 You want to be on mute? Hey, Dennis. Hi, how are you doing? Good. Hey, Terry. Hey, you're not on mute. Hi, Hayley. Hey, Norma. Hey, how you doing? Okay. Shut their front light up. It's weird. I know. No, she shut up. Yeah, my camera was being weird. Welcome back. Thank you. So when you want to be muted, just click that spot. Hey, Karen. Hey, Jacqueline. Hello, Hayley. How are you? Good. How are you doing? I'm doing. Good. Well, while we wait for Jean, I can let you all know that we had our most successful cafe. Yesterday. We had about 30 people in attendance. So that was a big success. Some new people, but we also have like a core group of. You know, consistent people who come every week. Good. It's really good. Yeah. We made Valentine's cards and we're throwing a Valentine's party at the next cafe. Next Wednesday. So yeah, be good. Thank you. I've been advertising it. Oh, thank you. Is there a care, a caregivers group at the same time? Not at the same time, but Helen does have the phone one. And then she can also just take some drop-ins. There's going to be some new info in the new newsletter. About caregiver services. Hey, Jean. Sorry for my. I tried five minutes ago and nothing was happening. We're going to dock your pay. Zero to zero. I'm in the hole now. I guess it must be inflation at work. That's right. Let's see. Do we have everybody? Christina won't be with us. Right. Yeah. Okay. I think we do. Okay. Awesome. All right. Welcome everybody. And welcome to the new year. It's been a little bit for us. This is our first meeting of the new year. We're getting a slightly late start, but nevertheless, I think it's going to be an awesome year for us. I'm going to call the meeting to order pursuant to governor Bakers March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law. General law 30 a section 18. This meeting at the council on aging is being conducted via remote participation. This meeting is also being recorded. And we're going to take roll call to check to make sure everybody is here and their video and audio is working. And yeah, if you just remember to unmute when you want to go to speak. So let's just double check. We have everybody here and. Yes. Excellent. Terry here. Chad. Karen here. Jacqueline here. Oh, I'm so excited to see you Jacqueline. Nice to meet you via screen. Yes. Right here. Wonderful. Okay. Excellent. All right. Public comment. Okay. All right. Residents are welcome to talk. Kayleigh, do you have any buddy on your master's screen that? No, but our friends group president is here when we get towards the end to make any friends announcements. As I said, it is a delight to see all of you. It's been a while since we all. We've been on the main screen. As I had mentioned last year, I longed for the day when we can gather in person. So that will be a wonderful thing. But in the meanwhile, here we are. And I think we have, I think. An exciting agenda and an exciting year ahead of us. So without further ado, like to invite Kayleigh to give us an update on what's happening. Yeah. So I think we have a really brief this time. You can see in the director's report, we had a huge increase in December, which I can attribute to things like holiday meals and increased need and social work services. You know, a lot of people applied for fuel assistance in December. We also saw a lot of folks with questions about health insurance and things of that nature. So that kind of explains the dramatic uptick. In January, we had an average check in count of. 620 serving a consistent number of people. It's usually about 300 or so give or take. And then. In January 2023, where you see that figure that about 750 figure, that's duplicated. So that's the same person coming multiple times to the senior center. So we do have a lot of, you know, VP customers. Volunteer hours. We did 221 in December up to 237 in January. In actuality, it's higher than that, even though I'm quite pleased with those numbers. Because we have a disconnect in our volunteer team where folks who deliver meals don't necessarily come into the main area to sign in. So we know that we're doing more than the 20, the 270 237. So that's a lot of work that we're doing. Other updates. We sent an offer letter to a volunteer driver. So we are very lucky to have found a really excellent candidate. Who I will talk more about. Next month, assuming that all the paperwork goes through. And then what will happen next is the driver will need training and we'll have to refine the program guidelines. You know, there's a lot of economic uncertainty right now. So we're going to do that. We're going to do that. So we're going to do that. The way that I had initially conceived of this program may need some alterations, but all those final details will emerge sometime next month. And certainly ahead of and well before we publicize the service. And then I wanted to just let everybody know that we're going to do another open house on Monday, April 3rd from three to five PM. And then we'll be back to you. And then we'll be back to you. And then we'll be back to you. Especially where we were coming like fresh off of the enclosed and still heavily masked. So I do anticipate that we could see more people this year. And if anyone is available to join us on that Monday evening, I would really encourage it. It would be great to have the council on aging, have a table at the event and talk to people about what we do and who we are. I actually have a question, Haley. Yes. About the, the numbers. I'm just curious. People served. Is, is the November number correct? Cause it. There just doesn't seem to be any consistency for month to month with the dupes versus the people served. Well, I think part of that is our. Tracking inconsistency of people. So we still have folks who prefer to do it on paper. We have people who are now doing it on the, my senior center software. So I pull all of these numbers from my senior center. And I just have a strong suspicion that somebody may have forgotten to sign in, you know, paperwork can get lost in the shuffle. So, you know, hopefully once we get a little bit more stability and people are more comfortable using the software platform that we have those little level out, cause they are inconsistent. Some of that is being seasonal, you know, people don't have as much activity in the winter versus the fall and the spring. But I think a lot of it is just inconsistent sign in patterns. Okay. I have a question. That prompted the ways in which they're served. Is there some way in which, because some might have to need direct contact more, much more so than others. Some in the building. Some making inquiries. Things like that is, is that. Tapulated. Yes. How they're, how they're using the center. So what we do is we encourage anyone who has any interaction with the senior center to sign in on my senior center. We make them a card. We get their information. And even if they come by just to like ask a couple of questions, which we try to refer them to that platform so that we can log that we did, you know, X amount of info and referrals. Does it always happen? No. For a variety of reasons. But the people served will encompass anyone who came to a class. You know, people who use social work counseling, people who volunteered. So it encompasses a wide range of things within that. You know, that title. That answers your question. Well, yes and no, because. Some people might come looking for. Information and one of the things I had in the back of my mind was the kind of collaborations that we have going on. Within the local community as well as the state. Because there might be. People needing resources that come. Through the state and another way to. The center. Or there might be ways in which people can connect with resources in the. Larger state. Capacity. And that means that the center is collaborating with other people who serve the elderly. Both in this direct