Parks and Recreation Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay. I'm gonna call us to order. It is 03:00.

Hold on just a second.

Still working. Okay.

I wanna make sure it's recording. Usually, it says it's recording.

You go.

Call us to order. What is today?

The third.

The third. We're ten days off.

That's right.

Okay. We have a full complement of our commissioners today as well. So we're picking up on time at three All commissioners are present here. We'll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance, and we'll find slides.

Thank you, Joe, fly.

Here we go. Alright.

I pledge allegiance to the republic for

which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible,

with liberty and justice for all. All right, welcome, everybody. And to all of those, it looks like we do have one in 10 p. As well. I see Tara out there. Welcome, Tara. And for those watching in the future, today's session, of course, is being recorded as normal, and we say hello from the past to anybody who looks in the future there. We have a fairly concise agenda for today, which includes a review of our Board of Supervisors presentation. Come to that a little bit later. But my understanding just from a little pre chatter was there may be a motion to swap one item in terms of the sequencing today.

Was there a motion to or proposal to the discussion on changing some of the order of the agenda today?

Well, I'll make a motion to do the update when it comes to the blacksmith?

We have several guests with us here in the room today representing expertise with the blacksmith area. And so to fit that in, I think we've got room under the Eldorado Western Railroad item if there is indeed disagreement on that. And that could be prioritized so that you aren't kept too long either for some of the other agenda items. But I don't wanna necessarily make that motion. Is that the motion that you're making? Yes. Is there any discussion needed on that motion first before we move the agenda?

I would second the motion.

Okay. All in favor, commissioners?

Aye.

Okay, any opposed? Excellent. So that'll come then as part of our discussion action item before we get to the Board of Supervisors on our agenda. The first item on our agenda that is adoption of our agenda, and now the beat of that small change, and approval of our consent calendar. And so is there any discussion on this item before we move to approve it?

And just checking with the public as well. And now that we have our agenda sorted out, is there any question or conversation needed around our agenda for today before we approve?

At the moment.

Not seeing any. Okay. We will then do I have a motion to approve and adopt the agenda?

I have

a motion to approve and adopt the agenda and consent calendar. Excellent. Is there a second?

Second. Excellent.

All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Great.

Can I just check who was the second? Fine.

No.

Okay. There were about three. Excellent.

Okay, let's move directly into report from staff 2021. Director Lavelle.

This is the library director. Just a few things to share. El Dorado Western Railroad, the extravaganza train event sold out in in just a few days. And related to that, we have the online ticketing system in place. So huge thank you to the Railway Foundation to make that happen. It's a lot easier for for riders to purchase tickets. It's all state of the art. They can pay how they you know, in a variety of of formats. It was very successful. It was without any any hiccups, so putting that system in in place.

So that's a huge upgrade. With the museum database database, the photo database, and we will have artifacts and cultural items in there in time, but we started promoting that. We promoted it on our museum Facebook page, and we will be promoting it on our our classical page. It's gone out in at least one supervisor district's newsletter. So for District 3, I think that just went out recently.

And so momentum's being built there with the promotional side. And the last item is that starting next month, the museum hours will be expanded. So we will be open Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays from ten till four. So that's very exciting to be able to offer that. I know that the community has been asking for expanded hours, and the commission, forced relaying that information.

So we're able to fine tune a few things and and alter the the the load balance and have the the library team assist a bit more on certain days. So it's very exciting that we'll be open three days a week and have those consistent hours, ten to four starting next month. That concludes my report. Questions?

Jump in with a couple

of comments first and then open it up to the rest of the commissioners to first begin. I feel like giving a round of applause to the library team for listening to the community, but really extending itself to find a path forward to be able to extend the hours of operation, therefore accessibility to the community. Not to mention applause also for helping to now surface through cataloging it that specific system. The name of the system doesn't necessarily matter, but now that we have the ability to digitize and make available to the public, the images of these artifacts, these ephemera, photos, etcetera, that's magnificent. It's really going so far beyond what we've been able to do as a museum at any point in the history of the museum.

I really think that deserves maybe a round of applause. It makes me so happy. I'm sure it does everybody else to see all of this happening, and we sure are grateful also to see that happening. Does anybody have any comments they want to add to that?

We appreciate you. Thank you, guys. Thank you for everything you're doing. Great. Please rise and extend that to your staff. Yes.

Thank you to staff and the commission and all of our volunteers. And absolutely.

Any effort. Dee, thank you for the catalog. It's a suggestion. I love it.

Yeah. It's a fantastic product. You don't always find that with technology and, in particular, things that are related to the library's sensors and pickups with some of the software that's existing, but we've been very impressed with cataloging.

Can you tell us a little bit more, too, about the ticketing system you elected to go with? I actually don't know which one it is.

From what I remember, it's simple ticks. Is that the one? I believe so. Mhmm. And the Rail railway foundation treasurer, I think, did most of the exploring in the different systems and tested a few things out and took into consideration cost and functionality.

And my understanding is very reasonable, very small percentage to to utilize the product. And you can set it up as well where they're because moving forward, we'll we'll continue to have some events that are free of charge. And when when we offer those, the platform doesn't charge us. So it's based on tickets that are that are sold at at cost. And the system was flawless.

So using it for eggstravaganza, the eggstravaganza event, of course, the, you know, egg hunt event geared towards kiddos zero to nine. And I know Keith will talk about that in just a little bit. But having that online system, we have we have people from the Bay Area and and, of course, locals, but all around having the opportunity to ride a functional train, that's not something that a lot of

counties offer for people who

are willing to travel, and this makes it easier on the on the back end of everything, but also for the experience of writers, so we're happy to offer that.

It's a great example, too, of community engagement, which is one of the pillars that we've established as part of our vision and how we measure ourselves, library system, museum, EWRR, all of that, right, working in tandem in a coherent way like this. It's just exactly what we, I hope you feel very proud of it. We all feel proud to see that kind of happening. It drives more tourism, wanna be able to track that in the future. Thank you. Are there any other questions for Director Lovell? Yes, go ahead.

Not a question, but a couple of comments in addition on this program. This was our first leap into the pool, and we were a bit apprehensive given that we were implementing it with our largest event to date. The extravaganza was two Saturdays. Last Saturday and tomorrow, eight trains, hundreds of passengers. This program allowed us to pre ticket, and they were all then descriptively listed by the program so we could tell you how many by age, type, so on, which run they were going on, and we knew how full we were or sold out.

And as it turned out, we were more than sold out, and it allowed us to take steps to serve those who came up at the end, and we were able to oblige them. And I'm sure tomorrow we'll do the same thing, but it's a very descriptive program analytically. It's seemingly easy to use, and the nice thing is the proceeds are not handled physically out at the railroad and so on, or by treasurer or other representative. No going to the bank like the old days, and we knew exactly what had been generated as we went along. So, anyway, we appreciate everyone's encouragement to get involved, get a programs such as this, bring us into the modern age, if you will.

And again, we had sold out trains within a day or two of going public is what they call it, going public with the ticketing. And all the trains for tomorrow are sold out. And the trains for the April are half sold out as I speak. It's amazing. But we know who is signed on, where they're from, what communities, how many kids, how many adults.

And so it has really been a joy so far. Haven't had anything steer us otherwise. So thank you. Thanks to Bryce's leadership and encouragement, and thanks to Steve Kirilli and Ed Cunha for their leadership and getting the thing off

the ground. And as we collect that data, then moving forward, we can make additional data driven decisions based on that with with the programs. And and a lot of folks too, they don't have cash with them anymore. That's more common. So having that as a convenience is a good thing. Yeah, think the railroad volunteers and the Railway Foundation.

I'll open it up to the public now in the room for any questions or comments on the updates and conversation that we've had in regards to director Abel's updates. Seeing none, I'll look online and ask if any of our audience online today has any questions or comments at this time. Not seeing any? We'll move on in our agenda. Okay, thank you, Doctor.

Ladol. That was a wonderful update. We're so happy about that. We'll keep the now, we've talked earlier about changing the agenda sequence a little bit in respect to our guests here today also, and to ensure that we can keep schedules optimized for you. So we'll move and we'll skip over 26.0631 and come right back to it after this next topic, will be from the museum program updates. We'll begin instead with the El Dorado Western Railroad. And I believe there are several individuals who will have some comments on that, both our guests, Jeanette and also Keith as well. And so can I defer to you, Jeanette, first? I Yes, think you've we got your

like to go ahead and update, put it on the update to do blacksmith. Can we do that?

Yeah, as a part of EDWRR on our agenda today, that conversation, absolutely, yes.

It can be more of a museum exhibit.

Museum exhibit towards an update. Okay. That's fine. We voted earlier to put that as EWRR. Doesn't really matter. Right? It's not material. So let's go ahead and

do that then. And if want you to go ahead and begin. Okay. Do you want to present to the blacksmith?

I'll have you. I think they're your guests today. Absolutely, if you want to introduce them, and then we can pick up on the conversation.

Okay. I'd like to introduce the blacksmiths here. There's Terry and George and Mark, and they all are interested in the museum blacksmithship. So I'd like to have them go ahead and and Wonderful. Say what they want.

We're glad you're here. Yeah. Welcome again. Good to see you again for a couple, and and welcome newly.

Well, we have had interest from other blacksmiths, and they opened their shop. And I'd I'd like to both Terry and Mark both have good suggestions, and I'd like to turn it over to them to present theirs now.

Thank you, George.

Well

Can I just get your guys' names?

