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October advisory board minutes
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# Minutes of the 30th meeting of the Scala Center, Q3 2023
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Minutes are [archived](https://scala.epfl.ch/records.html) on the
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Scala Center website.
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## Summary
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The following agenda was distributed to attendees:
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[agenda](https://github.com/scalacenter/advisoryboard/blob/main/agendas/030-2023-q3.md).
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Center activities for the past quarter focused on Scala 3 compiler
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performance, a specification for match types, scala3-migrate, sbt,
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Scastie, and Scala Days in Madrid.
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Details are below and in the Center's activity report:
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* [report](https://scala.epfl.ch/records/2023-Q3-activity-report.html)
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No new proposals were received this quarter.
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Other business discussed included Scala 2, the role of the community
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representatives, Scala Days, the Scala blog, and officer elections.
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## Date, Time and Location
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The meeting took place virtually on Tuesday, October 17, 2023 at
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15:00 (UTC).
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Minutes were taken by Seth Tisue (secretary).
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## Attendees
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Officers:
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* Chris Kipp (chairperson)
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* also board member, representing Lunatech
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* Darja Jovanovic (executive director), EPFL
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* Sébastien Doeraene (interim technical director), EPFL
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* Seth Tisue (secretary), Lightbend
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* also board member, representing Lightbend, subbing for Lukas Rytz
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Board members:
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* Daniela Sfregola, Morgan Stanley
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* Paweł Marks, VirtusLab (subbing for Krzysztof Romanowski)
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* Noel Markham, Xebia Functional (subbing for Maureen Elsberry)
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* Claire McGinty, Spotify
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* Lukas Rytz, Lightbend
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* Eugene Yokota, community representative
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Paweł introduced himself, as it was his first time attending.
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He is best known to the community as the Scala 3 release officer.
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## Technical report
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Seb, as interim technical director, summarized Scala Center activities
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since the last meeting. He presented from these brief slides, which
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concisely show what the Center is working on:
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* [slides](./2023-10-17-seb.pdf)
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His remarks were based on the Center's more detailed Q3
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quarterly activity report:
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* [report](https://scala.epfl.ch/records/2023-Q3-activity-report.html)
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And the Center's Q4 roadmap:
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* [roadmap](https://scala.epfl.ch/records/2023-Q4-roadmap.html)
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The following notes do not repeat the content of the report and
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roadmap, but only supplement them.
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Eugene suggested that the Center do more to make sure that these
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activities and plans are known to the community, including to "CTO
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level" people. Even quite short blog posts can be beneficial for this,
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he suggested. Seb and Darja both agreed that there should be more
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publicity outside of the Scala contributors forum, though it's
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challenging with the current smaller team. Darja also reminded the
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board that posts on the Scala blog don't always need to originate from
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the Center. Depending on the subject matter, posts from member
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companies and from the wider community are welcome.
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Chris asked if the Center looks at download numbers and uses that
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information to help decide what to work on. Seb said yes, they do.
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Eugene asked about the work on improved stack traces: is it for Scala
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3 only? Seb said it works on Scala 2 as well, but the improvements are
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more dramatic on Scala 3, because TASTy can be used. Seth mentioned
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that the team at Lightbend is considering helping to bring this work
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to Scala 2 users.
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## Management report
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Darja presented this section.
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Scala Days Madrid was a Q3 highlight. Center staff gave three talks
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and sat on two panels. The Center had a booth for outreach and
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fundraising. In addition to co-organizing the conference itself (with
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Xebia Functional), the Center also co-organized associated events like
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ScalaBridge, the Scala open source spree, an all-day tooling summit,
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an in-person SIP meeting, and an advisory board (and SIP) dinner.
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Scala Days allows the Center to raise awareness of the Center, meet
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the community, receive feedback, gather fundraising leads, and
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encourage community activity such as meetups.
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Staff changes at the Center this quarter: Chris's Lunatech-sponsored
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stint at the Center has ended. Guillaume Martres has taken a job in
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industry, though he will stay involved with Scala 3 compiler work
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part-time. These interns completed their stints: Lucas Nouguier, Ayman
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Lamyaghri, Shiv Verkaran. Sylvie Buchard has left the Center, after
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many years of part-time service; the Center has hired Valerie Meillaud
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to replace her (also part-time).
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The rest of Darja's remarks were about budget and fundraising. She
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outlined the Center's fundraising strategy and presented worst-case
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and best-case budget scenarios, depending on funding. The Center will
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likely finish the year in the red, but it's not clear yet by how
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much. In order to grow the team again, new member companies are
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needed. Membership regulation changes are under consideration. Some
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other sources of funds are also being explored. She noted that the
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financial climate is currently difficult industry-wide.
