Approved Minutes — original pdf

Approved Minutes

Zero Waste Advisory Commission                    Meeting Minutes   June 9th, 2021 The Monthly Meeting of the Zero Waste Advisory Commission convened through Video Conference on Wednesday, June 9th, 2021, due to COVID-19 Disaster Declaration for all Texas Counties. The following are the meeting highlights. For detailed information please visit: https://austintx.new.swagit.com/videos/122650 CALL TO ORDER Chair Acuna called the Commission Meeting to order at 6:10 pm Board Members in Attendance: Gerry Acuna, Cathy Gattuso, Amanda Masino, Melissa Rothrock, Ian Steyaert, and Kaiba White Board Members not in Attendance: Lisa Barden, Jonathan Barona, and Janis Bookout (Membership pending) Staff in attendance via WebEx: Ken Snipes, Tammie Williamson, Richard McHale, Amy Slagle, Gena McKinley, Andy Dawson, Donald Hardee, Dwight Scales, Jason McCombs, Brent Paige, Mike Lewis, Natalie Betts, Young Park, Blanche Quarterman, Victoria Rieger, Amy Schillerstrom, Memi Cardenas, Myra Rios, Jon Clement, and Selene Castillo Chair Acuna opened with comments, 1. APPROVAL of the June 9th, 2021 Meeting Minutes Chair Acuna entertained a motion to approve the June 9th, 2021 Meeting minutes. Commissioner Cathy Gattuso made the first motion for approval of the minutes. A second motion was provided by Commissioner Amanda Masino Item passed Unanimously   2. OLD BUSINESS 2a Discussion and Action: Multi-family Organic Collection Pilot Rollout —Selene Castillo ARR Staff member Jason McCombs provided an update on the Multi-family Organic Collection Pilot Rollout. Hi, it's Jason McCombs, Austin Resource Recovery (ARR). I'm filling in for Selene as listed on the agenda, but, just a brief update on the multi-family compost pilot. When you look, we have six properties right now committed they're all right. Now within districts, nine, six, and three, we do have two more that we've been talking to, that we feel pretty good about, you know, maybe you get to commit here in the near future in districts two and eight, so that puts us right now. We've got six committed. We're good. Close to about eight total, we've had, one, property start, in college courts. It's a, it's a multifamily property kind of near the UT campus and they just recently got started. So, it's still early, still very much early in the data collection phase. And we are still recruiting, properties, we'd like to get, you know, at least 10 properties and have, you know, hopefully, one in every district if we could. But so, we'll still be recruiting through August and, if, you have any leads or would like us to follow up with any, please reach out to me, Selene Castillo, and Elizabeth Nelson. I know we'll be happy to follow up. Chair Acuna replied, Awesome. Thank you, Jason, any questions for Jason? Commissioner White replied I do have a question. So, I know that sham board, condos were on the list and they have removed themselves and I’m friends with the president over there. And I know that they are, I know that she is personally very committed. She literally like walked over to my house to drop for compost, in their issue that they have is that they had pipes break both in buildings and like more of the distribution line, a lot of excess money right now And so a re-investment I’m so sorry is a barrier for them. So, if there was a way to pay the bill directly, they would participate. That's interesting. Jason McCombs replied, I mean, we, we can look at that. I think, you know, we've kind of got the pilot system set up that we can definitely take a look at, you know, if we have the ability to do that or not, actually, you know, there wouldn't be, I could see that perhaps maybe influencing one or two or three or more properties, if this is something that we ask them to participate in and they don't have to worry about getting that nasty bill at the end of the month, that might encourage one or two different properties to participate.   3. NEW BUSINESS 3a. Discussion and Action: Education, Cleanup & Beautification RCA – Victoria Rieger Finance Division Manager, Victoria Rieger, we bring forth to you today. The RCA did seek a favorable recommendation for a multiterm contract with Keep Austin Beautiful to provide education cleanup and beautification services for up to five years for a total contract amount, estimated that 1.375 million, and that is ARR’s portion. This is a multi-department contract; we are sharing it with the Watershed Protection Department. They have separate services that they've contracted for with two different vendors. The Trail Foundation (TF) in addition to Keep Austin Beautiful (KAB). They’ve also ordered to the trail foundation and tree folks, and their portion of the contract optimization is 2.6 to 5 million for a total not to exceed $4 million. So, our portion of the contract is $275,000 per year for five years. And that total is the 1.375 million. We welcome any questions that you have? Commissioner Amanda Masino replied, So the ARR portion goes to KAB and Watershed goes to tree folks and trail foundation is that right? They also have a portion, that will go to, keep Austin beautiful, okay. Victoria Rieger replied, for a specific service, but yes, so they are, their services are spread amongst all three vendors where ours is just with KAB? Chair Gerard Acuna replied Any other questions, commissioners? Commissioner Cathy Gattuso replied we've had the KAB, to their commission before to let us