 Okay. So good morning, good afternoon. Welcome everybody who's joined us for the re-launch of Amherst Community Chats where we'll be talking with different department heads or town employees, area employees every Thursday at noon. So today we are joined by town manager Paul Balkaman, Acting Public Health Director Jennifer Brown and Director of Senior Services Mary Beth Ogallowitz. Thank you all for being here. So before we launch into Q&A I'm just going to remind folks that if you'd like to make a comment you can raise your hand in Zoom for those of you who are joining by phone, star nine from your phone or feel free to use the Q&A function within the Zoom application. So I am going to invite the town manager to give any updates he might have. Thanks Brianna. It's good to be back actually to do these things. I think they're very useful and helpful for us to hear from people in the community about what their concerns are and answer any questions that folks have. Of course the big news for us, well two big news items last night, one is we have the windstorm that came through and knocked down a lot of trees. The crews are out, they were out all night, they're out throughout the day. I think about 10% of the town is without power, nearly a thousand customers of ever source. I have not had an update recently but I think they're trying to get as much done as they could during the course of the day. Certain town facilities are also working on backup power so it's a pretty all hands on deck moment for our DPW crews and fire and police were running like crazy last night responding and closing down roads. So our roads are still closed. So that's one thing. And the second was that yesterday, last late yesterday and the afternoon, the state announced that the town was moving into the red zone of the for COVID-19 cases. The red zone in football is a good thing and for us it's a bad thing. And that indicates that there's been an increase in the number of cases in the town of Amherst over the past two weeks and we can talk more about that during the course of the conversation. Thank you for those updates, Paul. I want to invite both Jennifer and Mary Beth to also report out in their areas. So Jennifer, would you like to start? Yeah. So my name is Jennifer Brown. I'm very happy to be here with you all today. I've been in the town as the public health nurse for seven years. So I've spoken with some of you, perhaps, I'm the person that's called and asked you questions about Lyme disease or other infectious diseases. And I'm also the acting health director for a few more weeks. And then we have Emma Dragon starting in November. So here to answer questions and hope I can add to the conversation. Great. Thank you. Mary Beth. Hi, everyone. If you don't know who I am, Mary Beth Ogilevitz, the director of senior services and I'm thrilled to be here in any way that we can interact and meet with the community and also answer any questions. We have now operationalized as a fully functional virtual online senior center. So it's a different experience, both for our guests who used to come here, people who have questions and also for our staff. But I really just want to continue to message that we are open. I still get calls all the time. People are shocked that we're picking up the phone. So we're close to the public, but we are open and we're here every day eight to four 30. So anyone who has any questions or concerns, we are here for you. Great. Thank you, Mary Beth. So I wanted to remind everybody in the room that we do encourage and we'd love to hear from you live. So please raise your hand if you want to be welcomed into the room or pop a question into the Q&A. I did have quite a few questions that were emailed to me in advance from people who couldn't make it. But I do see Sarah with a comment and question who's with us right now live. So parents are distraught at the post moment of in-person learning because of COVID-19 outbreak among off campus students, off campus UMass students. Can tenants be evicted and or property owners find for health and safety violations? So yes, if they're true health and safety violations under the code that we would go to the landlord and say you need to fix these health and safety violations. And that has happened with some households in Amherst recently, actually, where the our Inspectional Services Department had made a visit prompted by a different event and found some safety situations where they were they said that you're to the landlord, you cannot house people in this facility. And so they were told they were given an order to fix it or evict everybody. So and, you know, obviously, the answer is to get it fixed as quickly as possible. But that's the that's the tool that the town has. Thank you. So I see a hand from Amherst neighbors. Before I do that, I want to let everybody know this is a an open meeting. So anybody was able to join us. I do see that Western Mass News has joined the call. So full disclosure, Western Mass News is on the call. Okay, so Amherst neighbors, I'm going to unmute if you could introduce yourself and ask your question. Great. Hi, thank you. I'm Liz Welsh with Amherst neighbors. It's nice to see all of you. And I'm so happy that you're doing this again. And, and anyway, so my question and I it's probably becoming a