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A board member asked about accepting direct donations from
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individuals. Darja said these will be accepted through the "Scala
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shop", when it opens.
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A board member asked about Scala 2 vs Scala 3. Could the Center's
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focus on Scala 3 be a negative for fundraising, as many companies are
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still on Scala 2? Some discussion ensued. Note that some of the
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Center's work already spans both versions, and that proposals
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involving Scala 2 are welcome. In its fundraising efforts, the Center
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could remind prospective members of this.
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## Scala 2 report
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This was presented by Lukas.
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Since the last meeting, Scala 2.13.12 was released, with the most
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notable change being support for quickfixes (aka "actionable
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diagnostics"). They are supported in Metals and support is coming soon
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in IntelliJ. The compiler can also directly apply the fixes it
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suggests. Another notable change is that `-Xsource:3` errors can be
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downgraded to warnings or silenced entirely. The release also supports
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JDK 21, which is an LTS release.
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The following forum threads are open for discussing the contents
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and timing of the next releases:
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* [Scala 2.13.13](https://contributors.scala-lang.org/t/scala-2-13-13-release-planning/6315)
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* [Scala 2.12.19](https://contributors.scala-lang.org/t/scala-2-12-19-release-planning/6216)
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Chris asked about quickfixes versus Scalafix. When is it appropriate
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for fixes to be compiler-based versus Scalafix-based? Lukas
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acknowledged that there is overlap, but he noted that Scalafix is
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user-extensible.
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## Community report
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Eugene said the community has largely been "peaceful". There are
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encouraging signs of local meetups coming back to life in London,
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Tokyo, and elsewhere. The Northeast Scala Symposium has restarted and
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will be virtual this year. However, there is community concern about
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the Scala job market, especially considering that the job market
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industry-wide is currently challenging, given recent layoffs at many
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companies, including major Scala users such as Twitter. It is
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difficult to distinguish the climate for Scala job seekers
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specifically from the job market generally.
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He mentioned strong ongoing community-based interest in Bazel and
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improvements to its Scala support.
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Chris asked about the role of the community representative(s). Are
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they intended to represent the open-source community specifically, or
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the Scala community more generally? Are we doing enough to encourage
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proposals to be submitted through this channel? Eugene said he is
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interested in hearing input from everyone, but he sees his own role as
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representing open source primarily, since companies are free (and
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encouraged) to join the board instead. He also said that since the
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Center's engineers can't themselves do everything the community wants,
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perhaps the Center could organize working groups to help the community
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to self-organize to accomplish certain goals.
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Several board members mentioned how crucial it is for Scala's success
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(including Scala 3's success specifically) that IntelliJ's Scala
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support be high qualtiy.
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Chris invited board members to share feedback about Scala Days Madrid.
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One board member said they were pleasantly surprised by how many new
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and diverse faces were present and reminded us (to general agreement)
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that it's important to keep the conference a good experience for
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newcomers as well as veterans.
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Darja invited the board to help produce content for the Scala blog.
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Posts don't always have to be written by Center staff. She also
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mentioned the idea of using the blog to alert the community to news
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and posts sourced elsewhere. A board member asked about news sites
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such as The Scala Times and This Week in Scala; could those be carried
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on the Scala blog? Darja said she'd think about whether there's a path
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for something like that, to help get more Scala news out to more
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people. Two board members mentioned the possibility of using the blog
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to let the community about new libraries. And it was noted that some
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of the Center's activities get publicized on the contributors' forum
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only but might be of wider interest.
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## Elections
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For chairperson, Chris Kipp indicated his willingness to continue as
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chair and was re-elected unanimously. (Chairs are not expected to
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serve for longer than one year, but a willing chair is welcome to
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serve for longer. The chair not need be a voting board member.)
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Also re-elected without any other nominations being made were Martin
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Odersky (technical advisor) and Seth Tisue (secretary).
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## Conclusion
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Because of December holidays, a likely time for the next meeting is
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early or mid January. Chris said he'll try to schedule all of the
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2024 meetings soon, rather than wait and schedule them a quarter
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at a time.

‎records.md

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### Board meeting minutes
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- [October 17, 2023 - Thirtieth SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/10/17/october-17-2023.html)
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- [July 26, 2023 - Twenty-Ninth SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/07/26/july-26-2023.html)
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- [April 27, 2023 - Twenty-Eighth SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/04/27/april-27-2023.html)
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- [January 16, 2023 - Twenty-Seventh SC Advisory Board Meeting](/minutes/2023/01/16/january-16-2023.html)

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