 Okay, so good afternoon, everybody. I want to welcome you to the Amherst Community Chat for Thursday, December 17th. We will not be having chats the next two Thursdays due to the holidays. So we will launch back again at January 7th. I want to welcome today our Public Health Director for the town of Amherst, Emma Dragon, who's joining myself and your town manager, Paul Bachman. So to kick things off, I'm going to have Paul do a quick report out and then Emma's going to do the same. And then we'll be able to take live questions in the room, as well as some questions that have been submitted to us. Thanks, Brianna. So yeah, it's a snowy Thursday right now, noon and DPW has been in since about 11 last night, plowing roads. They were very grateful for everybody who was off the roads that made their lives a lot easier. We have reorganized things that DPW in terms of their plow schedules and where they're going. It's all a little bit new for a lot of folks. So having this first one be a light snow first off and being having people not on the streets in obeying the governor's request to stay home was really helpful to folks. They'll be out there all day today as well. We anticipate that one of the nights this weekend will bring them back in to do snow removal in downtown. So as long as people can keep not parking in the on the streets, that's very helpful to them. So, and just credit to the DPW folks who are just out there, you know, they it's a long night for them and they're still out there right now into our facilities folks for clearing the areas around the town hall, and John's library bank center places like that. Great. Thank you, Paul. And since Emma is relatively new, I'm going to just have her do a little quick intro of who she is before she gives a quick report out on her department. Hello everybody I'm really happy to be here for the second time already can you believe that I've been here since the beginning of November. It feels like I have been here forever because of all the great stuff that we're working on. I am Emma I'm the new public health director for the town of Amherst I am a nurse, and I also have my graduate degree in emergency and disaster management so I'm really happy to be here and do the work. Great team Jennifer Brown, the public health nurse and I know Julie Federman my predecessor in this role really helped build a good department to be able to be able to be successful in the work that we're doing. So, right now with the public health department, we've been doing a lot in terms of surveillance and testing doing that active contact tracing, working with the contact tracing collaborative so that way we can identify cases and connect affected families and patients with resources in our community that are available, if they need assistance for social services, like food rental assistance medications trying to get them hooked up in those ways. And then also we're starting to pivot towards the vaccine which I know people have heard a lot about and learning more about that we are enrolled in the Massachusetts vaccine plan. So we are waiting for the delegation and information to come through the Massachusetts Department of Public Health and and we are ready to be involved in that for community to be able to make sure that our community will get the vaccines as they become available. I know that we've had a lot of great experienced individuals that want to be volunteers I think that's something really important to highlight in our community. And we want to be able to engage all of our volunteers in a thoughtful way and whatever their specialties are. So in order to do that we're lost the word has that ever happened to anybody isn't that so funny when that happens. We're directing everyone to enroll with the MRC the Massachusetts Reserve Corps. So that way, we can be able to access you in a way that's going to be the best for everybody. When the time comes to do that vaccine management. You have to be a medical professional to join into that. You don't that's a great question Paul. So lots of people think that you have to be but there are many other roles that are possibly going to have to be engaged whether it's record keeping or helping maybe direct flow as people maybe come into a vaccine. Administration. But that's more to come so you don't necessarily have to be a medical professional a doctor or a nurse, but maybe with registration or people coming in. Sort of like the National Guard for medical professionals. Yep, there's lots of different ways that people can be helpful and the MRC as well I mean they've they've helped with people making masks and cloth masks and drives like that. So there's many ways that people can be helpful and engage with the community throughout Massachusetts and these efforts during this time. So we can add a link to our Amherst COVID-19.org page that that goes to that right Emma, I can get that information up there for people to find. Absolutely, thank you for thinking of that Rihanna. All right, so I just want to remind the folks who are joining us live. We would love to hear from you you can use the q amp a function within zoom. You can raise your hand within zoom, and we'll bring you into the room or star nine if you're calling in from a phone. I'll start with one of the questions that we got sent in. So this person was excited to hear about the, the testing at UMass, and they saw that the town is now offering drive up testing, and they want to know what the difference is. Are they the same thing war is one for a certain population. That's definitely that question because that's definitely something that I know we're talking about that Paul and I have been talking about and wanting to make sure is is pretty clear for our community because it can be so confusing because there's so many efforts going on right now. So the COVID-19 testing at the Mullen Center is an asymptomatic testing facility for the community for anyone throughout our area, not just Amherst residents or Amherst employees. It typically operates Monday through Thursday from the hours of nine to 430 it's signed up in advance and after January 21 there will be limited hours going through the 15th, but that testing is available pretty consistently for our public. There's a wide availability for that. And that is for individuals that are over the age of 10, and that are