For Donovan and Watez, we've got a quorum.

I'm going to wait about a minute.

Ruby's not here today.

I'm going to go ahead and run the meeting, but this is the two minute warning.

We'll get started in two minutes.

Wednesday, April 22nd of 2026.

This is the start.

Okay.

Wendy, you good?

This meeting is being transcribed and summarized.

So let me call us to order.

The date is Wednesday, April 22nd, 2026, and this is the Human Relations Commission board meeting.

Let me ask, are there any agenda requests?

Hearing none, I'll move to roll call and I'll go to those that are joining us on the web.

Donovan Phipps.

Turnisha Brooks.

Dan Carwile.

Gina Robinson Ungar.

Samantha Bente.

You have, I think, in your packet the minutes from our meeting of March 25th.

Are there any changes or corrections to those minutes?

Hearing none, I'd accept a motion to approve.

This Trenisha, I make a motion to approve the minutes from March 25th, 2026.

We've got a motion.

Is there a second?

I second that motion.

And Regina seconds it.

Any further discussion.

All those in favor signify by saying yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

We'll show those passes.

We'll show those passed.

Thanks, everybody.

We do have uh some new business.

I think there is a follow-up on a J.D.

Scheff Foundation sponsorship request.

And then Donovan, you may have to help us on mothers holding it down.

But let's start with JD Sheff, and I'll have Diane give us a background on that.

We'd ask them to come back.

We tabled that at our last meeting.

Okay.

I did speak with uh Ms.

Sheff and explain to her that we were interested in supporting this event, but uh would like to know if the proceeds could go you know directly for the renovation.

Uh we would forego any tickets to the event.

But we were very much interested in still having the social media presence.

Um and if we could modify the amount to 500.

Um we were I I believe the request was 600.

She was fine with that, more than glad to accommodate uh that she uh certainly uh would welcome that that uh donation at 500 and with those modifications.

Any questions now that we've had that follow-up from the group?

Is there anyone that would offer a uh motion to contribute $100 to the cafeteria renovation to the J.D.

Sheff Foundation?

I'll make that motion.

Thank you.

Do we have a second?

Second, right?

I'll show Juatez as the second.

Any further discussion?

All those in favor signify by saying yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Thank you.

Yes.

And Donovan, do you have some info on the other um sponsorship request?

Yes.

So I was at an event.

Um mothers holding it down.

Uh I think their sports mentorship program.

Uh the last two weeks ago, two weeks ago, and I noticed there were 200 kids involved in in that program.

Several different parents were out.

Um a lot of coaches are there, mentoring students, and then also playing the game of basketball.

And I heard that they're in need of different sponsorships, sponsors and partners.

Uh and I just thought that would be great for us.

I'm not too sure if the um director sent in information in regards to mothers holding it down sponsorship.

Was that sent to us via email?

No, we have a copy here today.

Okay.

Awesome.

Well, that program I I wasn't aware all the way, but that program has been going for 13 years strong.

And I noticed that it's it's a free for free funded program for the participants.

So they don't pay an entry fee or um uh or parents don't pay for that program itself, and it also it gears to the youth in this city, okay, across all uh parts of the city in every ward and every precinct.

You can see uh families engaged in that program a lot.

And and what I see that uh they do have um I I guess they do have partnership with some of the churches and nonprofit uh nonprofit organizations to help contribute in other ways, but I I do see that uh they're looking for a sponsorship uh and other sponsors kind of partner with them for the success in the remainder of the program on out through June.

Um Mika Watson is the director of that program, and I see her heart and um her her willingness to serve the families in this community, and I noticed that she may have a $500 or a thousand dollar sponsorship, and that includes several different things, especially a social media shout out, which I do see that they do have um uh a lot of parents and a lot of families in this community uh engaged on social media.

Um and so I would say um that's the information I do know at this moment in time.

I know they partner to make sure throughout the year that students are um doing well in their home uh in their schooling, okay, and they send some of the coaches out to help uh participate in different functions at the school uh with uh the council uh the council meetings uh with uh the schools to part partner with the schools and partner with the success of those students and those families.

