So, this meeting is being recorded to the town of Ammerst um cloud and it will be uploaded to the YouTube channel for viewing by the public. This meeting is happening fully remotely due to suspension of certain open meeting laws
by the governor. And at this time, I'd like to thank everyone for your service and turn things over to Tom. Thank you very much, Angela. Well, good evening everyone. Um,
okay. I try to Uhoh. Okay, here's a draft of minutes. Are you able to see it? Yes. Okay, thank you. Well, it they're pretty thin this time because again, I forgot to set the
record last time and Angela had forgotten also. So, just taking it from memory. So, as we go through this, if you think of anything substantial that I've missed and you think should be there, just uh call it out and I'll
amend it. So, I think everybody was present last time. Okay, we approved the March minutes. Um, and we did really two items of business. We worked on the update to the mission and policies
document and uh I took away um not notes at least uh verbal indications, oral indications of things to edit. I haven't gotten around to that. Um but I will for our next next
meeting. Um we spent a good part of the meeting talking about the percent for art at the elementary school. I tried to capture a few of the major um conclusions or plans coming out of that. I think uppermost perhaps was that
we're planning to make the pitch for the full amount and to support that we've got a we want to research some scent for art projects and present a selection of them
at the May 19th meeting uh to give a range uh a sense of the range of public art. Um I think at the meeting on the 5th, our next meeting,
our last meeting before the 19th, um it might be good to really settle on a handful of those and um and think them through just what to show and what to say. I have to say I'm a little bit
um concerned that I only have costs for very few of them and I don't really know how to get that number. They don't typically publish it. Um, one thing I've been thinking about
is maybe reaching out to the artist who is listed in each time in each case and just sort of ask the question about, you know, if we wanted to do something like that, how much of a budget should we set? You know, I don't want to come out and ask them how much were you paid to
do this, but um, I can't think of another way to get at the at the budget number for them. If anybody can think of anything, just do let me know. Um, well, I'll just add that when I, you
know, sir tried to research out art, you know, sculptures, I didn't find a lot when I would look under like public schools, but I did find a fair amount on college campuses. Yeah. And so there may be somebody there who has
an idea of Yeah. But for my thinking is that in the beginning part it's sort of like it's the concept of a sculpture versus something else. Um but do you think that the the co and
that and then you you get as much as you can for the amount of money you have? I guess you need to have a a range kind of or something. Is that why the cost is an important factor? Well, I expect that council members will ask whether we
present any cost numbers or not, you know, will ask us. Um, well, how much did these things cost people? Um, Tom, yeah. Um, I did some research on it because I was looking at
um some options for public schools and um a lot of there's 27 states that have them in the books and we did not get it until 2014. Yeah. And uh Deval Patrick said the minimum of 5%.
So, um he said at 250,000 that's what he put in the um it's a public order public art order 553. Okay. So it was not to exceed 250,000
but um that was the percent for art for um Massachusetts but but we are still not a member of the percent for art group of the 26 members states that are part of it. So, um, and I don't know the
difference there, but one of the things that I found was, um, the best ones for schools were like, uh, public spaces of jungle gyms or or that kind of artwork. Not a lot. I did
not see any art of sculpture at schools through persons. Um, even though I tried to look everywhere in the United States in all 26 states, I didn't find any sculptures.
I have I have a few. I have a few. Yeah. The the most that I found were um scattered through Cambridge. Yeah. And Boston. Mhm. I found a few today that are in public
parks and you know that's a step away from what we're doing but um I'll I'll I'll send that information after the meetings. I'm putting it was that through percent for
art? Uh yes. Okay. Cool. Okay. Because we want to get a grouping of them, right, to present. Yeah. As part of our
PowerPoint, I'd like to show several. And the the council already has as part of that document, part of that memo that Paul Bachelman sent them, he has a page of links to samples that I had
gathered, right, a couple of months ago, right? Um, so even if we it's possible that one or two out of that grouping might be what we'd show, but I'd say, you know, if we can find three or four and, you know, to go to
Lynn's uh suggestion or the implication of what Lynn was I thought was suggesting, we don't necessarily have to put the price number right there on that slide, right? we can just concentrate on the concept
and the quality right what we're looking at and then come back to it if asked is it important that the samples that we show are from percentage of art projects or can they be I mean like I say what I found I I didn't even it didn't even occur to me to search under percentage
for art I just did you know public art in schools and I found an organization called Americans for the arts and so I kind of went down that path I don't think it's essential that it be percent for art. I I I I
think the public art concept is good enough. Okay. And I I searched percent for it across the country. Yeah. So, you know, so based on what Mikey's saying, it didn't give wonderful results. No. So, I
would I I'm comfortable with it being a little bit wider. Okay. Yeah. I guess what I would say is when I did put the well public art in in in public schools, I really came up with just murals. Yeah.