community and in the state and other communities as well. Yeah. So I mean, we can track if we sent someone to a state agency, if we partnered with another town department or another organization and did a program, we can collect the attendance data and enter that. So we are able to capture some of it. You know, when folks just might get a phone call, you know, that may not always be logged, but we can roughly estimate, you know, about how much call volume we're doing in a given day or given week. You know, so we try our best to be accurate, but when you're dealing with this type of data pool, you probably know it's hard to be. Completely accurate. Exactly. Well, the accuracy is one thing, but you don't have to be exact, but have some idea. So you know what might be needed in the future. As much as what's needed immediately. Yeah, definitely. And just more training, I think for participants too. Looks like Chad. I'm sorry. I said, I said, thank you. Oh, thanks. Chad, did you have a question? Yeah. Okay. I was just wondering if we could get any detail. You know, there's a new brawl number of those classes, different kinds of classes. There's, you know, healthcare things like toenail clipping. There's so many categories of different things, the food that is eaten in the building of the meals on wheels that are eating outside the building. If we can get any kind of detail, I think we can get a little bit of detail. I really, really like that you have the return bodies or whatever. So we're starting to be able to see a little bit about who shows up. You know, I have my own theories about who comes there. And I'd like to pick up people who don't come there. I think that's a little more clearly a little more detail. I know that's going to take a lot of work at the center, but some of it is done on the clipboard versus the swipe. Somebody can go down my senior center and look at the number of entries in different programs. If there's anything that that can be done, that's really going to be helpful. Right. And yeah, and I'm happy to add more things. I think one of the things I asked when I was first. You know, I think one of the things that I really like the raw numbers is what do what does the council want to see? What are you most interested in? So if there are, if there's a specific program, if we want to know how many people are we doing foot care appointments for, I can provide that information, but I need your input on the things that are of most interest to you. Because we actually added another half day of foot care appointments. We're now doing Thursdays and Friday mornings. And I think we actually expanded that. How about a spreadsheet? One that shows the highest percentage of attendance programs and the lowest percentage. Five of the time or individual classes. Five of the top. No, of all the programs that are there. You have a, you know, I would not call. Can't remember cafe a class, but it's still a program. Right. Well, yeah, so. I don't know that I can pull that minute detail from my senior center, but it will pull categories. So if you wanted to know how many recreational events, if you do, how many educational workshops, how many like healthcare clinics, I can tell you those numbers. So those are the things you want to see. Just let me know and I'll add them. Like they said, any details helpful. I'm letting you know right now, I guess you're asking me to let you know. Yeah, like to have that. Okay. So, so all to that. So we want recreation and we want health and wellness. Just give me like concrete categories that I can look at. You know, it's kind of like the state of senior housing. There ain't none. So any is going to help. We can use senior housing that's extended care. We can use senior senior housing that's single apartments. So all I'm saying is. If you can go further than you've already done, which is great. We're starting to get more detail. If you can add. Yes, educational programs, health programs. You know, my, since I don't work there anymore, my only contact with the senior center is through the newsletter. So I see that filled with thousands of things to do. And if I can get a handle on which are most popular and which aren't attended. That's a big piece of information. Okay. So any, any of that. I will drop out early tonight. I've got another appointment. I do think that would be really helpful information for us to kind of, and I will speak for myself still trying to get a handle on all that the senior center does, but to kind of see the breakdown of the breadth of programs as well as what the volume looks like if we're heavier in one area than another, and maybe that's because that's what's popular or maybe not. I don't know, but I think it would go a long way in helping us be better informed. Okay. I have a. Another thought that comes up. And yes, I do appreciate your doing the breakdown. One of the things a couple of years ago, somebody was going to do an oral history, an intergenerational oral history project with the library and the senior center and one of the, I was approached about the demographics. Looking at the racial breakdown of the elders in this community and getting a handle on that was almost impossible. And they said they pointed to the senior center as a place where that might be obtained, but it seems that the data wasn't available. Whether we're just looking at coming up for use or coming up for grants. That might be specific to whether it be African, African-American, Asian, Latina and looking at the programming. If we're going to survey people to find out what kind of programs they want and we have some sense of where they're coming from culturally, ethnically, linguistically or racially. It would be good to have that information. I was going to say something very similar. I'm wondering, and this might be in the future, something I don't know if we can collect this data now, but looking at the age and ethnicity, racial makeup of people who are coming to existing programs, I think would be really useful to figure out who we're reaching and who we're not reaching and then comparing it to the demographic information in Amherst. This would be a great student project. Find a student who was looking for some kind of project to dig into the data, I think would be really terrific. Yeah. I'm a little bit uncomfortable about that. I feel that we have a professional like Haley running the senior center. And we seem only to be asking her for numbers and information about its use rather than asking her about her observations as to what's going well, what's needed, what's, you know, where it should be expanded. It's as if we're using Haley's presence just to give us statistics. And I think that disturbs me a little bit. I'd like to hear more about what Haley thinks the center could use or do or be doing more of so that it isn't up to us to just deal with numbers and look at who's using it. I'd like to know more about Haley's opinions about just the number. Sorry, I don't know what's up with my camera today. But I thank you for that, Ann. Because I do, if we're talking about what's working well, our cafe is definitely probably our best program right now. And we have a really wide range of people. We actually had two individuals who are experiencing homelessness come to the cafe this past Wednesday. We had a trans woman come and she had a really great experience and we were, you know, we're kind of also working in the background on creating an LGBTQ cafe. So that person was really excited in that. We have quite a few members of the Hispanic community who come to the cafe. The age ranges are kind of all over the place. Obviously there's myself and my staff on the younger team of things, but we have people 60s, 50s and beyond. There's a woman who takes her mother every week and she lives in West Springfield, but she makes the drive to this cafe because it's so relaxing and it's a format that they