moot point with the numbers going up the way they are in Amherst. But we're trying to grapple with what under the state guidelines of phase three, step two, how does that apply to older adults? And as some of you may know, we're an organization that part of our purpose, though it's not what we've been doing currently is to provide volunteer services for older adults in Amherst. Some of those could be what we describe as non touch services, which we're not doing now such as things like grocery shopping or picking things up, meaning not face to face. But how, but ideally at some point, wanting to get to face to face volunteer favors that people do for one another, our volunteers are older adults, they could be anybody, but the core of them are older adults. So I just don't know how under phase three, stage two, what that could look like. So if anybody has any thoughts on that, very best, do you have thoughts on that? Well, you know what, what I would share is, is generally our approach here. So obviously, Liz, as you know, we have volunteers who participate who are citizens who are older adults. And I've also worked with another organization called RSVP, which is a volunteer organization that works solely with seniors to place them in locations. And I think that the general consensus has been an increasing understanding that the risk and the health risk of isolation is equally weighted as the risk of transmission of COVID. And so we've had a number of volunteers who've come forward who said, I have to do something, I need to do something, I need some engagement and some purpose and meaning. So the way that I do is I work individually, first of all, with anyone who wants to come forward as a volunteer to really have a very direct and concerted conversation around risk assessment for themselves, making sure that they've taken into account how they feel how their family feels their partner, they're bubble, because I do say that I've often had conversations later with children of older adults who have some concerns about the older adult, you know, stepping into to doing something. So I always start with the volunteer and making sure they understand and they have the ability to express any reticence down the line as well. And then with regard to our services, the only ways in which we are utilizing volunteers out of an abundance of caution has really been ones that are contactless. That doesn't mean that they don't see each other from a distance or have the ability to have some conversation. You know, we have people who are doing technology support virtually, we have folks who are delivering meals, people who are making calls so that there's plenty of social interaction, but actually sitting in closer proximity for any, you know, like more than five minutes. That's not something that we have felt, given the guidelines from the state that would be appropriate. And I would just share that generally, you know, that that's been what most senior centers are doing. And I'm happy to have a deeper conversation offline. Sure, that makes sense. That'd be wonderful. Thank you. I just don't know what the state guidelines say safer at home. I mean, yes, it's safer at home. But how do we take that into consideration? Great. Thank you. Thank you for your question. And you know, at any point, if you have another follow up question, feel free to raise your hand again, or use the Q&A feature as well. We have a question that did get emailed that is kind of in this vein. So I'll ask that now while we're on topic. A community member asked, are there any plans pending to resume Meals on Wheels? If so, when it seems counter intuitive to further isolate and limit options for seniors? Thank you. Yeah, so I think that there might be a misnomer here. So Meals on Wheels has always gone on. We have never shut down our meals and the support of nutrition. So Meals on Wheels is actually a program that's run by Highland Valley Elder Services. They enroll people if they meet their criteria. And what we do is we deliver those meals that has been consistent throughout the pandemic. And people have been added to those lists. So folks who are homebound by their own criteria get a meal Monday through Friday delivered. And that has not not ceased for a single day. We also I think that the question might be more referring to our congregate meal, which is our shared meal experience. And again, that has had to be curtailed by COVID. And the way that the workaround has been a grab and gross go service. So folks come to the Senior Center and we meet with them on the outdoor sidewall, and they have their meal. And I will say the theory behind providing that nutritional support is was never just nutritional support. It was around socialization. So the person posing the question is spot on that that's a really important function of gathering together for meals. And I would share that folks who come for our grab and go, it is a very social experience. People walk over together, they drive. We have a lot of folks who say you are the only person I see every day. This is my one experience of socializing. And that's why I come. Sometimes they don't even like the meal. But they just get up because they want to say hi to us. So so that's an opportunity if someone wants to participate, you can call us at 259-3060 and