Right. That's a lot. Same here. Yeah. I I also spent quite a bit of time looking at the site plan and so and and I can bring up a picture of that. I think that we could look at the site plan and identify
a I mean I think the kind of sculpt you know to have a a substantial sculpture like we're sort of promoting I think to have to have it kind of located in a spot and if when you look at the plan it
has these two distinct entryways for the school but they do come somewhat together it and and it does make a focal point. And when you look at the map, when you look at the site plan, you can see that the that they've just popped a tree there because it's, you know,
probably be a normal tree, but it's it's something that you would see coming from any direction. And it's also it looks like there's a lot like a plaza there. So, it's it's an area of traffic exchange, I think, between the two um
openings of the school. Yeah. Well, one of them one of them is bound to be the entrance where the buses deposit the students. And so there's there certainly going to be whatever
wherever whichever one of those two that is is going to see an awful lot of traffic. I think can tell you can tell by looking at the site like Lyn's talking about where they are planning to have the buses drop people off. Yeah. Okay, let's
um let's just Should we do this first? Well, hang on a second. Let's let's let's zoom through the minutes here and get those out of the way and then we pull up uh pull up the plans there. Okay. So, um but we are talking about the right
things. Um, I also wanted to put in here that we we agreed that regardless of the amount of funding that's eventually decided that we would um recommend that there be a a consultant
and I did the looking into that like you asked me to do in the last meeting and I've talked to three people in different ways about it and I'll report about that later. Oh, great. Wonderful. Cool. Cool. Okay.
Um cost. Oh, and the next one here, the categories of cost behind the creation of a work of public art. That's going back um originally to the document that Lori turned up for us. And I'm sort of tossing around in my own
head the the prospect that uh we would ask Lori to speak to that and you know have her slide for it. Uhhuh. Okay. Um Okay. Then we All right. Then we're going to we're going to do a PowerPoint
have that ready uh for the meeting. Um Okay. Okay. And then we agreed last time we'd each divide up and work on some areas of preparation which we've done. All right. So those are my minutes. I move to accept the minutes.
Second. Second. All approved. I I Okay. Boy, talk about the rubber stamp. All right. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay. Um, so let's um let's get down to
business on the um uh the pl the plans. Um, so Lynn, do you do you have one do you have something at hand that you could put up and share? Yeah, I do. I did a well, I did a couple things. I did some screenshots from one
from the plan from the PowerPoint and then I did one I took a screenshot from the video. Okay, good. Good. Good. Angles. Yeah, go ahead. You should be able to share. I've turned on multiple user shares. All right.
See? Oh, I see. Okay. See, is that working as a share? I'm not seeing it. Maybe I have to take mine down. I'm gonna You have to take your Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Now try to try again because it's asking the entire
screen. So, I'm gonna say yes to that. Yes. Open system settings. I think it's just asking my permission here. Oh, it just says that you you can't record the contents of my screen
until it is quit. I don't know. I don't really want to quit. Well, just just go ahead. Just quit and reopen. Share. Is that gonna is that going to be You can choose to quit Zoom now or do it on your own later. I will do it later.
Yes. Now, can you see my screen? No. I Let's see if there's another way to do it. Oh, wait. Well, maybe this is working. I can Okay, there we go. Okay, so the first
one that you're seeing here is is and you know, we don't know how um you know where they are with the site plans. These are still, you know, in revisions, but this is the bus entryway and this would be where like parents
would come in. And so what I'm suggesting is that something go right in this area where they've got a tree so that you would it would be very prominent from whatever direction you came in. Plus I think if you were driving down the road here, you would
also see it. So that's what I was suggesting. And then if looking at it from this direction, I mean this is kind of where it is. So you can see the cars and the buses on the on the right hand side. So
So that would this picture who's up right now is the one you would put on your PowerPoint. Well, I'm Yeah, I think so. Or I would show both and show you know, right? So can see things from this view, but people can see things from
this view. Right. And to me, the way part of the fact that they have the architects or the landscape architects has left this so open makes me feel like it's almost like a a pass through. It's so open for people to have bikes. And so
I feel like this is kind of a a focal point of the front of the building even though it's kind of diagonal to the front. Were you were you able to see something that let you know the size of that area?
Um, well, when I look at it here, it's this is large. This is a lot of I know, but I mean, we need I think to talk about it, you need to know the square footage of it. Okay. Well, that's, you know, that would be something to
find out. I mean, here's a car. The committee in charge, the town council committee in charge of the school all along. They should be able to give you that if you ask them for that. Uhhuh. I think that it sounds a lot
better if you know how big that is. You know, that's kind of how big that it's like a plaza really. Yeah. The dimensions of that. I could I could find that out. And then my thought process would be that, you know, obviously actually getting back the the size and
whatever would be something that would be part of the um the call for proposals. We'd have the dimensions for that kind of once you do the price and then what my thought would be would be to show a series of That's good. Yeah.
What what could what art might look like. Yeah. Um I I have a you know and I think Mickey you probably have some too. So whatever those are good those are good. All three um you know those are all at at at
colleges. I think Dartmouth was a I wrote Yeah. Well, I wrote actually if this one is in Chicago. This is actually in That's I have to enlarge that one. This one was in Denver. Um just think this is actually
in a That's cool. It's a gateway into a public into um garden beds. They've got raised beds. Yeah. So, it's good that all the ones that you have though are all 365 degree images that like you can
look at what's made from every side and right this is in Cambridge. Um it's a gate. It's they're calling it said a gate into the um raised gardens.
