours.

And thank you for supporting us.

All the all the work that goes on behind the scenes to make the meeting happen, and then being here, managing the meeting.

And Lila will be supporting us next Wednesday.

Okay.

Well, thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

Okay.

First item on the agenda.

12 M Brown Act presentation.

And it's Melanie O'Brien who's deputy counsel for Alameda County.

Good evening, everyone.

My name is Melanie O'Brien.

I'm a deputy county counsel with the county council's office.

I've met some of you virtually a bit ago, but I'm happy to be here in person and give this Brown Act training this evening.

I'd like to say, say, at the start of my presentation that I'm happy to provide clarifying short answers to some of your questions as we move through the slides, but if you have substantive questions that require some discussion, I ask that you leave that till the end so we can address those and do that possibly after public comment.

That's your discretion, Chair.

All right, so I have the clicker.

All right, the guiding principle of the Brown Act.

The public's business must be conducted in public with ample opportunity for public participation.

So who is subject to the Brown Act?

Any board, commission, committee, or other body created by a charter, ordinance, resolution, or other formal action of the Board of Supervisors, and your council was created by action of the board of supervisors making it subject to the Brown Act.

The Brown Act is governed by what's called the open meeting rule.

The rule is that meetings are open to the public.

Exceptions to the rule are narrowly construed.

All meetings of the legislative body, that's your body of a local agency shall be open and public, and all persons shall be permitted to attend any meeting of the legislative body of the local agency.

So what is a meeting exactly?

A meeting occurs whenever a majority of the members of your council or of a subcommittee of your council come together at the same time and place and hears, discusses, deliberates, or takes action on an item within the subject matter jurisdiction of the body.

I realize that is a lot of legal ease sounding.

I'm happy to clarify, and we're gonna go through what all of this means in the next um few slides.

So meetings can be formal and or informal.

They can involve uh discussion or action or both, and they can be in person or through technology.

Meetings can include retreats, uh site visits, social gatherings or networking before after a notice meetings.

So what um is the difference between a meeting, a lawful meeting like we're having today and an unlawful meeting.

Um, I'm gonna go through examples of what unlawful meetings are.

So um pre-meetings and post meetings held without notice to the public, um, and serial meetings are types of unlawful meetings.

An example of a pre-meeting would be like a um parking lot discussion that the um a quorum of you have or majority of you have in the parking lot about what you're going to be talking about today at the meeting would be an unlawful pre-meeting or post meeting like a happy hour or going out um afterwards and discussing this meeting.

There's a majority of you doing that, that would be an unlawful post meeting.

Um, serial meetings are a bit more sneaky, a serial meeting occurs when a majority of the members of the body outside of a properly noticed public meeting use a series of communications directly or through intermediaries to discuss, deliberate, or take action on any item of business within the body's subject matter jurisdiction.

So what does that look like?

Realistically, serial meetings are often unintentional, right?

It's where A talks to B and then B talks to C, and then all of a sudden we've had a meeting of the minds here because three out of the five of you have had a discussion, and you unintendedly had a meeting, right?

And this is when you're discussing the subject matter of your body, not discussing, oh, can you believe it?

It's Shibana's last day.

You know, that wouldn't necessarily be a serial meeting, you know, how how great she's been is not a serial meeting, but if you're talking about a matter that is the subject of your body and you say it to one person and they say it to another person inadvertently, you've created a serial meeting.

It also can occur in a hub and spoke where A talks to B and then A talks to C and then A talks to D, right?

Where you've inadvertently passed on information to the majority of your body, probably not intending to, but creating unlawful serial meeting under the Brown Act, which means you have to be very careful about what you're saying, who you've said it to.

And if you're just communicating to one person and you only mean to communicate to one person to say, hey, make sure we don't let this leak out.

I don't want you to talk about to anyone else.

We don't want a serial meeting here.

I just said this just to you, right?

Sure.

So um if somebody is lobbying the group, and they're talking to one person and they say, I want you to approve my building, they talk the next person, I want you to approve my building, and the third person, I want you to approve my building.

That's not hope hub and spoke.

It's when they say, She agrees or he agrees, right?

That's a good clarification.

So the hub and spoke would happen there if the members are saying that to one another, or the members are saying, Hey, you know, go tell so and so that this is what I think, right through an interview.

The public can't violate the Brown Act.

Right, exactly.

Good clarification.

Okay.

So serial meetings can occur, um, obviously they can occur face to face, but they can occur through text, emails, phone calls, voice messages, and they can occur um through staff.

So, you know, if you're trying to tell staff, oh, I actually think this, so please get it on the agenda and let them know that I think this opinion, let another member know, or can you pass this on?

Or I really like this letter.

I want to see what move forward, and you're asking staff to you know hold your water for you.

That can create a serial meeting because you're using staff to pass on your opinion or your decision.

All right.

So that makes me nicely into my next slide.

Uh staff may answer questions, provide information to individual members so long as they do not express any views or positions of those members, and they're not communicating that to other members.

So, you know, staff can absolutely, you know, send out the agenda or tell you when the next meeting date is or communicate that to all of you, but they're not able to pass on your opinions or your positions to communicate that to other members as an intermediary.

All right, what isn't a meeting?

Some things are not meetings.

Uh, attendance at regional, state, or national conferences, not a meeting, uh, or a local meeting open to the public.

All of you want to go to a planning commission meeting, you can all do that.

Um, social recreational ceremonial ceremonial events uh not sponsored by the body, that's fine for you to do, but please give in mind that no collective discussion of your council's business can occur at these events, right?

So I would say the best practices if all of you want to go to a certain planning commission meeting, you sit in separate chairs, you're not seeing commingling, um, you want to give the appearance that you're here to actually just listen to that meeting, take that in, and you're not secretly doing the business of that body at those meetings.

You can go to birthdays, you can go to graduations.

I'm sure all of you have you know Friends in Commons, small place, that's fine.

Um, but the second something comes out that's under the purview of your council is when you have to take um, you know, care not to um inadvertently have a meeting or create a serial meeting.

Okay, so what about social media?

Things have changed in the last, I don't know I mean, I guess I could say 20 years at this point, um, but even more so in the last 10 or five.

So the Brown Act applies to internet-based social media platforms that includes uh Twitter or call it X, uh, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Reddit, those are social media platforms.