know, you know, exactly, what they've done in this past year, what I was saying in the past KAB representative came and let us tell us about what they've done in the past year, and it'd be nice for them to come back and, and, give us a little update on, what they're doing now, what they have been doing, what they plan to do with this money as well. Chair Acuna replied That's a great idea commissioner. We could maybe put that on, an agenda item. Great. Yeah, I absolutely have no problem with that. Okay, Measures any other questions, thoughts for Victoria? Commissioner Ian Steyaert replied I’m seeing that the breakdown of what it's going to look like in the future. And just wondering again, if it's possible to start to see kind of past comparisons, just to see how the growth of the city and the capabilities, how that's impacting some of these, t proposals. And of course, you know, that kind of allows us if we're seeing a steep increase, just to understand where that money is going. Victoria Rieger replied, Okay. I'm unclear about what you're asking. Are you wanting to see, what we've spent to keep Austin beautiful over the past few years or just over beautification? Victoria Rieger replied Yeah. Well, yes, I guess in terms of beautification and potentially yes. KAB, in the past, as well as going forward. So, if that's okay, I’ll get that information to you, I don't have that in front of me. Yes, we can probably combine Ian’s concerns with Cathy’s for a future presentation, perhaps at our next meeting with KAB. Commissioner Kaiba White replied Well, I have a question isn't, I guess it's, it's connected to this, that we, as a mission, was probably the better part of two years ago now passed a resolution that was supporting this kind of work, dealing with, plastic litter in the creeks and all of that., and one of the things that I know was in that resolution was looking at a trash wheel or town lake, and I say trash wheel with, you know, cherish wheel or wheels for the town. And, I’m certainly not opposed to this contract, and I’m not saying the trash wheel is an alternative, but it is hard I think, or could be part of the solution. And so, I’m wondering if that is something that's been investigated. Director Ken Snipes replied, I can tell you a little bit about it from my perspective, and then staff can chime in with more history, but when I first arrived, there was talk of a trash wheel right before the pandemic really set in, and at that time, we were, working and having conversations with watershed protection about that so we haven't, I’ll just tell you, we haven't moved very far in that space. What we have done is we, we're doing more work on the prevention piece of that. So, keeping the materials out of the creeks, as you may remember, we recently pulled together a team of folks that will now work in the watersheds to pull plastic litter. I know there's debris out of those creeks. So, it's not that we won't continue to look at it. I would just say it just lost a little bit of steam during the pandemic but in that time we have, filled out the team that will be working in the creeks to remove that plastic and debris. Commissioner White replied Thank you. I do appreciate that. And obviously preventing the litter from it should be our highest priority, I’m     just being realistic in the, you know, there's the magnitude of the problem is, is significant. And so, I think we're, we're unlikely to catch it all. And so, it's probably a both-kind of approach, assuming that's feasible. And so, I would just encourage that to see another race come to us or that additional piece of the solution. Director Snipes replied, Richard, were you going to add something to that? , maybe a historical perspective ARR Deputy Director Richard McHale replied, Hi deputy director for Austin Resource Recovery, I will say, we did like a representative from watershed to be on the call, John Clement, and he may be able to talk to, issues surrounding, a lot of real and other solutions that they may have. So, I don't, I don't know John, if you're able to, to address that? Jon Clement Austin Watershed replied, I, can sorry about I’m losing my voice, but I can't directly address that. I have a little bit of background on it, but my focus is on the stewardship programs, that are, wrapped up in this package. My understanding is that logistically it would be very challenging and, it would have to be focused, for example, shoal creek or something similar like that, getting it in Place and dealing with potential, adverse impacts from flooding or making sure it's secure. There’s a lot of engineering that would be involved. And we do have, we're working with ARR on, identifying locations for clean creek crew and, seeing where they can best be put to work. We have a list of priorities from the parks department. You know, some of the parks had been heavily impacted, and just from the field of work that we do, we've also been inventorying locations so we're hoping that, between the stewardship or that we do, with our volunteer partners and clean creek crew and the other contracts we have in place for app cleanups and working with the other one's foundation, and especially with COVID easing and with these volunteer programs and getting clean lady, bird lake, active again, that things should better. Commissioner White replied I would appreciate some more detail in the future. you know, it doesn't have to be at this meeting, but, you