 Hi, Dennis. Can you hear me okay? Yeah, can you hear me? Yeah, I'm using a new mic, so I have to test it out. Okay. Sound good. Hello, Anne. Hey. Hello, hygiene. Hi, Christina. Hi. Hi, hi. How are you? Good. How you doing? Okay, so far. Hi, Dick. Hi, Dennis. All right, Jean, you got your, your speech. I do memorized. No, maybe not. I didn't know I was supposed to memorize it. I thought reading it. No, no, definitely not. Yeah. Should we wait to see if others are going to join us? Give it a few more minutes. Yeah. I know Karen will not be able to make it. Nila's questionable. Hi, Chad. I like your shirt, Dennis. I figured off for all the classes I taught over there, I could at least wear this. You was sports fan, Dennis. Yeah, to some extent. I enjoyed photographing it a lot. I did that a lot over the years. And I taught a course in sports photography in the journalism department. For a little while. That was fun. Oh, nice. Get all the jocks in. Must be challenging shooting depending on the sport, how quick the action. Yeah. Yeah. I remember I was preparing for a class once. And I decided to shoot. I think it was men's field hockey. It was a lot of fun. It was a lot of fun. Completely blew me away at the speed. It just, it just, it boggled the mind. It took me two days to settle down from that. Very quick. Yeah. Others not so much so. Hello. Hey, Jacqueline. Hi. Hello. Welcome aboard. Thank you. Jackie. Jacqueline. And Jean and. And Dennis and Chad. And Haley. Hello. I'm not sure where Terry is, but maybe we start without her. Okay. Would somebody else do the notes then? Oh, true. Hmm. We have a, like a one day person. I think we could, I can take some notes. I don't think we should wait. They won't be as good as Terry's, but I can do it. Okay. Do you think we should wait or. I think we could start because if she comes in while we're doing roll call, that would be ideal. And then we all. But there's so much going on at the senior center. Big updates. Really? Yeah. I guess every minute will be precious to Haley. That's exciting. Yeah, we've got a couple of like really fun things on the horizon and especially working with the new staff and the intern. I'm excited to share. Good. So I guess I called to order and please guide me if I mess up any of this formality chair stuff because it's all new to me. And I guess we start with the roll call of members. So without further ado, and are you here? I'm here. Terry is not Chad. Are you here? Yep. Excellent. Welcome. Christina. I'm here. Wonderful Jacqueline. I'm here. Excellent. Dennis. Right here. Okay. So I believe we're missing Terry. Karen. And Mila. Mila. Mila. Sorry. Okay. All right. Pursuant to governor Baker's March 12th, 2020 orders for the meeting of council on aging is being conducted. The meeting is being recorded. Roll call to check and make sure everyone's video and audio is working properly. Okay. I think. And now we're going to move on to the meeting of council on aging. The meeting of council on aging is being conducted via remote participation. This meeting is being recorded. Roll call to check and make sure everyone's video and audio is working properly. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And now public comment. Anyone in the public is now welcome to make a comment or express their views for up to three minutes. If you wish to speak, use the raise hand icon on the lower part of your screen. Or dial star nine. If you're on the phone. We would probably say whether there was a quorum before going. To the. I guess you would call it public comments. So that way we know whether we have a business meeting or a happy fizzies party. Thank you, Chad. Excellent point. I do believe I'm not great in math, but I do believe we have a quorum because I think we have six out of nine. That's correct. Okay. Very good. Appreciate that, Chad. All right. And public comment. Do we. Don't see any raised hands. We can. We can dig right in if we want. All right. Welcome everybody. Thank you. I actually use the center for a class less. I heard about that. And it sounded like you had a good time. I did have a good time. Yeah. And question for you. When we have. You know, experienced within the center. That would come visit. Would you like feedback? I didn't catch the first part, but I did hear you say feedback. And yes. I think that's a good test when one of us has some experience with the class, which like feedback from us. Yes. Yes, absolutely. And we are going to start doing more. Like surveys at the end of every class. Because that is important. I want to know, you know, what's working and what's not. Do you want to, do you want to share it now? Are you going to wait? Oh no, it was, it was fun. But because the class was late in the day. My parents broke up. And they were at home. They didn't know who else had gone home. So the instructor, fortunately, I was there early. And she happened to be at the door, which was locked. But then other people I mean, she didn't know who was there and they were about to leave. So there's no doorbell. someone there. That's what you said. Yeah. Yeah. So she had no way of telling whether somebody, you know, other than her standing at the door. Yes, we're going to put some signs up and probably prop open that side door in the large activity room. So it'll be more clear. Because yeah, we don't want people to get turned away from that. Yeah, it was a fun class. That was that was really the big problem. She didn't she didn't have a way of letting people know who was coming in. It was good to know. So I pulled some numbers from August and September, just some really quick ones at a glance so we could see, you know, what's our average daily attendance and what was the overall count of people who came in. So we got over 2700 check-ins for August. So that's using the My Senior Center software and I'm sure that the the real number is a little higher is not everyone is back into using the computer. That's 118 a day. It was 359 unduplicated people. So I have that, you know, that's pretty good. You know, I think we've held at a pretty steady level. And then in September, it dipped slightly 2400 351 unduplicated people, but that's not a significant, you know, reduction in volume. So it'd be interesting to see what happens in October, because a trend that I'm noticing, and I want to talk about a little bit more later is that the first month that the newsletter comes out. So in this case, September, we get lots of activity, we get lots of phone calls, but the second month of the newsletter, we don't get as much traction. So I think people are forgetting what's going on. And they're not remembering to come for the events that they want to. And if they don't sign up in advance, we have no way to reach out to them for reminders. Meals are pretty steady. We're still doing about 40 for home delivered meals and 40 grab and go meals every day. So that hasn't really changed a whole lot. We will be or I will be reaching out to Highland Valley Elder Services, because I want to see if it's possible to maybe do a hybrid approach. I'm concerned that if we pivot to a full congregate in person dining, that we'll lose numbers, because there are a great deal of people who prefer the convenience of just taking the meal and going about their day, they don't want to necessarily have that socialization aspect. So if we could maybe do a few days as a congregate site and other days as a grab and go, I think that would be a really good fit for our site. I don't know if they're going to be amenable to that, but I'm hopeful. And I wanted to give a recap on the programming that we have. So we had a couple really like knockout programs. Holy Basalt was one, and that was led by Professor Richard Little from GCC. And he was talking about the Holy Oak Mountain Range. That was very well attended. I think it was about 20 people. And we had a lot of folks who were maybe in their 40s, who were college students and had found out about the program from the town website. So we actually got a really nice intergenerational crowd in addition to him just being a good speaker. And he's actually going to come back on Tuesday, October 25th, at 1030 to talk about how rocks can kill you, because we wanted a kind of a Halloween tie in. And he'll talk about falling rocks and some other ways that they can kill you. I think the belly dancing class that we're doing in the evening on Tuesday, that's picking up steam. People are really liking that. And the idea with doing that in the evening was so like if someone is working, or if they're a younger senior, that might be something that's appealing to them. We've gotten a little bit more people. I think we had five or six at the last class. And then we will be hopefully doing some more promotion and