If you're using those platforms, a meeting does not include a member engaging in a separate conversation or a communication on a social media platform to answer questions, provide information, or to s to solicit information from the public regarding a matter within the subject matter jurisdiction of the legislative body.

And I'll give you examples shortly.

Um but in essence, social media is allowed as a one-way tool or public-facing communication tool, but not as a place for members to interact with each other about agency business.

Um, so for example, you know, a resident asks you, you know, posting on social media.

Okay, what time does the meeting start tonight?

You can answer that.

Um, you can also say, uh I'm interested in your thoughts about let's say traffic on Main Street, you know, and residents can respond.

But again, what are we worried about here?

The communication between all of you.

So you're allowed to inform or clarify or collect input on social media, but you can't deliberate or agree or disagree on policy.

So putting out their like, I'm really upset about the traffic on Main Street, I'm gonna do something about this tonight at our meeting, right?

Why?

Because all of you can read that.

Whether or not it's acknowledged that you read it, it's available for you to read, you're sharing your opinions, and you're posting it to potentially the majority of you having an illegal meeting.

Um you want to ask yourself if I print this out, does it look like I'm discussing agency business and agency opinions that I have on my social media platform when I write something?

Or does it look like I'm soliciting information from the public or trying to just gather information on my social media site.

Of course, social media makes things even more complicated because we can react and have like likes and emojis.

You know, you got all your thumbs up, but you absolutely cannot use those on each other's posts.

The Brown Act is um very uh specific about this.

Uh social media communications include those that are made by posted sharing on the social media platform between members, including comments use of digital icons that express reaction with the law caught up to the happy faces and thumbs ups.

All right.

So a member of the legislative body shall not respond directly to any communication on an internet-based social media platform that is made, posted, or shared by any other member of that legislative body.

So that's not a forum issue.

That's just a no-no, you can absolutely not do that if somebody is saying their opinion and you're liking it or posting something that isn't the subject matter of this body.

When in doubt, don't.

It's my is my recommendation.

Okay, moving on from social media.

Meeting rules, time and place.

Meetings must be held within Alameda County.

Uh meetings must occur at a time and place set by ordinance, resolution, bylaws, or other rule of the body.

I know today we are having a special meeting, which is very special.

Um, and I'll talk to you a little bit about what the rules are for that.

Um, but those are the general rules about what is required to have a meeting and how to notice it.

So a retreat is not a meeting.

Yes, it is.

A retreat is a meeting.

Retreat is a meeting.

Okay.

And you can notice it, and you can say we're going to have a special retreat.

We're gonna go to Denny's.

The public are welcome to attend, right?

Okay, you want to make sure that the public is allowed to attend your meeting.

Okay, yep.

So we try to know.

So um teleconferencing, popular topic these days.

Um, I'm gonna go through some brand new spanking rules that came out this month and how they apply to your body.

Um, but first, I'll just talk generally about teleconferencing.

Um, I'm sure you're somewhat familiar to a peer-by-teleconference, uh, but a teleconference is a meeting of the legislative body, members of which are in different locations connected by electronic means through audio or video or both.

That's just the general teleconference conferencing definition.

So, what do we have?

What's on our menu now of teleconferencing options?

Um, SB 707 was enacted in October and is effective this month, as I said, and it replaces some of the teleconferencing framework that you might be familiar with.

Traditional teleconferencing still exists.

I'll talk about that.

That's where you put your address on the agenda.

It's with the posting, you have to post the agenda outside your house.

That's still that still exists.

Just cause teleconferencing has been modified.

I'll go through that.

Emergency circumstances teleconferencing has been eliminated and incorporated into just cause.

I'll talk about that.

It's been basically just consolidated.

And there's a new creation called disability accommodation teleconferencing.

And there are exceptions to teleconferencing in general for eligible subsidiary bodies.

This is a new term I get to say a lot.

Again, it's a lot of syllables, yeah.

I stumble over it at times.

So what's an eligible subsidiary body?

It serves exclusively as an advisory capacity, is not authorized to take final action on legislation, regulations, contracts, permits, licenses, grants, or funding allocations.

Unlike anybody knows the SNOLCAC is likely falls under that category of an eligible subsidiary body.

But there of course are some hoops to jump through if you want to qualify for that.

My next slide by qualifying means you are that, but then if you want to try to do teleconferencing remotely under that framework, we have to go through these hoops.

Okay, so do you have a copy of these?

Um I'm actually watching up there, but I will grab one on the tabler.

All right, which is a little easier.

Tom, do you need a copy?

Got it.

Yep, yeah, okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

Are you guys should bring home?

So for the sake of my um stuttering, I'll call it an ESP.

And ESP may be able to meet entirely remotely.

It reports requires formal approval from the current body, which is the board of supervisors.

The board must by a majority vote authorize remote meetings for the ESB.

The board must find that remote meetings will only have public access, remote attraction, retention and diversity of ESB members.

The board must adopt these findings before first use and every six months thereafter, and after the board acts, the ESV itself must approve the use of teleconferencing by majority vote.

And it's also not available for members who are elected officials.

So if one of you is an elected official, you're not able, you would you would be coming in person while the rest of you were remote if you got this ESB, you know, green light from the board.

We don't we don't know anything about how this is going to work yet or what the board is thinking.

I have no information on that.

Um, but stay tuned, I suppose, and inquire within if this is something you're interested in.

This is entirely new to every single advisory body in California.

Um, so we're just letting you know that this is here, it exists.

Um, and we'll just have to see what the board does with these.

So the um materials for board of supervisors approval for that to go into their agenda has to go to them.

How far in advance?

Two months in advance.

Oh, to get it on the board agenda?

Yeah.

Um, that's a little bit, you know, away from the browner, but I believe the clerk has their own, the clerk of the board and the county administrator's office has their own procedure for getting something on the board agenda.

It'd be really hard to have it.

Voted on every six months.

Yeah, very difficult.

I suspect you're not the only body who's asking these questions, you know.

So I think it's just sort of a stay tuned and and see how this is going to play out while the board figures out a procedure.

But I'm just speculating, I don't have the authority to really say that.

Okay.

Traditional teleconference rules.

Um, this is what I was allowing to prior that still exist.

Um, a traditional teleconference, um, is where the teleconference location must be identified in the notice and the agenda.