really like. So I would say that's probably the program that I am the most proud of right now because it's really hitting a need for a wide range of people. And it's low key. I think that is something that people are looking for post-pandemic. They don't want to have to register. I can tell you right now the programs where you have to pre-register, we don't get it. People don't want to call. It's a lot of stress to make an appointment and you know, feel obligated to do something, but this is just dropping and people come on time where they come late or early. It doesn't matter. Exercise classes are always very popular here. We started the Fit Forward program with Kathy Lawler and that has been very popular because it's more fast paced. Prior to that, we had healthy bones and balance. We had yoga, but the only real active class was Zumba. And so now we have another one. So it appeals to people who, you know, don't want to stay seated while they're exercising. They want to get up and they want to, you know, be on a mat on the floor and really get the cardio. Book care, again, we now are doing a half a day. So we're, you know, doing a, you know, 25% more appointments now because we've had such increased demand for this service. How much is foot care costing now? It's $50. If you come to the senior center, but we do have health and wellness grants. So if someone doesn't have the financial means, they should have a conversation with me and I have a self declaration form. It's very simple. You just say yes or no to a couple of questions. And if you qualify, we can comp up to a certain amount within a calendar year. So that's certainly something people can look at. And if you need the nurse to go to your home, that will cost you $80. And is any of it covered by health insurance? Possibly. Well, I should actually be more specific. So we have two nail clinics. We have the nurse who performs the foot clinic, but then we also have a, like a nail manicurist. And so she can do appointments. She can't do things like diabetic feet, but for $25, she can cut your toes and she can give you, you know, that kind of foot massage and take care of your nails. If you don't need a lot of in-depth help. And that's obviously more attractive to people who for $50, it's a little cost prohibitive. So you can get, you know, just a pedicure or you can get the, the in-depth foot care that you need. And both of those are pretty popular now. You know, arts and crafts programs, you know, again, I'm not seeing the numbers. And until we find more volunteer teachers, it's really cost prohibitive to have people come in and lead a, a workshop. So, you know, we might get one person who registers and they will charge, you know, $200 for the hour and it's not financially viable. So we're working now on trying to get some more volunteer leaders for different art workshops. But those are, you know, again, so the cafe is working out very well. The health and wellness. You know, Helen is seeing a lot of people with fuel assistance applications. You know, I think my feeling is that people really just want like a hangout space. They want to just be able to come in and talk to people and they're not really needing, you know, formal programs like educational workshops. Those also do not pull a crowd any longer. I mean, somebody brought up people who are houseless. And I, I've been listening to radio programs over the past umpteen years. And one of the things that certainly occurred to me over the past couple of years has been the place where people can feel comfortable, people who are houseless. And I know that I was, I was directed one year to a group that is behind, I understand the camp out behind Walmart, that area back there somewhere. I've never been able to find them and I haven't gone much since COVID. Um, but I'm just wondering if any of them, and I don't want them to feel uncomfortable. But being that when they, when they are in shelters, they have to be out generally at a certain time. And I'm wondering if elders in that category, find a way to make their way there. You, so I'm, unfortunately, I'm probably going to have to ditch my camera. Just, I'm not sure the connections wonky. Um, so you're talking about, um, houseless older adults coming to the center. Yeah. Yeah. And the house, the house was older adults. I, I suppose, and I don't know if it's open to anybody. Yeah. The, the set actually I was talking to, um, other senior center directors in the area. And, you know, you, you can't bar someone from coming into the senior center, especially since it's a public building. We can reserve certain programming for older adults. They are social work counseling. Um, but, you know, we are open. We are community center and we are open to all. And I have found that a lot of, um, the older adults in our community really like intergenerational. Um, maybe not in every setting, but there are times when that is very much welcome. I haven't seen as many houseless older adults coming. Um, usually I would get to meet, um, folks in their forties or fifties, um, who come and they might come, you know, have a seat and just warm up or like I said, a couple of folks came to the cafe and, you know, we gave them lots of coffee and baked goods and, um, um, you know, one of the interesting pieces about the cafe, since we do it on Wednesdays, that's the day that the survival center is closed. So it is kind of nice for, for folks to have an alternative. Um, on where to go. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You all said Jacqueline. Yeah. Thank you. No problem to answer your question. I go to a lot of the feeding sites and that's where you do see some of the older homeless. Um, and as our director said, they really enjoy the intergenerational which. Yeah. Um, so the Wednesday morning breakfast, uh, the evening, uh, not bread alone, uh, some of the other places, whether they use the shelter or not. Look, they'll come to the different services. So. Yeah. And open door with something going on is, is great. Um, we're going to be rolling out a lot of things for, for folks in that category. I don't know if you're familiar with him and Chris. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you both. All three. Was there anything, um, was there anything else you wanted to add Haley with regards to, um, your center? I know we're going to kind of get to the future in just a few minutes as we look ahead to, you know, set goals and whatnot and, and hear some of your vision, but was there anything else in the, the current that you wanted to make mention of to us in terms of obviously our senior center is limited by our facility. Um, I, when I was in the other day, a gentleman came in and he, he said, I, you know, I'm with the Hadley senior center and I said, how nice for you. We said, do you folks have this center? I was like, no. No. Um, yeah. Well, it's, it's funny you say that. So one thing that I am. Trying to kind of slowly get into is ways that we can do programs that are not at the senior center. Um, because I think not only might that be good for people who don't want to go to like an old folks place. Unfortunately for them, they don't know that it's awesome. Um, but it might also get people who aren't able to come or, um, you know, just people who might be able to see it in a different way. If it's not at the bank center, and then that might be a nice introduction to say, Hey, you know, you, you didn't know that we did this. We're being a little outside of the box, but why don't you come check us out? Um, so I think it'll help with outreach and just engaging people in a different way. Plus it's collaboration sounds good. Yeah. And that may appeal to a different senior that we, we can't get in the center. So yeah, I think that's, I think thinking out the boxes or outside the box, I can't even talk. It's a good side of the bangs. For banks in your buck. I'll start with your