I'm sorry. Terry Stillway. Stillway. Okay. Yes. Before coming up here, we all got together and had a discussion as to what concerns or how we might see this go and I'll let Mark at a point, you know, take over because he's got more involvement in a lot of irons in

the fire, so to speak. Not to think, hey.

You actually, no, but he does. But we had some issues talking about what the vision of the museum has for that, not only the physical space, but, you know, what what they're looking to have the final product down the road. Obviously, it could be several years. But I know at the last meeting, they talked about integrating the fact that they have the railroad shop, they have the machine shop, as well as hopefully a locksmith shop at some point. So that's one of the issues that we talked about, what the vision of the, you know, the commissioners in the museum have, so which is right now kinda unknown.

And then just secondly, obviously, there's gonna be some requirement for some funding and where that might come from. And so how they and finally, and I'll let Mark talk real quick, how they expect the exhibit to be presented because and I we've all been into the facility that is not a facility right now because of the Excuse. It's Yeah. But Mark saw this at the facility and there's a there, but there's it's far from being any working. So those are kind of just kind of an overview of some of the concerns as far as getting it off the ground.

And we did hear that they moved some of the they have cleaned it up to some degree. So but once again, to have what the museum's vision is to what they want, only how it operates because we had a discussion. Does it is it gonna be strictly a demonstration type of facility, or will there be some participation by the public? So anyway, I'll leave it over to Mark to flesh it out.

Well, my name is Mark Kochan, k o c h a n, and thank you for letting us come up today and talk with you folks. That excellent railroad program, that's just amazing. That's the kind of thing that you'll learn to see more of from the volunteer side. My connection with Terry and George is I I was a lead smith at the Oklahoma blacksmith shop for about fifteen years, and I was a smith there for about fifteen years. Most of that time, I was the lead.

But my background is is California Blacksmith Association president, retired now from that, and I was the head of education there as well. In building the Coloma program for the Gold Discovery Park, we really had that kind of a same kind of a problem. How do you manage all this kind of a facility and keep everything operational and get everything, you know, maintained at the same time and in a an environment that's safe for children to come into and and and show them what you have there. That's that's really what we did is we showed them that and had a program that we could share with the students. Anyway, to get to the point, our our interest is in making sure that this resource, incredible resource that you have available, doesn't get lost, doesn't get just shuttered and left in the dust, and see what we can do to bring that back to life.

Anything else you'd like to share at this time?

We have a lot of questions.

Can we have a conversation with you a little bit for a few Okay, great. First, I think, I hope I speak, I believe, on behalf of the commission just minimally this, and then we're gonna open it up to their comments here. But we do see ourselves as enablers and in a positive way. When individuals yeah. I'm on the Zoom call.

When we have individuals from our community who have expertise and knowledge, including education, including certifications, including decades of experience doing this, and then raising their hands and saying, I can help. We're all hoping for that to happen, and when it does happen, please know our intent and goal is to enable you to do that, and that's partly both saying yes in a forum like this, yes, and we want to find how we can help you, and then second, on the financial side, I'm gonna save that for later. We have no idea where that's coming from just to cut to the chase on that, but we can probably figure it out, especially if, as we've talked about in this meeting previously with a couple of you over here, and I suggested that if there were a proposal that came to us that was the simplest of proposals, I say that. Maybe there is no such thing, but if it was just one little project that we could show, that we could say, you know, we say, yes, we approved this with administration's approval, to be clear, too. I'm being very cavalier in sort of saying this as if it was just the commission.

It's not. We give advice and we have recommendations, right, but that's always within the respect towards the administration and the constraints that administration has, frankly, from a resource perspective, too. So therefore, we've said perhaps we could help if there was in your expertise, you might bring forward just like a little project. And, you know, totally you know it can be done, and it doesn't take a lot of resources or a lot of time, and we could say, Yeah, let's get behind that. And what that really does is it if it happens, then what it does is it just gear it primes the gears, so to speak, because I have to brace.

Gosh, I don't belong in a railroad, obviously, or a car. But it does set things up. Prime the pump. Thank you. Prime the pump.

Like prime the gears.

That's that's a little bit. But

to start with, they have to get the the interest is there. We all agree with it. But they have to get in there and clean some stuff out. I don't know what's been tagged and what hasn't been. But once it gets they need the help getting it cleaned out so they can get in there and actually see what they have. And they can't really do that without having the museum go ahead and say

So where we're at as a department, and just to zoom out and look at some of these structures, so the Museum Commission is an advisory group, a conduit of sorts between the board of supervisors and the community and the department. So the library department oversees the museum, and the museum oversees the Colorado Western Railroad. So where we're at, this idea of lack of bank is we are in contact with our risk department and and council and seeing what structures need to be in place so that we can move forward with that type of project. So that's been started, and we'll have updates over the next few weeks. I think that with live demonstrations And anything that we can do to to bring a living history element to the community is is spectacular.

And think about demonstrations during the fair and just all the opportunities around all of this. For the department, the first steps are looking at the pieces involved to risk and, of course, insurance and what processes have in place and making sure that those all have the green light before we move to the next step. With the yard what should we call it? The yard, really, cleanup of sorts. There's there's been a lot of things just over time that have have sat, and so that is in review.

And then that'll be part of our cons well, a consistent a continual process of review with all the items. But it's been a while since that was since that was done. So that's one element of this. And then as it was mentioned, that blacksmith shop in particular, I don't know the last time that was actually utilized. I don't know how many things in there could be utilized.

Early demonstration there in about 2016.

Okay. That's good to know. Part of the

part of the meet the fair council.

But you didn't use that facility,

did you?

No. We had to build a Yeah. Garden shop out in front of that.

Yeah. We were there exactly. Okay. But that magnitude back to that facility, I think Mark brought this up when we were having a discussion, it obviously presents itself as a jail. Yeah. So that does not, you know, convey blacksmithing Okay. Other than nature of their character. So, you know, that's that's one of the issues. Sure. So when you talk about cleaning it up, there has to be a vision of

what the facility will be. Sure. And just in general, cleaning up the entire yard and reviewing and assessing everything. That that process has started. And with as far as the department and then what we would like to offer to the community in time, I mean, anytime we can have something where it's it's a living history element, that's that's very exciting to think about.

But where where we are at with the process is working to see, okay. What is the the structure that we need as far as insurance and and other approval to even designate those next steps? And so we should have more information than for next month's meeting. Kelly, did you wanna add anything to that? Or is there anything I missed?

No. Yeah. I do. I have been in contact with risk and talks talked to them about it, and they're I've seen what else they need to find out. And, also, I I've told you I I have emailed the Blacksmith Association to find out more about the insurance aspect that they offer their members to, because I know that's gonna go a long ways with our risk management department. We must get that.

Well, I know what policy, because I was involved in putting that together. As as a CBA member when we have an event, we cover insurance, liability insurance on the participants that are CBA members. Mhmm. Now that covers us, but that doesn't cover you or your nephew or someone coming in to help out. So that's another thing altogether, unless you wanna sign everybody up to CBA, we could probably have applications here But pretty it is a matter of how can we make sure that the scene is safe for us first and foremost.

We wanna make sure that there's no hazardous chemicals, there's no dangerous structures, and if there is, what the reports have been, what has been found there. There's so many things we need to know before we can go ahead and say, this is safe for us to be in that environment, and then especially to bring anyone else into that environment. That's where I would start,

is

making sure we have the information we need. So you fellows have seen shop at the museum. Yes. And what I would be concerned about is you not being there when people are cleaning it up because people who don't know what blacksmith stuff is could look at something and go, Oh, this is garbage.

George has already gone through and tagged the items that need to stay in there as a blacksmith.

The next step then would be, I think, for you to say, this is what you need, and then we can start to see if we can meet your needs so any of this stuff can happen so that it seems like the needs assessment needs to come first, and we can see if we can meet the needs. If we can't meet the needs, this is all moot.

Well, with the insurance piece and the liability piece and the council review and vice versa. It all depends on on on those elements as well if we

can even offer

this type of program. But we should have more information

So so we have the economic end on covering insurance stuff. We have the physical end, as you said, for safety. We wanna make sure that place is safe for you. And the next thing's gonna be to make sure there's an adequate number of the equipment you need. If the furnace isn't working the forge, excuse me, then that that's gotta be taken care of. So I think all this needs to be looked at together because without all of it, you have nothing.

Well, our on our side, it could be that the the decision by the county, it could be that it's that it's no, that it's not possible. I mean, as a department, we you expressed interest and reached out, so they're they're reviewing what might be possible. But it could be that the decision from from the county is no. But I wanna mention that that piece because I know with trying to juggle the the the other elements, we might wanna wait a little bit to see what the response from risk and counsel and the county overall is.

Terry, George, Mark, may I ask a clarifying question at this point too? You earlier were generally kinda guiding us to answer a question that really, I guess, precedes any other consideration, and that is, to what purpose are we going to use this? I think you suggested that it could be for demonstration purposes or it could be that there's some element of participation as well. Do you mind spending another moment helping us understand maybe it's just me understand how to think about those two things comparatively? Like, what does that mean? It's a be a participant sort of led blacksmith shop versus just demonstration?

I think carrier would probably agree it really depends on the vision that you have for that. It's part of the library system, believe, isn't it? That whole museum.

So, yeah, the the library department oversees the historical museum, and and then the museum oversees the Colorado Westburn Railroad. So with the one one one scope that, you know, we're we're interested in potentially with blacksmithing and and and museum is that living history kind of element. And that's why the railroad or western railroad exists, because that's an example of a living history program.