So this is you saying, I want to, I'm not using any of the other teleconferencing paths.

I am going to be, you know, working from the library at our next meeting, and I'm going to post the library address on the agenda that has to be done 72 hours in advance.

And that agenda has to be posted at the library or wherever you are teleconferencing from.

Interesting, I think it's interesting that sometimes a members of the board use traditional teleconferencing when they are traveling internationally, you know, you're in Italy, you're posting the you know agenda outside of your Italian hotel room, that is permissible.

That's traditional teleconferencing.

You, you know, you can use this anywhere in the world, but you do have to plan ahead.

Um so Jenna must be posted at each location.

Each location must have public access.

So maybe the public is vacationing.

Um the public must have an opportunity to speak at each location.

So if you're going to use traditional teleconferencing and you want to say set it up in a place where it's more of an intimate space, like your home or your dining room, you better make room for the public and you better give them a way for them to use your laptop to speak into to give public comment.

So logistics are are an issue there.

Um and I would also really advise that if you're going to be using your home in this way to make sure that it's ADA compatible, um, right?

You don't want anybody slipping and falling in your home.

Are the additional rules for traditional teleconferencing?

Uh a quorum must be present within the county.

So that means that uh if all of you are using traditional teleconferencing, but you're all outside the county, that's not gonna work.

We need three of you within the county.

Um, if people are using traditional teleconferencing, um, and then all votes must be taken by roll call.

All right, moving on to just cause teleconferencing, and as I mentioned before, this was merged.

Emergency circumstances is now living in just cause, they which I like.

I mean, nobody asked my opinion on this, but it is nice just to have one set of rules because your opinion on it.

I like it.

I like it.

It's nice to have one set of rules instead of the just cause and emergency circumstances having two different paths.

All right, a member um may participate remotely for just cause when I'm gonna go through all the reasons that you can use just cause.

And the next slide is gonna discuss this, but I want to emphasize that if you're using just cause, you're not inviting anybody over to your house, you're not posting your address on the agenda.

This is because you have an actual reason to appear remotely using just cause.

It wouldn't make you have a contagious illness and then accommodate somebody in you know your home or a library, right?

This is because you have one of these reasons, and so you can appear remotely.

So that's child care or child giving or sorry, child caring, child care or caregiving for a child, parent, grandparent, grandchild, sibling, spouse, or domestic partner, uh contagious illness, uh, an immunocompromised child parent, grandparent, sibling, spouse, domestic partner that requires the member to participate remotely, a physical or family medical emergency which prevents in-person attendance, that's the merger right there.

Um, a member is required to be 50 plus miles away under official military orders.

A member has a need related to a disability not covered under disability accommodation of the Brown Act, which I'll get to, um, travel on official business of the legislative body, and then you can use this two meetings a year, two meetings a calendar a year, so members can participate in just cause for those qualifying reasons.

It does require a quorum to meet in person at one of the notice meeting locations that's open to a public, the public.

So if let's see, if three of you are, let's let me break this down.

A quorum is three for you, correct?

All right.

What's that?

Can't count as a quorum.

If you're teleconferencing, you can't count as quorum.

You have to have quorum in the building.

No, you you can you're not counting for a quorum for the purposes of using your teleconferencing, right?

So um for your just cause teleconferencing.

So if there's two of you here and the two of you are out, you're not you're not available for that meeting, and somebody is using just cause teleconferencing, there's no quorum, right?

You're right about that.

Um, but if there's three of you here and someone is using just cause teleconferencing, then we then that can go forward.

So if you're going to be using just cause, you should always notify the chair, and I'll go through this, but you notify the chair as soon as possible because the chair needs to make sure that okay, do we have a quorum in person for this meeting, right?

Because that would be a waste of everybody's time, not so.

Sorry, I just three.

Oh, the minutes must identify the specific statutory basis used for the remote um participation.

Um, so that means that uh you have to disclose when you're using just cause why you're using it.

You do not need to say that you have the mumps, you know, you can just say you have uh a contagious illness or something along those lines, you do not need to give any sort of specifics that would violate your right to privacy, but the minutes do need to indicate why you're using just cause.

You can just say a family emergency, you don't need to say my son fell out of a tree.

I understand.

Um so you want to know notify the body as soon as possible.

We talked about that, and though um remote location or identifying the location on the agenda, and you do need to disclose if there's anybody 18 years or older in the room with you.

Um, I can guess I I mean for voters at 18.

Yeah, I think that they're trying to make sure that it's just on the record that you are in the room with somebody that you could have you know potential influence over, or they have influence over your decision, so um, yeah.

All right, new disability accommodation teleconferencing, applies only to a member who needs remote participation as a reasonable accommodation.

Um, you have to participate by audio and video unless your disability prevents it.

And I should mention that for just cause as well, you have to do audio and video.

Traditional teleconferencing, just audio.

Um, so unless your disability prevents it, you need your audio and video on.

You again need to disclose if anybody in the room is 18 years or older with you.

It's treated the same way as attending um in person for quorum.

So this is interesting, different than the just cause disability.

You don't have to um worry about that forum issue, and uh there's no requirement that the uh location be open to the public.

And of course, there's no posting um at your address for disability combination either.

So that's new.

All right.

Moving on from teleconferencing, unless there's a teleconferencing question.

I know it's teleconferencing is detailed and it's changing.

Um, all right, written material.

This is pertaining to those written materials that correspond to your agenda items, such as what you have in front of you right now.

Um writings related to open session agenda of regular meeting that are distributed to all or the majority of the members um majority of all of the members less than 72 hours before the meeting must be made available for public inspection at the time of distribution to all or the majority of the of all of the members.

Writings can be made available for public inspection by internet posting and physical copies available at designated office and meeting locations.

So when something is made available to all of you, it must be made available to the public at the same time, right?

Um, that means if somebody brings you a document and distributes it from the public, it needs to be made available to the public.

There's a timing with that where if somebody brings you a document, meaning a member of the public at the meeting, you can make that available after the meeting.

But the rule is like if you have it, the public should have it.

All right.

The writing that is public record is distributed during the meeting and it was prepared by staff or members of the body, must be made available at the meeting, such as this PowerPoint presentation.

If it was prepared by someone some other person, it must be available after the meeting.

So if you receive something, give it to the clerk right away after the meeting so they can upload it online.

Um, and just make sure that the public has access to that.