we can get you enrolled within a day. And when you come to the Senior Center, you're just on the exterior. And also that we have a number of opportunities for socializing. Most of our classes online include a chat feature. What I mean by a chat feature is the exercise class might be 45 minutes, but then for the next 20, 25 minutes, folks are just saying hi and and convening online. So we have iPads to loan. We have volunteers helping to get people up and running with technology. So if that if that person making the inquiry wants some assistance, please contact me and I'll make sure that you're looped in with those opportunities that that we're affording people. And then also that Amherst Neighbors is running programs. So Liz, who just spoke, they have online programs and we can help to connect you for that. Great. Thank you for all that information. We'll connect that person directly with your team, Mary Beth. So again, just reminding folks, please raise your hand, star nine from phone or Q&A so that you can pop your questions in or come into the chat. I have another question here. Do you have advice for state staying safe for upcoming holidays? Should I let my kids and grandkids visit? Are we able to dine together? Well, I can add to that. And then maybe, Mary Beth, if you have something you can contribute, you know, one thing we want to make sure is that people coming together. Do so if you can sort of contain sort of this bubble that we've been hearing about. If you know each other, you've been interacting for 14 days. There's been no transmission that other people are aware of. Then you can sort of join people together. But if you do have a lot of folks coming in from out of a state, then that is something to consider how you're going to be joining. One thing is, you know, you do need to do if people are coming from other states. What is the travel ban sort of signing up for that, submitting that you're coming in and you'll need a negative test before you enter this state. But other things that you can do if you're getting together is considered the size. Where is the activity going to be? Can it be outside the number of people? Mary Beth, do you have anything else you can think of? Well, the only other piece that I would add is that we have technology so that folks decide that they're not going to have their holiday and an elder is going to be home alone. And the family might be doing a Zoom gathering that we can help to facilitate that for the holiday. So that's a piece I really want people to know. We have several accounts we can we can facilitate families gathering online. So that that is just a very heartwarming and important marker for everybody looking into Thanksgiving. So again, any questions, contact us. We'll see what we can do to help you. If you feel like you can't meet those parameters around being with individuals who've been quarantined and safe and within a typical bubble that you have interacted with. It's a really good question. And you know, each case is going to be very different. Yeah, so we're having that conversation in our family. Are we going to do what we normally do in Thanksgiving? Are we going to be adjusting that? Is it just going to be our immediate family? And even then, before my kids are grown, you know, before they come back, they need to be tested and making sure tests are available to folks is really important. Um, but you do we do need it, you know, we need to see our families and stuff. So it's it's there's some judgments that every individual is going to have to make in terms of what they feel comfortable with what they feel safe. And following the trip typical protocols of you know, you know, we were on a call yesterday after with the with DPW or DPW, DPH, DPW was with the power. Um, and is like, what else can we be doing? And they said, double down on all the things you know, social distancing, wash your hands, wear a mask, you know, all those things, um, you know, avoid large gatherings, they said, keep pounding on those basic public health mantras, because that's what works. And so if you are going to be gathering with a family, think about all those things that you can bring to it. Um, because we are going to be making we make judgments every day about risk and this is a risk assessment that we each every individual have to make. Great. Thank you. So we have a couple more questions that were emailed in. So I'm going to go to those next until I see a hand in the room or a question in the room. So this one came in just the other day. My husband and I are in our seventies. He wants me to stop early morning shopping at big Y due to the rising positives in town. Is there evidence of increasing positives among the elderly general population? Should I be concerned? I've always felt safe in that store in the early morning. You know, I would add some of the prior conversation to the answer for this one. You know, there are several there are many mitigation strategies that you can take and that the business is taking to keep people safe. The businesses are cleaning high touch surfaces. They're spacing. They're doing aisles one way. There's plexiglass to keep the person behind that safe and you safe. So I I believe if you take these strategies yourself, wearing a mask, making sure your mask fits well, cleaning your