Which suggests participation to me and some involvement. But if I look at, let's say, Goldbug Park, I can go up to their blacksmith shop today. But I haven't felt like I could be a participant in that. It feels like more that they're just demonstrating sort of some of the What do you mean by participant? You want a blacksmith? Well, I'm using your language. I think it was I think you said that there was, actually, Terry, I think you said that it was, we had to think of this either as a demonstration only, and you said it twice in the thing, or in some type of a participant. So that's what

I'm trying to clarify is what Well, the distinction is demonstration as you've chosen what the value of blacksmithing would have been from a historical perspective. Participation would be having, if you had school groups coming through having an opportunity for one of them to come in and dip hot metal, and that's participation. They don't get they're obviously not gonna be able to make anything in the time that it is. So how do they want participation, you know, is, oh, they could hold an iron bus and be struck at it or something, but I'm just saying that that's an opportunity. I I don't know what kind of participation the museum or this commission envisions when they talk about having participation.

Okay, I didn't wanna make any assumptions. I think we're at a point where maybe we can, just as a commission real fast, address this. I'll start by seeding that answer with a possibility which would be that our vision is to see that brought back to life, and that does mean to me demonstration. I'm not sure how thrilled I am about any participation except that I do want to see us have school groups come, and maybe they start up at the library, right, and it's part of a broader educational field trip visit, and it comes down to the museum, and they see the museum, and then they see the blacksmith, and there's like, be amazing if we had something that resembled that. Commissioners, is that what you see, too, or would you shape that differently?

I think the demonstration would be the thing. The participation, I don't think that's so good. The demonstration is showing how to do it and everything would be very important because it's a lost art, and so a lot of these kids would never even know about it. But what I'm gonna get back to the very beginning again is we have to get the insurance. We have to get all of these things in order.

But in the meantime, can we go ahead and have somehow get it cleaned out so that the guys know just what they do have there already? If they have that, then they don't have to get it or whatever. But just to clean out a whole bunch of that because I've been in there, and I can see there's a lot of junk too. But if if they just get cleaned out enough where they can actually see if the bellows will work or if what they can do about it or, things like that. Just kind of basic to start with too. What you guys are working on We're in the identify

help me out here. We're identifying and assessing items that are in there, and of course, we I my understanding is a bit of quasi working group around us. We have a few volunteers that are that are assisting, and of course, library staff. So we're getting a better idea of what's in those spaces. As far as, you know, testing anything or anything of that nature, we're not doing any of that.

We're just identifying what potentially might need to be moved to a different area of the yard or both the the appropriate process of I'm not sure how many of those things have actually been at a session, but we're just kinda selecting inventory and seeing, you know, what's there and what might need to

be rearranged.

Even even if, ultimately, say, we're not able to offer blacksmithing activities on-site, these are activities that need to happen no matter what. And, ultimately, moving forward with this idea with this a pocket of of blacksmithing, that is a that's a county decision that comes from risk and some of the other departments. So that's not something that the library department has authority to put forward. As I mentioned before, we're talks Thank you. In this one of those processes.

And that's coming up next session. You'll have an update on that. Sorry, I didn't beat that. I think so, yeah. Okay.

And then, Mark, so when when you were did the demonstration at the museum earlier, it wasn't inside that blacksmith building, was it? It was outside.

It was inside of the building. The building is a blacksmith shop. It was built as that. So we have a counter for the students to stay on the outside in the safe area, and we walked them through the building. Okay. So we always had them in a safe environment. And then we could work on the other side knowing that there wasn't any of the child stepping up behind you. They were beyond chains. Right. And we made sure that was pretty clear. They should stay on one side.

So you had fire going inside that building?

Yes. Always. First thing in

the morning till the end the Is it vented?

Vented, yes. Vented to his duty roof.

Wait. Are you talking about the museum or Coloma? No. In in Coloma.

Oh, I'm I'm not not the museum. I'm talking about I brought

my own forge here.

You brought your own forge, so it would because You don't have it in here. Yeah. The blacksmith the blacksmith building, as it's set up now, is set up as an exhibit only.

I was

gonna say

So that is It

never was a blacksmith, I don't think.

Yeah. That is not a usable that's not usable equipment as it is in there now because it's not vented. It's it's just put together to be an exhibit.

It could be made to be usable, but there there's a lot that would have to change, and I don't think you wanna do that.

Yeah. So what we were talking earlier that we were discussing having the demonstration outside the building and but, you know, also cleaning up the blacksmith exhibit area so that that, you know, would give a really good idea of what that would have looked like.

To to give you an idea, yeah, it I could set up a blacksmith demonstration there this weekend in one day and and tear it down by the end of the day. That's typically what I did for the the fairgrounds or any place else like that that I would do that kind of a demonstration. And we would bring all of our own equipment to do that with. I don't think that that's what you want in the long term. You want something that is sustainable with your equipment you have in mind there at the facility. And I think I think your experience with the railroad event in that organization, that's really what's needed to to see to create a vision big enough to make all of this work.

And

what we can do is we we can be available to you to as, you know, as tools, but you have to have a vision. The the long term plan is yours, and we're just here to help you to make this work.

Stepping in as facilitator, if I might just give us some track. Yeah. Last comment, and then I'm gonna go back to the commissioners, and then

we'll start putting this together. Yeah. So is there any program or initiative to get the machine shop unread tagged?

I think it's a similar conversation, putting that door a little bit there. Do want to say a couple of quick comments? Then we're gonna keep it on the There's a there's a lot

of work to be done and and a lot of possibilities, and we've made a lot of progress with with the museum. And, of course, it's offering catalog and expanding hours. And so there's there's nothing that's currently in place right right now where we're working on next steps related to any of the outbuildings. There's just so much to be done and so many possibilities that we're really trying to hone in and focus on just a few activities that we have capacity right now.

I'll add to that just really fast, especially if anybody watches this later, but also for all of our awareness too, again, we're so grateful to the library system within the county administration for stepping up because as we all know, the museum, although not gone, is zeroed out in the county's budget. And so we're working really hard to identify sources for revenue both within the county eventually, but certainly external donations as well that may enable us to do more there.

That was my next question. Do they have any facility for picking up donations that are earmarked specifically, say, for the blacksmith shop?

There are definitely ways to do that. But we're I'm gonna take us can we have that conversation separately,

if it's okay, just so I

can keep us Just to clarify

quickly, so we did have a museum administrator official, and then that became a big thing. And then we deleted it with the the need to compress our budget to to meet that county cost. With we do under the the library department, there are activities related to the museum where where funds are utilized. So it's not like the museum is completely separate. We have that within the library budget. We just don't have any positions that are directly related solely to these, you know, activity.

So, Bryce, are you saying, just for clarification, that there are funds that normally would have gone to help support the museum through the county that are now part of the library's budget directly in the

other That's always been the case.

So you can look at the or you

can consider the museum kind of like an additional branch by Right. Five or six locations. You can have the museum. So with things or utilities, other that are needed to keep the museum open. That's all within our our overall department's budget. They never will pay those funds. Correct. We've always built that in with and and there's there's in

the budget, there's all sorts

of different fields that we populate based on the the need of of the. In the past, we were able to have a little bit of a training budget and and other pieces, but that fluctuates per year. You have to think what the needs are, maybe what the the snapshot of our budget looks like.

And thank you for allocating that budget. But the big changes,

you know, as as occurred a while ago, is that library, as

an

apartment, there was we were holding positions that became vacant, including the museum administrator position, because we knew that we needed to compress as a department to help the county meet that county cost. So ultimately, we deleted 6.75 positions from the department. So we have just about 34 full time employees from six locations. And, of course, we have, you know, the railroad activities. But then one FTE was brought back during the time when we fully absorbed all railroad activities, because at a time it was being explored that perhaps it would go to the parks department.

But the library department went ahead and and kept the the railroad piece and fully that's fully within our department.

Thank you. I was trying to

make No. No. No. No. Good.

It's a good tangent, and thank you again to the entire library system, all employees there who have are really giving of a constrained and reduced budget overall, the library system still finding ways to get and to keep the museum alive. And of course, the commission wants to continue to work on behalf of the library system and by extension, from the museum to increase funds available for that entire system for the library as well as for the museum and the railroad. Bringing us back to our topic here, I just I need to make sure I'm checking in with each of our commissioners on this for their input now at this point, too, and any questions they may have for our guests. And I've noticed a couple of individuals that seem to be leaning in a little bit, not to read body language too much, but maybe, Joe, you might have been leaning in there at a couple points.

Well, keep

doing that, but somebody

is addressing it so I

Speak up. It's okay.

I get that. Well, no.

It's that's that. I I I thank you guys for for being here. I I agree with you that there needs to be a vision. And perhaps if we step back a bit and said, well, you know, that's probably a pretty good thing for us to have in general, not just for a black Swiss shop, but a vision for the museum in general. So the next question would be is how do you create this vision? How do we create this vision? Who does it? What form does it take? How do we make sure we all agree or align with this vision? And then you have something to execute on.

Right?

You have a vision for boxing shop. You have a vision for the the the railroad aspects and all of that. That would be the next question. How do you kick that off?

Absolutely. You're in luck. We're gonna actually review that today, and it's gonna be a little bit later in our agenda. So that's wonderful. It's a broader topic, the vision statement, which does exist, and we've kind of looked at it here together. We got a really good one, so we'll look at it a little bit later. It certainly does support this. Back to my comment earlier that we want to enable these types of things to happen, especially where the community wants to step up and says, Hey, I can help with this. Keith, I don't know if you might have been leaning in at 1.2 before I checked just generally with everybody else.