Uh, like I've done with my presentation, the clerk has my presentation, she's gonna upload it, and I brought copies here today.

That was because that was at the time it was distributed to all of you.

So normally we've been posting those, attaching them to the minutes and then posting them that way.

I don't even know how we would post them.

Right away.

Where would we post them?

Usually you can link it to the agenda.

That's that's how it's I've seen it done.

So so we'd update the agenda that's already been posted.

Yes, okay.

All right.

If a document is too large or impractical to post online, which happens sometimes, it must be made available for in-person inspection.

This is tricky.

It must be made available for the public at the same time the members receive it at a designated office, and that the agenda identifies physical the physical office where the inspection can be made.

So if you have a voluminous record, sometimes we have big records like that or big architectural plans.

You have to think ahead with that to make sure the public knows where they can go inspect it.

So you're not bringing, you know, hundreds of pages per copy into the meeting, but you can't just say, oh, you know, it's down the road, you know, it has to be identified on the agenda where that is.

Um not sure which office you operate out of, but you would have that as your place where you could go and take a look at it, and then you could make copies for it if requested.

It would be like a public records request.

And I just want to walk back what I said.

It wouldn't be like a public records request.

It is a public record, and you would have to accommodate the request for um the copying.

All right, uh notice and agenda.

Regular meeting agendas must be posted 72 hours in advance of the meeting, and special meeting agendas only require 24 hours advance notice.

So this agenda technically could have been posted at 629 p.m.

yesterday.

Because it well in advance, helpful.

Um teleconference meetings are the same.

So if you um are teleconferencing for a special meeting, then you can post that 24 hours in advance, not not 72 in front of wherever you're teleconferencing from with traditional teleconferencing.

So the agenda shall contain a brief general description of each item of business to be transacted, action item, like an action item, or uh discussed like a discussion or informational item.

The agendas must describe each item to be considered in enough detail that a person of ordinary intelligence can determine whether the item is of interest.

The importance of the agenda is that a body um subject of the browna may not discuss and may not transact what's what they call it in the statute or act on items that are on the agenda or that are beyond the reasonable scope of the agenda.

So ask yourself when you're concerned about your agenda language, would a reasonable member of the public reading the agenda understand what business will be discussed or acted upon.

The public must know specifically what the body is discussing, not just that it is discussing something.

Um, and adequate agenda descriptions protect the body, protect the work of your body from from brownout challenges.

That's really why this is important.

Um, so I have an example.

If you put on your agenda like discussion of planning matters, right?

Um, that's very vague and doesn't let the public know what you're talking about.

But if you say discussion of proposed amendments to zoning ordinance relating to lot line adjustments, very specific, they know what they're talking about, right?

You want to talk about that now or at the end?

Let's save that for the end.

Things that do not need to be on the agenda.

Um, commentations, announcements, um, requests to agendize future items.

You can absolutely say to staff, oh, I think that's a great topic.

I'd like to see that on the next, you know, agenda item.

Can we do that?

Um, and then limited follow-up to general public comment.

We're going to talk about the different types of public comment to provide information or direction to staff.

So sometimes you get general public comment and they're talking about let's say a tree fell over in their yard, you want their property address so you can figure it out or where they are.

That's totally fine to clarify.

So you're taking note of that.

Announcements.

I hope you like my graphic.

Umnouncements should be concise, uh, unilateral.

There should be no discussion, no request for feedback, no deliberation, no opinion, no advocacy.

Um I have to say, Connie, your announcements this evening were spot on.

You know, you said you know what you needed to say.

There wasn't a discussion back and forth, but people that was that was the way announcements should be handled.

Um, we don't want to get into a discussion with announcements because then we should have had this on the agenda so the public would know.

But you know, providing an ORCID was a fine announcement, but um, an example of announcements, which I have here is that you attended a conference recently and you know you enjoyed it, or the next meeting will be on this date, you know, even though we're having a special meeting tonight.

Something like that is totally fine for announcements, all right.

The rights of the public.

So this is all about public access and transparency.

So we're gonna get into that a little bit.

Um talked about this, but the right public has a right to an open and public meeting with limited exceptions to have access to all agendas of the public meetings and documents distributed to the legislative body members.

We talked with that to audio video record the meetings and to inspect recordings of meetings made by the agency.

People are allowed to come in here and record you.

That's totally fine.

It's actually specific in the government code that they're allowed to record public meetings or video public meetings, um, to attend without any precondition.

For example, you can't mandate that they give their names or that they register to speak under the Brown Act.

Brown Act doesn't say um you know any specifics as to the registration requirements, um, but you you can't, you know, compel their identity.

So they can say they're Mariah Carey, and you just have to go along with that.

Really?

So why is it that we've got speaker cards?

Yeah, the speaker cards are county system, and we request that people fill those out for an orderly meeting.

So Mariah Carey could fill that out.

Mariah Carey, whether she be actually Mariah Carey, which would be interesting, right, or fake Mariah Carey could fill it out as Mariah Carey, okay, and she can come in and do that.

Um, you know, we can't mandate that they fill those out, but we can say this is so you can your comments can be held, and this is an orderly process.

Um, and I have a suggestion that if you know they say I don't want to fill out a card, I'm not doing that, and they say, okay, after the the card uh public comment is over, please just raise your hand and I'll you can stand up and speak, right?

Um, just to provide your own process.

But the card process is our county process, and you know the raising your hand would be a nightmare here.

That's what I'm saying.

I understand, but just for specific people that don't want to fill up a card, you can say, quietly raise your hand, and I'll and I'll call on you to speak if you don't want to raise your raise your card.

Quietly, we don't want people disruptive, and I'll get into that.

You want to get into it.

I'll get into it.

There's a graphic for that too.

All right.

Types of public comment.

So we have specific public comment.

Those are concerning the items on the agenda at the time of consideration, and uh general public comment, those are within your council subject matter jurisdiction, but are not listed on the agenda.

Um, so obviously specific public comment, maybe I should say obviously why I'm giving a training, but uh specific public comment is the opportunity for the public to dress council members on any agenda item, discussion, information, action item.

And this must occur before the conclusion of consideration of an item, discussion or informational item, or before action is taken, right?

The whole point is that you're getting the public's input before you have substantive discussions or consideration, or before you take action, right?

You want to hear from them.