funds. Quick. All right. Um, okay. And so you're good with upcoming programs. I just want to make sure I have it. That's the big one. Yeah. The open house. Um, you know, and everyone's welcome. Come by the cafe sometime. We had again, about 30 people. Um, we're doing a Valentine's party on Wednesday, the 15th. So you're anyone's welcome to come to that. And, uh, And yeah, that's it. Awesome. Thank you. And just before we leave Haley, since she mentioned the Valentine's party on the 15th. Um, there are things that I would love to bring my husband to at the senior center, but the senior center is following the town mask policy. And he has normally in system and many older people. You know, the town mask policy is wonderful for the general population. I'm just wondering whether any thought is ever given to having some programming where people know that that particular program. Is a masked program. That might bring some people in. I don't think that would come in otherwise. It's like the Amherst cinema has one show a week where people have to wear masks and people who are concerned about it. No, that's the show they can go to. So I just before we leave the senior center thing, I would just like to make the suggestion that that be considered. I think that's a great idea. I think that's a great idea. I think that's a great idea. I'm just telling people in advance. This one is a mask one. Don't come if you don't want to wear a mask. Do come if you're reassured by that. That might get you a different population. That's really, that's actually a really great idea. I didn't know that Amherst cinema was doing that, but I think it's smart and you're right. If it was designated, the people who aren't interested can steer clear, but if you would prefer that. I think you're the expert. I think you're the expert. So I think it's better to do like a socialization program, or like a specific activity for that. I don't know. I think, I mean, I think you are the expert on. What might expand. I'm just giving you input as to. Like why I wouldn't go, for example, to the, the. because I'm not assured that everybody's going to be masked. So I'm not saying that all the programs should be masked programs, that wouldn't be fair either, but you may be losing. I'm only telling you, you're certainly losing my segment of the population because it's not masked and we can't afford to take the chance. So just think about it. Oh, I will, thank you. Even straight socialization might be great. The games were very well attended. If there was more furniture, people could just come in and hang out, more places to sit and gab. With a mask, they can do that. COVID rules are sort of dropped right now and people are really trying to bust out. So even just the straight socialization thing might work. OK. Yeah, sounds like a great idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good. All right. I'm sorry. I got another appointment. OK. All right. I'll look at it. I'll look at the tape. Thank you. All right. See you next month. Yes. All right. We're going to move on. Yes. Going to move on to next on our agenda is new business. And among our new business, we want to talk about in part how we want our meetings to run. I think just I still feel like a new member. And I know many of you are much more seasoned than I. But I feel like it's a new year and a new opportunity for us to set some guidelines for our meetings so that we can have a more positive and productive meeting. I think there are some things that we're learning as we go. Zoom has limited us somewhat in what we can do. But I think we want our meetings to be more than just reporting out or getting updates because we can certainly read those on our own. So I hope you join me in your desire to help. Haley and I improve these meetings so that they can be more engaging for folks. And among the things that I think will help us to accomplish that is setting some guidelines about what we expect from one another so that folks are kind of clear on how things are going to run. And I would like to kind of open the floor to that and invite you all to give thought to what you would like in the meeting among the things that I would just request of you is that I think it's really important that we hear from each and every one of you. And I would like my hope is that we can make these meetings more equitable in that there isn't just one or two voices that are kind of dominating the conversation, that everybody has an opportunity to contribute in that after somebody has spoken, that we let others speak before anybody wants to kind of have a second go round on a topic. Because I think sometimes some folks are getting shut out or left out when that occurs. What do you all think about that? I agree with you. I think it's important that there be some element of dynamic movement. And it will help to know what we're operating with and what our expectations are. So yeah, yeah, I certainly agree with you. OK. Interestingly enough, I was thinking of the same thing when I read the minutes and when I read the agenda. Yeah. Good. Terry, I see your hand up. I think we should just set a time limit for each thing. Because sometimes people talk and we go over. Like last time, we couldn't approve the minutes because we ran out of time. So if we just set a time limit for each thing, if it's going to go over, then we'll put it on the next month's agenda to continue it. Mm-hmm. OK. OK. Are you good? Did you have something else? I'm trying to watch these little hands that pop up. So OK. Karen? Yeah, I think I like the idea of more interactive meetings. I think if we're going to be asked our input, maybe telling us in advance so we can prepare and think about it, I think it would be really useful for me personally instead of having to think during the meeting when things might not occur to me, if there's topics of discussion, putting those out a week or two beforehand so that we can prepare, I think would be, at least for me, would be really useful. Yeah, excellent point. You mentioned a week or two ahead of time. And I actually was, that was something I would watch yourself. I feel like 48 hours is, for some of us, cutting it close. Because if you don't have, if you have a busy 48 hours prior to the meeting, you don't have time to give thought to it. So is that something Haley that you think is realistic for us to be able to do? I think it might take some time. But I think if we come to a consensus tonight on what we feel are good guidelines, I think then we can, I think realistically we could probably discuss no more than like two or three, maybe four topics. So if we start saying a list of priorities, then we could plan the meetings out pretty far in advance. So I think that's an accomplishable goal once we kind of fine tune how the meeting operates and get a list curated of what we need to be discussing. OK. Great. You guys come in up with great ideas. What else? Well, I'll second you on the I think everyone should speak before there are second voices. That way we just get everybody's input. Or at least we won't force you to speak. But if you have something and you want to say it, you should be given an opportunity to say that. And then maybe just caution folks that if you're reiterating the same point, maybe just try incorporating a new idea to that. Because if you're saying the same thing and we have limited time to talk about something, it would be more prudent to keep your conversation concise. Does that make sense? Yes. Can you just say a little? I would just like to really encourage folks to share your thoughts, particularly as we sort of kick around some new things. I think it's really important that this works for all of us. And silent sometimes it's hard to figure out, are you with us? Or you think it's a stinky idea and you're just not comfortable saying it. So I'm looking at you, Dennis. You're smart. What did you say? I know you've been