So it's another program that's in the community that I don't know if we have sponsored them in the past, but I I would like to see if we can just you know support that initiative and get our name out there uh focused on a program that actually is running right now and on out to June that would help serve the purpose and the mission of our of our commission to help serve different programs in our commit community that are making an impact and difference and it's uh diversity, diverse with different different families involved.

So Donovan, do you have they do have in the request a $1,000 impact sponsor, uh $500 community sponsorship?

Do you have a recommendation?

My recommendation since I see I I actually saw it with my own eyes.

There are almost 200 students involved in that program and families engaged in that program.

I would always recommend the most, which is the hundred uh the thousand dollar sponsorship.

And that also, I believe that also includes um some promotional uh promotional um advertising, I believe.

All right, thank you.

Diane, how about our wheelhouse as far as resources?

We're getting a little bit low on funds.

Okay.

Um that's why we were trying to keep donations at a minimal, you know, minimal to maybe 500 just simply because we have um a few that had not been processed and they are now being processed.

And um I mean, it's not to say that we can't fund uh, but if we continue to do this, there won't be any money at all.

Um so just would like to know if you might want to consider it the conservative give at this point, and we can certainly, you know, revisit it next year.

Donovan, do you want to put your request uh in the form of a motion?

I would put my request still out in a form of a motion for a thousand dollar sponsorship.

I do want to say that 200 students involved in a program, and then we have families across the community and uh uh that are actively engaged in that.

I still want to put that motion out there to uh at least the sponsorship for a thousand dollars.

Is there is a one of the host today?

Uh so they I I believe they host um so the main host is CK Newsom at this moment in time, and they have functions throughout some of the other uh churches, I believe, uh for practices and mentorship programming.

Um I'm not for sure if that's still with memorial and Greater St.

James.

I know that throughout that time, uh I I believe the host is CK Newsome Center at this moment in time for different uh mentoring and uh basketball initiatives as well.

CK CK is only closing down in a little bit, isn't it?

Uh in June, yes.

So actually uh that's a good question.

Danielle Crooks, uh the parts director actually helped um uh they they were doing the planning of the renovations, and they actually made sure that that program can still keep going throughout this uh throughout the time in the session of when they normally do it uh for mothers holding it down program.

And so the renovations is actually happening right a week after their program is uh is completed at the CK Newsom uh for the main part of their program for the summer.

So we have a motion on the floor.

Is there a second to mothers holding it down for 1,000?

Uh this is Trinitia.

I would like for uh Ms.

Diane, she provided some very important information about funding.

Um I would like to be educated on when the funding, the current fiscal year, when does it end, and um how much funding are we talking about?

Because I think it's important if you know, under her leadership she's given us guidance on being conservative, but I would like more information of when does that fiscal year end and uh where we are currently sure.

The funds that support these uh requests come from our donation accounts.

So it's not funding that comes from the general fund.

Uh these are funds that uh we get through sponsorships mostly when we do our annual dinner.

Um so that's the pot.

And there is um I think six thousand left in there, and we have uh one that's being processed.

So once that this one actually it's it's it's uh once it is processed, we'll have about 5,000 in there.

So, you know, like I said, and we won't get any more funds in that pot until around annual dinner time.

Uh so that's that's why I'm saying, you know, we probably need to be more conservative.

And the annual dinner is not until October.

Yes.

And so we we have a ways to go.

Yeah.

So I'll yield to everyone else.

Donovan, would you consider amending your motion to include $500 per the guidance that you were just provided?

Yes.

With the information, educated information that we were provided, I do amend my motion for and and move it to $500 sponsorship.

So we have a motion on the floor.

Is there a second?

For $500 to mothers holding it down.

I would second it.

Samantha.

Any further discussion?

All those in favor signify by saying yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

We'll show that as passed.

I'm going to move on.

I want to uh make note, Matt Hanka is here.

Uh moving on to old business.

We did have the Fair Housing Summit last Thursday.