recruiting. We're going to see if there are some other ways that we can get the word out about it and get those numbers up even more. And then the last real, this was a standout program was the Murder Mystery Dinner Party. So for anyone who didn't know, we had the Murder Mystery Company out of West Springfield come in. They had two actors. We decorated the whole large activity room at the bank center. And we had a nice little Italian dinner caterer by Black Sheep Deli. And we had 30 people there. So we had a packed house, really nice event. We had people from Belcher Town, Northampton, Palmer. So they were pretty spread out. The word had traveled about that program. And that was, I would say that was a huge success. And thank you, Jean, for helping out you and Ted. That was a huge help. So I think there's definitely a trend of people gravitating towards programs that are more recreational in nature, more just interesting and not really kind of what I would describe as a drier program, some of those informational workshops. I also want to highlight upcoming programs. So we have a really wonderful workshop on Thursday, October 20th called Planning for the Unexpected. That is led by the District Attorney's Office. They're going to come in and talk about, you know, what do I do if I need to grant somebody power of attorney? You know, how do I, you know, if I suddenly lose my license, how do I navigate those things, you know, things that you don't think of until it's too late? In tandem with that, we're doing an estate planning workshop with Attorney Karen Jackson. And that'll be on Thursday, October 27th at 10.30 a.m. And she'll cover a little bit more in depth about will creation, you know, some of like the end of life legal planning. We'll be having a presenter come in to do Sherlock Junior, one of the silent movies. And he'll he'll play the piano in accompaniment. And so that should be a lot of fun. I think I'm hoping we get a good turnout for that. That'll be Monday, November 7th at 2 p.m. Then we will do a health fair. So I pulled in a lot of providers from the area, clinical support options, behavioral health network, Masante Center, Florence Hearing Health. There's a really lengthy list, but we're going to be talking all things health. We'll have shine counselors there. That's happening on Monday, November 14th from 2 to 4 p.m. And that's right in the middle of Medicare open enrollment. So for particularly for people, you know, 64, 65, this will be a really great way for them to know what are my options. And some other exciting news is that starting the second Thursday every month in starting in November, we'll be having a massage clinic at the Senior Center. So we'll have a licensed massage therapist on site who can help alleviate all that tension and we'll be promoting that with our caregiver support group so that we make sure that our caregivers know about it and hopefully make use of the program. And of course, we have the caregiver support grant. So if people, we don't want them to have to pay for that service at their caregiver. And then the other really, this is the thing I was alluding to earlier that I'm wicked excited about is the memory cafe that we're doing. So I have been working with our intern, Rachel, and also with an Amish college student who reached out because she heard that we were thinking about doing this and she has a background in photography and she sent me this wonderful essay on how photographs boost memory, all the different research that shows that it can help you and she wanted to get involved. And so we are starting this memory cafe on Wednesday, November 30th. We're going to have an open hour from 10 to 11 with some coffee. We've got pastry donated by Coronation Cafe and it'll just be like a little mixer mingling, particularly for individuals with memory loss and their caregivers, but also just anyone in the community. And we're really going to heavily promote this to people who are missing some of the socialization programs that we used to have and who want to get more involved with other people. We will at 11 o'clock from 11 to 12, we'll have a like a rotating speaker. So some days it'll be music. Some days we'll do an art class on the launch date 11 30. We have the Amherst college singing harmony with heart. So they're a student musical group. So they're going to come in and perform for everyone and do wicked fun. And the tie-in with the photography that I mentioned earlier is that we are working currently with Walmart to try to secure some funding to buy Polaroid style cameras. So the idea is that a senior and their caregiver would get this camera and then we'll have a little theme every week. So take a picture of your favorite flower, take a picture of your, your favorite part of the holidays, you know, something very, you know, easy to do. And then that'll be a little conversation starter before we do our musical or art program from 11 to noon. You know, we want to bring in that component where photography helps boost memory. It's a great activity with people's permission. We can also you get scans of those photos. I would love to do an exhibit, you know, after so many weeks of the cafe where we can feature, this is people's, this is the art that they've done, all the pictures they've taken. I think it would be wonderful to be able to take our town counselors to an exhibit like that and show them this is what people in the community are capable of doing and have done through the senior center. And we want to have fun with it. We didn't want to call it a memory cafe. We didn't want it to be something where people felt like they had to register or jump through hoops to do. So we're calling it the CR cafe, because that stands for can't remember. So the can't remember cafe, which is like a, you know, it's a short, snappy name. I think it would be, you know, really nice. I'd love to see some hats. That's a CR cafe, you know, walking around Amherst, hopefully so, you know, the intern has been phenomenal. Rachel has been making phone calls, going out to businesses and seeing who can support us. And so far, the reception has been really good. So I just wanted to do all the know about that and hope that we can talk about that for a little bit, because I think it'll be a way to fill a need that's not currently being met. And I don't know other senior center is taking it on the way that we are. So it's different, you know, it's not when Rachel was doing her research on whatever options in the area, a lot of places you have to pre register, you have to come in a certain time, and we didn't want to be like that, we wanted to be a lot more flexible. You know, if my parent has Alzheimer's, and it's taking them an extra 45 minutes to get out of the house, we don't want them to feel more put upon that they were late to something, you know, we want it to be easy for them to come and attend. So what do people think? I'm not sure what you what, I'm not sure what the attendees are meant to get out of it, could you just describe? The the idea is for the person with the memory challenges, you know, when you think about going to like Amherst coffee, it's stimulation overload, right? We want to make that less of an issue. So this would be something that's a lot more relaxed. You know, it's very welcoming. And then for the caregiver, it's a little bit of respite, right? So they're coming with their, you know, with their parent, with their spouse, with their friend. And, you know, you don't have to feel like I have to pay for, you know, have to pay for the coffee, or I have to be on edge, because I'm not sure how my loved one is going to react in like a busy room, right? And so it's, it's modeled after memory cafes, which are, it can be found across Massachusetts. And then I also kind of faced this awful one that we had done in Bernadston, which was really successful. And we used a lot of music programs, because music is can be very therapeutic to people. So the the idea is that we are offering, you know, respite, we're offering just a welcoming way for people to come together and socialize. I think we need to start trying to build programs where people are going to stay longer at the senior center. You know, my hope is that we're going to do this program from 10 to noon. And then if we do it on a day where we're doing an in person meal, well, then we could say, hey, why go out and spend money on lunch, you can have lunch here, you know, and kind of build in ways for people to stay longer, you know, have more contact with us. I think right now, things feel disjointed. You come to the bank center maybe for an hour, and then you leave, and you might not really see the staff. We don't have a way to really connect as much as we would like with folks. And this