HomeMy WebLinkAboutHRCMinutes_2018_09_10Brookings Human Rights Commission Minutes
Monday, September 10, 2018
Room 300 Community Room, Brookings City & County Government Building
Attendance: Steve Bayer, chair; Maggie Owens, vice-chair; Lawrence Novotny, recorder; George Hamer; Hanna
Holmquist; Meagan Irvine-Miller; Wren Murphy (student representative); Erinn Osborne Thomas; Kas Williams
(SDSU liaison);Shari Thornes, city clerk-staff
Absent: Penny Hauffe; Shafiqur Rahman (county representative);
Chair Bayer called the meeting to order at 12:01 pm.
Motion by Holmquist, seconded by Thomas, to adopt the agenda. All present voted aye; motion carried.
Wren Murphy was introduced as the new student representative. Murphy is a sophomore journalism major
and is in the honors college at SDSU. She is also a member of the Gender & Sexuality Alliance.
Minutes of the August meeting were not available.
October 15 & November 19 were selected as the tentative dates of the next 2 meetings.
King Awards:
With the reduction in the city clerk’s office staff, the BHRC has to pick up more of the work involved with the
King essay contest if we want it to continue.
Gail Klinker retired as the honors English teacher. She would assign the King essays as a project in her class.
With this change, we do not know how many essays will be submitted this year.
The posters are the most labor intensive. In the past the posters were scanned in for display on the website.
The parents of all of the winners need to be contacted.
It was decided to continue with the King contest in a scaled back version and see how it works.
The poster contest will be limited to the 4th & 5th grades which are all located in the same building. We will
eliminate displaying the winning posters on boards during the city council awards recognition and instead
project the winning entries on the screen.
A logistics team was created that will come up with the themes, develop the timeline, distribute info to the
schools and handle the posters. The team consists of Hamer, Murphy, Holmquist, Bayer and Thomas.
The essay review team consists of Novotny, Miller, Murphy, Owens and Williams.
Nominating Committee:
Hamer volunteered to be a 1-person committee to nominate a vice-chair for 2019 & 2020.
Combined Awards Event:
There was a full house. The city may have to consider a bigger venue in the future.
The Butler and youth ally awards went well.
Al Branum gave a great speech. Branum supplied a transcript of his speech to the BHRC.
The poster boards about each winner are great ice breakers.
Williams left at this point.
Community Common Read:
The BHRC will be organizing a take-back-the-night walk as part of the city’s portion of the community common
read events. Holmquist drafted a route working with the police chief. The walk will be on the evening of
October 24 and will start at the city/county building with stops at the detention center and Episcopal Church and
ending at the campanile. The police department, the Brookings County state’s attorney, and the sexual assault
response team are tentative speakers at the start and scheduled stops. Individuals will share stories at the end
of the walk.
MEI:
The Human Rights Campaign will come to Brookings to make the announcement about Brookings being the first
city in SD to receive the perfect score of 100. This is scheduled for October 10. The MEI committee will work
out the details for the press conference and the celebration event.
Adjourn: Motion made to adjourn at 12:48 pm. All approved.
Submitted by Lawrence Novotny, recorder