asymptomatic, meaning that they feel like they don't have COVID and don't have the symptoms of COVID. So our throw, fever, cough, body aches, those kind of things that people might experience, and if they don't have a known exposure to COVID-19 meaning that they have not been in close contact with someone that has COVID-19. With UMass coming on board with this great testing and availability for our community, I know that's something that we identified on the local level is a need for testing for quicker testing for people who think that they have COVID have those symptoms that sore throat, cough, fever, body aches. And also those individuals that feel like they've been exposed in our needing testing to come out of quarantine or possibly identify if they're in fact becoming infected with COVID as well. So in order to meet that need, we were able through CARES grants that are available left over through really diligent work and planning. We've been able to coordinate a testing site at the Mill River Recreation site tomorrow from 8am until 11, which is at 95 Montague Road and Amherst of course. And it's drive up, it will be outdoors. So it will feel a little chilly, but we're going to be there and ready to see people that need testing. And we're happy to do that. Oh, and it can any, any ages can come too. And the link for that is on our, on our homepage, amherstma.gov and the news section but it's also at our COVID information page amherstcovid19.org because the appointment is required but Emma informed me this morning that there's still plenty of slots for tomorrow so if any of that applies to you or a friend or a neighbor please share that information with them. I think that Ken has his, his hand up so I'm going to pull Ken in if you could unmute and introduce yourself Ken. Thank you. I'm Ken Rosenthal I live at Sunset Avenue. I wanted to tell you that I at Paul's suggestion I signed up for the community testing at the university on Monday. And I want everybody to know how easy and fast it was from the time I left my car in the free parking lot until I got back into my car was 10 minutes. And then half of that time was spent walking to and from the Mullen Center, because we're pre registered. I first was shown to a desk where they confirm my registration, and handed me a vial, which I then carried to the next place where it was a self administering test I didn't know that was going to happen that way with a q tip and a smaller q tip not the long one that scares everybody. The woman behind and the attendance are behind the screen so you're never close. The woman behind was monitoring me and she watched what I did, approved it. And then I put the swabs in the vial left it on the proper place and and left the building and 2048 hours later, I got my result negative thank you very much. And it was so easy to do, and so convenient, the pre registration really helps. The only inconvenience is trying to get the results you have to enter a password that they give you which is, you know, a little complicated I think they could improve that. And I want to tell you quickly about a similar process in New Jersey where my daughter lives. The county runs it and it's, and it's an at home test. So what they're doing is mailing you those same vials. Then they require that you go on to your computer so that they can observe you, giving yourself the test so it's a zoom engagement, and then you put the vials back in the mail and send it back to them so you never leave your phone. And the county health officer is satisfied that you have administered the test in the proper way. So that's just a variation on that thing. And thank you, thank you all for making this possible for us asymptomatic folks to give us the reassurance that this test did give me. Thank you. So Ken, are you going to go every week now. No, I'm not, but I'm ready to go next month. And, you know, and especially if I if I seem to be spending more time engaging with people than I intend to, and I'm really trying to be totally isolated, but you know going into a store or coming out of going into a gas pump and passing somebody by. Maybe I'll do it in January. I'm comfortable for the now. So Ken and thank you for getting tested and sharing your experience. I know both Paul and I, I'm not sure if Emma has gone down yet but we both did that this week, and I had the very same experience very easy. Quick results, and I'm already signed up for next week. So thanks for sharing. Thank you. And I think the concept is that they want, you know, it's asymptomatic testing is to try to get as many people tested on a regular basis you can't do it more than once a week, but you can do it once a week right Emma. Paul. Yeah. Paul, do you encourage me to, to go back again and do this every week I didn't know that that I thought I was giving them some data that they could use but I didn't know that they wanted to see me very frequently I could do it. Yeah, I think right now I think the more testing the better because there are is such a link with the asymptomatic spread with this virus I think it's with it's still being such a novel virus we're learning more about it each day, and how it evolves so I think the importance of people getting tested, especially through this asymptomatic testing available here at UMass. I think we should in you utilize it to our benefit for the Hampshire community. So there's a benefit to the community, aside from to myself from having this test. Absolutely can that's a great statement. And I fully back that. Thank you. All right, great. Thank you, Ken. Just want to do a quick reminder for the folks who are in the room. If you have a comment or question like Ken just had. Feel free to raise your hand so we can bring you in the room, or use the q amp a function I'll be monitoring that in case you have a question or comment to pop in there. So another question that we had. I guess this would be for Emma. Are you seeing case counts increase. If so, where are the increases incur occurring in our community. Yes, so we are seeing case counts increase over the weekend was our eb to the amount last weekend we saw about a total of 35 cases come through between Saturday and Sunday. The majority of the cases that we're seeing at this time aren't student population related with our colleges, they are really multi generational so they're throughout the age span. So