know, I, I’ve just, I know it's working in other places. And so, if there's something unique about our situation, I would like, I guess, a presentation, you know, details. What is unique about ladybird, like compared to the other successful cities, deploying and trash wheels. And, you know, not saying that there are not challenges and just hit her every time. I and I realized that some of these things aren't ramped up yet, but, you know, one-off cleanup events are, they don't think they're, they're not going to cut it. Chair Gerard Acuna entertained a motion to approve the Education, Cleanup & Beautification RCA Commissioner Cathy Gattuso the first motion for approval of the RCA. A second motion was provided by Commissioner Kaiba White Recommend unanimously by the Zero Waste Advisory Commission on a 6-0 vote     3b. Discussion and Action: Underpass Camp Cleanups Contract Reauthorization RCA – Victoria Rieger and Richard McHale Finance Division Manager, Victoria Rieger, we bring forth to you today There are seeking a favorable recommendation for another multiterm, contract with relief enterprises to provide cleanup services under overpasses, under bridges, and in the transportation right away for two years in the amount of 1.1, 5 million, this commission primacy approved this item when we brought it, before you on July 17th, 2020, it subsequently went to council, oh, I’m delighted, 29th, 2020, where they approved a one-year contract, with the expectation, the item returned to the council, for future authorizations. that's what this item is doing, this contractor will allow the city to continue these critical cleanup services to provide a clean and safe environment for residents experiencing homelessness. And we will take any questions that you have. Commissioner Gattuso replied but the ban is on camping. Do we need this for up till 2023? , Richard McHale replied we do have the band, but we still feel that we do need this contract can be amended, if we go to three 50 person office, I can talk with the vendor so we can amend the location. So even though there may be a ban, in public areas, there's still going to be folks that are out there, camping barks, and in other areas exposed, so it’s, unnecessary pool for us to have a, as we address these because we know the problem's not going away, just a ban. Commissioner Gattuso replied So it doesn't necessarily need to be, overpasses or under bridges Is that right? Or the right of way? currently, it's Richard McHale replied Mainly that, other areas are rights of way. If we have some major changes to the contract, we would definitely have to go to the purchasing process to amend the contract, to make sure that the vendors are okay with the additional work and potentially, different locations, but it is something that we do all the time. Chair Acuna replied, And I must agree with Richard. I mean, this is not going to go away. This is going to go into hiding and we're going to have to chase it. Chair Gerard Acuna entertained a motion to approve the Underpass Camp Cleanups Contract Reauthorization RCA Commissioner Ian Steyaert the first motion for approval of the RCA. A second motion was provided by Commissioner Kaiba White Recommend unanimously by the Zero Waste Advisory Commission on a 6-0 vote         3c. Discussion and Action: Boards and Commissions Website use – Gerry Acuna Chair Acuna stated this is kind of, a moving target item. It's the, I guess discussion, on the use of our personal email information or to participate in boards and commission business, if that makes any sense. And I know we've asked some conversations up until a few months ago, that was from permitted for us to use personal emails to today. That’s currently not, not allowed my questions are, can we get a formal presentation and or decision by either a city staff city clerk's office or legal that would help us, but this dress one way or the other. And literally, just a better idea of this is again, a selected item that, one commission can decide that they want to use strictly boards and commission sites versus another commission who decides that a personal email along with wards and commission sites is permissible, but then the last we can get a formal, formal, discussion going with the city clerk, legal staff. We have Myrna Rios on the line who can maybe answer a few if you want to share some of those with her. Thank you. Yes, we can. Thank you, Myrna. Myrna Rios (City of Austin Deputy City Clerk) replied Hi, my name is Myrna Rios. I'm the deputy city clerk, and I have been on before the meeting started, and I know there was a question that chair, you meant you were asking if the rules are selective or not. And, response to that, inquiry is, the rules are not selective. They are citywide, we recognize that having a separate email account can be a challenge to manage, but we have, we must enforce the rules, when all members first are appointed and you attended the training, the majority, if not most have signed an agreement, the email agreement that you, each member would abide for adhering by those rules, and those rules are, in code. So they are codified, they are on a, in section 2, 1, 4, 9, and specifically, there is one which is 2, 1, 4 9 C 3. , if those rules are not, or the code does not adhere to it is, the member is subject, to vacate or vacation of that position. And, the council wave. And so that everyone is aware, we were, we were made aware of these inquiries, if you can