very quiet, Dennis. I'm sorry about that. You're our token male. Oh, god. If somebody's coming up with a stinky idea. It's hard to put you on the spot here. If somebody's coming up with a stinky idea, I'll basically let you know. And so far, I've basically been pretty much agreeing with everything that's been going on. If one thing that I really did like from Chad's tenure as the head of the group was that he indeed did very actively seek out the opinions of every member one at a time. And I thought that was really admirable on his part. Thought it was a solid idea. And so I think it's the kind of thing that you, as Eugene, as the chair, should go right on doing, even though you did drag me out of silence just a couple of minutes ago. So thank you. So when you said seek them out, you mean call upon each person one at a time? Well, that's pretty much what he did. I mean, I'm not so sure. I don't know how intentional it really was. I mean, I'm sure it was intentional. But I don't know if he was following, if he was ticking down the list, or if it just happened a bit more organically than that. But yeah, I think soliciting opinions is a really, really smart thing to do. Yeah. Yeah. I would agree. Just like you just did. Very good. Any other thoughts with regards to meeting guidelines for us? Because I think part of this is we just want to have some clear guidelines that we all kind of know what to expect and how things are going to go. I don't want anybody to feel like they're surprised or anything else from other groups you're involved with. You think things that work really work out well. I mean, obviously, it's very useful to get the agenda ahead of time to know what we're going to be discussing. And we can certainly, I think, look to maybe set some arbitrary times, I think, until we sort of get this all hashed out. I don't know that we're going to be really good at our times, although we'll try. Ann? I'm sort of at a loss for words as to how to describe my discomfort with my, I guess I've been to four meetings so far. And I know there is a certain, because many of us are new, that there's a certain introductory period to how a group works. And I'm also a little confused about the open meeting rule and because I was so eager that we become involved in short and long-term goals and do some active work, I suggested that there be a subcommittee to work on it so that we wouldn't get in the way of open meeting rules and that we could report back. So our subcommittee, Chad and I, we've met a number of times. We have a different approach to how to go about developing something to report to you and get you actively involved. But it seems to me that once a month, if we're going to move forward with anything, to meet once a month and have that meeting be a discussion of many little things, we're not going to accomplish a lot that way. So I'm sort of asking the question as to what the structure is going to be so that when we do have a once a month meeting, we're really sinking our teeth into something and working. And I don't know how that's going to work with Zoom and the open meeting laws and everything else. I'm really looking for some guidance because I put a lot of energy into a lot of research. And I really don't know what to do with it. Yeah, it was clear to me you did put an awful lot of time in and you gave us a lot of great information. I think among the things that I learned since you and Chad had different approaches to it is we needed or I needed and with Haley's support to clarify if we're going to have committees, how that's going to kind of work with regards to the council and what your output, how that needs to be presented to us. Because as you know, we got two very different animals. If you will, and didn't quite know what to do there. So I will just say since this was the first time we had folks, I'm going to say part of my learning curve that should have offered some guidance with regards to that. And so if you will, I'm a day late and a dollar short. But here we go. When we do break into committees, and I expect in the future that we probably will so that we can get more things accomplished, we need to make sure that we have guidelines for committees so that everybody's clear on what you're working on, what is your project, what is your task at hand. And then what are we looking for that in a committee, we're looking for one report, not two different or three different things depending on something from every single member. And the expectation, I don't think this will come as a surprise to anybody, is we need it written up in a standard format. It can't be like a texting numbers, letters, shorthand. Everything is going to be written out in a more formal way with the report needs to have an introduction. We need to have the body of work, the conclusion, because this document is going to be part of a public record. And obviously we want it to represent the Council of Aging well. So those are among the things I want to make sure that people are aware of as we go forward so that we can avoid what has happened. Yeah. Hailey, I see your hand up. I wish I could see you, Hailey. I know. Yeah, usually it's fine. I don't know what's going on. But I have a couple. I think you're absolutely right about the shorthand, about the official document. We want things to be presented in a way that when someone from the public reads it, they sense the seriousness and the effort in which we put forward our communications. And then I do have a light at the end of the tunnel. If we envision being in April 2023, the executive order on remote meetings will be lifted. So at that point, we will be able to resume. So just keep thinking April, April. And then about the open meeting law, I can tell you in a very general sense, if you're discussing something that should be discussed among the Council as a whole, or particularly if you're discussing something that could be voted on, that would be an open meeting law violation. But I can also say that MCOA, for the Mass Council on Aging, is developing a training for COA board members. And so that'll give an overview of what a COA does, some general guidance about state ethics, the meeting law. And I know that they're working very diligently on that. So I'm expecting to hear more about that soon. Do you think that will be available or done for this year, or is this more of a long term? Yeah, I think this year, I'm just not sure. They said to keep reading their briefs, which anyone can subscribe to. And if you don't, they're really helpful, because they'll talk about grant opportunities. They talk about different initiatives all around the Commonwealth. I definitely would recommend subscribing to their emails. And eventually, that will be coming forward. And it's a really helpful training. I've had it done with my prior Council on Aging. And it's so informative, especially for people who are not used to being on town committees. Yeah, that sounds awesome, which leads me to something else that I don't know. Again, I will just speak for myself, although technically, I guess I do qualify as a senior. I don't feel like I know a lot. So I'm looking to learn in so resources, like MCOA. I think I don't know about everyone else, but I would appreciate having other resources that we can kind of look at so that we can learn. We can compare ourselves, get new ideas. We can educate ourselves. So I just wanted to throw that out. I don't know how others feel about that, but I agree. Yeah, same here. I don't want to hold up your question, Karen, but does anybody else read other senior centers' newsletters? Yes. Yeah, so I think that's also a good way to get your pulse on what's going on. And I think especially what does it look like, what are the programs they're doing? That's actually how I kind of get some of my ideas by reading others. So that's probably one of the best ways. And I always look at Hampshire and