Uh Diane and others, some comments in that regard.

Well, I'm sorry.

Well, we think it went well, glad to see some of you were able to make it.

Um I did want to um just bring some information to your attention.

You have a spreadsheet.

This came from Amy Nelson with the Indiana uh their housing center of Central Indiana.

And I it was um I was a little tired that day, I guess, or busy, and I didn't really get a chance to look at it really carefully, but uh and I did ask her a few clarifying questions before she left.

But um what this information is, it's Humda data.

And we have um, of course, you know heard about Hamda data for a long time, but it's basically mortgage data uh that's specific to our um our county.

And um it's there are three sheets.

One of them is the number of mortgage applications, uh, the other sheet is the number of originations, uh, and then the other the last sheet is the number of applications, I believe, without uh with the denials.

Uh so it's very you know eye-opening in terms of uh you know, the number of loans.

And I I believe there was a question while she was here about why why there were so few loans, and perhaps it could be that people didn't know, you know, how to seek out loans or something to that effect.

And I believe her answer to that was, you know, that's the bank's responsibility to do more outreach and you know how can they uh improve in terms of doing outreach.

So I'm going to ask her for this information so that it can be emailed out, but I do have other copies in the office if you're not here today and you're interested in seeing the data.

But there are just some real obvious disparities in terms of uh the number of applications, even for uh black applicants, Hispanic applicants, Asian applicants, and so forth, Pacific Islander.

Uh and really Native American, I think is basically zero just all the way down.

So that's that's sort of um, you know, the information that we have, and uh, you know, we we have uh wanted to educate the community on disparities in home ownership rates.

So we have to get a bigger pool of applicants to apply if we're ever going to uh address that disparity.

Yeah, um this was very helpful information.

Um put it into perspective, you'd think there'd be more applicants or more originations, and just shows a lot of people have their homes owned, you know, that just doesn't 34 seems low for a county of 180,000.

But um it was a good good job.

That was a great um summit.

Um it was a lot.

I think some takeaways.

It feels like as we get later in the afternoon, there's fewer people there, and I don't know how we thread that needle because you want to have enough information, enough opportunities for people to engage information.

I think our speaker, the 130 speaker, um the the lawyer for uh he was good.

Maybe if we ever have someone speaking to us on Zoom, we probably ought to break up breakup or in the afternoon break up his discussion because it just sort of went on and on and on.

Like did he know who he was talking to out there kind of thing?

You know, um there's a lot of good information about f the changes in fair housing law.

Can we facilitate it where maybe we break it up and you know what I'm talking about?

It was just he almost probably went a whole hour.

Well, well, that was his time slot he was supposed to say.

Oh I know, but in the hour, not have him talk and you know, people were just have questions maybe breaking interactive.

I mean 97 percent of the audience lost their I looked around, no one was paying attention.

So something like is there a not the information dissemination, but just kind of can we break it up?

Can there be QA in the middle instead of just that was just the one takeaway from that?

I learned a lot, but yeah, it was kind of I remember looking around and seeing nobody engaged with what he was saying.

That's that was yeah, I was a little surprised because I was sort of hanging on every word.

I know he's a a little bit you know professorial or whatever.

But you know, I I really enjoyed it, you know, because I I know him and and he's been here before.

We've had him in Evansville, and um I just like his presentation.

It was well done.

It was given to the other.

But you're not the first person.

Okay.

We've had some more people say that.

Yeah, if it's broken up, yeah.

And just to comment, we're a society that is just glued to our phones, and that is a free opportunity.

He cannot see you.

He is going on and on that it's time for me to check messages on my phone.

Yeah.

I don't bring my phone in for those reasons.

But is there an expectation for the presenters um prior to as far as audience engagement?

Like do we give them expectations or pointers of you know?

No.

If not, that maybe something to consider.

Yes, I think I think that we can definitely do that.

Um I know we've had him at other conferences that I've attended, and we usually have him do a dual um you know with another person.

So I think it's sort of it's a good balance because you know you have one person that has one uh style and then his style.

So that's something to think about.