use the personal email And, we are going Stephanie in our office. She's our boards and commissions coordinator will be, forwarding some information to all the staff liaisons, executive liaisons, and all board members regarding, this practice. And so, before that, I went ahead and, made all the mayor and council aware of this information that will be sent out to everyone. And, that they are to at, you know, all the members are to adhere to this piece of this, of the code, regarding the email address that is provided to you from the city. And, I just want to share that, you know, the city will, or the city has an expectation under law, have access to disclosure of any personal email accounts that are used in place of the city-provided system. So, if someone chooses, let's say we have one member who does not agree with, does not agree, and is not assigned a boarding commission address. The only thing that we are supposed to provide that member is a copy of the agenda and not even the supporting documentation, and that is it. That member cannot utilize their personal email for the board, any board work, or communication, if they have an assigned city email address and they are utilizing a personal address, they must use and must also copy their city account, staff liaisons, and any staff should not, and will not be, emailing anything to a personal account. They will be emailing it to a board and commission assigned account, again, it's in the code. And if the member who is in violation is subject to automatically vacating the position, so the mayor and council have been made aware, and that's what I can share with you all, for now, if you have any questions, Chair Acuna replied, I appreciate that. Any questions? Commissioner White replied Yeah. Can you just tell us exactly what it says in code, because I think you read out some action, which I didn't catch, and would like to look it up, but if you can just tell us, I would appreciate what it says. Myrna Rios replied, so what I, I will be reading are, codified requirements that specifically seek compliance, about your inquiries. So the first one is 2 1 4 9 C 2, and it states if a board member receives a communication related to the member service as a board member on a non-city account, the member shall promptly forward the communication to the city account, furnished to the member. The other, the other section is 2 1 4 9 C 3 and it states except as provided by the, a board member who uses electronic devices for communications related to board business in violation of this subsection automatically vacates the member's position, a board member who vacates a position under this subsection does not hold over under section 2, 1, 2 7, which is vacancy and hold overcapacity. Those are the two codifications specifically to these inquiries that have been made and that, I emailed the mayor and council to give them a heads up that we would be, providing all the members or a refresher or a reminder, about the use of email     addresses. Commissioner White replied, so wouldn’t it be in compliance if you received a communication to both of your email addresses and replied and co and copied your boards and commissions email? Myrna Rios replied, yes, that is complying by staff. It is important to know that staff will not copy your personal email address. They will only copy your board assigned email address. So, if you happen to miss some communication because you're not used to checking your boarding commission address, then you're going to not have that information. Another scenario that comes to mind is what if a member of the public is trying to reach you specifically, and they are utilizing the board and commission email address. You were assigned that you are not checking because you're trying to use your personal email account. Then you are not, providing that public member, the support that they are seeking from, you know, as a member, as your role as a member. Commissioner White replied, So I hear you. I like that. It probably makes sense for a lot of people. Like personally, my, my emails, all my emails, and my cell phone number are widely available. So, I’m easy to find, but I get your point. And again, Chair Acuna replied No, go ahead. No, and again, everything that we do is subject to open records requests. Now back again, please Myrna, correct me if I’m wrong. And I mean, just historically speaking, we had participated or were able to participate with both our personal end boards and commission, email being copied and staff up until again, please, correct me if I’m wrong up until perhaps a months ago, we were able to continue using our personal and boards and commissions sites prior to that, I guess this goes on forever today, but, what did this actually, when did the change occur Myrna the actual change,? Myrna Rios replied, correct. Oh, I want to say when we went to, I’m not sure that it occurred between 2015 and 2017. Chair Acuna replied, I don't have the exact well I’ve been getting and using personally, I have used my personal email and my board's and commission email. It's a lot easier when I’m traveling or running around to use my personal email. I copied myself and I’m able to communicate quicker to, the boards of commission folks, liaison staff, you name it when I do use my personal versus having to log in specifically to a or to commission site. But nonetheless, I heard, I appreciate the update on this. And, again, I, I don't recall