will hopefully make up for that. Does that answer your question? Sort of. Sort of. Yeah, I'm trying to imagine it. And yes, sort of. I understand everything you're saying. I'm not sure. So you're really motivating the caregiver to bring the memory impaired person through the program. Yeah. Yes, the caregiver, but it's still open to anyone. I mean, I think that's also something we want to promote. One of the things that I heard when I first started was, you know, we really want an exercise room. And we also really want a cafe program at the senior center. And I think that this will also feel that need as well. I have a question to ask. Sure. If it's a nice place for the relative to spend time with their family member, I'm wondering if it's really respite for them if they have to come. And I'm wondering if we can get students, nursing students from Amherst, from UMass to come and be there and do things with the elderly person experiencing all timers and then give their relative a chance to really have respite. They may come to another part of the program. They may even want to stay there. But the point is that if it's the whole idea is to have a welcoming place to come. There should be something that can be facilitated. And I know that I know because I worked in long term care and I know the music program is excellent. Generally, you have to find out what kind of music the people like. And then you load those headphones with that kind of music and they listen to it and it brings them back to a time in their life when that music was a big part of their life. And so it's very soothing. But there are also other things that can be done safely with individuals that are afflicted with dementia. Yeah, I think that's a good, and we could certainly do that. We could have a special day where we have an additional massage clinic so that people could enjoy that for the two hours or so that they're there. Yeah, we can have a lot of fun with it and be really creative in terms of what we offer. I know that when I did this program in Franklin County, it might not always seem like respite for the caregiver but just having that atmosphere where there's no pressure. There's no pressure to perform. You can just come and sit and you don't have to worry about it. And that can act as respite. But I agree, Christina, maybe we could take it even a little farther and do some other things with it. Yeah, I was thinking of a partial day program almost where the caretaker gets the kind of service that Helen gives with her caretaker support group. And, you know, if you're saying it's two hours that there'll be a program for both. Yeah. For the memory impaired and something for the caretaker. Yeah, I don't know whether it's a question or a concern. But my experience with people who with patients who have dementia of one level or another is that some of them are really, you know, one can engage them, distract them or entertain them or whatever. And some are kind of wanderers and they don't really want to be confined to a room or a seat or something where they're passive. And you don't know who you're going to get at the same time. So it's both a question and a concern. How do you handle those people who are not likely to kind of stay in the social place that one expects them to? When you have, you know, a wanderer or somebody else very loud and interrupts and you have a group of people who are slightly memory impaired and they're, how do you work that out when you don't know who's coming? Yes, but you could say that really about any day at the Senior Center. The idea of memory cafes is that they're not for people with really advanced dementia. They are for people in earlier stages. But what we're going to be doing is recruiting volunteers to help with this program. If I have a volunteer who might want to go walk around the Senior Center with the person, you know, we have the capability to do something like that. You know, if someone is acting loudly, we can, you know, de-escalate as best we can. We can, you know, we, the staff has an understanding of, you know, what that entails and we'll work of course with our volunteers to make sure they understand that. So I think, you know, for example, we had a person at the Senior Center the other day who, I'm not going to name names, but this person had almost what I would describe as a complete panic attack in the middle of a class. And people in the class were very upset because they didn't know how to handle that. So those sorts of things happen with or without the cafe. But my hope is that with this program, we'll get that traction going in the community. We'll bring people in the way that we've been talking about wanting to. And it'll also give us a really nice way to say, hey, this is a, this is a fundable program. This is a program you can fundraise for. You can recruit volunteers for. I think it's something people will want to get involved with, which we need a little bit more of. We need some more stable programs that aren't just a revolving door of speakers or, you know, a craft here or there. But yeah, absolutely training on behavioral techniques and intervention has to occur. So I think I also can be a bit of a resource for you. I have a collection of 1940s and 50s movies, mostly musical. Oh, that'd be nice. We really felt that we used to have like a Thursday afternoon where you could sit down and watch one of these movies and almost everybody knew them from their youth and sang along really good with them. So I have them available to me. They came from a patient at the hospice who had a large collection and he died. And so I separated some out and we're not doing group things at the hospice now because of COVID. So I've got these movies and should do, you know, set aside a particular day when you do 50s musical. That'll be fun. Yeah, I'll definitely I'll take those. Thank you. Christina, you had your hand up. Yeah, I basically wanted to sort of add a little bit to what Chad was saying about a day program. I know what you mean, but let's not use the word day program because day programs are very regularly regulated heavily. And there's certain things that have to be in place. And so to have a cafe and to just say that this is a component of the cafe, a component would be to have the volunteers that are studying therapy, studying nursing, and they're full of energy and they want to spend time with someone who has some form of dementia. And at the same time, the relative will be invited to either have the massage or to participate in something else. Or they have the option of just staying there if they want to. But the whole idea of all of it being a component of the CR cafe. I don't know what you labeled it. What was, what was that? Can't remember. Okay, cafe. And you know, it would make it simpler because what we don't want is regulation. We want things to flow and for people to feel comfortable and not have to feel constrained by having to do things. A lot of applications and give permission for their relative to stay and all of this and all of that. Very well said. And yeah, and this would not be a day program for those reasons that you just listed. I think that would be a little too intense right now on to try to set up. But this will be very easy, you know, in the sense that people will have the freedom to come and go or participate as they wish. And then Terry had your hand up. Yeah, you don't know how many people, excuse me, how many people are going to come with their situation is so you can't plan for everything and nobody show up. I know. I hope not. So we'll have a few things on the back burner, but yeah, we don't need to do the whole ball of wax the first day. You kind of play it by year depending on who comes and how many come and take it by that. Absolutely. And we'll scale it up as we go. Right. As a word gets out. I just wanted to say overall, I think it's a great idea. I think the program is needed. It fills a niche. We don't have anything quite like that. And that's a population I don't think we're reaching. I think it's attractive in that it's going to be flexible because it really does take pressure off. And I will speak from experience. I have a family member who's battling this. And it sounds like this is going to be a safe place for them to go that they will be comfortable. And you know, people aren't going to, they're not going to attract attention as sometimes can happen in other venues. So I think this is a program that has great potential to grow with add-ons and whatnot for both the client and the caregiver. So yeah, I say go for it. Awesome. Yeah. And you're all invited. You're all invited. You can all come on the 30th. So that's the biggie that's coming up on the horizon. And oh, Terry, did you have another question? Yeah, how