Um, we don't want to do those things in reverse.

And then specific comment, you should avoid engaging in back and forth with members of the public on specific comment, and you should avoid deliberation with each other during public comment, right?

You're there to hear them out, then public comment is over, and then you discuss them with yourselves.

All right.

General public comment.

Sure.

So sometimes we get public comments where they're asking for clarifying information from the presenter.

So this would almost say that the presenter wouldn't respond to the comment.

Yeah.

But nobody's obligated to respond in public.

And you can't compel your presenters to respond to the problem.

So we would have to repeat the same question and ask it of a speaker.

That's traditionally how it's done because it's the questions that matter to you.

So you're hearing them.

They're asking a question.

Maybe you care to know the question, and maybe you care to ask the presenter after you've close public comment and ask the presenter to answer some narrow questions that you have.

That's fine.

But the point is that you're not allowing the public to then take control of your meeting, right?

And direct questions to a third potential third parties sometimes.

They're, you know, not even county employees, right?

Um, you know, you and those um presenters and staff are under absolutely no obligation to respond to the public.

Um, and things can really go off the rails when there's public response that's been given.

Um, and not to mention, and I'll get into this, I'm always getting ahead of my slides.

Uh, but then we are expanding the amount of time that the public is potentially being allowed to talk, and equal opportunity for time is a big part of what the Brown Hack's uh public comment laws are about.

So we would need to somehow keep track of this QA ping-ponging back and forth, and so and so can make a claim.

Hey, you didn't let me do that, you know, and then you're in a real mess.

All right.

General public comment.

It may occur at any time in the meeting.

It's limited to the matters within the scope of the council's jurisdiction, even if not on the agenda, but they can't uh, you know, ask you questions about your favorite Disney character or something, or not ask you questions, but give comment about their uh favorite Disney character that's not within the scope of your council, right?

But they can give general public comment about those things that are within the scope of your council but not listed on the agenda that evening.

Um members may not discuss or respond substantively to the public in any way that could be interpreted as a meeting on a non-agendized item.

So we just sort of talked about specific public comment and you know, sort of back and forth with general public comment, it gets even more of a you know, uh, you know, red flag, because if you're substantively engaging with a person who is saying something that is not on that night's agenda, you're you're having a meeting um about something that was not properly agendized.

We really want to avoid that with general public comment.

And uh general public comment is not required with special meetings, not this evening, so I mean, I suppose you could, but it's not required, and I don't know if it's agendized more importantly.

Um Rights of the speaker, just talked about that.

Right to equal time.

The Brown Act is all about fairness, transparency, public trust, applying time limits consistently prevents favoritism and it protects the integrity of the process, reduces legal risk.

Um, and the rights of the speaker, they have the right to criticize the body, its members, its staff, but they cannot be disruptive.

So let's talk about what disruptive means.

Well, first let's talk about this, and then we'll get into disruptions.

All right, limits on public comment up to a reasonable amount of time per speaker, for example, two or three minutes on an item.

The reasonable limit on the total public comment time before or during um its consideration, that's fine.

You can play if you have a line out the door and it's you know, you have 50 people, you're gonna be here all night, you can say, you know, we're gonna have 30 public speakers tonight, um, and you're gonna get this amount of time.

You are allowed to cap it.

But you have to be reasonable, right?

Um, it can't just be because you know the pit is on tonight and you want to get home and watch the second episode.

Not that that's myself, um, but you you have to have um a reasonable methodology of how you're coming up with that amount of time.

Some sometimes change it.

Well, yes, you can change it during.

So it used to be three minutes, and all of a sudden it's like, wait, wait, wait, wait, can we go to two minutes now?

You should set the equal time, the beginning.

I got a ton of speakers, yeah.

But the total, but the total time, you know, you could you could cap.

What about um like if there's we have a pretty aggressive agenda, and so the chair says, okay, we're gonna do two minutes, but then there's you know, and we might go into the next topic here, but we have somebody who wants to speak their full two minutes on every single topic on every single item on every on the agenda, um, whether it's constructive or not.

Not that we were we would be um judging that, but you know, they would want to speak on every topic.

And so it's if we have 10 agenda items, that's 20 minutes total.

It's two, two, two, two, two, two, two.

How would you how would you look at something like that?

Well, I think you'd want to get a sense of who's speaking on what item.

The same person.

They're allowed to speak for two minutes on each item.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's so in essence that if we have a two, I mean, they they could speak for 20 minutes in essence.

Absolutely, yes, absolutely.

We're stepping on Trumble.

What's that?

Public comment.

You're stepping on Trumble.

Oh no, I'm not saying anybody in particular.

I just want to make sure I understand if it's two minutes and if we have you know, then here, yeah.

20 minutes total or if we know how it works.

So good questions.

Um, so there's no right to response from the body, it's members, presenters, or staff.

I already said that.

Um, interesting, I think this is interesting.

Public uh members who are using translation services are entitled to two times the amount of individual time granted.

So that makes sense.

Their transition time is um extending their public comment.

All right, my favorite graphic, controlling unruly speakers.

Uh, the council chair may impose reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions on public participation.

Um, unruly speakers may be excluded from the forum if necessary.

This is important italics to allow business to continue, and a warning must be given.

So, what is if necessary mean?

It's actually a higher bar than you would think.

I always like to say like if somebody is whispering obscenities, right?

But you're able to do your council's business, you know, it's just in the corner, they're being just you know, they're being unpleasant, but it's quiet.

That's probably not gonna rise to the bar of you get to kick them out of here, right?

Um if they are making it so you cannot conduct your business reasonably, then you might be able to do that after a warning if they don't stop.

Um, if you want to err on the side of caution, give two warnings.

Obviously, if this is a dangerous situation, you would expedite that.

Um, but the brown act wants to give the public a chance to correct their conduct if they're being disruptive.

All right, I'm nearly done.

Consequences of um Brown Act violations.

Uh so what happens if we violate the Brown Act?

Why do we care about it?

Uh the Brown Act violations are a breach of public trust and transparency.

Uh violators may include any member, that means individually, the entire advisory party or the county.

Any action um taken in violation of the Brown Act may be invalidated by the court, and knowing violation of the Brown Act is a misdemeanor, criminal liability for Brown Act violations.

Any member who intentionally deprives the public of information they are entitled to under the Brown Act commits misdemeanor.