So, I don't know. This is sort of this is kind of as far as I got was going through. Great. Um, and this was another one that I think I think this one might have been Well, I'm not sure exactly, but I tried to find things that I don't
know, looked interesting to me. And that looked wonderful. Yeah, I love that. That one's great. Yeah. Yeah. The the architects have done two favors for us in in their renderings. Um, one is that they they have left a
lot of potential spaces even though they've plugged trees into them. And the other is that that place the placement of the trees is some uh strikes me as
reflecting a judgment as to where things can go and not disrupt the flow. So we don't get if we say, "Hey, we want to take this tree out and put in a sculpture." They're not going to say, "Well, is there going to be enough room to walk around it?" Yeah. Yeah. That's
kind of what my feeling was also. Yeah. the you know a couple other side notes on this one is I was really struck when in the video of the 360 degree t uh turn around the school
that there um there are little gu there are little garden beds planter beds and there are open spaces. So, you know what? Uh, if if the sculpture did not go in
that entry plaza, and I agree that is the prime place, if it didn't go there, it could conceivably go in in lawn or uh or even included in a planting planter bed,
right? Yeah. Um each of the schools has a um a community garden. Yeah. Um and they use that food for the whole school system. We get a lot of our vegetables from them at the high school. I almost feel like it could be a three tiered
thing where you can have you know the the the the A thing is like a a you know substantial sculpture that you could see from the road that really is identifying. A bee is kind of something like a garden gate that goes into the,
you know, something that enhances the environment, a different kind of an experience. And then a mural is kind of an interior thing and kind of Yeah, Fort River's got lots of murals
already. Um, if anybody's been there lately, I've been there every day for the last month, but um, there's murals all over the place. um on the outside of the school. So, it would be good for us to um maybe go look at the each one of
us go look at it just so we are aware of how much their um artwork they've got on the out outside of the building. Yeah. You know, in some ways I feel like we're trying to sell the idea. We could take I could take some pictures of the
ones and we could include that in the PowerPoint. I mean it you kind of want to show this the range or the scale. Yeah. Where you could be going. I don't think though. But if we're going to ask for the full $250,000, I don't know how much we need
to emphasize a whole lot smaller projects. Yeah, that's I can agree with that. I mean, that would come next. If money is taken away from us, then we get in about how to make the most of the little that
we got. And I don't mean we, I mean the Yeah. Right. But we want the um we want for sure want the person that's going to um support it. The
the one that um Lori said. So Mikey, I think that you probably were on the commission when um Ellen Kaider was on the commission. No, I remember her. Okay. Well, I talked
to Alex Kennedy who was the head of the Eric Carl Museum until recently and asked her for some advice about people to talk to because I think it's really important that the people be from Western Massachusetts, right? I think that the town council cares about that.
I think that any citizens who or would ask that question and some of that. So, I talked to Alex because she knows pretty much everything going on in the art world around here. And um she suggested that I get in touch with Ellen Kaider who was on the public art. Do you
know her Lynn or your Her name is really familiar to me but I can't think of I don't know. maybe sort of Zoom met her, but on I like briefly over overlapped with her on the public art commission, but I didn't talk to her. How's her name
spelled? Uh, K, wait, wait, wait. Let me let me get my act together here. Um, Ki Ter. Okay, thank you, Ellen. E L Len. Yeah.
Mhm. She is a uh consultant for art projects like these and she lives here and she was on this commission and Alice got in touch with her, asked her if she'd be interested in talking about it
with us and she said yes. Okay. I wrote to her today about just in a general general thing about what basically the over overview of the project and um I'm waiting to hear back
from her and I will tell you all about that as soon as I get back. Great. Yeah. With her. And um the other person that Alex told me to get in touch with is uh somebody whose name is Nora
Morales who's just been I know Nora. Um her husband used to be at the Chamber of Commerce or the bid. Tony Tony Morales and he's now at UMass. He got a fantastic job there. So, I don't
know her personally, but um she used to work at um Eric Carl, I think, and now it's in Springfield or in Worcester. She was just hired. She was just hired to be the
new uh person who runs fundraising for Mass Mocha. Oh, wonderful. Wonderful. Phenomenal. Yeah. and and having a connection of that kind to a local museum is useful to us, too. So, I hope
that she is interested. Her her husband was certainly interested. They're both really good. Great. And because I've talked to him about some other projects and he's very positive and he wants really good things to
happen, right? So that's a real bonus, you know, because the hardest people to deal with for anybody is people who are like very negative to begin with. And so like you're working real hard to try to keep a spirit that you need up and that
can be difficult sometimes. But anyway, I'm I'm heard back from Tony and um I'm waiting to hear back from Nora. Oh, good. Okay. So, we've got at least a little bit of information and I think
it's good information. I trust those people. All of them have worked with other arts and businesses and different areas of different ways into the arts for people.