many times a week is it going to be weekly on Wednesday? So you do want to have some consistency, right? Because that helps the person with the memory challenges. Weekly is a pretty good fit. And then a little staffing update. So everyone is working really well. The staff that we have right now have been absolutely phenomenal. Both Al and Julia have been so helpful. You know, and being at full capacity, again, I can definitely tell it's taking a lot of pressure off of the other staff who have been having like, you know, Helen in particular, as I said last time, you know, doing two routes in a day. That was way too much for her. So I can, I can tell that there's more stability. People are definitely feeling more comfortable, which I'm very pleased about. And on the volunteer side. So I have been working with Julia on making a volunteer handbook. So that'll be ready within the next few weeks. Just a way to kind of have all of our policies and procedures on one sheet of paper, kind of streamline the application process. You know, it's really helpful to have volunteers, because it also sets it up that it's hopefully something that they will take seriously. You know, we love our volunteers, but sometimes people think, well, I'm a volunteer, so I can not come in today, but it does impact programs and services, you know, and we don't have people coming in. So handbook is a great start to that. She, Julia is also working on a new onboarding procedure for volunteers, you know, make doing a little interview and assigning people to their best fit area. She'll be doing orientations later on with new volunteers, you know, giving them a really full comprehensive look at everything the senior center does. You know, if our greeter volunteers don't know all of our programs, how can they help when someone comes in off the street and doesn't know, you know, what we offer. We really want them to know us in and out. And then we'll also be making an email list for volunteers, you know, to communicate a little bit more easily. For the last couple months now, we've been doing a volunteer newsletter. So once we have the email list, we can just email blast that to everyone, you know, help get, you know, so if we have a program update or, you know, an announcement we want to make to all the volunteers, the newsletter will do that for us. And then of course, we'll be planning a volunteer acknowledgement event in the spring, you know, to thank everybody for all their hard work throughout the pandemic and just for sticking with us. Does anybody have any questions on the volunteers? I mean, we get a pretty steady stream of applicants. You know, we're almost, and Julia has been so good that we almost have to kind of really stretch for what can we have this person do, which is a really nice problem to have. I wanted to talk a little bit about program planning. You know, I think that, you know, in talking about, you know, memory cafes and, you know, the different workshops that we have coming up, you know, I think we need to be looking at our age demographics a little bit more and how do we create programs and sustain programs that are going to attract seniors of all ages, right? So I pulled some numbers from the town clerk's office, we've got 3,600 baby boomers and Amherst, and we have 3,500 Gen Xers. And the reason I mentioned Gen Xers is because they're going to turn 60 years old in two years. You know, so a whole demographic of people that we have not currently had much interaction with, we're going to have to adapt programs for their needs. And those needs look very different, you know, from somebody in their 80s or 90s. So I think now is really the time to start thinking about how can we kind of make some of the programs a little bit more contemporary or meet needs that we're not currently addressing. You know, for example, if I am just recently turning 60, it's very likely that I grew up working with a computer, have a smartphone. So those people don't need the basics courses that we have been teaching, right? They're going to need something that's a little bit more nuanced. How do I navigate, you know, social media? Like how do I send a TikTok to my grandchild? And, you know, I think we ought to be kind of trying to develop some programs that's going to be able to fit that niche. So I wanted to put that before the group and kind of brainstorm what are some ways that we can expand what we're offering to reach some new demographics. And hopefully, people have some ideas about that. Is that a question? Yeah. Yeah. I think how do we reach? I don't have the agenda. I don't know where we are on the agenda. I'm not sure what we need to cover. One of the things that's a national program is called Cyber Seniors. It's a reverse mentoring where the kids who are tech savvy meant to be older people. You talk about Gen X, you know, they might fit in to that demographic. It's a national program. It's online. You can find out about it there. Cyber senior. Okay. And it does the whole, they use the word tech, but for me, tech is anything that isn't man-made. And what they're really meaning is computer and not only that, but smartphone. So it's mostly smartphone, a little laptop, what's the pad there, iPad, those kinds of things. Okay. And then, Ann, you had your hand up. Yes. Okay. This is a sort of observation based on my husband who hasn't got a lot of friends. And many women seem to make friends more easily than men. And many women seem to be eager to join, as I did a belly dance class at the bank center last night, curious to do a new craft or whatever the usual things you might offer. And I wondered whether the men in our group would have any suggestions about what kinds of programs would attract men to become not only involved, but to have the opportunity to socialize and make new friends. My husband is constantly talking to me about his friends that have died, and he hasn't got new ones. Any suggestions about what's particularly appealing to men rather than women? This is not for me, but sports, some of the most famous games are available. For instance, that football game of 1985 Super Bowl, this and that pass that was received and that sort of thing, that baseball home run or whatever it was. So sometimes sitting around in the way that the old senior center was with couches and lounge type situation, with a TV or a video screen that has some of these different games. It's a wild out of left field thing off the top of my head, but you know, you talk about ice breakers, I see the gentleman breaking ice with one another by saying, did you see the football game last night? I was played out of sports by the time I was 15 or 16, so it doesn't interest me, but I noticed that that's something that happens. This couldn't happen, but I do it in my own life. I love restoring antique trucks and automobiles. I don't think we could have a garage at the senior center, but that's another interest. Go ahead, I'm done. We could do a cruise night. We don't have a garage, but we can do a cruise. Monday night, Monday night, Adkins has it at 5.30, Thursday there's one in Florence, Wednesday there's one at Butter, what is that, Butterree Park or whatever it is in Granby and so on. You could have a whole tour. This week we go here, next week we go there, different nights of the week. I think that's a really fine idea of going to different cruise nights as a group of senior men, really anybody in Florence, but I think it's a great idea. Well, we're going to have our eight-seat van in the near future. Oh, Anne, you've got your hand up. Yeah, this is a suggestion and question at the same time. If certain crafts classes like making jewelry or felting or any number of hill mortar women than men, how about a model building class? Would that appeal to guys, do you think? Do you think they have one that doesn't require, if they didn't have motor skills, do you think there are more? Well, but you're a big age group, so yeah. Also, it's a mistake to think that people over certain ages may not. No, but I wouldn't want them to feel excluded. I'm 87. I have fine motor skills. So I think I'm just asking, do you think that model-making might... Yeah, if I can find somebody who can lead it, I'd be happy to do that. Just like the survey, age-friendly survey that was done in town, we can sit here and come up with all kinds of ideas that might not fit at all. We have a list of 3,000 seniors that get a newsletter from the senior center. There could be a single-page double-sided survey that goes out with the possibility of a response by email of an actual poll to find out what really is of interest instead of us trying to figure it out. I mean, we did that with the Amherst neighbors. What are going to be the interest groups? Well, we'll have