that back in 2015, again, that doesn't mean that you're not correct. It's just, I have a terrible memory. And, I want to thank that. We had been using personally emails up until again, six months ago that they were permissible, but nonetheless, Myrna Rios replied any time that you are nominated or I mean, appointed or reappointed, you know, this is all in the training, we have an agreement. You, if you have an assigned email address, you signed that agreement that you would adhere to those rules, you know, that was drafted by the law department. It's codified on all of them. Mayor and council are aware, unfortunately, we have so many not, you know, just so many boards and commissions that unfortunately our office, we don't know the ins and outs, and that's why we have unless it is brought to our attention, or we receive a public information request because someone, for some reason, received an email, let's say, for example, from you, from your personal email account, they will submit a public information request And then we, our office will reach out to you and, and request that information. And the member is required to turn that over. Now, what occurs if you don't? I don't know, but we haven't gotten to that, that point, or to that state. So, again, it's really, it just depends on who is aware and how, you know, if people know the rules, we also provide training and refresher training to all the staff and leave, you know, staff liaison So this is something that they should be, reviewing and informing us about in seeking advice from our office so that we can, do what we're doing now. Commissioner White replied, Yeah. I just want to say, like I was recently reappointed, so I went through the refresher training and I asked this specific question and I got a different answer, so, you know, the answer that I got there was that it was strongly encouraged to use your official city email, but that if you chose to use your personal email, that it would be subject to open records request. And that was, you know, a burden You were taking on yourself by using your personal email. Myrna Rios replied So, I thank you. Well, and thank you for sharing that. We'll address it. You know, we'll, I’ll mention that in review the training with our staff and whoever provided the training, but it may have either been, you know, communicated, maybe not communicated as thoroughly as it should have, but in that training, I know that it is stressed. That again, if you do utilize your personal email, it is subject to open record. And like the code states you need to, you, you must then forward that email to your board and commission address., so maybe that communication wasn't as thorough, but that's what the intent was of that discussion. So that's what I’ve got for now. Chair Acuna replied, Thank you, Myrna.     Any other questions? Concerns, commissioners. Thank you very much for the patients, Thank you for the presentations and some clarity here. I, again, I’m not as dense as they come and I’ll probably end up making a mistake or two in the future and you can slap me on the wrist, but, but nonetheless, I thank you for the presentation staff. Thank you for providing Myrna and well see what happens 3a. Staff Briefings ARR Staff member Brent Paige provided an update on Solicitations Updates, Performance, and Statistical Reports Commissioners. Brent Paige Financial Manager, budget and contract development for Austin Resource Recovery, this evening we have some of our financial data as well as I briefly wanted to touch on these solicitations update. , as you all are aware, we have, are they actually gone over one of the solicitations on here, which is in our solicitation is under evaluation and negotiation. That's the education. You have Beautiful Patient Services, so we're going to go ahead and, briefly touch on our recycling and solid waste consulting services, we have a solicitation on our development to assist our apartment and, providing some professional recycling industry consulting services, to help us when we're analyzing, all of our needs, when it comes to the recycling processing, we expect that solicitation to, hit the streets sometime in the next few months, it's still in development, so we don't necessarily expect it to be out in the next 90 days, that is why it's up at the very top, moving on to the next section, our solicitations, we expect to be posted within the next 90 days, sorry. Still, on the solicitations update, we have the, as best as lead motivated services are eating, this is for our brownfields group, this is to help utilize our revolving loan fund, money that we received from EPA And these will be contractors that we will then, create individual contracts with under that agreement. , and I believe we've actually already hit on all the rest of the solicitations that are in the evaluation and negotiation, and unless anybody has any questions we can move on into our number section. Commissioner Amanda Masino replied I have a quick question about the consulting, a solicitation. Could you describe a little bit more about the kind of information you hope to get from the consultant and how that might inform what types of decisions ARR is making? Brent Paige replied, I can briefly touch on that , so within, the solicitation, particularly we're looking for some expertise when it comes to, pulling in data from other entities, for instance, we have used in the past, Burns and McDonald to, help us, show