hands, keeping your distance from people, I believe the risk is going to be very, very low. And again, it's being balanced with what Mary Beth was talking about is socialization. You don't want to be isolated. Go get your food, take the right steps and you can do it safely. And this stuff that we're learning now here we are in October. So we're six months out and we're really this is getting back by science. You know, when this all came out in April and May, we were leaning on information from other illnesses, which is very pertinent and helps. But we know this is the way to prevent transmission. So I say go out in the morning and do shopping. Why you're out? Pick up a loaf of bread. Right, I see a hand in the room. So I'm going to ask Jeff to unmute and please introduce yourself. Hello, I'm Jeff Amherst, president. Yeah, I know that my son, soccer, high school soccer season has been temporarily suspended because of Amherst being in the red zone. And I just curious are there other ways that Amherst is impacted? Well, the most immediate has been the sports other schools are canceling games that they may have with with our students, which is a shame and because the sports for a lot of of our youth is their only outlet. And it's and sometimes really important. You know, I think in terms of other impacts, I think that just the we worry about the impact on our businesses, because the sort of general feeling, oh, it's a red community. I think it's a it's a very crude tool. And I don't think it's necessarily a helpful one. It's designed to get people's attention, which it does. But it has some some other consequences, which because it's such a public designation and it doesn't take into account special circumstances. You know, we have a university here that that has a high concentration of students. There are other communities. There's the town of Middleton has a jail in it and they're red community because there's there's a surge in the jail. You know, the North Andover has a college in its same type of situation. So it's I don't know if it's necessarily reflective of the general community, but it's the it's a tag. It's a designation we've been tagged with. And so again, it's the sort of more general opinion. I don't think that is necessarily based on health risks that people are making that decision. That's my opinion. I'm just not I'm not a health instructor, though. Either of you have anything to add to that? Well, I would say that when this designation started, you know, weeks ago, it just it felt like people were going to take this as this was the one piece of information to judge to make all our public health decisions on. And that is not the case. It's one piece. So we know our community. We know if there's transmission in what population. So it should be a conversation that we have all together with a superintendent with with other people in town. So it's one tool. But that red designation, it does catch your attention. So it seems pretty dramatic. And I believe that these games are being canceled not by the town of Amherst, but by the opponent, the opposing teams. It's a good question, Jeff. Did you have any follow up? No, I was mainly curious if there are things that can't open now because of us being in the red zone or things like that. So so I think we are prevented from going to get these phases and steps mixed up. But the only thing that happened on October 5th was that restaurants could were able to go to allow 10 people at a table instead of six bars were allowed to have people sit at the bar, you know, like skateboard parks and indoor things like the things that didn't really impact. It was a very minimal impact on on the town of Amherst. So I don't think it's significant for us. All right. So thank you, Jeff, for popping in with your question. Always, always nice to see you at our chats. I want your cat and your cat. I want to remind folks that we've got about six minutes left in our preplanned time for this community chat. So now would be a great time to pop in with questions. And I see a hand from Janet. So I'm going to unmute Janet. Please introduce yourself. Thank you. Welcome. I hope I will. First of all, let me ask you a question and also thank you for doing this and all that you are doing. It's greatly appreciated. But I sent a letter on behalf of District One neighborhood association this morning. And I'm so sorry that it came in late morning. Did you guys get it? Janet, I think I did see it. It's just sort of one of many. But I believe I got it, Janet. OK. And Paul, did you? I'm seeing it. I'm just opening it now. Yeah. Yeah. So as we said in that letter, it was on behalf of the five of us who are on the steering team of the District One neighborhood association. And basically what we were saying is we so appreciate what you are doing. And please keep doing those things. And then we pointed to some new things that we thought we saw in the governor's order number 52 that became effective on Monday. And we asked especially that for an increase in enforcement efforts and that was commensurate with the kind of risk that of life or to people's lives or of long term disability. So there are greater fines that could be assessed. There are a number of things we asked for there. That basically that large gathering should be treated as super spreader