It was during the period where we were discussing the basic concept of having a blacksmith shop or program on the grounds of the museum. I wanted to make sure that everyone that I believe I could see for the railroad volunteers that would very much like to see that continue out there and to the extent that you can do it safely, have a a partnership. And, occasionally, there are parts and pieces that have come along. Although, also, some of your colleague, Bill Fisher, I believe, know, he he has been very involved with restoration of caboose there at El Dorado, making all kinds of metal parts and pieces. So so, anyway, I believe the heart of the museum is in the heat, the sound, and the and the noise, and it's not just simply what's on a paper.

It's it's that living part of it. And so I I wanna support that in every way we can.

Thank you. Yeah.

I also would like to have the other question about the machine shop is kind of a chicken or the egg kind of question because a lot of the stuff we're talking about doing, whether it be to the locksmith shop or any other area, will require the machine shop or will require the equipment in it. And how do we go? Where do we go from? The other point in order to to drive this forward at some point, you know, we're talking about how do we get the museum or the the the blacksmith shop to a certain state. But then there's a there's also an operational state there.

Right? And you'll have demonstrations every you know, on some sort of schedule that needs supplies. You'll need how do we go about hopefully, we don't have to go get approval from, on high in order to get all of these things. We have a regular process for obtaining that type of stuff. And that could even be true for the the process of of, getting it to the point where we can do the, hey, we need some lumber over here. We can put it together, but we need the lumber. Where's it gonna come from?

That's part

of that chicken and egg situation. No. Let's turn that into a different analogy, eating the elephant. Right, they say? You do that one bite at a time. So I just wanna bring that back around to my comment from earlier, which is a small proposal to come forward from those of you who are knowledgeable about this. Just the smallest thing that helps us to, I'll use it properly, the same properly this time, prime the pump so that we because like, we learn how to view this together. We learn how to work on it together. Vision, I'll just hazard a guess here, hazard to suggest rather, and I guess suggest that it is let's make education our focus. You know, how can we turn that space into an area that is able to serve the community through education?

Everything else will start to follow, I think, from that. Who knows? Maybe one day it'll actually become a true blacksmith shop, but that's not our vision yet.

No. But, you know, obviously, and I don't mean to interrupt, but it seems like your point about getting approval from a risk or from a, you know, a insurance perspective is kind of, you said you might have more information by the next meeting in that respect, but that's kind of the driving force at this point. If if that's not feasible, then it's it's a move becomes a move question.

I would agree, except that when you talk about approval, it's an approval for what? Exactly. You have to have a vision in order to say, yes. Go with this. Or There's my from a from a insurance risk perspective, I think you

were talking about So even though there are different departments throughout the county, the library department has an as an example, we are county of Colorado. So we are we are within that that that system or work together. So, ultimately, the the decision and being able to move forward even with the idea of blacksmithing activities on county property that goes through risk and council. And then they've they will provide us with additional information of what might be possible.

Well, if the state can do it, I think.

Before we can do any blasting, obviously, we have a lot of planning to deal with, and we'll have preparation. We have to have access to things that they know, you know, whether fuel supplies. I mean, what what's available to us. There's gotta be some kind of basic budget that will give us some idea whether these are even workable or not. You certainly have some liability coverage on the property, but with our walking in there, we can we can have liability insurance through California Black Scholes Association, but we need to be as members of the board to do that.

You're covered through the county. You have to figure out all that stuff. And then we we have to know how can we help you. What what do you want us to do?

Help us come in and do another pass.

Yeah. We did one thing. Yeah. Ultimately, it is a it's not a department decision. It's a accounting decision. So if we were to get be given the green light, there'd be additional conversations to be had. There's so much potential and opportunity. As a department, we're very flexible. To give just a snapshot example, there's some libraries that have beehives on the roof know, around their libraries. Redwood City is a prime example, and they actually sell the hunt.

And so we explored a partnership with the El Dorado County Beekeepers Association. At Plattsville Library, we had a a space that is secure. You can also from the criteria, you could potentially see the hives. It was set up in a in a you know, it it had the potential to be set up in a in a very efficient way. The would take care of all those elements.

And, ultimately, we didn't move forward with the with the project, with the with the process because it was determined that with, you know, the liability piece and some of those other components, that wasn't something that the county was interested in at at this time. But we explored it. It's a fun thing to explore, and, ultimately, things didn't align, and maybe it'll be explored again down the line. But as an example of we're a partner within a system, and then we leave the the legal and and other decisions to those experts. And so that's you're in a similar position with the idea of any lax methane activity.

But we should have some updates here next week. There's there's gonna be a

lot of back and forth, so they'll probably have questions for me. I'll have questions

for you. What is this gonna require? So

Lots of precedent for this in a lot of other areas. Jake Jackson Jackson. Museum. Awesome. Yeah. And then, of course, Coloma, although it's different, it's not a good statement. So hopeful that that precedent may have some influence, and I've taken a note also to try to explore through the commission through its avenues communication too to try to say yes to that. I assume that the bees didn't make it because they wouldn't obey the chains that were put up. Like, we would have enough to give the children out and the blacksmith's top, couldn't keep them on the other side of the chain. Probably, was it.

Well, these are wonderful names everywhere, but there's a liability piece that that it it didn't it's been aligned.

Not gonna sell peanuts for the same.

I mean, that's what the defense looks like. It's just, you know, an opportunity. And then sometimes everything aligns, and, you you continue the the journey. But we're excited just to be exploring this right now and that we have individuals that are very knowledgeable and interested and volunteering.

And mow the baby. So yeah.

I can promise that at least a few of us are gonna be tenacious in trying to make it happen. I appreciate that. We can't guarantee anything, but we can guarantee we will do everything we can to make it happen.

And is there an opening here also for a follow-up visit, George? You helped us already to come in and do some tagging. And, Jeanette, I don't know if you've seen it after. We did go in and followed George's We took out the things that weren't tagged, that was easier, and or it was reversed, I can't remember. But it might be ready now for a second pass actually because now you can actually get in further, and there may be some other stuff that we need to kind of clear out of the way. Is there an opportunity from the administration's perspective to maybe work again with all three of you gentlemen or one or multiple, but to go in and just do a little more cleanup? Maybe not, but I thought maybe I'd ask.

Well, I obviously, my perspective, I can make myself available to be down there.

Sure. That's not a problem.

Thanks. I can take further notes on, you know, what we're seeing, and it it's probably gonna be a multiphase. We might start off with the demonstrations outside and get that started and get that support and and momentum started.

You mean a demonstration outside?

Outside the the Structure. Blacksmithing.

You wanna start doing blacksmithing now? Well, not now. I'm I'm speculating.

I'm speculating about Down

the road. Yeah.

Yeah. Down the road.

But as far as checking, I

can make myself available if you Yeah. Come Yeah.

And then see what what's might be

So you know you know when we're there. So I'll I'll be there tomorrow all day. If you wanted to come by, I'm also there Thursdays and Saturdays.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow, I can get get down there if you're

And you're all covered under the CBA, it sounds like, your own insurance there also additionally.

It isn't an automatic thing. No. But we're all current CBA members. Right? So, yeah. Oh, that's good. We we can Right. We can have a blacksmithing cleanup event and I communicate with CBA and let them know that that's what we're doing so that there's no questions or concerns about that. Okay.

That's when it's considered an event. Right. Right. Yeah.

We when we declare it in event.

Yeah. We don't and we

don't do it just on a a when you Yes.

Oh, hey. They wanna know we're doing this.

To drop in the box. So what time would you expect them?

Morning?

What?

Afternoon. One? Morning

or afternoon? Morning.

Morning, afternoon.

10:00.

The afternoon. Jordan got to help with the room. Busy in health too. So he can't. Well, he should. He's already there. But What about you could be there one or two.

Any time except one at one.

That's kinda weak.

Can we go earlier? I I'm available at ten.

Yeah. George, you won't

be there. You have to someone will be there.

You won't. I'll just watch your help, Kate. And I'll be there. Yeah.

We we craziestly send George forward.

He did interact with it. He said he would help in any way he could.

Yep. Okay.

Great. Well, no. My wife is gonna have something to say. I just But she

that act fair.

We're not doing any cleanup. It's with you're coming to visit, and they're look at some things.

And envisioning. We're getting the envisioning starting. Excellent.

Yes, we can do that. Let's back together again. Any last comments from the commissioners before we open it up to the Commissioners, any last comments here or questions before we open it up to the public?

They have to come up with a vision. Could they present a vision next time? Got it?

Janet, I think next time we're gonna hear from administration on any feedback that may come from the county and so far as a risk assessment. Hopefully, my hope is, not to guide this too, but my hope is that the risk assessment may come back, it won't come back with a yes, I'm sorry to say, but it would probably come back as not with a no, it might come back and say, Let's define this a little bit more carefully. Like narrow exactly what is and isn't going to happen with that blacksmith's shot in order to reduce risk, right, the risk assessment. And then that would inform the insurance, no doubt, at that point. So that I think will be the next time, but yes, Jeanette, we will work towards a little more concrete once we've got that information.

Thank you. Yeah, thank you too. Thank you for putting us in there today. Appreciate it.

Other questions or comments from commissioners before we open it up to the public? Okay. Looking in the room at our relatively few representatives from the public. Any other comments or questions at this time?