the breakdown of the other cities, that believe they did a presentation to you guys, that kind of gave us an idea when we had questions about our recycling, the commodities prices that we were receiving for the recycling, so we had them come in, do some research, well then their knowledge to add on top of what we already have and utilize their services in that, in that way, and this and this, resulting contract, we expect them to, do some similar type of, research, as well as, did we help us out at our different recycling processing, facilities and making sure that, you know, we as a department are not just taking our own institutional knowledge, but utilizing knowledge outside to ensure that we are, making the most out of our, the citizens, money. Commissioner Gattuso replied I'd like to, I don't know if this is the moment to talk about this or not, but, I think any new information, any different way to, for marketing and anything that you get, more, current status, you know, on recycling in general, that would be really important if that could be passed onto the commission. Once you get that, and this solicitation is that for one time, is it for one time? I can't remember what that said, was it for more than several years, or how often do you access that, that con the consultation services? Brent Paige replied, So this one, this one will be for on an as-needed basis, we, don't expect it to, we don't, we expect that it will be less than $50,000 and the resulting contract, and, it'll depend on the services that we needed at the time as to how much it will be, for that particular engagement, you know, we, we don't expect these will be very high dollar engagements, we expect them to be, you know, a few thousand dollars maybe, and we'd expect, you know, to have a couple of them, but we wanted to put something in place so that if we had something that we were asked, we didn't, we weren't struggling last minute, trying to, A find the information ourselves and B find a contractor that could do the work and then have to go through that whole process that may take, you know, some time. Whereas if we set this up, we can call on them once we have the     those, results from the solicitation Commissioner Gattuso replied Mr. Snipes, I remember when we had the retreat that I think, tammy and I had talked about, more of the nitty-gritty that the department has to face And so I would really like more of that again, on maybe the obstacles and the struggles that you all are having and to where then that makes you want to have a consultation, and then it, it gives you clarity and hopefully it would give us some clarity. Also, I would really appreciate more of those updates, Director Ken Snipes replied, absolutely commissioner. We can certainly do that. And, you know, we have a couple of sessions planned, where we were going to come back. We, we were in the process. You may remember scheduling another retreat, also, so we, we, we are working on that, and the types of things, just to give you an example that we're looking at the fuel, I don't want to go through our whole number stack tonight., but at the types of things that we're paying close attention to are the number of customers that, we're adding to our accounts, from 19 2019 to 20, it was about a 3000, customer, increase. And, halfway through the year now we're already approaching another 3000. So, we're just under that. So, we're looking at, all the impacts to our services and trying to get an understanding of what those types of things are going to do to us going forward. As we see more people come coming, you know, w what types of changes do we need to make to, to, to stay on pace, and to increase our performance in some sectors. So, we're certainly paying attention to those things, and we're going to be sharing those things going forward. Commissioner Gattuso replied that’s great because sounds like we're going to need more education. Aren't we if knowledge new people are coming in? Director Ken Snipes replied, exactly. Chair Acuna replied, you know, this is a very challenging industry today, as staff will probably attest to, I mean, the markets are coming back, but selective markets, I should say are coming back. There are so many variations on, let's just take plastics, for example. I mean, there are certain plastic plastics that, you can give away all day long there are others that are challenging to process, to find homes. This is, an industry, again, that's in transition, and with this pandemic and or some of the other routes, obstacles that have been placed in front of us, it's, it's, this is an absolute timely study. Is there a possibility, brent, and, or would there be a deadline on perhaps including a question or two from the commission that might be, included with this, with this presentation? Brent Paige replied, are you talking about the solicitation or the solicitation? Commissioner Gattuso replied, just a, you know, in addition to a, can we include April view, a, b and c and d? So, I think, any questions and concerns the commission has, bring them forward as soon as possible. Brent Paige replied, and it may be something that we can investigate adding into it, there, as far as the solicitation goes, it's not out on the street yet. And so, anything that, we may need to investigate that we may need to Find expertise on. I would say to bring it up at some point, thank you. Chair Acuna replied, Commissioners, that looks like, that takes us to