So, I was happy that they were they seem real positive. Oh, great. Great. That's that that's very very welcome news about both of them. Thank you. Yeah. So what do I do next? If say they both are interested in
being a part of something, how do we proceed? Yeah, I've been thinking about that myself. Um the one possibility might be to ask them to do to do a Zoom call with a couple of
us and and you know that would be a chance for us to ask some questions as we're you know to focus on the presentation that we're making advice on what what to present how to present it. Um,
okay. I think any one of the three would be fantastic. Yeah. Well, I think that Ellen is the one who is a official consultant, right? Yeah. And um I don't, like I said, I don't really know her, but I'
the recommendations that I've heard about her have been real good, right? But Tony and Nora are really good. I know. Nor's helped out at the Pelum Historical Society when we need anything
because they live in Pelum. So, and then Tony's also helped out at the Ammerst Historical when we have questions. Yeah. Well, I I think you probably know this that Tony has been the leader in making
putting an outpost of UMass downtown. Yes. Yeah. Oh, right. The store he did that by the way. um at the uh I met the manager of the of that
store at at the uh at the Ancestral Bridges open house meeting that um la last week had very nice conversation with her. I'm going to go up go up and see her her her place. I'm a little I'm
interested that uh they they they claim to be able to um host events in the evenings and such. So there may be a chance to explore down the down the road
explore with her, you know, how how that out how her operation could have a hand in public public art. Well, um, just as any other interested business would, right? Emer historical society. We're opening a
new venue on the back side of Boltwood um uh to have for our exhibits because our house the construction is not going to be accessible with the construction of the library because they need a 25 foot
clearance or uh variance to get their trucks through. So, um, we found out that we wouldn't be able to have any exhibits in our museum. Okay. So, we are, um, renting and there's a, um, press release about it. I'm not sure if
anybody saw it about the vintage shop on the back side of the of Boltwood Walk. So, it looks at our portal gallery. It faces our portal gallery. I'm like, "Oh, I know that little building."
you can think about it a whole lot, you know, we could see it nicely, but it's so it's the backside. Right now, it's the vintage shop, but um it's a great space. So, uh the historical society will be doing exhibits in that space. Starting at the
end of June. What? Congratulations. That's great. Thank you. Yeah, it's really wonderful. Okay. Really wonderful. So, and Tom, you've talked to uh Liz or or not yet? Liz Gigi. No, no, not yet. Okay. She at the histo
She's the historical society. Uh Liz Larson is the executive director and Gigi Barnhill is the president and um I also told Liz about the space in the town hall. Okay, good.
I was going to ask you whether whether you had had that conversation and I can just go in and talk with them. Sure. Okay. I'd be happy to do that. Well, I talked to Liz. I didn't talk to Gigi about it. Okay. But I did talk to Liz and she's there every day. Okay, good.
I'll do that. Okay. Um Mikey, did what did you turn up since the last meeting? I did not I mean I only looked for percent for art. Yeah. Okay. Projects that were just for schools and I only found the ones from
the Cambridge the same site you had. So, I did a full thing and then I went back over and I went, "You found that. You found that. You found you found all of them." And the only one that I thought was anything good and you have that
list, right, that you put together? Yes. Okay. So, the only one that I found that that was really interesting was the um playground, which is something that, you know, the school might go for is if it's
really well designed. I would imagine they're already building a playground, aren't they? I don't have any idea. That's always an afterthought. I know that they had to tear that one down. They don't have a plan for it. Well,
it's in the it's in the site plan in stages or not. I'm not sure. Yeah. But it's usually something that they get the parents to fund raise for. In the past, the one that they used to have at Fort River that Tom's and my
kids went to, they had to the parents raised the money for it. So, I don't know. may be worth looking and I I'll do this too is is to do do a search on um on playgrounds, you know,
somehow to see if see if there's a practice out there of doing high art concept. I think maybe I think it'd be a good idea to find out if they have plans for one already in place or not first. Right. Right. Yeah. And who who who
would have that information? Oh, that's that's out in the um there there's a ton of stuff on the web on the project website and um I'll I'll look through that too because I spent a couple of hours one evening and downloaded
hundreds of pages of stuff and they go they have uh there are a number of versions of a line by line by line budget and so that will tell us whether they've got it planned and funded.
Okay. What I expect is that uh like the percent for art, they just sort of left it as a line item to deal with later, but you know, as as Darra is cautioning, they might have gone farther and already have something picked out.
So, we can that that would be something to ask. By the way, um as part of what was my homework, um I sent emails twice to Kathy Shane asking her to meet with us as she had offered to
review the um conversations and findings that the project group had had with the architect and she hasn't responded. So, um, I'm gonna I'm gonna talk to Lynn Griezmer
and ask her to lean on Kathy a bit. So, I think we're getting I Well, Kathy's been Kathy's been really involved in the um the the library for the last couple of weeks. Okay. She's so
she's been really busy. She's she's busy on a lot on several big projects, right? to answer the question about the space that's available like for that plaza area. Is Kathy the person that you would go through to get that information from
the architect? Probably. Um if and if we didn't, she'd be upset. So the question may be to to ask her and then see what what she does.
So Tom, did when you were looking at all those hundreds of pages, did did they have a specs with the design project for for the playground? No, just for this whole the whole project. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, the specs should
include a lot of information size and shape and length and height. Where are those documents? I mean, I might be able to find out the answer. Are those on the town website? They're on the town website. If you there's a
there's a whole web page or subsite for this project and then there are document archives uh that are linked there. Okay. I there and see yeah they do have
they do have specs and measurements for things to scale figure it out scale. Well, if you know if if push comes to shove, if we can't get exact measurements for something, I think
there are enough measurements there that we could estimate. Yeah. And and uh I mean, after all, we're we're just doing a a talking exploration, not not engineering it. But
also uh I noticed in a lot of the interior renderings that there is sample art up on the walls in some places including you know it's it's just like uh clip art or you know just
filler. Yeah. There it's not it's I'm sure it's not intended no to represent what will be there but just gives the idea. So, for example, in the library, and I'll dig this up and send it. I think it's in the either the library or the cafeteria, there's a
there's a tall ceiling in the room. And so, the top 15t or so across a whole wall is a big, you know, space screaming out for some mural or something.