this month when I started and started to look at the data for Amherst. It was really interesting to see that there wasn't a lot of our elderly population becoming positive with this but we are starting to see that again like we did in April and May of this past year during the first surge. So that's a good question to those minute multi generational homes where we're seeing it. We're also seeing it in the congregate living settings meaning group homes apartment buildings with with roommates, and then also our local nursing facilities and skilled nursing facilities so that's a good question I think it's a meaningful question in terms of also the shift of where we're seeing the density of our cases is no longer with our young adults. It's really throughout the lifespan. I missed a piece of that you said it is college related or it's not college related. I'm sorry, I'm, I tend to mumble Paul and I apologize for that, because I get so excited the words just want to come out before they're fully formed and I can articulate them in a meaningful way. They do not seem to be college related at this time. There are a few here or there, but the large amount of them are not college related they're throughout our community. There's an increase in the number of cases just like the rest of the country is our numbers are ticking up. Yes, that's, that's absolutely true. Yeah. All right so we have another question here. In regards to collaboration with the state public health team so how often are you in communication with them and are there things that they've been alerting the community for that might take place over the next couple of weeks and months trends that they see. Yeah, so I know that we have twice weekly local boards of health calls with the Department of Public Health, not only just those calls and webinars but we are communicating with state epidemiologists every day, or the vaccine branch of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health really trying to gear up so we're prepared for when those vaccines come. In a couple of weeks to the next like four to six weeks they, we all, I think, see a light at the end of the tunnel with the vaccine rolling out. But I think it's important for us all to remember that we are really in the thick of it right now. And while we can all be hopeful for the vaccine to come and be distributed on the community level as a community, hopefully the goal is I believe April or so at this time that the Hampshire community Hampshire County is is not immune to the impacts of COVID-19 and that approximately half of the people in Massachusetts have been sick with it and can still spread the virus, which is why that asymptomatic testing at UMass is so important to go to so please use that if you it's appropriate for you. And that public health departments are observing community spread and that we want to urge everyone within our community to continue to do the things that we've been talking about to wear a mask, even if it's you know, wash your hands, sometimes even if they feel clean, avoid groups, even if it means meeting virtually with others just like we're doing in this virtual room today, and keep distance from others, especially those that live outside of your home, even if it means possibly not hugging your grandchildren. We're coming into another holiday season I think that in the public health room and, and I think a lot in our community we've seen the outcomes of a lot of individuals getting into these small groups over Thanksgiving and the impacts of that as we've gone into the second surge. And I just want to encourage everyone I know it's really really hard work and we're all in this together, but during the next couple weeks really just try to stay at home as much as you can, and do all the great hard work that we've been doing for the past 10 months of the pandemic. And we're going to come through the other side of this if everyone does that work. Great thank you Emma. Yeah. This might be a more general question for both Paul and possibly yourself Emma, but how, how has COVID impacted town operations and public services, especially lately. Yeah, I'll start. It impacted a lot. You know when it first hit we did we sort of got as many people out of the building as possible and then we were gradually bringing people back into our buildings to be able to work. I think with the information that Emma's been sharing and giving us some guidance lately. We're, we're depopulating our buildings again. And the reason for that is to make make sure that if there is someone does have the disease or is exposed to someone to the has the disease. The rest of our workforce is protected. So we've been spending a lot of time to make sure people can work remotely. So they're not exposing, they're not being exposed to the disease. You know, we look at this in chunks of time. So we're looking at this until the end of January and feel like we're going to have to really knuckle down and limit exposure of the to each other until the end of January. So let's try to reassess and see where we are. You know, you're starting to see some colleges already delay the start of their, their college years, Emerson College just announced that they were delaying the opening of their semester. I think everybody's looking at the next four to eight weeks is pretty a pretty tough time. So, you know, we've tons of precautions being undertaken at police fire DPW. Some of those jobs just have to be done. They have to be done. So that's, they're all ongoing schools is a totally different topic. I don't want to go there because it's such a complicated topic. But I think just for employees, it's also just like everybody else is it's stressful and it's anxiety provoking and it's, it's, it seems like it's going on forever and everybody's feeling it. So we're just trying to buck each other up and make sure that we can keep doing our jobs. There's a lot going on in town. There's a lot of projects that we're trying to get, get moving and keep moving so I mean, what do you think? How do you think? I guess I could speak a little bit more to our services, you know, we've been, we've been really trying to offer new ways of connecting with our residents. You know, mostly through new technologies because that's what we can do right now, as well as trying to streamline online services things you have to