Franklin and sometimes the Eastern countable. Get the Northampton one in the mail. The newsletter. Today's reminder has a front page top of the page headline, Hadley approves housing dementia-friendly plans. And the whole thing is about that kind of planning and working with the AARP group. I guess when I came on board, I expected that we would be a working group working to do exactly that and take something to the town council or to the board. So I'm still asking the same question. How are we going to get it? Yeah, so in my experience of once a month board meeting like this, the work doesn't get done at this meeting. It's got to get done in subcommittees. But what concerns me is we're such a small group that I think we can only hit on a couple of initiatives given the size of our group. And so I think we need to be really targeted about priorities and what we want to prioritize because there's so few of us. And if we're going to be doing much of our work in committees, there's only so much we can ask of. But again, in my experience, the once a month meeting, this isn't where work gets done because that's just impossible. I think proposals need to be brought forward to this group to talk about those proposals. But that work of developing the proposals is done in committees. But again, my concern is that we're so small that there's not a whole lot of initiatives we can work on. So I think we have to be really careful about what we prioritize. That's yeah. Yeah, that's an excellent point. Yeah, and I think we can go in a lot of different directions. I mean, there's no shortage of things. I think if we all just did a brainstorm right now, we could easily fill a page. And we can't do that. The other thing I don't want to do is frustrate myself or any of you that were sort of scattered all over the place. So I do think we're going to need to drill down. I will say for me, again, I'm just going to speak for myself. I feel like I still need to educate myself more on, I like information. I like data. So I love tiering. I would love to learn more about our seniors in town. Haley has certainly heard me speak on this. But I want to get a better sense of who the seniors are. As much information as we can gather, I think is valuable for us to make sure that we understand who we are. And then I think to me, what would make sense is to kind of map our different populations and segments to what are we currently offering to see whose needs we're meeting and then maybe where there are some holes, which you may or may not be able to fill. I don't know. But I don't feel, I feel like now I'm still kind of putting my hands up trying to walk in the dark field my way through. I don't know what we should be. I know we want to improve and get better. But I'm not sure which way is the step forward, I guess. And I don't know if I articulated that clearly. But. Well, and I think I think I can answer your question a little bit, you know, the doing part of the meetings. I think one of the things on new business is short and long term goals. I think we should set a couple. I think we should set two or three short term within six months to a year, something we can do and build our momentum up so that we have an accomplishment under our belts and then think about in long term goals, you know, another two or three things that we can work on for the next two to five years. If we meet and we know what the meeting expectations are and we know what the committee expectations are, we should be able to develop from that a list of where do we want to target our resources? Because Karen's right, we're pretty small. It would take the involvement of everyone being on a subcommittee to really push things forward. And I like you, I'm pretty action oriented. So I want to, I like to get those easy wins and then build on that and keep growing. I thought that crosses my mind because of, you know, the truth that it is such a small group. It is that we almost inevitably have to in some cases at least have to create essentially committees of one and divvy up the responsibilities and hopefully get reports whenever they're appropriate. That's my thought. That's good. I wonder if this would be a good time for us to kind of segue into goals setting. We had made mention of it, you know, last year and I'm sure in the past two months that's all anybody's ever thought about. What goals? But I do, I think there's a lot of value in setting goals. You have something to aim for work towards and also kind of measure yourself against. So as we talk about short term goals, I think perhaps what might be reasonable is like a six months to a year would consider a short term goal and then multi-year for long term. Has that seemed reasonable to folks? Yes, of course. Yeah, I think it's a good idea too. We have to figure out where we're going and establishing priorities and goals that makes all the sense in the world, of course. So Haley, before we sort of get cracking on this, do you want to share with us what goals you... Yes, I'm trying to pull up my document. You may have to talk without me for a second while I look through my email. Well, I can tell you one of the goals, well here, let me actually start with this. One of the goals that I am the most proud of is that we increase the income limit for the senior tax work-off program. I think that was much needed. Again, we went from about $36,000 a year for a single person to $54,000 a year for a single person. But there's still work that needs to be done with the senior tax work-off program because some of you may not know this, but you have to pay federal income tax off of that. So they say you can get up to $1,500, but what you will actually receive is less than that because they're going to take out a couple hundred bucks of income tax, of federal income tax. So I think we need to spread awareness about that. I think that we need to... People need to know so that we can make some changes. Haley, can you explain? I'm not aware of what you're talking about. Can you explain a little more? I would be happy to. So we have a senior tax work-off program. And what that is is you... If you're income eligible and you can work, volunteer for a town department and earn money off of your property tax bill. So you can receive an abatement of up to $1,500. This cycle, you would work at $15 an hour for no more than a hundred hours. And then you're able to get the abatement. There are other abatements for folks who don't meet those income guidelines. People can get like $1,000 off if you meet certain age requirements. There's veterans discounts and so on. But it's a really great tool for people who are feeling that property tax burden, which will be going up. Some of you may have seen the Gazette article. Yeah, it's a great program. We still have more slots if you know of people whom I wanted. So, and I found my document. This will be posted in the town upcoming budget information. So what I said my goals were for the upcoming year was to increase our average daily attendance by 10%. I want more bodies in the room. We're gonna be doing that outreach campaign. So I've got some preliminary numbers. There's at least 2,000 people, 65 to 75. And now I have a list of all the ages in the town. So once we do this initial campaign, we can look at people in their 80s, people in their 90s. So that's another goal. It's just to kind of spread awareness of the senior center. We're gonna be launching the Silver Shuttle, which will be our transit program. It will look a little bit different, but we'll at least be able to take people to the senior center to medical appointments, which were probably one of the few senior centers in the area that doesn't have a transit program. And then I wanna be working with student groups for volunteer opportunities and intergenerational programming. I was approached, for example, I was approached by Eisenberg School of Management. They're looking