Yeah. I love murals, by the way. It's just funny that that's like the backup, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Because there's so many different other visual arts that can take up space. I saw one today that I I just loved. It
was It was from Oh, one of the sea coast towns in Connecticut, I think. So, it was fish themed, but there were these really nice I'll send I'll send you the pictures and and the link to it, but there are these
representations, these sculptural dolphins sort of in metal frame and it's like they're swimming through the hallways. Oh, yeah. Of the building. And I thought, well, maybe we'll do birds, you know, something we do
actually have up here. Okay. Um, all right. Let's see what else um in the way of um homework here that we were doing. Um uh I actually had want one of the things I had wanted to do that I haven't been able to figure out quite how to do
it was to get a sense of how much the public uses Fort River School and I wanted to see if they had a calendar of events there but they I just found a school calendar so I didn't really find um what I was looking for. Well, I I know that when our kids were growing up,
they had uh soccer games there. All the fields were taken by soccer. And baseball. I know they have baseball. Baseball. And in the winter, it's basketball. A lot of basketball games. That's where we vote. Yeah. Um in the gym. Um and it used to
be in the music rooms. legal lito. This is a great list of all the different book sale for book the the scholastic sales. Um
oh the uh was it League of Women Voters in July, right? They they would set up in the in the gym for the big book sale. Big book sale. Um that but you reminded me uh I talked with
uh with John Paige at the bid and he's promised me a set of statistics on u you know the dollar value of the arts in tourism etc to the town. Good. Yeah.
Uh but uh we also at Lor's I think it was Lor's suggestion last time should do some uh look up what the capacity of of the school is planned to be in terms of number of students. Little back of the napkin arithmetic to figure out how many
students will go through the school in 50 years. Well, um I do know that um they're going to consolidate Fort River and Wildwood into one school and it's going to be K through five. Sixth grade
has to move to the middle school. Right. Right. Y I think somewhere in the architect somewhere in the architectural plans there must be there must be a mention of how what they estimate the capacity to be.
Well, I'll see if I can get if I get into the plans, I'll look for that. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe you could talk to somebody in the Fort River office who manages public events at the school separate from the school's
main mission. That might be at the family center and in uh the middle school. The family center runs a lot of that stuff and they're based out of the middle school um school offices. Okay.
Okay. Okay. Um yeah. All right. So, I'm I'm going to I'm going to follow up on the suggestion to go to go visit with my camera at uh at Fort River. Well, yeah. And I'll go to the office and introduce
myself, you know, introduce myself and and explain what I'm doing and see what they'll volunteer uh also. But the middle the family center at the middle school, I can go go see them, too. I think Marta Guarva
Martva, she might run that. I'm not positive. Um Okay. But at Fort River, the cranes are there. And um I've been on the van with little kids for the last month and we go by we drop off kids at the at um Fort River.
So we look at the cranes every morning and the kids talk about how big each of the trucks are and all of that. But um they've been building right along. They're just they're working hard. That building's huge. Very
high. Very high. So, it's fun. It's fun for the kids to watch. Oh, yeah. Yeah. They all want to watch and sit on the trucks. Can we go see the trucks? Yeah. It would
be I know one of one of the things my mother always always advocated was that um you know the public schools sit sit sit unused evenings, weekends, summer and why can't the town this was back in
New York. Why can't the town work out something where they can put programming in in there? Now, we're not that's not a fight we're gonna we're gonna start here. But, uh, but one thing that would be helpful, and
this is the gist of the conversation we're having now, is if we can get a handle on uh how how many of the, you know, Ammerst residents would have some other reason to go into onto the school
grounds and and see these things, right? And I mean just before when you all were throwing out different names of things that have gone on there, that was a great start. Yeah. And I was there a winter farmers market
in one of the schools. Um middle school that goes on in the middle school. And um right now in the high school, middle school, and one of the elementary schools, and I'm not sure which, there's an early morning group um and um they do
basketball in the wintertime with the kids and weightlifting and all these other sports that um I think are fifth grade through 12th grade. So in each of the different schools at six o'clock in the morning. Yeah. So, do you would you
all send me an email with just the what you know already and then I'll get on phone and drive I'll do some work to try to keep adding to that to make that a serious component of our knowledge. Yeah. Let's let's let's all let's each
individually do that. Send it to the group. That'd be great. Well, the the I know the police department works does one of the uh groups at the high school because the um this past Oh, maybe it's on a Thursday. This past Thursday, um I
saw these police cars there at 6:00 in the morning and got worried and found out it was the group that's working with the kids. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think traditionally, I'm going out on a limb
here, but I think traditionally the thinking about elementary schools was sort of to keep the keep the public at general away, you know, for perceived safety reasons. I think that's always been a little bit less. I think back to
my own high school that was a very different attitude, you know, that um you know, more people would come in for more reasons, you know, organized events is what I'm talking about there. But um yeah, and I don't know, going back to
something I think uh um you mentioned uh Lynn, I don't know how visible uh the new building is going to be from the street. If you if you drive by now there, you know, there's a row of houses on the street, so at best you're sort of
peeking between them, so it's not like there's an open view to the street. is is there uh Mike? Um so the old entrance to Fort River is now closed off and it's the construction, but that's where it's
going to be. That's going to be the new entrance. And then um if Lynn pulled up that uh rendering again, um that parking lot that you see is the old parking lot and they're keeping that. Mhm.