a food interest group this and that. Nobody showed up for any of it. If you do an actual poll, you have a 3,000-member newsletter, correct? Right, we do. You can put a double-sided page in there. If the survey was designed well designed, you could probably do it in two pages. It would be hard to do it with all the content we have, but if we can pivot to a monthly e-newsletter, we could do a survey much more easily that way and we could just email it to everyone, have them send it back at their convenience. I'm hoping if we can transition to having a larger e-distribution list that we can have the capability to do more of what you're talking about with surveys and polls. Yeah, I'd like to chime in if I could. An e-newsletter is absolutely the way to go because I get all the e-newsletters from, and they don't always have to be all of the content. You can post the content on the website as you do, but they put programming and things that are of interest. One of them, art goes a long way and you talked about Gen Z, but then we got off the subject a little bit and art and music go a long way. Could there be someone interested in using their talent to build an Etsy shop? We're talking about, as you stated, a generation that is more tech savvy and able to do some of the things that we weren't able to do in other generations. So this music and art, they have artists of the month. It encourages people who are seniors and who draw or paint or anything to showcase their art, and they have that every single month or week. I don't know the frequency, but I get all of the emails from them. And in terms of us generating, I absolutely agree with you, Chad, that we should always know what the seniors want. But in terms of generating ideas, I don't see any issue with generating ideas because this is what we could put on the survey. Here are some of the things that we think you may be interested in, however, then you leave them an open, open-ended spot where they can actually say what they want. But here are some suggestions. Pick any that you think could work. However, also tell us, what do you really want to see? And then be respectful so that you're really capturing the essence of your population's needs. Yeah, I think that's a really great point. Even suggestion boxes at the senior center, because not everybody's got email or is on the computer or that sort of thing, but a suggestion box in a general place. Good to do that, too. I miss Terry's hand and then Jean, I'll get to you by. People can also feel free to jump in. And my father couldn't golf anymore. All the golf and the buddies went to the Elks and they played pitch. Every day they would go and play pitch. And Northampton Senior Center has a pitch league that they just started back up against because of COVID. And the table is huge and they have so much fun. The girls and guys are mixed. But I know a lot of guys like playing cards. Yeah, and we really don't have very many card games. We have cribbage. I think it's a great idea to solicit feedback from our constituents. And I'm wondering, there was a time earlier that I think you did gather some information, Hayley, and that was at the open house. I was just curious if any there was anything that stood out or maybe we can go back to it another time if I'm sure that isn't right on the top of your head. But other places where we've had people in either in person for a program or they've come in and they've offered feedback or suggestions about what they would like to see, I think that would be that's important for us to factor in. From the open house, I do remember there were certain things that are just going to be tough for us to try to do like a gym. We just are not ready for that right now. We did get a lot of requests for arts and crafts, which I've been working on. But I have heard that people want, some people would prefer things not to be a one-off like they would like a frequent class. And that would be tough for us to do. I think, first of all, it'd be very expensive to do a really prolonged class like that, but then finding the right instructor. But to your point, the surveys, we could start handing some out. We can have paper and we can try to push electronic with the e-news letter. One of the thoughts that I just had as you were talking was that I know Haley had this idea that we might have chess tables outside, which would be a fun thing, but of course we've got weather, which is another subject. What if there were a game afternoon where batgammon and chessboards and those other things were available and we set up a room where people could find other people to play with or come together to play? In other words, some people might have partners that they like playing batgammon with, but other people might have a skill like chess or batgammon or checkers or whatever that they would be looking for some companionship, somebody to play with. So if you had a, you know, every Tuesday afternoon from two to four is there's a game room that's open. Yeah, I would love to. Yeah, I've been kind of working on that with Julia to try to get maybe some like college students who could help with that too. I think that would be really nice to do an intergenerational program where people can just drop in and play games and we could put on coffee and have pastry. So yeah, that's certainly something they can do. If we look into maybe doing, I'm going to throw this idea out and I don't do this, but it looks attractive to me. Pickleball. The recreation department really likes pickleball and I've been trying to work with them on how can we get a court or something. Pickleball and shuffleboard. My personal favorite is shuffleboard and I think we need one in Amherst. Everybody that I know in Florida who's kind of over 60 is playing pickleball and the shuffleboard courts are totally unused. Oh, see millennials are, we're really liking shuffleboard now. It's come full circle. Oh, both of those are heavy resources. You need a lot of resources to pull those off. Whereas bocce ball, bocce needs nothing practically. I get that started with nothing at the neighbors. All you need is the lawn and the sick falls. Yeah, we could do that kind of do the wine. You move your body for the balls and the candy moves your lips. Yeah, we could definitely do bocce in the spring and I'll see maybe we can collaborate with recreation to really make the pickleball happen because we would need probably the support of another department to kind of go in for the space and stuff. Yeah, but I just think more active things again will appeal to, you know, another part of the population that maybe hasn't been engaged before. Definitely. I agree with that. I think those are all really good ideas. Have you missed any for programming? Yeah, in Kendrick Park, you could have bocce easy. Yeah, we could do it. We could also try to do it in the little courtyard behind the Senior Center. Well, it needs, what is it, something like 40 foot of grass. Oh, yeah, then that would be kind of hard, but Kendrick might be better. I mean, it's not wild and crazy like lawn darts, where you can do it anywhere you want. There is an official international rule book and that sort of thing. Yeah, okay, maybe we could do that or Look Park, that's near Clark House, something like that. You know, some other ideas I had for the cyber, you know, for more tech specific programs where, you know, I was talking to the DA, one of the people from the DA's office the other day, and there's a really high prevalence of romance scams that are happening in the Valley. Does everybody know what that is? Yeah, a romance scam. Somebody says, I love you. I want to marry you. Send me a thousand dollars. And they, they, they financially exploit people. It's true, but people will. I knew a woman in my last job who lost $100,000 because she thought this person really loved her and cared about her. So I know two people that that happened to it's sad, but it does exist. But I laughed because I said, they're never going to get anything from me. I have a thousand dollars. I know how to use it. Yeah, but, but there is a high and we think that the number is a lot higher because it is very shameful to say that, you know, this happened to me. So I'm going to try to work on doing some programs around that, you know, particularly with, if we're trying to do like maybe a Gen X or a baby boomer, spin to it, we can talk about cat fishing. You guys probably never saw that show on MTV, but they talk a lot about what is essentially a romance scam. It doesn't always involve a financial transaction, but that program could involve things like, you know, how do you reverse image search? How do you look at a an online profile and determine whether or not that person's probably legit or not, because