Thank you for having us down here. I think this is a great beginning.

Great. Exciting. And now I'll look online and see if anybody's joined. Sarah's out there still. Any questions or comments from those online from the public?

Just gonna wait an extra moment or two just in case. Okay. Not hearing any. I'll wrap this up on this item, which has been the exhibits and tours and partly EDWR, but not entirely, with comments also for our visitors from the future looking at the past reporting. And just say if you happen to have if you're a member of the public and you happen to have an idea for something that your expertise and your experience and your energy, available energy, right?

We want people who can help. And if you've got ideas, we wanna hear them. And you're always welcome at our commissioner meetings. Okay, let's move on in our agenda then. Closing out that item, next on our agenda, I'll hand to our guests. If you need to go disconnect Yeah. Okay. Okay. Thank you for being here.

Thank you. Yeah. Thank you, guys.

Question for Bruce. Thank you. You. Appreciate it.

So next meeting,

Thank you for bringing. I think great.

Thank you, Yeah. No. It was perfect.

And then anytime if you are if you let I think Crystal know, she usually submit the agenda. She can put anything on the agenda also too in advance. We we can put it in interview.

Okay. We do. We

may have lost a couple. But

we're good.

Okay, I think that Randy will be back in a moment. I'm just taking the key. But we can go ahead and get started with our next agenda item, which was, it is twenty six-six thirty one, review the completed annual Board of Supervisors presentation. So as a preface to this, on the seventh, am I misremembering, I'm pretty sure it's the seventh? Good, yes, so like Tuesday, exactly.

We have our presentation to the Board of Supervisors as a commission. That is accelerated. It's just slightly if that's the word to use here, it's earlier this year than it was last year. I'll put it that way. I think it was October that we're presenting, and we had previously talked about doing this and established that Randy and I would get together, and we did, to go and work on an updated version, an updated version of this presentation, which Crystal has sent out, and so you have this in your inbox.

We don't have it printed here. And what I propose that we do now is that I begin by just sort of saying, how do we frame the presentation, like what's the objective of it, and that'll inform what you see in the slides. And then, too, we'll actually step through the slides. There's seems like there's a lot, but there's actually not a lot. You'll see why that's simultaneously true and not true.

So if that's okay, even though Randy's not here, I think I'll go ahead and just tell you what the general purpose was, and then we'll go into the slides. Before I do that, do the commissioners have any questions? Okay. I think it's in good shape mostly because it's frankly what we did last time in terms of the layout. So you're not seeing any difference in style or even really in layout.

There are maybe a couple of slide topics that are a little different. But the approach to this is this presentation is really showing and demonstrating positively all that has happened in the museum, and it's a chance for the commission to throw praises, heap praises upon the library administration. And I'll be very open about this, not just because we do love the library administration and all that's happening and all the good news. Certainly that's true, but it's actually intended to set us up to be able to say to the Board of Supervisors, Hey, look at all that is happening, with let us be the ones to say with so little relative to what they could be doing. Even the smallest of additional investments, when the time is right, we're not tone deaf, we don't know that the time is right right now.

We get it. Like, maybe not the moment. But it's literally our responsibility as a commission to continue to advocate, and we stand before you advocating for additional investment, not only in the museum but in the library system itself. It is the same group, And so any extra dollars that could be found can do so much. And we're gonna give a few examples too.

I'm gonna leave them with that as an open invitation to talk, you know, at some point to come forward and sort of say, Okay, let's talk about what that could look like. If we had an extra $10 bill, what could you do with it? And what I hope, and I'm hoping this is watched by people, right, in the video too, I'm hoping that somebody comes to us and says, Okay, if we're gonna give you a $10 bill, can you give me a return on that investment? Can you bring back into the county $11.100 dollars I don't know. Could you turn your efforts, being a public serving organization here, into something that brings in more people that are gonna spend more money in our county or that increases spending in our county?

And I will tell you, I'm enthusiastic in my belief that the answer is yes to that. But we do need to have the Board of Supervisors at some point say to us, Okay, hey, you know, Commission, we want you to go work with this other commission or this other agency or this other department or you have permission to go out into the community and come back to us with a plan that if we did spend some money, if hypothetically, and we're not promising you anything, but maybe if we had that $10 bill to give you, that you could bring turn that into $20 to the county. Show us how you can do it Because that way, there's no risk to the county if that can be they don't have to say yes to it if we can't prove that we can do that. And then if we do that and money is returned, well, the coffers went up, not down, as a result of support, you know, enabling and giving more dollars to the library system. That's the theory, which, of course, makes sense because it works.

Right? It's worked for many organizations many times over. So this is built with that in mind, and it's pretty gentle for the most part. Randy's just come back in, and I wanted to just catch him up, gave the general premise that you and I, of course, work together, but to set this up to enable us to say, Hey, if we had look at all that's happened, praise lauded upon the library administration for this and upon the board of supervisors for the support that they're giving. And imagine what else we could do if there were some extra dollars, and especially if those extra dollars came with very little risk.

Because, for example, you expect us to work with other parts of the county and come up with plans that bring more tourism or that bring more revenues of any kind into the county. And I really believe that's possible. With that said, do you have anything you'd like to add before we kind of just walk through the slides?

I think the slides will tell the story.

Just talking to the guys on the way out, Mark and I had a old friend in common. I figured from his discussion that we would. That's why I went out there. But they're excited to be a part of this. We're excited to have them be a part of this. It sounds like this thing is the momentum is ready to go. Mhmm. And I'd like to have us push forward with that and continue with it and not let it slide. Even if there's not a whole lot of money, let's make things happen.

And they're not too young.

Not too young.

None of

us are told.

Yeah. My son's a little bit older too. I miss out the s.

Is. We must remember. Okay, let's go through the slides really quickly and I will say, Joe, from your comment earlier, you will see at the end of the presentation, we have the vision statement that we worked on as a group, but maybe just preceding your joining too a bit. Yeah, exactly. And so we reworked that vision statement entirely. We're a small group now, I just thought I could address it more completely. We will come to that and look at it. I will say, for my part, always open to revisiting it. It's about to go before the Board of Supervisors on the seventh, actually. So on the seventh, fingers crossed, we will actuals not only get this presentation but also get our vision statement.

And I'm pretty happy with that vision statement, although anything can always be improved with time. Let's go through the slides. Here we go. Welcoming, I'm planning to present again this year as long as nobody's opposed to that, but if somebody loves presenting and standing in front of audiences, I am happy to relinquish that. I would trust any of our commissioners here to present to the supervisors. So speak up if that is what you want. Otherwise, I presume that you'll let me stand up and take any bullets that fly our way, if there are any. I don't expect any. Okay, so we'll go to the second slide. I'll begin always with the reminder. I'll be fast about this, who we are. I will, if you all can make it, I hope you can. I get it sometimes you can't, but

I'll

bring this up. Did you say it's at 10AM?

Is that that or is that fluid?

What I remember, that's set. Okay. Yeah. At ten. Yeah,

there are things that are set and things that are fluid on the agenda there in terms of time. I think we're on one of the set times. But you can go to, and I certainly will afterwards, you can go look at the agenda and it says what it's got. I will introduce all of us. I will ask, if you don't mind, you'll be in the audience, and if you can make it, I will point to you, and I'll just, if you don't mind, just standing up and waving.

That way it's really, really evident. And I'll thank each of you for being here, and then we'll go to the next slide. I'll try in the presentations to also try and point out the pictures as I go through it where that makes sense to do that. Remind them what we do, the vision statement, that's ours in terms of setting a vision, recommendations for policies. In summary, it's all of the things that are advisory, right? We only have We only actually have one thing

How that do I

put this? That's sort of routine and regular, because setting the vision statement is a rare event for us, for example. But the routine and regular point of business that we attend to, of course, is our accessioning and deaccessioning of items as a part of our recommendations around what should and shouldn't be accessioned and deaccessioned. We've been quite permissive of things coming into the historical museum, and I think we've done better at being appropriately selective about what the quality theme and standards are of things that are coming into the museum. We filled up the first one, and we don't have a second building yet to fill up.

So we'll keep going here to the next slide, and here's where we start to deviate from the last presentation in a good way. Celebrations, this is the praising upon lauding the library administration and volunteers, no less, who have been working together to keep the museum going, but now even beyond that, expanding by 50% the availability of the museum. I'm playing with numbers, right? Because we're going from two open days consistently to three open days consistently. That's a 50% increase by my calculation.

Did we have two open days at the last presentation?

Nope, we had one day open twice.

Yeah, think you might have

That's right, no, it should be tripled.

It's a 300% increase relative to that date. I like that. Get this I like that.

The public could come research. It's even more if you go to hours. Well,

I'm gonna stick with 300% because I think that'll But

they could research another day. They could come in for research.

Technically, it's 50%. I'm gonna say 300%.

I'm not The caption there is 70. So

okay.

Do you accept I I do. I was a little worried about something, but I'm not now.

Sean doesn't necessarily trust me to get the captions right, and there are a couple of minor spelling issues that I didn't catch in here too, which I'm just gonna gloss over. So we also have ongoing cleanup of the facility, and I actually have a backup slide on that. Don't know he's gonna ask to see it, but there's a few backup slides. One of them is a picture of actually, Kelly, you're in there. Like, a it's not a picture you disapproved of, but it's like, you know, you're in there helping to clean.

Commissioner Mammering's helping to clean up in the yard on the exterior. We have the 600 items and documents and catalog it and growing. I'll speak to how impressive that is and how important that is, that we are accessible now, not just when the doors are literally open. We're actually accessible 20365. And there's such wonderful focus and appropriate focus on Bryce's part.