Maybe we'll do if we want to do a legal update, we can have, you know, Professor Sang along with uh, you know, I don't know, a Joshua Barr or somebody.

I don't know.

But just sort of to split it up a bit.

Broadly, I Diane and I talked.

Uh this is Dan Carwill.

It's just a I think it's a powerful worthy conference.

I think we bookend our year with the Fair Housing Summit and then our October dinner, and those are just two fantastic events.

So we're still getting um survey results back, and we'll share those results, results with you.

Shall we move on to the annual dinner, Diane?

Yes.

Um well um this went before uh BPW, we had the firm offer agreement, and it was approved last Thursday.

Um so we are uh moving forward um uh with our annual dinner speaker, Reverend Barber.

Um we just need to decide on the date in the firm offer, it gave us the option of October the second or October the 30th.

So we need to make a decision uh which date we want to go with.

Um I know that um there are quite a few things that are going to be going on in October.

I know that the um uh Evansville African American Museum, I believe there uh Gala is going to be the 15th or the 16th or something like that.

Um I also I've I've been informed that uh the NAACP will have their state conference in Evansville.

Um I believe that's like the 29th or something like that.

So I don't know if we want to, you know, go earlier or if we want to wait uh to the end of October uh where we're getting really close to elections.

Yeah, I will um so the Haitian Center, they have their gala typically in at the beginning of November.

Um Carver community, they may last year they had something um like November 1st as well.

And I think um October 2nd earlier with all the latter things happening, we may get uh better attendance.

Okay.

I agree with that.

That's a Haney's corner first Friday.

I could not commit to attending if we selected the second, but that does not mean that we can't select the second, just being transparent about my inability to be a part of it if we selected the second.

I see.

And there's no and the other intervening Fridays don't work.

It's not available.

Um we just received dates from the old National Events Plaza, and then we gave dates to the mayor's uh her calendar, and these were the two that rose to the top.

And Diane, it's probably doesn't feather together that well, but if the NAACP state meeting is here the day before, I mean Reverend Barber is pretty powerful.

Any way to connect those two?

But but no, actually it it it wasn't.

It's the the date because he's the 30th, 30th, and 30th, and theirs is I think the 26th or something.

Oh, it's earlier in the week.

Yeah.

Okay, okay.

I think I had heard 29th as well.

I probably misspoke, but I can tell you exactly when that is.

Okay.

If it's earlier in the week, then you're right.

It's not.

That was my first thought when I heard about that.

I said, oh wow, that would be great.

Uh but if it's the 26th, that's that's still a four-day gap.

Yeah.

Outside of Samantha, I'm hearing some uh congealing around the that first date, October 2nd.

Any further discussion on that, and maybe we can start moving forward on that date.

And Diane, do you want us to vote on that or is that just is that fine?

Well, I I think if we could probably not vote on it because I want to make sure that that date is still good with him.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Uh yeah.

Gotcha.

Okay.

Yeah.

But we'll try to look towards the October 2nd date.

Okay.

We can put a virtual presence for you.

If that's okay, we'll just have a I'll have a screen and it'll just be just hologram in, yeah.

Just put me on the Zoom, I'll just be in the corner of the scene.

It's it's possible I could join later, but I would I would just be unavailable for that's the last event of the year.

So it just would be and while while you're at 80s quarter, you can sort of your face gets going to show up and it looks like you're not going to be able to do that.

I'm going to move us on to police community relations.

Any report there?

Um, I did uh have a meeting with um Chief Smith about um us doing an engagement uh with the RAN Corporation and it really came down to you know, did he have the funds in the budget, which you know he said, you know, he with overtime and things like that, he didn't have the money in the budget.

So it sort of um yep, we need to either consider you know making a request to city council or um how we can find the funding to be able to have them come in and do this type of engagement.

But that's where we left it about two weeks ago and of course the conference happened and all of that.

So I have not been able to explore if this is something that if this is a request that we can take elsewhere to see if we can get funding.

If you want me to keep going I I know we've talked about the strategic plan and picking a month and are we going to use Tad Dickle and correct.