This includes conducting business outside of notice meetings, participating in legal legal serial meetings, taking action when not properly agendized, a misdemeanor may um from a student may include um fines, jail time, and may affect your eligibility for future public service roles.

Okay, and I know I just talked about crimes, but what I care about a lot, and um what you should also care about, um, is that court could invalidate your the actions you take, um, including injunctions, you know, restricting conduct or requiring public corrective actions, which is embarrassing, right?

Um, so we want our our work to hold up um in court and we want our actions to hold up.

So um and if the challenger prevails, the county um must pay attorney fees, which are likely thousands of dollars, even for a minor violation.

I don't know if you know anything about lawyers, but they charge a lot of money um for what they do.

So if the plaintiff succeeds, you know, we're on the hook for their fees.

Uh it's unilateral, yeah.

That's true.

So is that true?

Files.

Is that true?

Is that true?

Attorneys just attorneys are attorneys charge a lot.

So I have completed my presentation, and um I would you know suggest that you want you to go to public comment, and then I could come back up and and answer any clarifying questions you might have as part of your discussion, it's up to you, are there any comments?

I didn't get a card.

Uh answer up the questions.

Are we able to ask questions to her?

Well, I won't be responding to questions from the public, I just won't be.

So um that's what she said just a few minutes of slides ago.

You can yeah, yeah, you can ask us.

You ask us and then we can ask her.

Um the body, and then I'll come back.

Well, uh, if I may, please say, I'd like you to ask.

I would ask the uh board to ask the presentator.

Uh not necessarily referring to this particular board, but if a citizen were concerned about uh violations of the Brown Act, could that citizen submit a public records request seeking all communications between board members on any given subject, and would those board members be required to provide that information?

Is that a question?

Did you have a question or a comment?

You're asking me, you'd raise your hand.

Yes.

Well, uh unfortunately I've lost hearing in this year, and uh I find that although the the speaker have all the agenda and I understand the Brown Act, and I'm really happy with all these new rules because being part of this community since the 1950s, and I've attended many of these meetings, I've seen some pretty brash uh vulgar screaming at the board, volunteering their time, and uh I like the idea about it taking it once or twice of telling them you know you're out of line, and uh with that said, as far as a microphone, uh it didn't bother me because I'm reading and I understand this and I've seen it up there.

So if we have a microphone for someone who's speaking, I could hear.

She spoke with a very low voice, but but again, I have everything here, and this is extremely important.

Uh so I like what's happening, and then the the Valley people, you know, they have a whole industry back there in Happy Valley area.

So it's good to see you on board.

Thank you.

You know, so you've got your work cut out for you.

But uh it's a matter of hearing uh that I find now uh and later on I'll discuss with you uh about writing that and stating the name and things that's sort of changed.

Uh as far as when I've come up, I've said who I am, how long and all is my question quickly is has that changed?

I we just we come up or raise our hand.

How how is that gonna work in the in the very near future of that particular uh filling that out?

I state I'm from so and so and I've been here, whatever.

Okay, okay.

Any other questions?

Another question, and uh there was a comment in the uh flyer, specific public comment that's on page six.

It says members should avoid engaging in a back and forth discussion with members of the public.

I'm confused by that in that I would think that members of the public should be able to ask questions on a specific agenda item and seek clarity of the board's position with respect to that and for the presentation the presenter to suggest that the board should not engage in the public or with the public on a specific agenda item, I find a little disturbing, and I recognize that you have time constraints, but I think the point of the Brown Act is to have transparency between the public and the board as to how they are engaging with certain items, and to have a specific agenda item that says you should avoid engaging with the public.

I find disturbing.

Okay.

Okay.

So Melanie, do you want to address the question about Public Records Act?

Um, as a way of proving the lack of violation of the Brown Act, I guess.

I'll take your questions if that's one of your questions.

I'm not going to be responding to that question.

That's it's beyond the scope of my job to assist private party in that.

So I I work for the county.

I hear what you just said.

I'm a lawyer for the county of Alameda so I'm not going to be um I'm not going to be advising a member of the public on that.

Okay.

On the first question?

Yeah.

Yes.

Okay.

Can we engage as a speaker?

No, you are not.

Tom again.

No.

Okay.

Oh, so let's let's talk so you're the public record act request is a state of California law.

And that's outside the scope of your expertise is what you're saying.

It's not outside the scope of Maximum okay but I'm not um going to be giving you advice from member of the public tie on.

Can you answer can you answer so based on everything you trained us on if there is a member of the public who has concerns about potential violation what what course of action they should take.

They should see private counsel not my counsel but private counsel.

Okay.

And I think that answers the question about the back and forth discussion too.

Yeah I think we've answered that question.

It's not allowed.

Well and I and I want to clarify um for specific public comment it's not that it's not allowed it's the it's not required.

And then I've outlined this evening about the dangers of engaging in specific public comment especially during the public comment process I mean not to be illustrative but tonight this going back and forth between speaker we have to keep track of the timing um the timer has to be restarted and then you have a clerk count you know making note not just of somebody's time elapsed but how much time did they have prior you need to be mindful of that when you're engaging.

But there's nothing in the brown that says in specific public comment that you can't respond.

It's just not required and it's not required that your presenters respond either.

Yeah.

Okay.

Ian yeah question um what should the protocol be if I'm out and about somewhere let's say I'm even in my yard and I have uh a neighbor or a community member I'm at the coffee shop here and they just want to voice their opinion about the subject that's been going on for two or three months it's it's keeps recurring there's some deliberation going on and they just want to let me know that hey we're really like this or I really like this or I really don't like this and I just want you to know from the community that it's something that I'm not interested in us doing or pursuing it sounds like uh I really just I need to tell them I can't like I can't listen to you I can't discuss it with you you just got to bring it up at the next meeting.

That's not how I understood I understand you could have that conversation as long as there's not a quorum not another member.

Well you you could if there's two it's still on a quorum if you had more than two as far up a five person counsel.

If it was you standing there talking to the person they're going I think this and the bridge and then you go and then you give them your opinion right because you're a member of the public and then I walk up and I go what's up well we're talking about XYZ PD Q and like well yeah that we're still not but the second that you know Graham was to walk up and go hey guys what's going on we can't talk about it anymore but if the it's gonna happen all the time.