I'm gonna point that out in making that a priority. That's long overdue. Two new volunteers and enablement of 12 additional 12 new community activities. And I'm gonna say, I wanna show you that because there's no better way to represent to you as a Board of Supervisors than pictures of what the museum being opened has enabled, because if it had not reopened and if it had not now expanded ours, all of the things I'm about to show you wouldn't have happened.

Or wouldn't have happened as well.

Okay, well, I wanna be a little dramatic. Okay. They may not have happened, I'll put it that way, or they may not have been able to happen as well. Let's take a look at this first one. Got a presentation that took place, this is all just since October, by the way, right, when we met with you on October.

And here we have Meg Gifford, who's author and descendant of Eldorado County Sheriff James Madison Anderson, affectionately known as JMA. And we were in the IOOF Building in Downtown Placerville, sold out event. Luckily, it's a really big space, but that's me taking the picture. I couldn't capture quite everybody in the frame there, too, who came to this, and we were learning about the last legal hangings in El Dorado County, and it was a story. I mean, if you haven't read, she's just published a book, it keeps you on Everybody here, I've read the book several times and I was literally on the edge of my seat, even though I read the story several times.

Just, it's so captivating. Well, where did that research take place? Some of it. Here, in part here, other parts too, yes.

Stop it. Well, she's writing her next book, which

is fascinating, and as to Kelly's point, she's been coming up from Pasadena to the Open Research Room.

So yes, but I'm

not saying it's a 100 page book. Not all the research happened in one place.

Let's keep going, and I'll show you another event that took place. And many of you are familiar and have gone and attended the annual, it's now in its sixth year, Save the Graves event that takes place in the Plastropical Union Cemetery. And we have many characters that are portrayed every year, different characters each year, generally each year. Here's a picture from our most recent event, took place in October, again, just shortly following our last presentation. The research on the characters that were portrayed, graveside, right, we were telling the story of people from Eldorado County or who had a major impact on Eldorado County or even California, frankly, and that are buried right here in Eldorado County, many of them either in Placerville Union Cemetery.

Research also largely taking place here in the museum.

Kathleen's coming in tomorrow. Excellent.

For this year's Sandy Graves.

Yeah.

Let's keep going. I'll show you another wonderful event. Actually a series of events and I'll go through them quickly, and I'll just show you here. We've got a first event, here's commissioner man wearing in a top hat. You should wear those for our commission meetings, think. And here we've got a whole group of the community members, not only from Eldorado County. I'm pretty sure we had people coming from Satt County, from Placer County. There was a wait list for this tour. Let's go to the next one. These are walking tours of, I will say, Eldorado County.

These pictures, this one happens to be in Placerville, but we've also just had one that was in Georgetown. And these are events that are always sold out. Not just sold out, the waiting list is two or three times bigger than those who actually fit into the available capacity and the walking tours. That's just astonishing. And the research? All enabled because our museum is accessible and available again. There was also a speaker's engagement here. We had a community member with expertise, Phil Barry, longtime resident. Many of you may recognize that Barry name. They have a storied and long history and significant influence in the county going back to very early days.

Phil remembers riding the bridge, what do I call it? A cable car. A cable car, exactly, Pinot Grondie. Pinot Grondie. Yeah, I will say that. And he was able to tell his story here. Know, let's see. Sean should present. I know.

I think Pino grande every time I look at it So we're bilingual, so when you do that, you see the Spanish first.

I always pronounce the words. Way, okay, so. Pinocraft. Pinocraft. Pinocraft, yeah.

You know what you meant.

Yeah, exactly. So here, I'm gonna point

out Pinocraft. Exactly. Here

on this particular slide, I just wanted to show there's something intentional that's happening here. This is included not just because it's totally in the theme of events that were enabled by the museum being opened, but it was also a reflection of something that happened that was very special in the community. This was almost a disaster for us on that day because the venue where we were going to host this is not the venue that's portrayed here. This is actually Doug Beercamp's Museum of Tractors.

Oh, yeah.

And And trucks, it's gorgeous. It's just astonishing. That's not what we were scheduled to be. We were at a different location, and that location double booked us. And, you know, you call it bad luck. We got there early, early, but the other people who had booked it were there earlier. We were there hours early, and they were already And Doug pulled up in one of his beautiful restored trucks and helped us, helped stepped in and helped us to have a successful event, relocating it. And just, like, a great example of what the community does together and how history ties us together.

And so the footage Bill was speaking on, portions of that footage came from the collections of the county museum.

Yes, exactly. Let's keep going to the next, and I want to also recognize that thanks to the museum, certainly other groups, the Eldorado Western Railroad specifically, and supported by the Historical Society. After that event, with Doug Beerkamp and with Phil Perry, we then actually had a live train ride, and EDWR was so grateful to you, so graceful rather in enabling it to continue to stay open longer because with that whole mix up and having to be in different locations. And here we see many of the community members enjoying that train ride that same day. Let's keep going, and I'll show you another actually truly special walking tour and research that happened.

To my knowledge, it has never happened before. Am I wrong about that, Sean? We've had a historic walking tour of what used to be Chinatown. As far

as I'm aware, that's never happened. Yeah.

The research that happened through the Eldorado County Historical Museum, among other certainly sources, but could not have happened, primarily because of the historical museum, enabled us to identify the locations of long lost buildings that were part of Chinatown, establish the perimeter of it to some degree that had been documented. We were able to research and trace it and find pictures that haven't been seen for decades and stories that hadn't been told in decades. And that ended up becoming a joint event where not only did the county museum play a huge role in that and the walking tour, but then even at the Fountain Tallman Museum. Thanks to the county museum, artifacts were loaned to the Fountain and Tallman on Main Street, and we had dual we had the ability to have a whole display and exhibit up. It's still up?

I don't think

it's It's still up through May. Yeah, and I wanna point out on this theme real fast, because it's not in your presentation, Jiga, but I think if the commission agrees, it may be worth bringing up, and you'll have to be you'll have to be my memory here. They were vague about what was going to be filmed. Scouts came, I believe, to the county museum months ago. Is that true, Bryce? From a film production that was going to be happening and wanted to know more about Chinese artifacts and what the county had in terms of research material? Am I mistaken on that?

Is that a reminder?

Yes. That did happen, but I don't have any updates around it. I'm not sure if that project was cancelled.

It was not cancelled. Has been announced that Academy Award winning director Ang Lee will be bringing $30,000,000 in revenue to El Dorado County to film Gold Mount.

Okay. And and where was that announced? Everywhere. Everywhere from this.

Are you going up? Are you not?

Are you guys

This is a big deal.

Beyond the museum involvement and and one of the individuals that is involved with with props and those pieces. It wasn't something that I it it wasn't public information Right. At that time, so

I was just curious. I'm giving you a hard time.

Sorry. It's been very publicly announced, but I think that this is something to celebrate. It's in the theme of the lost Chinese communities of our county. So even if it's just a set designer looking for inspiration in the photos that are available, very few, but the ones that do exist from our county are solidly in the county's collection at the museum.

He was impressed with the artifact. Yeah.

But I think we had somebody from another state come and We did

as well. So a descendant of a local Chinese immigrant merchant family from the Gold Rush years

Very big.

Came specifically from Idaho, from Coeur D'Alene, Idaho, to attend this walking tour and spent hours before and after the walking tour with Kelly at the museum.

And yesterday, Rhodey did more research for them.

For them. They're still, they think they might have found more connections, family connections, through the information provided on this tour. You just see how grand the impact is.

So in the theme of public relations, you announced that this individual is bringing $30,000,000 into the county on a certain day, is that presumably by stagecoach? Or Right. You know?

I think that that the article said that I think they just mean in terms of production and the revenues that they anticipate. That could make police production too in terms of

You know, the chamber of commerce has been I've been a member of I volunteered for their many years there, but we have done so many through Kathleen Dodge is a film director. Not a film director, but one that gets Film commissioner. To she brings some movies to people in here. But we've got, like, ten, fifteen, or more movies done right here in town

Yeah.

And around here. So we brought they brought a lot of money into this town Sure. For just the movie soap when you say that one.

It's a it's a great connection to the county museum specifically as I'm saying into these efforts. Yeah.

Lopez, let me take you back to this, we're gonna keep going in the presentation just to keep my eye on time. Yeah.

So quick before so I I went ahead and and double checked to make sure that the the item is set for 10:00

Oh, good. Okay. On Tuesday 10AM. That's it is,

and we'll have about ten, fifteen minutes for the presentation itself. But my piece before that and it ties in to everything, it will be will be relative. It will be short. Yeah.

I'll submit it. Did say yours is a part of the fifteen minutes?

I believe that's how we have it structured.

Okay, thank you. Yeah, I will also be fast going

through But I also verified because this is, it's a bit of an conglomerate item. So we have the annual presentation, but then we also have the the the first reading and and it from the ordinance to the resolution. Yes. And so it's a combined item. So when I when I inter introduce it, I'll I'll do it in a slightly different fashion than how I've done it with with other items. But I'll I'll get back to you and confirm exactly how much time we have because I can't remember if we booked or if it was two ten minute slots or if it's different. Okay. But I'll let you.

Okay. Mhmm. Yeah, I can be very fast if it's needed, but hopefully we can at least get I wanna make that impact a little bit on some of the, and then we can come here and say upcoming goals and work plans, and here's where I just, this will actually be a very brief slide. Just want to say, hey, we can, I'm standing before you too because I can show that the museum is able to generate even more of an impact in the community. And we'll go to the next slide.