So Tad and I have a meeting on April the 27th and we're going to you know look at how we can roll this out with our advisory board boards and probably I'll I think he is open to doing something in June or July if that's if I recall the email but we're going to talk about it on April the 27th.

Is there anything you want us as commissioners to do to prepare for that or we don't know that I think once we have a contract with him and it's been approved I think there may be some things that we'll need to do on the front end before before the engagement and I can let you know that would be good.

Any further questions about the strategic planning opportunity your meeting with him on the 27th and we're going to is it June we we're thinking we're starting this or May that's what we're going to discuss.

Okay.

We'll also show Marjorie Cabell has joined us.

Hello Marjorie Hello Greetings I'm sorry I'm late we're going to kind of just continue on.

Ted Zemer are you on the line and do you want to give us a report?

I am and I I probably I I joined late but I've been listening for a little while now.

I don't have a whole lot to report this month other than to say um there are a handful five or six matters that um are dragging on we're still kind of coming up with some new processes and procedures on on how we're going to hold people's feet to the fire and and get get people to be more responsive.

I did for the second consecutive month hold a meeting with Diane's team all the investigators for about an hour and a half in their office.

And like we said like I said last month I we're going to continue to do that now on a monthly basis which is something we've never done in the past.

Just to I I think it's been really good.

I think they would say it's been good and and it's certainly been good for me to keep me up to speed on everything.

So I'm I'm excited about that and I think things will be more efficient on my end going forward because of those meetings.

But other than that, nothing specific to report any questions of Ted Diane we'll move on to your report.

Okay.

You do have it in your packet and there were seven new complaints filed in March.

We did transfer four of those cases for lack of jurisdiction I believe they all did go to the EEOC.

We did have about 71 open cases at the end of February and then we did close nine cases that were closed as no probable cause meaning not that discrimination did not happen, but we were not able to prove that it did happen.

We also had four administrative closures for a number of different reasons.

Normally don't have that many but in March we did and it can be for a number of different reasons failure to locate failure to respond things of that nature.

We did have four settlements or conciliations that totaled 29,500 and we did have just one withdrawal meaning the person just said I want to not go forward with this investigation.

Every charge with the EEOC will get the right to sue eventually but this is a situation where they actually requested the right to sue prior to 180 days.

So we did grant them that or we requested it through the EEOC which left us with about 55 open cases at the end of March.

We are really being intentional about making sure that cases are processed, processed in a timely manner.

Having uh Shadrach, his job is enforcement manager, and so he's been uh working with staff to make sure that we stay on track with with our closures, particularly with um our housing cases because they tend to pile up.

We get more housing complaints, I'm sorry, employment complaints than we do any other area.

Uh on the flip side of that.

The housing cases require um a more intense investigation because they have to be completed within 100 days.

Uh so that's sort of where we are.

Uh you can see that there were just some meetings and activities that we participated in uh in the month of March.

Questions of Diane?

Certainly we've got a lot going on with locking down Reverend Barber on our uh dinner date, the strategic plan, so a lot a lot going on in the next 30 days.

Thank you.

Uh open discussion on community issues.

Commissioners, do you have any items?

The um River City Pride event will be held on June 6th, and I know we talked about having I did check with them.

I know they did not submit any funding requests for that event, so you didn't miss anything.

But they um I I as a commissioner would love to suggest that we get some folks together for the parade.

I know we had a banner made, so that is already done.

Uh I will be unable to participate in that because I am running the stage for Pride, the entertainment stage, but would love to see some commissioners and staff and anybody else that we might like to have represented in that event.

When will we get information?

That has been posted.

I can I'm happy to send it to you to register.

Okay.

Did we did we sponsor prior last year's commitment?

We did, yes.

Okay.

So will we have time to consider sponsorship or do you think I think they have another event that they're planning to submit a request for?

Okay, meaning uh there's a resource fair later in June that I think they had hoped to secure some funding for.

So not primary.

Correct.

Which actually makes sense considering our funding limitations.

