Mayor Jordan Hess We can start our general comments with our online participants. Ms. Anderson.
Alderperson Anderson Thanks so much Mr. Mayor. Apologies for not being there in person, I’m feeling under the weather and didn't want to breathe on any of you, but just wanted to continue, to you know. First of all thank Ms. Miller, my day job, I have to spend quite a bit of time paying attention to the legislature and I have no idea how she's been able to track all the bills that she has been and I appreciate all of the con and follow through that our fellow Council members have had. You know, we only get to do this once, for 90 days, once every two years and you know, I made some pretty impassioned remarks last week about the fact that I really felt some of the bills with the legislature were passing were legalizing hate in our state, and I still continue to feel that way. I think that there are real problems that we as a community and a state need to tackle head-on. We see them every day in our community, they're you know they look different in different communities, but they are housing mental health care access, equal access to opportunity and things like that and the fact that the legislature spending so much time not addressing these issues and creating more harm, I really think that after this legislative session we will have a lot of things to the rubble, which we will have to crawl out of is going to be significant and, and harmful and, and the effects to so many of people in our community is going to be significant. So, I, I want to be mindful of that and continue to encourage my Council members to engage, it's hard, it's tiring, at the end is coming as someone told me fast and furious, but it's just the unintended consequences are I think going to be broader than even the worst case scenarios that many of us are spending time imagining. And I just, you know, feel like I have to use my space is in a position of privilege to continue to highlight that and say that I will continue to fight against those harms and do what we can here at the City to protect all members of Montana's, all Montanan’s and, and I'll just leave it at that. Thanks so much and continue to be well everybody. Stay home if you don't feel well, wish someone would have stayed away from me.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thanks Ms. Anderson. Ms. Sherrill.
Alderperson Sherrill Yeah, thanks. I apologize I'm not in there in person either; I am in the same situation as Ms. Anderson, under the weather and I just want to echo her sentiments. Thank Jessica and also thank Ms. Anderson because she's always tracking all of these, so she's a great source of information. It's, it, we're gonna have to after this session, we're gonna have to let the dust settle a little bit and figure out where we are and what we can do as a community, but this is going to be a rough one. So, I, I appreciate everyone's work on it and not really looking at forward to the outcome but we'll get there and deal with it when we know what it is.
Mayor Jordan Hess Ms. Becerra.
Alderperson Becerra I will pass, thank you.
Mayor Jordan Hess Ms. Vasecka.
Alderperson Vasecka I’ll be quick. It was just April Fool's Day and so why is April Fool's Day a thing when you pull pranks on your friends? Some historians speculate that April Fool's Day dates back to 1582 when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar. If you all remember my President's Day lesson that was a similar thing, as called for by the Council of Trenton 1563. In the Julian calendar, as in the Hindu calendar, the New Year began with the Spring Equinox around April 1st and people who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1st and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1st became the butt of jokes and hoaxes that were called April fools. So, I hope everyone had a wonderful April Fool's Day with that blizzard and sunshine.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thanks for that. Ms. Jones.
Alderperson Jones Thanks for the comments and I appreciate all the information about the legislature. To just talk about something fun for a second, I wanted to say how much I enjoyed watching the Women's March Madness championship game and it, it was so fun watching two great teams just play so hard for the entire championship game, and really elevating women's sports because the focus on this March Madness has been on women. The men are making their way to a Championship tonight, it's been a very bumpy ride over there, but for the women, it's just been really gratifying to see how women's sports are starting to gain more traction.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thanks Ms. Jones. Ms. Savage.
Alderperson Savage I was gonna pass but since you brought up the Final Four. I also really, really enjoyed watching the women's final four. I'm an alma mater of University of South Carolina, so it's a little bit of a rough loss, that was one of the best games I have ever seen though, and I totally do appreciate women being in the spotlight as well. Thank you.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thank you. Ms. West.
Alderperson West Pass.
Mayor Jordan Hess Mr. Carlino.
Alderperson Carlino Yeah, I just wanted to speak really quick to the emergency winter shelter closing. I know, you know it's going to cause a lot of other issues around town that are going to pull on police and fire resources and Parks and Rec, and it's going to be really difficult for all those people that have been having a nice warm place to stay at the emergency winter shelter, and I don't, I think we really need to try and get our priorities, funding priorities a little bit in order with this in the coming budget session. We should have a warm place for people to stay at night in Missoula every night of the year and, and the truth is that some of the other shelters are, all the other shelters are full and we don't have enough shelter beds after we close down this emergency winter shelter. And we saw it coming a mile away and it's our duty as the semi-circle to make sure that we have enough funding for everybody to have somewhere to keep their head at night. I think it's the cheaper option and it's definitely the more humane option, so I hope that we can fund these shelters year-round in the coming budget year.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thank you Mr. Carlino. Mr. Contos.
Alderperson Contos I’ll pass, thank you.
Mayor Jordan Hess Mr. Nugent.
Alderperson Mike Nugent Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Quickly, I would just echo Ms. Anderson's comments and I appreciate her bringing it up every week, but we do need to talk about it because it's not okay to hate anywhere and it's important, especially in a state like Montana that we take the opportunity to speak about it and so I just appreciate Ms. Anderson making those comments and, and keeping us informed. Since Ms. Jones brought up watching sports on TV, I will just say that I read that the semi-final game between Iowa and whoever they played was the highest rated basketball game on ESPN of any type in several years, so you might be onto something on gaining popularity and it's great to see them in the spotlight. On the note of sports, it’s spring sports season, which means that there's all kinds of youth and youth sports leagues around town that are starting up, and are in need of volunteers, coaches, referees, people to help run things. So, if you are someone who has played a sport and are willing to help coach, you could definitely make a difference in a kid's life by reaching out to whatever association you want to find, be it soccer or baseball or rugby or, or track or anything else and volunteering some of your time. So, I would just encourage people to do that.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thank you Mr. Nugent. And Ms. Farmer.
Alderperson Farmer Thanks. I just wanted to say thanks to the Parks and Rec Department, they opened up their summer camps on Sunday morning and if you are like me or coffeed up and ready to register your kids, as if you were getting concert tickets, but we're just really lucky to have such awesome camps that we can register our kids for and I just want to say thanks to Donna and Megan, all their staff for making those parks happen, and we're really lucky to have them.
Mayor Jordan Hess Thank you. Okay, thanks for all the comments tonight.