I'll just use that as a transition. Example, we think that if we could have an opportunity to, this must be the old version, which is okay, I can work through this, I was gonna say, I think I've moved to educational programs first, do more in the way of, I'll just speak to it that way, do more in the way of educational programs. Do more in the way of partnerships with museums and nonprofits. Continue to invest in digitization. These types of things are going at a great pace right now.

I am so impressed, and, again, complimentary of all that the library administration and volunteers are accomplishing. Can you imagine what we could do in terms of impact with even the most modest of investments, if that were possible. And I'm not tone deaf. I know what's going on in the community right now and across the county. There aren't extra funds available. But what I am suggesting is that the economic impact of these is really positive and very clear having just announced $30,000,000 for example coming in.

Let's go

to the next slide. It's exciting. With your additional support, we would be able to make that happen. We can turn, I'm gonna say, we could turn a dollar into $2. Quite confident with that. What we need is a nod from you to say, Okay, well, come up with a plan. We would entertain a plan as long as you get a return on investment for us and you can show us that.

Would this be the time that we take a hat and go in front of the superintendent? Like it.

Babe for almost can do it.

Comes back to you.

More like a Sam. Okay, how come

I use?

I'm not reading the vision statement because this is the last slide. I'm not reading the vision statement, but it's up there. They'll read it, and just real fast. Let's do that together, though, just because it's So this is what's getting voted on on Tuesday. The Eldorado County Historical Museum will be a nationally recognized leader in preserving and interpreting the complete diverse history of culture Cultures, excuse me, of Eldorado County. Quite encompassing, but also saying we're gonna be We wanna be nationally recognized. That really is the intent.

Well, we had Hugh Hauser. Hugh Hauser, is that new? He came here, and he did everything in our museum. Exactly. He did. Yeah. About a couple years. Well, some time ago. I know he's dead. But it was out '18.

But he's still on TV.

He is. Yeah.

There's no reason for us not to be nastily recognized because the whole world came here at one time many of them stayed. And what drew out of that is what we are today. If we can't make ourselves nationally known, shame on us.

Are you all satisfied with the progression and content of the Yes. My thanks to Randy, you've helped us to build that out.

And so thank you for that, Randy, also. Yeah, look at that.

Does all the work. I just go, Well, what if?

The stairs are all of

Yeah, these are extra slides, extra pictures. We won't have time, and that's okay. But with the time, there's little things that we could stumble into because I know how interested many of the supervisors are in history. Oh, there we go.

Yeah. The infamous.

And the additional photos are beneficial because the board members read all all the item. Yeah. So they'll go through the entire mutation and then, of course, available online. Look.

She's picky. Picky is so photogenic every time. Can't take a bad picture of her. Yeah. These are other these are other events I couldn't squeeze in. I had to be selective. There's a lot of other events that we've that happened this last year that were enabled because of the museum. Okay. Let's continue. Was yeah. Okay. Okay. Coming back to our agenda, any additional discussion on the presentation that will be given to the board of supervisors and or the theme and intent on Tuesday? Just the Ang Lee piece. Yeah. Okay. Understood.

It seems like Sean had a lot to say about this presentation.

Are there, is it okay if I ask Ben, just to add that to your calendars, if you can make it? I know it's the middle of the day too, but morning. And no worries, we can't be there, but if you're able to, it's good for us to show up together for that.

So it's Tuesday at 10:10 a. M.

Yes, that's right.

On the seventh. This Tuesday, yeah.

Yeah, that's right.

My sister's first day. It is? You should burn. She's burning. Don't know. My sister's burning. Yeah. She's burning. Water. You can't be like, hey. No. She's That's

what I was thinking.

Yeah. Okay. Let's open it up to public comment in the room. We have not a public

I think it's really nice that you put the signage. I know we talked about that in our last meeting because it was really interesting, actually, because when I was at the railroad with the extravaganza, Ed Cooney's wife was like, is the museum open? And I'm like I'm like, having a fit? I'm like, yeah. So it's great now that there's more days that's open and you're telling the board of supervisors that the science will definitely help. Perfect. And then we have more open hours, because that really surprised me because she's I mean, she's very involved because of Ed in the railroad. I was like, oh my gosh. You don't know about the museum. So that's really great that they all know about that.

And we have funds allocated Yeah. For the upcoming fiscal year that can be used to solve the signage issue. And I think when that main sign was put in in front of the museum, or maybe that was well before the crosswalk because of where it positioned, you know, coming from one of the directions, pretty covered for how you're passing it. So maybe we need to that, our our side.

Okay, we'll look online to see Oh, we lost our attendance.

The brand new crosswalk. Oh, okay. I

see nobody online at the moment, so I'm unable to check for any online participants. But with that, we'll close out this agenda item, and I look forward to seeing you there on Tuesday if you're able to make it. We'll move next to museum program updates. We already covered exhibits and tours, but it's to be checked, was there anything else related to exhibits and tours that needed to be covered? Okay. Not seeing anything there. Yeah, EDWRR may have had more topics, I'm guessing, even though that covered a part of it. Keith, do you have anything to add? Okay.

Just simply that we had an educational seminar last Saturday.

Friday.

Friday. Friday. Excuse me. Friday. And we appreciated Bryce's work with that.

That helps satisfy our federal railroad administration safety requirements, and certification for different positions. I would also like to mention that we have not forgot Shingle Springs in the new schedule, which is now out. Shingle Springs has two operating Saturdays a month using the maintenance away cars. And but our goal, our our objective is to obtain an excursion car such as the one at El Dorado and have that spliced into the train at Shingle so we can begin to operate right east from Shingle through Buckeye Flats up the grade through the tunnel and so on because that has scenery and history and and a flavor all its own. And so there's two entirely separate experiences there.

So, anyway, that's what we're working on, and we appreciate everybody's support and help. And if we can live through tomorrow with the cavalcade of eggs and children, I understand some of you who were in the room actually witnessed all these kids lined up by age groups and somebody in a bunny suit or something lifted a flag and the kids all took off like rockers and went after the eggs. Anyway, we saw a lot of people smiling and a lot of people very pleased with the experience. Thank you. That's wonderful.

Any questions or comments for Keith regarding the EDWRR?

Well, one of the families I heard, I overheard them talking. They were on the first run when we were going out. I could not say the right names. You're gonna get it. But he was saying, oh, I came last week, and it wasn't the big cars because they had been in the smaller cars. So it's, like, super nice to have them because he had his kids with him. They saw the smaller ones, and then with the bigger event, they saw the larger ones. And so they really enjoyed it, and we saw everybody had fun, especially because the kids got candy and everything. So it's really nice that they get to see all the cars that we have working.

So, again, with the new schedule, two Saturdays are with the yellow maintenance cars, a cars, which is in, like, a model a in the parley of the manufacturer in in Minnesota that made those cars for the railroad industry. That was their classification, APA. And so we use those currently at Shingle Springs, and we have the full size train consists at El Dorado, and we'll go from there.

Looking online to see if we have anybody commenting from the public. I don't see anybody online. Any additional comment in the room before we move to our next agenda item? Okay, thank you for those updates. We'll go next to our next section, which is Museum Commissioner, Violence, and Community Engagement Updates. If it's okay, I'll actually start off this time on this particular one because I'd like to come

back

to the topic of the organ, and there's an update that I can share from the Historical Society on the organ. And again, in full transparency, right, I have a role with the Historical Society separate from my role as a commission. And my role in the historical society, I attended Commissioner Mann Waring was there also in your role from the historical society and others at the Association Board's meeting, which took place two days ago, think it was. It was two days ago. And they were meeting on essentially what to do with the organ, which oversimplifies it.

They had four options that they were contemplating and are published in their minutes, you'll see. But those four options included one, which is the do nothing option, which has to be in your list of options, right, obviously. Nobody was gonna vote for that. And then the last three were essentially to keep the organ in place, which was both part of number option two and three, keeping it there. And then there were a couple of spend levels involved with putting in tenant upgrades in the space where the organ is kept in the organ room, a kitchen, an ADA bathroom, and there were some rough estimates for different options, slightly different implementations of those tenant improvements.

And then the very last option, option four, was to remove the organ. And so that could mean a few different things, but I'm not going to go into that so much. But the historical society learned of the meeting and came with a proposal, which will also be available. I actually handed had an extra one and I handed it to Randy a little earlier. Is it okay if I use that as a properly passed?

Thank you. And I'll just say that, so this few pages here, there's a couple of pages that document the history of the organ. It's and where, you know, obviously where it came from, the Bay Area and San Francisco and all the way through the present, and why it is historically relevant and very unique, one of only two known to existing to remain, and arguably the best example remaining of John Bergstrom Morgan that's arguable because other one has been restored, whereas this one has fallen into disrepair, obviously. And the historical society's perspective was that we wanted to recognize that the Fair Board is under pressure, and it is its mission to raise funds. It's under pressure to raise funds to generate revenues on the resources and assets that it has available, which that building, the organ room, is one.

And it's been unable to do that, at least to the level that it has wanted to do that. And I think they would say, I think they are saying, that the organ has something to do with that. I think that's debatable. But notwithstanding, we took that at face value when we were saying, Let us help you to raise money. In exchange for us helping you, the historical society, helping you to raise more money and bring more revenues in, we would like, in turn, your agreement to move ahead with one of your options where you're keeping that organ in place.