So that's um they're not getting rid of that where all the um people park, not the buses, but the people. Yeah. So that will be So over to the left, that long parking lot and the drive out that
that's the original parking lot and that's the school where you see the sort of Nope. The other one. So if you go by the parking lot, this is the old school. That's the old school, right? And that will be um fields. Yeah. Now if um and
this is the So that's going to be still be the drive in and right now it's the construction. Yeah. East Street runs from where the P is right down the margin, right? And what the architects
left out is that on the right side as we're looking at it of uh East Street there their houses except for the here right there. Yeah. So you people driving
by will have a view into the fields here here I think. No that's right Lynn. So, right where you're putting your thing, they'll have a view into the school there just from here. Right. That's why I was saying this. That's why this to me
seems like an ideal location for you to have. Agreed. Yeah. And here's what they've shown here. Those are basketball courts. Yeah. And um this might be raised beds or something for Right. So, that would be
seen too. Maybe this is identified as a playground area. Right. Can that get closer at all or can you make it bigger? Bigger. Let's see. Yeah, cuz then it could see.
Oh, that's bigger, right? I'm not sure what this little thing is here. That must be an existing thing, utility or something, right? That's probably I don't know. I have no ide I think baseball diamonds are gonna go
as we say soccer and Oh, here's a soccer. Oh boy. They used it for they use that those fields for every sport. Soccer um adult baseball, um slow pitch baseball, and um yeah, all of it's gone
this year because they're building the building and the other buildings got, you know, there's there's nothing now. But um that's always been used all that land. So I have a question
for you, Tom. Um so the next town council meeting is April 28th. Um yes, but we're not on the agenda for that on that agenda. Ours ours is the
19th of May. Of May. Yeah. So, we have um I just wanted to check this with everyone because I'd lost written track of this, but I believe we had agreed that we would meet again in two weeks on Monday the 5th. Yeah.
Yeah. Okay. Um uh and by the way uh when I was at the Ancestral Bridges reception um and saw Lynn Griezmmer and she said
she said to me uh see you on the 5th and afterwards I thought wait a minute wait a minute what's that I forget something and no I wrote to her today and she said, "Oh, no. I I was thinking of the 19th." And I said to
her, "Um, we would I'd like the the uh opportunity to caucus with you before the 19th." And she said, "Yeah, we can do that." So, um I I think it'd be nice if a couple of
us could could have either a Zoom with her or see her in person at uh at town hall or something. Excuse me. When would that be? Sometime between now and the and May
19th, closer to maybe not immediately, you know, when we have a better idea when we have a more detailed idea of what we're going to present. So, if we we're meeting in two weeks, so that's May 5th. Mhm. Um if what if Ellen
Kaider would agree to meet with us? Yeah, that'd be that'd be wonderful. Wonderful. Okay, let's see. Um, are we planning on having that handout that we worked on for the town
council to have like a week before we meet so we can just send it out to them just for a preview or background information on the council? Yes. From the commission. Yes. what uh I had hoped to have that revised
so that we could um sign off on it today, but I'll I'll kick that ahead to the next meeting. But yes, I would like very much to have that we wouldn't have to include much of a background in the presentation. You could just Right. We
can That's right. That's right. Yeah. I can make that pitch to to Paul Bachelman too when I ask because I I wouldn't I wouldn't do anything with our document without him seeing it and having a
chance to say whatever he wanted to say. Um, but I I can make the pitch that hey, this will save us some time in that meeting since the counselors are are, you know, probably not closely
informed as to who we are, what we do. Mhm. But um my my thought in having a conversation with Lynn Griezmmer would would be just to to let her know the shape of what we're planning to do at at
the meeting. I want to be careful about that. I don't want to over get overly clever or political about it, but um I think when the chair when the chair of a of a meeting knows what the participants are planning to
present, uh I think that's always helpful. Um, do you want me to take the outline that Lori put together and try to edit that down into a PowerPoint format? That would be wonderful. We're gonna have to
do that. Yeah. Yeah. If you're if you're willing to do that, that's fabulous. Yeah. And try to make it a lot shorter than it is. Please. Yeah. Yeah. I I I'll so I mean I appreciate the detail and I appreciate the thoroughess of a lot of it but
it's more as they say granular then Yeah. Yeah. So useful to talk about I would I would I guess I would say no more than five slides. Well, you'd want to include some images but they could be on one page. That's
right. So, let me take a stab at that for the next meeting. I wouldn't Thank you, Lyn. I also think it would be okay to um make full-size,
you know, images, you know, full page, full PowerPoint page images and not count those as part of the five or the text because I think five of text, you know, text content like to have a site plan as a page to
orient people. I mean, you need the context of everything. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. That'd be very helpful to to have drafted up for us. That'd be great. And do do remember that uh you know let's uh
let's give uh let's give Lori a page where she can run through you know all those components. I think in that case it is worth getting more granular because we want to make the case as we've said here a number of times that
if you if you allocate 250 100 or or 50,000 uh it has to include a lot more than just the I think that's good and even if we do it in percentages yeah that's fine you know we have an example and we can extrapolate from that what the percent
that's better that'll keep us out of getting into money money haggling the using percentages. So what what's the philosophical angle of this in your minds in terms of how do you make a case
for the full amount being the out ofthe- gate first time Ammerst town does this honors this and makes it be part of an expectation of a commitment to public art at a at a raised level than it's
been able to be before. Yeah, I think that's that's the heart exactly what I think. That's the heart of it. So, I think that's one thing we need to practice, right? But we're gonna have to do it again um for the library. Yeah. Yeah. Probably are going to have
to do it again for the library. And that's exciting, right? You know, that's a visible visible spot, right? And you have a historic place right next door. Right next door. Yep. Everybody thinks that the library owns it, but yeah. No.