events and to have the ability for the Department of Health to call the police in if there's something that's jeopardizing our health. So I, you know, and we pointed out, I think that this is always difficult for town officials or government officials. But in time, you know, we pointed out that smoking regulations weren't popular. Everyone thought that that was going to bring the earth to an end. Seat belts weren't popular with it, but upping the ante did save lives. Many, many, many thousands of lives. So we hope you look at our letter in greater depth. I know you haven't had a chance to look at it in many depth, but that you will hopefully consider intensifying the response that in a way that's appropriate with the risk to people's lives. That's basically what we're asking. Yes, so thanks, Janet. So I haven't read it, but we will read it in our core team meets tomorrow morning. So I'm sure we will discuss the things that you put in that. So thank you for doing that work. And that's helpful to us. We did meet with the university we have a our regular meeting with the university this morning and went through a number of these things. You know, again, we want to do things that change people's behaviors. And there's one of the key pieces of public health strategy is to do successful contact tracing and testing. And the university especially feels very strongly that, you know, maintaining compliance of willing compliance by students to participate in that process is crucial to is an important factor for people to be able to for us to be able to conduct contact tracing successfully. So contact tracing and Jen does this for a living. So she knows a lot more, but you want people to tell you what's going on. If they were at a party, you want them to say, yes, I was at the party. Who did you talk to? Who did you spend time with? And then you follow up with those people. And that's that's the way the system works. If students feel like there's going to be retribution against them for admitting that they've been at a party, there's a sense that that means they will not talk about things. And so so it's we're sort of weighing the two things, the sort of, you know, punitive measures, which we some people feel is be more beneficial and and would would make people stop gathering versus the public health method of trying to ensure proper collection of data. So we can actually address the things that are the people who have the disease. So that's the conundrum we have. The fact of the matter is that the event should correct me, Jen, was not a large gathering that initiated this. This thing, right? Correct. Yeah, it's small. It's like eight people or something. It's about eight, yeah. Yeah. So but all that being said, we also know that the weather this weekend is going to be very warm. We are having additional police officers and ambassadors on the street to just it discourage the gathering of people. It's not necessarily the size of the gathering. It's any gathering. And so we're putting more people on the streets, especially in areas where there have been previous experiences of people gathering, you know, townhouses, one of them, but just a number of places throughout the community. And just making frequent going, going by, checking on if you see a party starting to form, intervene, start to have a conversation, talk about the risks and things like that. The town has issued a number, we issue numbers of those fines, the $300 fines. You know, I think that that's some, that that's, you know, and those are basically town bylaw violation because of noise or non-cooperation or something like that. And then the university, they, you know, these cases do get reported to the university. They review every case over the weekend or the prior week on every Monday morning. They have reported that there's 195 or something cases in the dean of students office being reviewed. I don't know what the disposition of those cases are. And they're not all COVID-19 violations, but they are handling these types of cases on a regular basis. So Jen, do you want to talk about, go ahead? I have a number of live questions that came in from our participants. So I'm not sure if there's much more, if there's anything else on that topic, but I do want to answer it. It's my diplomatic way of saying that. You can just say, quiet down. So I'm going to answer. Mike Pence. No fly though. So I will answer, ask these in the order that they came in. So first we have, hello, can you please tell us when and if the governor will be back up to a different phase and what this could mean for schools and local business? Thank you. I think we have to be non-red, which is lower risk for three consecutive weeks before we can move to a better phase. Okay, great. So another question here, is there any indication of increased community spread of coronavirus in the wake of the UMass outbreak or cluster? Jen. This cluster that we had has been defined as, I think UMass is calling it around 30 or so. We know there are more students. So those extra students, so 98% of the cases are UMass students and they originated from that cluster and they've gone out in waves and sort of generations off of that initial small gathering. So we feel confidence say that the transmission is through this one demographic and is not per se in