We do think those things are complementary. They're not mutually exclusive. You can keep the organ and arguably, we would argue at least, that by keeping the organ, you're more likely to be able to use this space. If it were incorporated into a space that's historically themed, you have something as impressive as that, and, you know, it could actually bring more revenues. That proposal was made. I'm pleased to say that the obviously, the county museum has interest in this, and it's been a part of our conversations as a commission. I'm pleased to say that they were swayed. I think that was not certain, and that was very much at risk, and they were swayed to agree to talk more. And you know what? That's a huge win.

They're going to put together a small committee, two people from the Fair Association Board, to people from representing the historical society to go and talk and talk about what a plan could look like.

Wow.

And so it's a huge win. It's not a certain win, And so we're not treating it as anything other than still an urgent need to come up with a plan and deliver on that plan. And they're gonna take not more than probably, my guess is three months for this, and then we would come back with that plan and we would present the plan.

Or they wouldn't talk before.

No, they would not talk before. We felt lucky to learn about the meeting. So that's really good news, and I do think, even though I'm saying that, even though I just said what I said, I would say that they've become more communicative just in the last two days, and I'm taking that as nothing but positivity and nothing but optimism in terms of our ability to save, to come up with a plan to help them make money, number one. Help them make money because that saves the organ simultaneously. Great, we will win. Are there any questions or comments on that?

Only to add that, and I don't know if the Commission's aware of this, I know that Director Lavelle is, descendants of the Bergstrom family have become aware of the organ. They weren't even aware that it survived. They have come up from LA and from Oregon multiple times. They were in attendance at this meeting advocating for its preservation and offering their support any way they could. So the family is also

part Oh, of the that particular thing.

That's good news.

Yes. And the Historical Society has now established a fund that will be used for fundraising and is separately, specifically So identified, restricted for that it will, and it's beginning in earnest, in good faith, frankly, since we don't have an agreement yet per se, but we're moving forward in good faith to start raising. And so for anybody who may watch

the public at some point in the future, and you

have rich friends who might want to give towards a cause like this, we would be very creative in helping to support acknowledgments of those businesses or individuals or other entities that might be willing to support for that cause. And you'll see more about that in the future. I'll now ask if there are other community related updates or any other organizations or events at this time.

The historical site is a historic home tour, I mentioned, at the last meeting on April 18, Saturday the eighteenth, from 11AM to 4PM. 11 homes will be featured or 11 properties, one historical church and 10 residential properties ranging from $18.59 to $19.39. We are expecting hundreds of people to attend this. We've already sold hundreds of tickets, and so we need a few more volunteers. And if any of you feel so inclined or know of anyone who may be interested in being a docent for a half day, it's three hours is a shift, and then

you get free tickets and a free catered lunch. There you go. What do like with it?

It's not hard.

You can even just take a chair and sit in

a parlor in one of the homes, and you're just, you know, controlling traffic and answering questions. So if that may be something you or someone you know may be interested in, we would love to have your participation. And then the last thing is following Participation, right? That what you're saying? We need the participation. Need help. And then the May 3, we're having a fundraising ball on the Springboard Dance Floor. They call it a floating dance floor at the Morning Star Lodge on Plaster Hills Main Street. On that proceeds will support the the preservation of that building. They have several projects they need money for on that, building.

It's over a 100 years old now. And, that's gonna be really special because they don't allow dances on that floor very often anymore. It's very restricted. This is one of, as far as I understand, less than five surviving springboard dance floors in The United States. So spread the word, it's a big deal that we're gonna have a brass band and dance instruction for period dancing and the Edwardian ball.

Don't the Odd Fellows own all that building? They do. Well, George is not only He's a chaplain. He's a he's a chaplain, and he's been there for years. And they did a lot of remodeling where Arians went out. They owned that too.

Yeah. There's so much to do. So they're they're raising funds for that building. So that's all I have. Thank you for your time.

How about the research room also? Or I'm thinking of the trails or any of the

On the trails, I sent out an email today for help to do the metal detecting at Smoky Ridge branch, and I have some great people already help at the end of the month of April. And the research room, we've been working away. Yesterday, I finished inventorying number 800 map. There's another 800 to go. It's exciting. Fun. I like doing that. It is. It's really exciting.

Have you found any maps that you were, like, never seen before that were surprising to you in some way or

Well, there's a map of Eldorado that we have copies of, but it's very difficult to read. So the surveyors didn't come in yesterday. Was gonna give it to them, when they do, I'll give it to them. They really appreciate them.

Because they're scanning? Yeah. Because they've got the big scanning equipment, yeah, okay.

And then will all those go into catalog as well?

No. We we need to see what we have to The the inventory will probably be connected in there somehow, but there's probably some that we will wanna upload the images for sure. Mhmm. So we need to see what we have first. And we've been doing lots of research for people who come in and email.

And hope to work. Do we Kelly, do

we have enough records in the the map folder and catalog it to go live with that?

What do we have about? I haven't put many more in. I mean Yeah. Like, we can find some nifty ones to put in tomorrow just real quick. Yeah. I think we can work on that.

I just know that we have a few other folders that are there's some items in there, and then we'll have to chat offline and then figure out which one to offer next as far as making it live in the system for public. So and

with the

with the surveyor surveyor's office and with their scans, they they acquired a very fancy scanner maybe five months ago. The one that they had before was was was great as well, but this is a $20,000 machine. And they're able to scan a variety of of sizes, and it's very quick and everything for scanning the PDF, I believe. And so as we continue discussions and go down the line, it it could be, as Kelly mentioned, that we import some of those and catalog it. There's just so many maps that we prohibited to add them all.

Yesterday,

my granddaughter was helping me, and we found a big roll of maps, or there's a whole box that said digitized by the surveyor's office. And yet I've never seen them digitally. I mean, where are they? Where are those digital copies that they did? They're beautiful, they're gorgeous, and they're maps that it would be great to have on our computer there at least. I think

it all goes on to, you know, one of their one of their drives that they have access to, and then they import them to a particular tool. So it could be that we're just granted access to that tool of digital.

But we don't have access to it, do we?

I I would have to put in the the request, but I'll I'll I'll chat with the surveyor's office. It's been a while since I checked in with them.

So I can take the list I made on my spreadsheet of which one there were. Oh, as far as ones that you you Yeah.

That you have an interest in

No. The ones that they've already digitized. It was in this box that's been digitized by the Supervisor's Office, and then they printed them, And they're in this box, and that's what we were inventorying yesterday, those already printed copies that were much better than the copies of some others. They're all the sandborne maps.

I wonder if that was not directly related to this current project, but something that happened before.

Oh, I think it was. And that rock has been there for a while.

Yeah. Okay.

Nobody ever gave me

Well, and for everyone that loves maps, of course, we have lots of maps at the museum, and then we also have more maps at the library, and so we'll be going through those in time as well.

You have maps at the library that we don't have at the museum? Possibly.

I've been told yes by Dana Superniewicz when he was part of the county advisory committee or commission that got those maps and secured them in

the library's basement. Just happened to have them.

A few decades ago. Yeah. So he said there's some real treasures in there.

We have an inventory of the maps.

Oh, that's good. In the oh, in the vault. Yep. Mhmm. And then I keep all the super secret treasure maps in my office. For the record, there are no super secret

treasure Yeah. Don't freight it to prices off.

I thought you would see them.

Where is that 30,000,000?

The map on the back of the original county charter. I

was just talking about buried treasure the other day. Yeah. With the the dogwood.

With the the dogwood. Yeah. And where do we get to the aerial Aerial photos. Aerial photos. There's nineteen thirty five aerial photos, and I've never online, I can find the 40 back to nineteen forty, but I've never seen online nineteen thirty five aerial photos. I hardly wait Thank to you, Dee.

Any questions for Dee? Any additional community related updates that anybody would like to share from the commissioners?

Well, maybe this is I the time to mention just spoke to the Dogwood Garden Club at Pollock Pines about the bullion bin robbery during the Civil War because they're from Pollock Pines and it was up that way. But it occurred to me that another way to promote the museum might be to establish a speakers bureau. And along those lines, as I talked about the idea of the digital videos for Facebook, I would like to encourage, especially the people that are in the museum all the time in the reference room, if you find stuff, write it down, and we can start to put together, maybe 10 or 12 to begin with, things to try and do that with. The library is doing such a great job with their little videos that they put on Facebook. Seems like this would be a nice thing to do for the museum.

Did you know something happened in El Dorado County? And then that other idea that what if we had six or seven topics that we could have people go out and for public groups to do through the museum, not just through Randy Mitchell coming out there, but that would promote the museum. So we did mention when I was introduced that I was a commissioner, but it would be great if I was here as a representative of the museum. Now those are inexpensive things that can bring in more publicity.

Thank you.

I'm for it because I have six library branches. We'd love to have you guys come and speak.

Did you know? We have six branches.

And a museum. We had a train. A train. Yes. All night.

And by the way, the reason I mentioned the map is there's still discussion whether or not that money was ever recuperated. And the question is, did they bury it somewhere before they all took off to Santa Clara Valley? And by the way, that was confederates that robbed the stage. People don't know how involved California was during the civil war. Greatly.

Who were the ones where the sheriff was shot and it

That's it. That's it.

K. That was out by Somerset, I thought.

Well, but it started at Williams Bend about two miles above

And then it out

of the

My sister and I, for years, are digging a little See? Digging out under the trees. We knew that could have been buried in there, so we upbanged a couple of nice oak trees.