And the cinema is right there. It's a really nice spot. It's possible you can use that to our advantage by saying the fact that there's this other project down the road. You know, we want to set a present here. Good point. It's really true.
The first time you do it, it's a big symbol of how you're going to treat this, right? Okay. Um what you're gonna do. Does anybody No, now the the library is not part of the percent for art. Oh, really? You know, it's not counted in
there. Oh, because it's privately owned. Because it's privately owned. Now, one thing to check is do they have a p public art line item anyway, right? Um,
which which would keep our thinking afloat here. But I do think we should make the case, you know, that uh, you know, the bylaw, which is carefully considered and overwhelmingly passed, you know, calls for 1/ half of
1% and the and this is the first run through. We want to get it get it right, etc., etc. Set a high standard. Um, but also uh keep in mind please that when when Lori and I were at that last council
meeting uh the you know after Kathy's motion to cap it at 100 the reaction of several of the other counselors was wait a minute wait a minute we want to hear what the possibilities are we want to understand this more so my view is we're
doing honor to that line of questions. Now, you know, I had a note from Paul Paul Bachelman when I uh I think I shared it with you when I I asked um it's an email
I forwarded. um you know when I'd asked to have a meeting with him he sort of reminded me that what he wanted was for us to bring forward you know a proposed uh price for this you know it would be you
know so we I'm trying yeah there's there's a price you could you know I don't know you could present the price as here's a scenario of what a price can be but without knowing What? Yeah.
I don't know what did they talk about or so much of this is really vague. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh I think we're trying to be really clear and specific and plan well and that's important. Mhm. But I want to
know, I have so many questions, such as, has anybody talked about the town of Ammeris hosting a competition for this art at that high an amount of money? I think what's happened is that there's
kind of a watershed that we haven't gotten to yet. and how we would solicit the art. Everybody's been thinking, "Oh, that's we'll deal with that later." Now, the the golden opportunity is that we
are the ones designated by the bylaw to come up with what happens once we've got once we've got uh our budget. And one of the reasons I'd like Excuse me, Lynn, go ahead. Well, I was going to say that
it's poss, you know, we could do the presentation and then and then in the next steps, one of the next steps would be to make decisions about, you know, I like the idea of a competition, you know, I love it for a competition. Do you, you know, what are, you know, and
that news? You want it to be news. Yeah. Because this is the first time it's a it's a significant amount of money. Yeah. Develop PR around it. And to have a competition would be make it open in a way that the way we've been
talking lately not through any fault of our own but just because it's so vague. Little bitty idea can come from it but we don't know. You know the if you do a competition and it's serious competition
and you advertise it in all the right places and that's not hard. And that's why some connected to Mula is a really good good connection to have and then you know we get to be surprised. Yeah.
Yeah. By how wonderful something might turn out to be that we never would have imagined. Well, I think that that's your thinking there is in line with a couple of the questions that the counselors asked to which what you just
said would be the answer. and that the sense of their question or their their comments always hold it, hold it. We don't want to miss right the opportunity to have something really nice. Another person to talk to um might be John
Beckold who is the theater runs the theater at Ammerst High School but he's been also working uh for Mass Mocha for the last six months and he's doing a big project for the 250th
um with the town. I know him. He's very positive too and really he's really good. Yeah. Um, but he knows all the ins and outs. He knows what's going on in the school. He knows what's going on in the town. He's very involved with Mass
Mocha and creating all sorts of um I don't know what, but he did something at the historical society um last year. Right. Pardon me. At the high school. Yes. John Beck told. Yeah. And how spell
his last name for me, please. Oh boy. I don't know. Um I'm terrible at spelling. B I think it's B E C H T O L D. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe an H in there, but but that's close. Yeah. B E C H T O. I feel
like my kids know him from a long time ago. And I'll find out. Yeah, he's really good and he's very involved. That would be great. Yeah. Now, here's another little point that uh I've been mulling over and we'll bring out and bang on if if
uh if it seems useful or necessary at some point, which was that if you go back in the bylaw, we were the project people were supposed to notify us much much earlier. Oh yeah. We were supposed
to be have a foot in the door before all these plans got made. and we didn't have that opportunity. So, so um we're
um we're at a bit of a disadvantage on things like, you know, uh the site, the um just the integration of the art into the architecture. We missed out on that. we
were not included there. And that that's also going to play in my view into our argument if it comes down to an argument over needing a consultant. Uhhuh. Because we're not just we're not taking the view that we're going to slap
a piece of art in place here. No. Well, so maybe we can think about these things that have all come up now at the end of Yes. Yeah. Each write a little something that it that includes something about
the feel, you know, the zeitgeist that we're producing. Yes. Yes. Yes. And I think that that would give us some a start for some language and some coherent combined collaborative kind of thinking about what what we want
to begin to say to them. What I what I foresee uh for the 19th is that you know there be several of us whoever whoever is free available and wants to be there for sure. um and that
we would present as a panel. So, we each have different pieces, but we're all closely thought out. And heard need We need the outline of that panel. We need the outline. We don't want to get picked apart. We don't want to get picked
apart. Yeah. So that we'll know what pieces to put in it. Yes. That's right. And I I mean I I think spontaneous talking about things is great, but I also think when you're present making a presentation to a town body Yes. some
preparation really different different task. Yeah. So you know how long do we have to open our presentation? How long is that? How many pieces? Well, that that I'm going to bring up with Lynn with Lynn Griezmer. Okay. I don't
want to arrive there and find that they've given us 15 minutes. Well, if you if they've given you 15 minutes, so then we have to make a presentation that fits into it. Right. Right. I don't want to be surprised. Be be illprepared because the timing
wasn't we what we presumed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that it's makes a big difference in terms of how you start a conversation by having at least put put it out there that you have tried to do your homework
given the amount of time you've had to do it. Yes. The vagueness of our charge. I think we can I think we can easily demonstrate that we've been very thoughtful and have put in the work.