there are some telltale signs. So I'm also going to work with the DA's office in our cell council on maybe doing some programs to fill that niche. So I just want to add to your romance scam. What is particularly prevalent with older people is getting a call grandma or grandpa, I'm in trouble, and that is a big scam. And we have had friends, some of whom are really very urbane and bright and just absolutely fall for it and not know kind of what to do. So yeah, maybe scams generally, you know, so that it's not just romance scams, but all the various ways in which you can get sucked into stuff. Definitely, because it is very easy. It's very easy to do. Actually, the DA, the representative from the DA's office told a story about this woman based in Athol, and she got talked into driving to Hadley to purchase $100,000 in gold bars. And it was only en route from Athol to Hadley that she, you know, had the presence of mind to say, Hey, you know, something doesn't seem right. And she called the police and they actually brought in the FBI and they had a whole sting. But it's very easy to get talked into doing things that are really bad for us. Oh, the other thing I wanted to talk about with program planning was making a formal subcommittee. We have the structure in place, but I don't actually know if we have people on the program and activity subcommittee, or if we need to nominate people for that. So I wanted to put that before the board. I think it would be a good idea to have one because it looks like when I read the I don't know bylaws or whatever that is part of this subcommittee. So yeah, I think it's a good idea. You know, I would be so much happier to give you the names of people who might be willing to instruct craft classes, for example, rather than being on a committee. I'm really very fearful of volunteering more of my time, but I'm really happy to make a list of some of the people who you might approach to do some really interesting craft classes. Okay, yeah, I'll take that list. We can make some phone calls and maybe get some things happening. Is there any other interest from people to meet and do a separate subcommittee on programs? No, I'll jump out. Only if that data came in and showed indications of what the public wanted and needed. Okay. All right, so we can wait on that. So can I just ask a question? Would it just be programming or could that include like potential trips? I mean, I think we want to look bigger picture, not just arts and crafts, and I love arts and crafts, so don't get me wrong, but and in that regard, I think, you know, my thought is ideas, you know, is people have ideas or suggestions where they can pass them along. But if you had a little group that was sort of brainstorming and looking ahead for kind of long term, you know, things that we want to work towards or maybe trips, I don't know, I'd like to get those trips going again. Oh, yes. Well, we do have our trip next week. But my interpretation of the the programming subcommittee would be something more like that where it's a bit more long term, you know, I can make a phone call and schedule program, I want to know in five years, what do we want our programming to look like and who are we going to be serving with those programs. And I think that's more of what the subcommittee would be working on. If we decided we wanted to be a pop up board, that we would not do any planning, we would not have any strategic plan or forward thinking kinds of activities. You don't remember that conversation? I don't remember that conversation and that, you know, I mean, from an organizational standpoint, you want to have some, it doesn't have to be as formal as a strategic mission, but we should have a sense of where do we want to be in the next five years, the next year. I mean, otherwise, I don't see how we can really stay say ahead and stay, you know, gain that traction that we've lost during COVID. Yeah, me either. I mean, that's what a board does. It has a business meeting where it conducts business and part of the business is the plan, plan of work. What do we want to accomplish and how do we get there? Right. But that meeting, I went through two meetings and it was pretty well shot down July, June, and what was it the last before our break, August break. I do remember that, but it was for a big strategic plan. What's the difference? And we felt like this is programming. This is a group of people that are going to talk about what are we going to do for programs. It's not like a complete strategic plan for the entire senior center agenda. So we wouldn't talk about building a new building. We wouldn't talk about policies at the senior center. We wouldn't talk about our fiduciary responsibility or any of those other things. This is people who want to do programs. My understanding of it are a subcommittee of people, people that are going to zero in on one particular area that needs to be fulfilled on a committee. And I've been on many committees that do that. And so you're not going to talk about every single thing, building a new building and doing this and doing that because you're focusing on one particular aspect of improving the lives of the seniors, which includes programming, programming that will fulfill their needs and their wants, as opposed to having to talk about what are we going to do? Are we going to build this building? Are we going to expand? Are we going to buy a bus? I mean, I don't think that that's what it's about. And I think that when you mention a strategic plan, honestly, that's what I thought you meant is you want to talk about the future in a bigger way than we are capable of doing and paying a consultant to help us. Go ahead. I think we're talking about two different committees and I think we need both. So this shouldn't be, I think, a debate about one or the other. We need both and they have two different funds. Oh, I volunteered for a program thing if we had some data. Otherwise, we're going to generate programs and put energy into them that don't get attended. Okay, not what the people want or need. So might we consider whether anybody is interested also in examining the long-term goals and the long-term needs as well, you know, setting aside a program committee that's dealing with specific programs, something kind of bigger? Is there a group of people or is there anyone who would like to examine that task and see how to begin it? I mean, you know, just beginning it is a question of setting out goals. And I would certainly be willing to be on a kind of ad hoc committee that examines what our long-term goals might be. And I definitely think that's needed. Like I said, anywhere emerging out of a pandemic, we have a whole shift in demographics coming up. You know, the MCOA conference is next week. There are a lot of programs talking about how do we reach different markets? How do we put, you know, I'm not saying we do this, but a lot of senior centers are thinking about rebranding, right? Shifting away from some of the more traditional programs and bringing in some fresh ideas, some fresh takes on activities. You know, like I said, I mean, and we're in a college town too. So we have the ability to really draw on that as a source of strength, where not a lot of other communities have that influence. We can use that to our advantage. So is there anyone else that would be interested in examining what maybe our long-term goals might be and, you know, something other than specifically programming for now, but looking at the bigger picture, I would think that we would need Haley to work with that. Anybody else interested? I have to say, it sounds like a huge, a huge task to take on. And I am wrestling with, is that ours to do or not to dump it on you, Haley, but is that your job is the director? And maybe there's particular things you can parse out, but, you know, to write a strategic plan for the senior center is more than I signed on for. I'm not sure that I meant a strategic plan for the senior center. We are a council on aging. The senior center is a really big part of that, but it is not the only part of a council on aging, which is why on the agenda I have something else that doesn't have to do with the senior center. So I'm suggesting that maybe as a council on aging, we ought to at least begin to talk about and examine, you know, what our, what the town of Amherst needs to be supportive of its growing older community. You need to call on people, Gene. Okay, can you see the hands, Gene? So I've got Chad and Jacqueline with their hand up. Go ahead, Jacqueline. I was feeling pretty much, I missed the person who spoke two persons ago, but it was starting to feel to me like we were taking on the positions of employees of Amherst, and I like contributing, but it was starting