the end of the agenda?, as far as future agenda items, I think, Kathy, you can tell you, but mentioned that perhaps a keep Austin beautiful presentation and aura updates Commissioner Gattuso replied Yes, yeah, the past year, what they're looking to do this coming year, some of their challenges, successes. Commissioner Amanda Masino replied, I’ve got one and I think this might be a big, big topic. So, I’m going to ask everyone to please give me a minute or two to try to get out what's in my head, I received a lovely newsletter, the ARR newsletter came in today. I don't know if everyone receives it the same day I do. And it was just so impressive to see, you know, the various programs, the trash dance documentary, the composting classes, you know, brownfields all the things going on. And then I saw the move out the west campus move out program. That one is called Move-out ATX. And I read about that one and I was like, oh, this is great. You know, college students cleaning out the dorms. This is an important recovery effort. I think we've talked about it in this, before, but it's the west campus. It's not St Stephens and, it's not Concordia. It's not Huston Tillson, it’s the University of Texas. And that got me to thinking about how we talk in this room about equity and the environmental justice impacts of the work that's done at ARR because there are many, I mean, we see it, you know, in, in the brownfields, area, but I think it's not something we're tracking and talking about all of the time, right. Month to month, we see the solicitations month to month. We see the numbers for recovery and diversion, but we don't see, who is benefiting in terms of income, demographics, et cetera, from these various other supplemental programs. And it seems to me that if we're not tracking it, then we don't know if we're doing well or not. So I’d like to introduce maybe for next month, maybe for two months, if we could visit this topic in a big picture, maybe that would involve looking at the equity toolkit and swat that, you know, the equity office facilitated for all city departments. Maybe we could go through that, but for what that looked like For ARR and have some discussion about what's achievable and what's not, but it just, it stood out to me that we pick on this topic as it boils up and not in a systemic way, not in a deliberate repeated way in the day-to-day business, that we're month to month business that we do in this commission. And I would like us as a commission for us to engage with that more frequently than we do. So I don't know if that's a topic for next month or maybe two months from now, once we've had time to coordinate a little bit more on what that looks like, but that's what your request of, the department and, my fellow commissioners. Chair Acuna replied I like it. It's a wonderful request. In fact, it's a, oh my god, it's something that is probably needed. I mean, just the encouragement that, that could come about by, by doing something such as that for the entire community would be, would be a great boost. A commissioner's your thoughts on that? I, I, again, I like the idea, Commissioner Gattuso replied, glad you brought that up. Something I would really love to focus on. So, you were saying that there's information about the west campus, but you also want to investigate that having hack and the other colleges involved. Commissioner Gattuso replied Exactly. And I think, think, you know, I’m sure that there are programs where the t you know, I am sure there, there are programs that are really hitting all demographics and really benefiting, all austinites. And then there are probably others that are not, and that we don't know because we're not really looking in a systemic way. Right I mean, look, when we, when we get the report about the particular program, we might talk about English language speakers versus non, but we usually don't visit us in a big picture way, you know, on a regular basis. So, so that would be very helpful to know. Chair Acuna replied, you know, along, along your thought process there, I, I would love for staff too, to maybe work with, with us, with you and, and devising kind of a format that we could use to track, and then to actually set some standards, set some protocol for the future. I mean, Ut moves out every year, St. Ed's Houston Tillson, Concordia, you name it. So, this could be a great opportunity to, to really involve many, many people, many young people there, any thoughts, guys, concerns. And again, these are future agenda items, so please feel free to spit out anything here. All right, guys, Commissioner Kaiba White replied, I would like to have the water wheel thing at some point when there's more information to share. Chair Acuna replied Thank you, Kaiba But, okay. And I guess, any other thoughts? Any other ideas? Yeah, my guys, I’m sorry. You meant the trash wheel, correct? Commissioner Kaiba White replied Yeah. Chair Acuna replied, Well, we were going to, we were going to rent that other wheel out in days of non-use so on several months, but nonetheless guys, commissioners. Thank you so very much staff, wonderful I appreciate the patience guys., we have no additional items to address, I will entertain a motion for adjournment Meeting adjourned at 7:02 pm FUTURE AGENDA ITEMS   1. Discussion and Action: Keep Austin Beautiful Presentation Challenges and Updates   2. Discussion and Action: ARR Visiting the Equity Toolkit   3. Trash wheel updates