Yeah, that's we can we can do that we'll do that through the PowerPoint but even more importantly through how well we are individually and collectively prepared all the things we've thought about the sort of fallback or or fillin
information that we've got at hand and our ability to you know to answer the questions about well what did you look at how widely did you Look, what did you find? What's your sense of Yeah. You know, and try to anticipate some of the
questions. Yep. I think you're doing right now. Right. Right. And um and what's the order of the presentation? Yeah. What's the best? Yeah. Let's let's all noodle on that. I'm going to say
that I think I think somebody we want somebody to lead with the with the uh philosophy is to to put a term on it the zeitgeist there. Um I'm not sure what the next piece would be. It wouldn't be
the Lori piece, but it may be it may be what uh the the Lynn piece here looking at looking at the at the places on the ground or in the and and in the building and showing them some pictures and ideas
get them uh get them thinking a little more concretely about what it could what it could look like. I think those the few slides you showed us, Lynn, a couple of them are very very Yeah.
Yeah. And just that being up out there help people mightily to Yeah. I think the visualization is really helpful. Yes. Because at least two of them are really inspiring and good. Yes. Mhm. And um I
think we can probably find a couple more. Yeah. Well, Mickey, if you have some you want to send me, I can Yeah, there's the Cambridge one of the uh playground, but that's on the list of um that Tom already sent and I found the
same one. I was I was very specifically looking for ones a percent through art for our through at schools and there's so few. Yeah. But there are like 26 states that do it.
26 states and I found two. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you that um Massachusetts under was it Smith? Who was the the Republican last Republican governor? He rescended he rescended a percent for
art. Oh, really? The career law. Deval Baker was the one who started it and and um Minnesota when they swung Republican I don't know 10 years ago or whenever it was beginning of the Trump era um one of
the first things the governor did was kill the percent for art. Uh, so I think there's there's been some roll back, but I think it's been sort of where you'd expect it on the political spectrum.
Um, just a question about putting together a PowerPoint. Do you think that within that you want to show interior sites as well as exterior? Do we want to just focus on something outside? I would say let's show some interior
because again we don't want to be caught short and somebody say well did you did you consider inside the building? Mhm. Even though uh I mean there's is there any place inside the building that
would accommodate something as sculpture not sculpture and I think we would you would we would quickly get into dimensions and clearances you know ability for people yeah I think that
would be a rocky one whereas doing um a mobile or something I don't know if the ceilings are high but yeah that's the kind of thing you See, that would be one to look for because one of the one of the nice ones I found today was a ceiling uh
suspended uh sculptural array done in done in lexan, a kind of plastic. Um very pretty. Very very pretty. Well, maybe you can. But you need a high ceiling for it. Yeah. I've been in a lot of airports lately and um they excel at
putting things above you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. This was this was really good. I will um I'll be in touch with Lori. I sent her an email uh asking some questions uh just this afternoon. I
think uh as of next week she'll be back and available. So, are we going to have ask Ellen um Dara? Are you going to ask Ellen to come to the May 5th meeting? Yeah. Yeah, let's do that. Yeah. And if for some reason she is already busy,
maybe I'll ask Tony. Tony would be good to come. Any one of them would give us outside view that would help us organize these last couple, not just couple, many steps that we have still to take, right?
Maybe they've done this before. maybe they can make point point out things to us that we h haven't occurred to us too, especially sort of quite a bit government government process standpoint. I'm sure that's all true. And I'm going to also hope to get
from you all your short list of public events other than schooling that can go on in public in a public school. Okay? And I'll put that all together. Okay. Great. So, I'll do those two things. Okay. All
right. Can I get a motion to adjurnn? I motion to adjurnn. Second. Okay. Vote. Okay. We're through. Thank you. Thank you very much. I'm trying to leave.