The phone calls your text people are going to call you and they're gonna they're gonna want to talk about all the time yeah yeah you can discuss it one-on-one you're in act you're supposed to because you know you're we're here we're here to represent the people of Sinol and people are going to talk to you all the time and you know for us to make decisions, we have to know what the people think.

For my what I've been explained to about these meetings, because this is we're just kind of in a weird spot it's got a kind of a weird thing going on.

This is they've been running like town hall meetings, and this is how Sonola is Synol's been very different for a long time.

We're at this spot with technology and changing of staff and stuff.

Where, well, that's not how it runs there, and that's how it runs there.

And a lot of the people who've been here for since 1950, they have run that way.

So we're at this weird spot where we're trying to do it, and you're kind of caught in that tonight.

It's these are all awesome people.

It's not that's it does nothing, but what I the way it's been explained to me, because this is not, you know, Tom, this is not the first time this has come up.

If you look at the Alameda County meetings like with a board of supervisors, you know, and we're an extension of that branch, or you look at you know, C-span and you watch, you know, Congress.

People are there witnessing, but they're witnessing a business meeting where we're trying we're discussing agenda items, and that and it's open to the public, but it's a business meeting for for for the council, and then if there's comments or you know, things like that, we can listen to them, but they're they're not responding to.

People don't go up on the board of supervisors and say this, that, and the other.

They don't engage in conversation back and forth.

It it can't, like she said, it can happen, but it doesn't have to happen.

And we're just in a weird spot because we're so small and we all know each other, and so it's it's just a weird kind of place for us to be.

We're just gonna have to have to work through that.

So if I had a few neighbors that came up and said, you know, I'd like you to uh put such and such subject on the agenda, yeah.

Well, yeah, you have to get with Connie on that.

But you can't send her an email and copy me.

No, I send you one to Connie, right?

On the agenda, if I'm wrong, please, okay.

Am I allowed to am I required to pass that along?

Or am I uh making a decision of whether I want to have that put on the agenda?

You're not you're not required to pass that on, and if I don't, then you know they're welcome to come speak publicly and request that it gets put onto the agenda throw a meeting.

You could bring it up in the meeting, yeah.

Okay, it's a future agenda item possibly.

My response is to listen to them.

Oh, sure.

I don't, but I don't necessarily engage back engage and put back my opinion.

I will be happy to listen to whatever you have to say, and then take it from there.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, you you you're making some type of judgment call whether it's an appropriate item to be putting onto the agenda.

Or they're just mad at the county, it just won't eventually get a lot.

Thank you very much.

Yeah.

So we I'd like to talk about agenda items, because there's an art to writing agenda items where you can communicate what's on the what's going to be discussed, what might be the outcome from that.

It's supposed to be 20 words or fewer.

Um I mean that when you write the agenda item, it's supposed to be 20 years or fewer.

Gotcha.

Um, and so I don't want to when I'm right putting that together, I don't want to assume that people are gonna respond a certain way and want to take a certain action, but there's a desire for us to put down what action might be taken so the public could come and provide input on that.

I see what you're saying.

Um depends on the way you you depends on the way you write it, could potentially send flags up to what you know what people may want to respond, and you're trying not to be a misrepresent it, but you're also making sure this is kind of a big you're kind of this is kind of a big one, and we're gonna vote on this, and if we say this, then this happens, so you're kind of at a weird point on how to but sometimes it's really clear.

Yeah, but a lot of times it's not.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

I mean, we'll have a discussion about Caltrans, chopping down a thousand trees.

Um, and in the course of that discussion, we'll decide, you know, we we should tell them we're not happy about this, but I can't, I don't really feel that I should put in the agenda that we are planning to send a letter to Cal Trans saying that we're unhappy with it, and predisposing that conversation.

Well, it shows it shows everybody like kind of Mary Sandy, kind of shows what side you're on in that deal, even though it's kind of obvious, but it's I that's that's that makes sense.

Yeah, well, could I suggest in that case?

If that if you are considering sending a response that you say, you know, discussion of X issue and consider sending response to X issue regarding this potential action item.

Then during your meeting, you discuss what that response would be as far as you know what you're going to put in your response.

So the public knows that you're considering responding to a public agency, right?

That's putting the action in the description.

You know, I know that there's been some pushback as you know, putting an action item.

You can put potential, but you need to say, well, what's the potential here?

I'm able to even know what the intentional outcome is going to be.

And then if that's the case, the most you know, conservative approach would be to have it as an informational item or an action item where you don't take action because your action is changed and it's not identified in the agenda, and you set it for another meeting, but kick it over with specificity.

So that would mean that we'd be doing the same topic month after month.

I don't know if I would do it.

That's your work.

Um, you're also free as individual members to draft letters and say, I'd like this attached to the agenda is something that we reviewed tonight to send, right?

Um yeah, then it's clear.

Yeah, that's clear.

That's not what I'm talking about.

Sorry.

I'm I'm talking about when we are trying to resolve a situation where we've got a problem.

We've got speeding on Main Street or something like that, and we come up with a in our discussion, come up with a solution.

It seems reasonable that we would be able to say, okay, let's take that action.

Well, something that comes to mind here, and we didn't really discuss this today, are subcommittees and what you can do with subcommittees in certain situations.

So there's two types of subcommittees under the Brown Act.

There's standing subcommittees, which uh require notice to the public, um, or you say tree subcommittee, right?

You know, that's ongoing, or there's uh ad hoc subcommittees that have a specific purpose and specific, you know, contemplated ending times, gonna dissolve the subcommittee, it's not going to last in perpetuity, and it's less than a quorum of your body.

So that to the two of you could work on something together without it being noticed to the public as an ad hoc subcommittee, um, and then bring that to the body and say this is what we think we should do.

That's a clear potential action item in a presentation by an ad hoc subcommittee.

There's there's ways for you to use these processes to accomplish something a little bit faster than your regular meetings if you fill in those parameters.

Is there anything that prevents us from taking an action if we didn't say action item?

Well, um as I mentioned, the the words that is not.

That was exactly that's exactly my next question.

Words in the statute do not say you must say quote action items.

Action item is the clearest way to let the public know.

We we are contemplating action here.

This is an action item.

If you're not putting action, it should be abundantly clear in your description of what you are potentially going to be acting on.

You know, like for instance, make recommendations to X body regarding this, this, and this.