to feel like we were taking on the job of the center and not the position of the council. And it's not to discourage anybody from having that energy, but I do feel that the center is worthy of resources from the town to do the kind of programming that is being put forth. And it was feeling to me too, like we were starting to take on the job of the center and not just looking at the council on aging. I see what you mean. Yeah, I mean, I think it would be helpful to have a subcommittee for programs, you know, that that doesn't, you know, I think when we talk about programs, you can plan things out long term, but it doesn't have to be a strategic plan. You know, that that is an area where I would definitely like the feedback and the advice of the council. I think it would be helpful to start trying to formulate some long term plans, and maybe that's something where, you know, I'm presenting these ideas, and this is what I think for the senior center. What does my council advise me on on the proposal that I've laid out? And certainly Ann and Chad, if you have feedback on that, if we can meet together and we can talk about, you know, what does that look like? You know, there is that divide between senior center and council, but you know, but the advice is really important. And I do appreciate all of that from each of you. But I don't want you to feel like you have to be paid. Chad. Go ahead, Jean. Are you calling on me, Jean? Yes. Okay. I think Jacqueline's talking about the difference between a working board and a policy board. We are a policy board. But the reason I wrote, wrote my hand was for Ann to say, are you familiar with the age friendly survey? The area agent? Yes. What is the AAA? It's American aging, whatever that. AARP. AARP, I'm sorry. Not AAA. That's Keep your car going. The AARP has started a national survey. It's about a year and a half, two years old now. And Amherst participated in that. And one of the more powerful boards in town, the affordable housing was able to get a bunch of questions in there on affordable housing. Hailey also was able to get a few questions in there. And that to me forms our strategic plan. What are the needs of the Amherst elders? What are their interests? What are their preferences? You know, what do they like? What are they dislike? That sort of thing. That's our task as a council on aging is to meet that. And part of that is through the senior center. So, you know, I'm all about that. That's a great interest to me. My background is in organization and community development. So, you know, I mean, I'd rather have that kind of orientation than what I call a pop-up board where today we come up with ideas and you know, just some brainstorming is a better instead of pop-up what you call it brainstorming because that's more what it is. So, you know, it's a different orientation. But that's there. Jacqueline, you still have your hand. Did you have something more to add? No, I'll have to figure out how to put it for my hand. No worries. Ann? Yeah, I don't think that we need to think of one or the other. From my point of view, we can do both. We can be a supportive group and, you know, a committee or something that gives you, that helps you find resources. And we can also be the kind of policy looking into and making board. It's not policy making, certainly a board that sets some goals for the seniors in Amherst. And so it's not appropriate for me to bring the, you know, that I added to the agenda up at this point. But I would like to go back to that because I think that's just what that falls under the heading of the work of the council that Chad was referring to. But I don't think that council work cuts out the work of helping Haley, you know, find the resources of teachers or programs or anything else for the senior center. They're both important. I think we've got important skills that can do both. So Chad, I would love to work with you on the bigger goals. If you think, and I'm talking about ad committee to do that. And I don't think it I don't think it stops us also from becoming involved in in some more of the day to day things that will, that will help Haley accomplish what she's here to accomplish. I think they're done simultaneously. I can see them as interwoven. You achieve one through achieving the other. I definitely work in tandem. I wonder if we could maybe suggest in the future as you have information, you can share some of that either ahead of time so we could review like numbers and whatnot. Haley is you are gathering demographics and hearing about trends and, you know, kind of whatever kind of quick scoop information. I think it would just be valuable for all of us to be aware of that. And then for those that want to dig deeper and start doing more planning, but I think for our our education, if you will, as a council, I think that would be really valuable. I know I would really appreciate knowing that because you know, you don't know what you don't know. And if we're trying to really meet people's needs, we need to have good information to work with. We do. Yeah, I'll definitely I'll take good notes at the conference because there's going to be a lot of information generated there. And I did want to just say really quick that, you know, I think that the survey data that we have is important in collecting future data will be equally important. But sometimes people don't always know the programs they need. And that I think is something that is the value of talking about programming in a format like this, because if things might come up that I might not think to put down on a survey. Or, you know, I think from a business perspective, sometimes you you have to market your product and you have to get people interested when they might not otherwise be. And then Ann and Chad, you have your hands up. Who is running this meeting? So it's a it's a joint meeting, Chad. Yes. All right, who was first then? Unless Ann has something to add and you may just forgot your hand up. I really did make the suggestion that I would be willing to work on an ad hoc committee that looked at the bigger pictures. And I was asking Chad with his experience if he'd like to maybe have coffee with me one day and begin to do that. We can't do that because it's the open meeting. Well, some committees can meet if you want to meet whatever suggestion you have in a motion and it will need to be voted on. All right. I move that we that we establish a subcommittee on broad goals of meeting of of examining the the broader goals of meeting the needs of seniors in the community of Amherst. I second the motion. All in favor or do we need to just we can do it. It's nice to do a role. You can call on people and have them say yay or nay. Okay. I don't know where to start. Terry? Chad? Yes. Christina? Yes. Yes. Jacqueline? I say yes. But I also raised I guess I would raise this question later. Yeah. Dennis? Yes. Okay. Anne? Yes. Can you say the motion again so I can make sure I have it down right? What is the motion? I move that we establish a subcommittee to examine the broader long-term goals of being supportive of the needs of seniors in the town of Amherst. Okay. Thank you. And for the record, I'm a yes. So I do believe we are unanimous. Yeah. Excellent. Christina has had her hand up for a while and it's 10 minutes to 6.30 so 6.20 is FYI. I'll be I'll be succinct. Yes. We have to look at the purpose of the council on aging when they first started. There was a purpose. It was advocacy. They were really big issues. And at the time, seniors did not have a voice. But since then, things have evolved. And we have senior centers. We have all kinds of other services for seniors. And they're actually towns where I spoke to a friend, a town that doesn't have a senior center. In that case, the council on aging becomes the only thing that the seniors have to plan for them. And so there's a thin line between the council and, you know, the senior services. It's not like we're two was supposedly two separate entities. But who are we serving if we're not serving the individuals from the senior center? And so I'm feeling like we would be we would not be an effective council if we weren't working with the people in this community, not just the senior center, but all of the other groups that are serving seniors that we can extend ourselves to those group as well, because that is really the purpose. It started as advocacy. So then when we have this conversation later on, let's keep thinking in terms of that. And I think it's absolutely wonderful that Ann and Chad, that the two of you have decided to look at the long term goals. I think that's basically that's advocacy. That's looking, you know, for what is it that is going to be needed? You know, and how we can move ahead on those