for volunteer opportunities for their class. And one of the things they said they would be interested in is helping us with fundraising efforts. Because that's again, something that we are very seriously lacking. And they were really interested in the idea of how do you market a senior center in a modern society? So their wheels are turning. And I think that would be a great project for them, because we do face the issue of people need us, but they don't wanna go to us. And so hopefully their brainstorming will help. So that's one way. Again, we can work with fraternities and sororities. I think at one time, pre-pandemic, there was like a, they would send fraternity brothers to rake leaves in people's yards and things like that. So I think I said this before, the colleges are our biggest asset in this community and we're not utilizing them to the full potential that we could be. So that's certainly some target areas that I've already identified. And now as we're talking, I have more, but that's a start. That sounds terrific, because they are in many respects an untapped talent and it's a win-win, right? Yes. For them, you're building relationships. It's, yeah, that's tremendous. Excellent, okay. So our short-term, so let us as a council, hoping we can identify, if not our specific goals, maybe some areas that we want to focus on and then maybe we can flush them out between now and our next meeting. But anybody wants to start throwing out ideas for short-term and I would like to just suggest that we limit our goals to, no more than three short and long-term and we can be less than that, but I also want us to be successful, I guess is the other piece. So, yeah. And did you have your... Yeah, I did. Okay, I'm gonna preface this by saying, I love the idea that we're focused very much on the senior center, but as I said before, I think we have a professional, Haley, running it and I think she's open to our ideas for improvement, but we're a council on aging and from my point of view, I don't think all of our focus on short or long-term goals should be only those things that can be accomplished by the senior center. For example, I brought this up very early. We're living in a time of not only climate change, but earthly disasters. We do not have a resilient center plan. We invited our wonderful guy from the fire department who's simply told us there's a plan to use the Mullen Center if we need a warming or cooling center. That's not a resilient center. There is no real plan for letting people know where to go. No real plan for telling them what they need. Most of the people, I held a series of focus groups with people and most older people don't even know they need to have a go bag in the house. They don't know what a go bag is. They don't know what goes into it. So I think we have as a short-term goal, the identification of those things that will keep people safe first. Yes, people happy is another thing. But I think there's safety and security comes first. And so if we can identify those short-term things that will support the safety and security of older people will also support not older people. I think that comes first in a short-term goal for me. I agree. Do you want to vote on it? I think that sounds like a reasonable goal to me. Can I ask just a general question? How much of that is under our control versus not under our control? It may not be under our control to develop a resilient center but to report to the town council what we think is needed in terms of what's needed to call a resilient center and how we can communicate or should be communicating. I mean, one of the things that, again, I'm going to go to the side. I have gone to the side of the town council. I have been told, oh, you can find this out there and that out there. The steps that you have to take and what you have to go through to get anywhere near the information is beyond most people's attention span. And I'm not even talking about whether somebody has ability to use the internet or not. It's the time that it takes. One needs to have some direct communication. And so I'm really, I guess I'm like, I have a one year appointment to the COA. In this year, I would like to see one thing go from beginning to end and accomplish that will help the seniors in Amherst. Amen. That's wonderful, that really, really helps me. Yes, and I don't know, I'm trying to navigate my way from technology here. I think if there's anything we can think of individually, what you're saying just furthers the notion that we have to begin at one point ourselves and then move it into the collective place. So that as a group, we agree on at least one thing for the year. Yeah, I agree with you. That's a great idea. Yeah, yeah, I agree also. And I think it's, you're right about having to pull a lot of different bits of information together and that's probably the thing that this committee could really do would be to pull it all together. So the instance for the idea of a go bag which is so simple. And might I also add to the go bag an ordinary common transistor radio that does not depend on cell towers going up or down or anything else but just an ordinary common transistor radio and things like that to make it easier to at least be able to communicate to the seniors that this is what's necessary just in case. The go bag and the go place. Because that was something that concerned me when I came forward that I had called around and people were telling me, well, you might do this and call a friend and I'm saying, but there's a town half a place for its citizens. I mean, we're told it's the Mullen Center but how do people get there? And how do they- Exactly, exactly. And under what circumstances do they go there? And yes, yes, yes. This does seem to be beyond the senior. You know, I agree that this should be a priority but one thing we should think about as we're moving forward is this seems to be beyond seniors. You know, this isn't just an issue for seniors it's an issue for all the residents of Amherst. Both are true, yeah. It is, it is Karen, you're right. And yet, I think the seniors constitute a much more and you're absolutely right. At the same time, seniors constitute an even more vulnerable population. Exactly. All seniors don't drive, they have no place yet. Where do you go? And in times like COVID, especially, what do you do? How do you handle that? Yeah. If, and like in the, in the go back, if, and COVID is still a reality as we come, as we come to another stage of it, we still have to talk about the realities that people are facing, people who are elderly, people who are more vulnerable, those particulars. We can't leave it to fate. That's what I think about is the other vulnerable populations and who else we need to partner with to make sure that, yes, we're concerned with the seniors, but there are other vulnerable populations, nor are we thinking about maybe I'm going to go ahead. And maybe we could be the model. There's an African proverb that says, beware of the naked man and I, I abridge it, naked man or woman who comes bringing you clothes. So it helps to have a pilot, so to speak. And it's not that it's only the elders, but especially the elders. Well, and perhaps what we could do is focus on the elders. There'll be parts that would be applicable to other populations, but focus are the seniors in town. Yes. I would agree. Making sure people are safe is really important. So I support the idea of working on a resilience plan, Ann. Yeah. Yeah. And the terrible news, go ahead, I'm sorry. No, I was just going to say, I think I'm seeing Haley's hand up since I can't see her eyeballs. Yes. This is actually really great for me. I feel so incognito. I'll get used to it, Haley. Well, I was listening and I was, I had a lot of great thoughts. I think people are generating some really amazing ideas. And I just wanted to underscore two things. One, I absolutely think that the council