the general population. Is that a fair description would you say? That made sense to me. And if it makes sense to me, I hope that it doesn't to everybody else. But if that didn't answer your question, I believe it was Sarah, feel free to just pop back in. I do have one more Q&A and a hand in the room. So we have another question here. Has there been an increase to the Department of Health budget in response to their new duties? So the town has CARES Act funds that can compensate for any additional costs that are related to COVID-19. So I think we have engaged a couple of additional nurses to help with contact tracing and whatever the public health department needs, it's the top priority, but there are, we have funds in the bank ready to go for those things. And I'd like, I see a hand in the room. I'd like to welcome and invite Ava in if you could unmute and introduce yourself please. Hi, I'm Ava Fredkin. Thanks for taking my question. I just, Paul, when you were mentioning about the COVID ambassadors being around this weekend to discourage gatherings, I'm wondering if, oh, I'm wondering if you're able to say what, look what streets they'll be on, like will they be on, will it be going to Meadow Street, Summer Street out this area? That's one question. And then connected with that is also, will that only be during the daylight hours or will they also be around in the evening at night to also be discouraging gatherings? So ambassadors will be out. I think they go and they're out until eight or nine at night again, but the police officers will also be out. They will be doing, they do knock and talk and I think the next two afternoons, they're doing summer bridge and townhouse either this afternoon or next tomorrow afternoon. I forget what they're hitting, you know, going where they go door to door. If there are specific places you think they should be, just email us and we'll put that on their list for them to show up. That's a good thing for us to know. So yeah, they'll be out. We are now answering the COVID hotline live until eight or nine at night as well. And there's their ambassadors there and a police officer available to support them in their answering of the phone. Okay, thank you. And the email address just for folks in the room to use is COVID concerns at amrstma.gov. The phone line is 413-259-2425. Again, that's on our homepage and it's on our amrstcovid19.org webpage if you ever need to find that and reference it. So thank you, Ava, for your question. So we are a little bit over time. I don't see any other hands or questions in the chat here. So with that being said, I'd like to invite our panelists to give any last statements that they maybe didn't get asked or something that you wanna leave the room with. We'll pick on Paul first. Oh, no, I just wanna thank everybody for being here. And it's a really hard time. And I, again, please send us your questions because we do respond to them and it does shape how we are deploying our forces and thinking about things. So I really appreciate you reaching out to us. Absolutely, thank you. Marybeth or Jen? I'll go. I'm happy to tell our older adults a couple of things. One, don't forget your flu shot. The newsletter that's coming, I have listed all of the local places where that's gonna be available for you. CBS, Target, et cetera. If you need some information, call us 259-3060. Also please know that we have a senior health services nurse and she is available, Karen Reynon and her number is 259-3257. So you have any questions that come up, you can call and we will make sure that we get back to you. And most importantly, stay involved. If you need ideas, call us. We can have you volunteer. We can have you connect to a program. But as the weather gets colder, it's really important to stay physically and mentally active and we'll help you with that. So we're here all the time, call me anytime. Thank you, Marybeth. Jen? You know, I wanna say that I'm relatively new to this community and I see how people really care about each other here. And I just commend everybody. I know I love how we've been working together. I love hearing all the comments, you know, the information that goes to the COVID hotline because some of those that need to come to me, they do come to me. So it does keep my finger on the pulse, you know, per se. So I appreciate hearing what people have to say and I really learned from some of your comments. And then I was also gonna say, remember to get your flu shot. Don't say, oh, I'm not coming in contact with anybody. I don't need it. Get it anyway. It's gonna keep you safe, other people safe and it builds up your antibodies for next year as well. Great. That's a good timely reminder, Jen. And I will just say one last thing. This chat will be put up on our YouTube channel and our community chats playlist in case you wanna reference something or share it with a friend or neighbor. It'll be up there shortly and we will be back next Thursday and subsequent Thursdays at noon. We will have our, we will announce who our special guests are probably in the next, probably by tomorrow. So you can stay tuned and join us next Thursday as well. And I wanna say thank you for everybody who's joined us and to our special guests, Mary, Beth and Jen. Thanks, Brianna. Yeah, bye-bye. Have a nice day. Yeah, take care.