ideas. And I also agree with Hayley that we have to talk about these things. It's, you know, and throw out the ideas, because as you see, she's taking notes. And then later on, she's going to say, hey, you can't think of everything while you're in a meeting. But later on, you look at your notes, you look at what the ideas that came up, and you're able to formulate something more from those ideas. I think that's part of our purpose, too, is to advise and to give the information. So that's basically what I wanted to say. Thank you. That was great. Chad, did you have something to add or is that an old? Yeah, my hand was actually up from way back when you were last speaking yourself. You mentioned to Hayley the importance of having that information that you guys were talking about, we were all talking about, possibly prior to the meeting. And I was going to make a suggestion. The other boards in town have a written packet that they received before the meeting that shows some of the things that are on the director's report so that they can think a little about them. They can come to this meeting, or I don't even know, maybe email to Hayley some of these ideas. So the meeting can be less composed of reports and more about the business of the organization. So I don't I'm not going to make that as an emotion. It's just a thought. It's more on our staff, more on, you know, her shoulders, but she pulls these statistics together from swipe from the members swiping a card on a little computer. And she has to give these reports to the Department of Elder Affairs anyway. So, you know, we could really, I mean, for me, because I do have some different kinds of learning disabilities, I'd love to see it in a pie chart that, you know, today, Hayley, you mentioned what do you call it? I'd call it repeat visit. That's not the proper term, but your census. Oh, the check-in count. Yeah. Return visits for, let's say somebody's there all day long and they go to every program. That's not a new hit. That's a repeat hit or whatever. I mean, a bunch of these things are really important to get to for us to know about to make decisions. So I'm thinking that this is one way that the other boards take care of it through a written report might be something that we want to talk about and see if it works for Hayley as well as for us. So that's why my hand was raised. Excellent. Thank you. I think that's a great idea to consider. I'm just wondering, Hayley, given that we have five minutes left and looks like some more things on the agenda, how we should proceed there. I'm guessing we need to approve the minutes. Is that a requirement? So not a requirement, but we should do it while it's fresh in people's mind. Okay. Should we jump to that? And then I wasn't clear on announcement. So I will defer to you because you know what the content of others because I did see Dick on the screen, but you can do a call for the for the minutes. And then I can really quickly hit on point three about the the warming and cooling center because I have come up before. And and then if Dick wants to say anything about the activities of the friends, we would love to hear an update on that. Okay, awesome. So the minutes of the September 22nd meeting, are there any adjustments that need to be made or just some typos? Okay. And what's the most efficient way to do that is is that I don't have them in front of me right now. So I can't Right. No, no. Sorry, Chad. What I was wondering is I would find that tedious if somebody said, you know, number three change this. Can we email that? Is that cool or everybody has to have? We'd have to we have to vote on it. So we wouldn't do that via email. So we can always postpone if people are not comfortable signing off on them, we can do it next time. Okay, I think we should do that. Feel like the prudent thing is to have that document in front of you. So let's let's forge ahead. Do you want to tackle the warming cooling center? Yes. Yep. So we we do over the summer, we had instituted a cooling center at the bank center. That's usually a conversation that I have with Tim Nelson, our fire chief, and Paul Backelman. I can tell you, though, it's not typically a well attended thing. You know, for example, we were open, people could use the bank center, but we didn't have anyone show up for that. And I think a lot of that has to do with there are just other places in town, the Jones library, the survival center, those tend to be the places people will go and congregate. Now that being said, with the warming center, it was the case several years ago that there was a fire in Anne Wayland, and we did take people seeking shelter from that at the bank center. So and I don't know if that answers your question, but when there are emergencies at our neighbor's properties or seniors live, we do help them. I'm happy to hear that you do. But that really was not my concern. My concern was that as I listened to the national news, and we have greater and greater numbers of weather extremes, should there be a power outage in Amherst, and we have an extreme of either very cold or very hot weather, we need to know that there is some place within the town that has a backup generator so that people will not die of the heat or the cold. I'm not talking about the inconvenience of very hot weather and somebody doesn't have air conditioning. I think the senior center can take care of that. We are in a community, our colleges and universities have large gyms, have the Mullen Center, have lots of things. I don't know whether the town of Amherst has made any arrangements to make sure that in the event of a power outage, we can care for our senior population. Okay, I can talk to Chief Nelson and see if I can get you some answers. It's called a resilience center. It's called a resilience center and it upholds with floods, snowstorms, hurricanes, fires, tornadoes, etc. And Earl Miller, who is the C-R-E-S-S New Crest Director, is thinking that Amherst, just like Northampton, should have one. Well, I think we should. And that's why I put on the agenda. Does anyone know who's responsible? Because I think it falls also within the purview of our group to ask the question and make sure that it's taken further than that. Yeah, it would go to the town manager and the emergency management response. So I'll start there and see where the conversations are at, but it sounds like Earl is getting the ball rolling, which is good. And we should certainly weigh in on how to care for seniors' needs, particularly if somebody is diabetic or if they need oxygen or if they use a power chair. Those are all considerations that have to be taken into account. Excellent. So we will revisit that at a later time. You've got more information to report. Do you want to move to announcements, Hailey? Yes. Unfortunately, Linda Terry could not be here tonight. We're hoping that another representative from Amherst Neighbors can join us in the future because we know we want to collaborate them with them. But Dick, do you have any updates on the friends that you would like to share? Well, just that like you folks and everyone else on the face of the earth, we're trying to recover from COVID and get back in gear. And we discover that things that were appropriate before are not part of the new normal. So we're assessing what we can do to financially support the friends. And it's an ongoing task. And personally, I'm glad to see the council becoming more proactive. And we're trying to do the same thing. Thank you. You're feeding back, Jacqueline. Somebody's cell phone. Yeah, are you getting a call maybe? And you're on vibrate? Yeah. Topics not reasonably anticipated. 48 hours in advance. Okay. Splendid. Our next meeting is Thursday, November 10th at five. I just wanted to point out the next day is Veteran's Day. The time? How about the Veteran's Day was the 11th? Right. November 8th is election day. Veteran's Day is on the 11th. But we meet on the 10th. Correct. Is that a federal holiday where people go away? No. I just wanted to raise that to make sure people are aware. We're going to have the Veteran's Day breakfast that will be happening. I talked to Steve Connor today and they will be resuming that more details will be forthcoming. Okay. I don't think it will cut into a five o'clock meeting. Nope. Okay. Anything else? Otherwise, we can officially, do I need a motion to officially close out? I saw a move. Second. Excellent. Aye. All right. Well, I survived the first one. You made it. We're just four minutes late. That's not bad. We made a good comeback at the end. All right. Thank you all. Have a good night. Have a good night. Have a good night. Have a good night. Have a good night. See you all on the 10th. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Bye-bye.