This would be a more appropriate level for that budget.

But you can still be in the parade, which absolutely.

Okay, sure.

Yep.

I know many of us were here.

I saw Matt and his family last year.

That's one of the bigger downtown events that we have.

It's a big parade and a lot going on.

It's a pretty cool day.

It's great, yeah.

There's about uh, I think there were 20,000-ish people, and there was some rain sprinkles throughout the day, so um Diane, I'll send that directly to you so that you have it.

Um the deadline to register for the parade is May 23rd.

Other comments about things going on in the community.

Us at the commission.

Donovan, go ahead.

So do we have shirts that would help represent us as a commission or like name badges or so when we go out to function?

Well, we have a banner, Donovan.

I think that's sort of since we're going to be in the parade, I think we certainly want that, and we had that done last year.

So we will have a banner.

Okay.

Is there any way we can have like shirts that's representing the commission or so or like cards out in case you know someone wanted information about what we do?

I don't know that we're going to have a table because we I think that comes with the sponsorship, but I doubt if we can get shirts at the right now, just because we have so much going on.

Um but we you know if you're going to be in the parade, we will have the banner.

Hope that's enough.

Thank you.

I have one announcement.

May the 16th, 1 p.m.

Ebbezville Vanavir Public Library.

There will be a walking tour of historic Baptist Town.

It will start at the library in the main meeting room on the second floor.

We'll make sure that Human Relations Commission receives a flyer on that.

The start once again will be at the library.

We'll proceed to few sites within the area with the walk including at the Evansdale African American Museum.

Got it.

And you have to register online if you want to begin at the library.

Because that room only holds 30 people where we'll be at.

But you can join the uh walking tour at any time.

Thank you, Juatez.

Other community events.

I Dan, I did I did want to mention I did attend an event at the library, and it was done by Professor McLeod at University of Evansville.

And it was on uh Reverend J.

M.

Caldwell, uh, who you know was the city's first African American City Council person, uh also a former member of the Human Relations Commission and uh a pastor of Zion Missionary Baptist Church, and amongst other things.

And it was very interesting.

Uh I've I've heard things about him that I I was not aware of, and you know, certainly he was uh a strong advocate for open housing in Evansville, and um part of our resolution or proclamation, I'm sorry, that the mayor presented at the summit did mention uh that that was one of the reasons why he wanted to run for uh city council was to push open housing.

Uh but it was a really good uh presentation, and he I believe he is um I don't know what they call it, like the in-house historian or something like that.

So if you you know have time to catch another one of his presentations and Dr.

McLeod.

Yes.

And Dr.

McLeod, yes.

One of the first um slides that he put up, he had a quote from uh Nicole Hannah Jones and a picture of uh Nicole Hannah Jones and Commissioner Phelps at our annual dinner.

That was like the first slide that he had to introduce the session, so I thought I would bring that up.

Uh Mental Health Matters, Evansville.

Um May 30th.

Um there's an event.

Uh the city we have become, and I know there is another event that's happening um that day as well with the Deltas.

Um but it's the fifth year anniversary for mental health matters in the theater.

May 30th.

Is that it's at the CK from 11 to 2.

And um I will be the keynote speaker for that.

So a lot going on.

What else do we have that we ought to bring to our attention?

Let me shift to Commissioner Remarks.

Are there any announcements about job changes or location changes?

Okay.

Where's somebody moving?

I thought I heard Samantha say she had some updates, but oh no, I just had a job over book for the first quarter of the year.

Okay.

Government funded positions.

All right.

Prove your worth.

Wates, Marjorie Donovan, anything on your end before we um adjourn the meeting.

No, no, no.

I did want to remind everyone about the Haitian uh flag day.

Um and that's um May 18th.

Um we will have our um information translated by that time, right, Whitney.

We're on yeah.

So um if you want to participate and be out with us, please we'll send out something.

Uh but wanted to put that if you could put that on your radar.

Well, if there's nothing further, I'll show us adjourned.

Thanks, everyone.

Uh we we will meet again uh in a month.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.