That's an action.

Discuss XYZPDQ for potential action.

Well, what's the action?

In that example, I don't hear what depends on what depends on how you phrase it, but for potential action.

If if there you think there might be action, then be sure you at least phrase the words the how you write the agenda item that the public knows there might there could be action here.

As long as that action, that potential action is involved in the description, not just potential action, but potential to recommend or potential to draft letter to so and so regarding this, like needs to be specific.

Kind of somewhere in the neighborhood of what the agenda item is about.

It can't be talking about traffic and then end up talking about you know trees.

It has to be something similar.

I think she's even more specific.

Yeah, exactly.

I don't think you're gonna be happy.

So if you're not saying action, I need to be able to read the sentence and see what the contemplated action is, even without the word action in it, right?

So we say true action to slow speed down to retard accidents.

That's an action.

On Main Street, in other words, the action is we we're concerned about people racing down on main street.

So to put the agenda in there.

Just an action statement to try and retard the speeding down main street.

I think it would be what you're going to do to do that, right?

What what's when we said we discussion?

And we have no idea.

And then we we hear public comment, we discuss it, we do the whole thing.

We go, oh, you know, that that somebody had a good idea.

We could write a letter, we could do this, we could do that, and we discuss it.

We're like, you know, we don't need another two weeks on the or another two months on this.

This is something that we can take action on.

I like the idea, you know, and I'd make a motion and then that I would say is a ground act violation.

Okay.

So it's it's it it is in essence it's potentially slows everything down.

If you meet once a month and there's a couple of months that we don't meet, then the inactivity capacity of this board is staggering.

Well, you could have special meetings like we're having tonight, that happened.

Um, but also, and I'm happy to give you some uh you know offline uh verbiage about what these subcommittees look like, where two of you get together and say we're gonna tackle this problem so it's ready to go, it's teed up at our next public meeting.

That's for that ad hoc subcommittee where you are not bound by the public meeting rules.

And this is uh it's the way the cookie crumbles, unfortunately.

Um I want to recognize this is not yours.

You're training us on this, yeah.

And at the end of the day, whether it seems like it or it's like, oh, I can't wait.

You're gonna you're protecting us, right?

And you know, that misdemeanors and jail time and fines, that's that's that's that's not that that's big words.

It makes you wonder like for almost a volunteer, like, why you why you wouldn't expose yourself to that, right?

So I appreciate you being here.

I know it's kind of weird and it's not probably the the the forum that you're used to.

Um, but uh I want to make sure I recognize you questions and you're here literally to help us and and make sure that we, you know, because you never know when when you're gonna step in it, right?

And the more we know the better, and I you know I know it's tough questions because you're kinda like, well, how do I answer that?

I I appreciate you being here.

Well, I meant when I said earlier when, you know, I went through the criminal, you know, scary stuff, but really it's like the work of your body needs to be protected.

And it would be just you talk about a few meetings dragging things on.

Well, imagine like a few years and then somebody files a brown act challenge because of something that happened here and you are at square one, and that is just a nightmare.

You know, that's it's an embarrassing nightmare, and we don't want to act violations are that's what I was thinking about now we lost out.

In Alameda County saying I mean, like every year, I don't know.

I don't defend the county in Brown Act violations, that's not my role.

About how many there are per year, like complaints or anything.

I couldn't estimate, but I I know that they happen, they're not infrequent.

They're not in frequent, not in frequent, people that are looking to make these cases.

Everyone needs a hobby.

So let me read this and you can help me understand it.

Okay, it says as used in this chapter, action taken means a collective decision made by a majority of the members of the legislative body, a collective commitment or promise by the majority of the members of the legislative body to make positive or negative decision, or an actual vote by a majority.

So it's it's more than just a vote.

It's action, it's indicating that that's the way you'd like to go.

I don't have the statute right in front of me, but I don't and I don't need it either.

I don't want it.

But uh or a vote is fine um when you're having a motion and you're voting on a motion to approve or disapprove, recommend or not to amend.

But th those that's a a different definition as to what needs to be in an agenda description, right?

So we're talking about just now agenda descriptions.

So we're talking about actions, right?

But what's an action that we might take?

So that's how violating that's how you take action, but the action needs to be in the description, right?

It needs to be referenced in your agenda description.

I don't know why I'm so confused about this.

It just it seems like it just it's it's circles.

Okay.

Okay.

Any other questions?

No.

If you'd like me to send you some resources on subcommittees, please let me know.

I'm happy to do that.

You would form it by putting it on your agenda.

Uh and you know, you can take it from there if you want to get some work done offline a little bit.

Okay.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you very much.

You're killing it.

It's just sort of a whole other water two wineries.

Gabe, we'll work on a microphone.

Um it uh for you.

Just happen, you know what I mean.

Yeah, you're not the only one, so it would benefit more than several people, I think.

So we'll put a speaker up here next to you too.

I know I've seen them.

I know we used to have one, but but when we got this system appearing, we need to go over there.

The microphone went away, so I don't know.

I wondered uh when it's questioned, that didn't include us as an audience to ask questions then.

It was just for the board.

And that's to us, we asked the answer.

Okay, that my curiosity when I saw this, I was notified properly and advanced and all.

And and I didn't quite understand, but once I saw this, then I knew and personally among my neighbors, uh Sonold is a very unique and very intense community that rely on you folks because you're the go-between between the supervisors and all, and uh it's important that we interface.

Well, that's the difference is trying to have a difference between uh a a business action meeting by the council where we have an agenda and we're discussing and we're taking action, and and a town hall meeting.

And and that's kind of where the the flux we're in right now is is is and we've all we've always been running a town hall meeting where everybody stands up, everybody just talks and raises their hand and stuff like that.

That's what's been done done forever.

But now, you know, we're we can understand what brown act violations, we may not be able to do that anymore.

We may have to do, you know, have it where where we have the open communication, open dialogue, people can stand up and they can ask questions of the speakers and kind of that's more of a that's more of a town hall, which we can schedule those as well, but these aren't designed for that, and we're trying to figure out you know how we can work within those confines and still make it still make it feel like that and get to get get the balance so but it has to change from how it used to be, and we but we don't want to necessarily make it totally different.

We just have to figure out like Connie said we have to find the balance to make them run in the right way.

Yes, it is the little valleys for the people.

And we'll see you again next we