come to town hall for or chose to come to town hall for how we can make that easy for you to do from home or from your own. We'll be having some some new communication tools come online hopefully in the next week or so to, to kind of have another touch point with our community members sharing public health information but also other important information for people who are still, you know, using transit and public transportation or. So I think that the focus, the focus for me and some of my team was how do we recreate our services but also enhance them and make them easier for people to use given this given this opportunity and while still acknowledging that there is a digital divide coming up with ways to bridge that wall in this landscape has been has been a challenge but we are well aware of it and we're we're working for some creative solutions to that. All right, so we are coming up on our half hour that went quick we have about we have about six minutes so. I can't believe it. Time flies when you're having fun. In this in this chat. I want to give a last call for folks in the room to to pop a comment or question in or raise your hand. And while we wait for that I'll give Emma a chance to leave us with anything she didn't get asked or some calls to action that she might have for you. Yeah, I think one thing that I really want to highlight is how much we're really all in this together. We're all in this pandemic and, and I want us to all just recognize that if if we see others around us maybe having a hard time, or maybe not responding in a, in a with as thoughtful wording as we maybe sometimes do a non pandemic that mental health is is really important at right now. And in addition to going into winter, and I want people to be aware of depression and suicidality and the suicide epidemic that we're having at this time, and be thoughtful of our neighbors and our loved ones and make sure that those people if you can and have the ability to to reach out to people and let them know how much they mean to us during this time I think. If we do all of those little things those are that are thoughtful to those around us I think they're going to mean so much more than this year than they would in other years and I think they're going to go a long way. I think together we can build each other up. And I think community now more than ever means something different. And I just want to thank everybody for the hard work that we're doing. And, and this is really. I've heard this phrase so many times and sometimes it's an unprecedented time but it really is. And this is a time that I think none of us will ever forget. And I want us to all think about all of the good things that we did during this time to positively affect our communities. And that's what I have to say about that. Thank you, I think it's really important we have such a focus on these very specific public health reminders that are more, you know physical wash your hands do this do this I think mental health can often go forgotten with our other focus so yeah thanks for that reminder. Go outside and do a walk. Do those things that make you feel content whether it's reading a book or, or sitting with that nice fuzzy blanket that you just love and makes you feel safe, or those sense that also make you, make you remember and feel grounded in a way, or cook. It can be such a sensory experience those cookies or bread or other great things that people do in their homes, I think, taking those moments to be mindful when we're home with our families or loved ones or even in zoom meetings like we're in meetings chat like we're in right now in this room. I think those are the special carrots that we can take back with us. That'll help fill our cup a little bit more than yesterday. Very well said. All right Paul now now your turn. I'm going to be more practical, you know pretty pretty simple. There's the town's doing a lot. I mean, there's a lot happening there's a lot coming up. You know, tonight, the, you know, in zoom world if it's knows it doesn't matter. We're having any way. Tonight that one of the council committees is going to have a start to have a more in depth this in depth discussion about proposed renovations to the North Common and the Main Street parking lot. That's going to there's a major project for the council to take into consideration that will come over that will be on their agenda probably through the month of January. We have another project, you know, a land purchase on Belcher Town Road that will be presented on Monday to the town council. You know, Brianna was in charge of launching a redesigned website, which is really exciting to see the new design and that just sort of is a preview of all the changes that we anticipate happening over the coming years. But as these projects come forward, people say how can I participate, and that's something we're working on how do you participate. We have the redesign of Pomeroy Village Pomeroy West Pomeroy and West Street huge project that we want people to be engaged in. We have the North Amherst Library rent, you know addition being worked on. So there's lots of projects happening so it's just exciting time to be part of the town and we sort of figured out how to keep doing the work. You know, remotely when people have to be remote or collaboratively when we're in person. We aren't in person, you know, other than one one on one meetings, socially distance but we really aren't talking everything in town staff. Oh, my bells. Yes. Everything town staff is happening remotely like this as well we're learning to do that in a lot better way to. So, lots happening that's fine message that folks is, you know, 2021 is going to be a like a crazy year with lots of initiatives coming through the town. Very true so stay tuned and just a quick reminder we won't be back the next two Thursdays but we will be back with you on Thursdays at noon in the new year, starting January 7 so all that information will be on our website our community calendar as well as our social media channels. And if any suggestions or comments concerns in general or specific to this meeting please email us at info at Amherst MA.gov. We'd be happy to hear from you. So I want to thank everybody who joined us live and a big thanks to Emma dragon for taking a moment out of her very busy day to come give us some information. Thank you.