Committee forwards two youth-commission applicants to City Council

The Reading Nominations and Appointments Committee on March 17 interviewed two applicants for seats on the Youth Commission and voted to forward both candidates to the full City Council for formal appointment.

Councilor Chris Miller, District 6, led interviews with applicants Annabel Salom Milander and Brianna (last name not specified). The committee members — Councilor Vanessa Campos, District 1, and Councilor Wesley Butler, District 4 — each signaled their support to move the applicants to the Council agenda.

Annabel Salom Milander, a 17-year-old student active in school programs, told the committee she sees the Youth Commission as “a resource and a voice for the youth in the city of Reading” and said she would bring a student perspective to issues the commission pursues. She described a recently started outreach project to teach young students about their rights during police encounters and said she would like the commission to work on issues such as increasing graduation rates.

Brianna (last name not specified), a member of a school social-justice club the committee identified as Knights for Social Justice, said the commission could help reduce phone-driven isolation among young people by creating more in-person outreach and engagement opportunities: “we as a community … could do more outreach and allow the youth in our community to connect together and communicate with one another rather than being on their phones all the time.”

Shelley Smith, deputy clerk and staff liaison to the Youth Commission, explained the process after the interviews: if the committee moves an applicant forward, the full City Council will consider formal appointment at its next council meeting; Smith said she will add appointees to the commission’s email group and group chat once the appointment is formalized. Smith also said Youth Commission meetings occur the first Wednesday of each month at 5 p.m. and currently meet virtually.

Committee discussion noted applicants’ school-based involvement and interest in community engagement. Councilors did question the precision of one applicant’s cited figures about dropouts; committee members said they appreciated the applicant’s concern but asked for clearer sourcing of numerical claims.

The committee chair closed the meeting after moving both applicants forward; the committee did not record a roll-call vote in the transcript, and no formal motion text or mover/second was entered on the record during the meeting.