should, our council on aging should be talking to the town council. I think that's absolutely one of your functions. Resilience center. And I would also make a plug for. People are living on a fixed income at a time of unprecedented inflation and taxes are going up. I think that's something else that we should be thinking about as a group. Yep. And then, but it also shows, you know, as your, as you're making your case to the town council, we can tie in that into events at the senior center. So I'm hearing the resilience center and I'm thinking, well, the senior center sponsors community safety day. And how great would it be to have information for seniors on how to prepare for emergencies at community safety day? Right. So everything is kind of coming together. So that was one of my thoughts. And then the second thought is one of the tenants of the age and dementia friendly project was that supporting older adults supports everyone. So you're right. We can really only focus or should only focus on our older adults, but that makes it a better community for everyone. And I think that also helps sell the message of we need to be taking older adults concerns more seriously. Those, those are my two thoughts. Yeah. Ditto. I haven't heard anybody who's opposed to us focusing on a resilience plan for short, short. I think it's a wonderful idea. I really do. Brilliant idea. Yeah. Thank you. And you made this so easy. The identification, not the doing, but. I've done a lot of research on the doing. Yeah. All right. All right. Awesome. Do we want to tackle. Long term. Oh, I don't know if we have time for that. We're already at almost 20. We might get carried away. All right. Okay. So how about we do this? Yes. Yes, but if you all could give thought to your ideas with regards to. To long term, that would be, that would be awesome. And if any of you want to send them in. Ahead of time, I'll be happy to. Compile them to see if we have any common themes or whatnot. That we can then work from. That might be. We might get carried away. All right. Okay. So how about we do this? Yeah. Yeah. So that might be. You have, you have my list already. So if other people would send a list of things, that would be really good. Then we could see where we have a. Sort of group interest. Yep. Yep. Absolutely. But I also think there's great value when, you know, as we bounce ideas off of one another, it's really awesome. Okay. So thank you for keeping me on task here, Hailey. So I guess next up is approval of minutes from. This past fall's meeting. So let's start with November. Minutes. Thanks to Terry. I'm hoping everybody had a chance to. You know, I'm hoping that there will be some changes or. Changes that they thought needed to be made. Move that we accept the November minutes. Second. Awesome. Awesome. All in favor. All right. Okay. Those opposed. I'm not opposed per se, but I think what I would suggest is there's. There's a gap for me. Sometimes from morning till evening. So when I'm trying to remember if there's anything I would suggest. The highlighted or underscored or be included. The time gap between the receiving of the minutes. And then there's a gap between the receiving of the minutes. And then there's a gap between the receiving of the minutes. And then the approving of the minutes is. Quite a distance. So to be quite honest. I, I, I can't say I, I. Holy agree or I disagree at any point. And if I do it's just for fun. Okay. Is it fair to mark you as in. That you're abstaining. Yes. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Jacqueline, we obviously this was what I hope is a very unusual situation that we're months later. Approving that, you know, our aim certainly will be to, to be timely in doing the approval, the very following meeting. So hopefully we don't run into this again. Okay. Very good. So that is November. Okay. Meeting minutes. Any questions, concerns, suggestions, revisions. Anybody. Saw on those. Anybody want to make a motion to. Approve. Move that we approve the minutes for the December meeting. So moved. Excellent. All in favor. Aye. Aye. I'm going to abstain because I wasn't at the meeting. And Jacqueline, are you, sorry, I can't see your, if your hand was up or down or are you. I'm abstaining. Okay. Very good. Just wanted to make sure we were clear for the record there. Splendid. Okay. I think we are now on to friends of the Amherst senior center. So with the minutes upset accepted. Yeah. Okay. I didn't know the abstaining how that happened. Oh, sorry. My apologies if I'm. I got to learn my chair lingo, I think. Sorry. I appreciate coaching me along. Terry. While we're at this point, I'd like to say. I've been doing the secretary minutes for 18 months now. And I'm going to stay on the council, but if anybody knows anybody who wants to take on the secretary minutes job. Dennis. No. Doesn't hurt. Nice try. You know, if anybody knows of anybody who wants to take on the minutes, the secretary position, let me know. We appreciate you. Yes. Thank you. In many respects, it's a thankless job, Terry, but. My abstinence. Terry is not a reflection is. The short term memory. It is. And so I cannot honestly, I can't honestly say. What I should be saying. Okay. All right. And I didn't take any. I didn't jot down anything that jumped into my mind while we were having the meeting. So that says that I need to tune into that maybe a bit more. I think next up is. Friends of the senior center. Is. Dick with us. He is. I promoted him to a panelist. Excellent. Welcome. Thank you. The news about the friends is all about the town census. And I think that's what we're talking about. Is by far and away in. Orders of magnitude, I can't even describe our biggest fundraising. Effort. Is through the solicitation letter. That is always included. With the annual town census and Amherst. Last year. The combination of. Leaders changing. And town hall deciding that they wanted to let everybody know that. They dropped our letter out without telling us. So our biggest fundraising thing. Just went completely out the window. So. With my constant. Reminders and encouragement. Haley's been working ever since. To get. That. Make that a reality this year. And a town hall. Has worked with her. And has assured her that it will happen. We've said, we don't want to hear anything about extra postage costs. That you don't want to put it in. Put it in. We'll pay the extra postage. But we want that part and parcel. With the census letter. Because having it mailed separately. The disassociation would makes all the difference in the world. Yeah. Now we're on, we've been assured. Haley's been assured that this is going to happen. And we're all just waiting on pins and needles. For our census letter to come with the friend solicitation. So that, that's, that's the big thing. Haley's getting tired of me asking her about it. Never. But it's that important. It is very important. So no one's gotten their town census. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, I can tell you, Dick. Mary sent over the donor list and we had like 40 some donors. Since the last newsletter went out. So that's really good. Cause we had been pretty low on that. Maybe we had hit like 20 or less. And you need to get credit for making that newsletter. So much better. Better than it's true. Really good job. Yeah. And it's getting appreciated by more and more. Yeah. Thanks. Just wait till you see our new E newsletter hitting your inbox next, or this March. That'll be even more successful. That's going to be called the senior spirit light. And it will just be a monthly snapshot of all our programs and, you know, the program highlights, it won't have everything. If you want everything, you got to get the paper format. It'll be more comprehensive, but the special programs we want to promote will all be there. And it'll be beautiful and full color. Easy to read. Yeah. I also want to thank Jean for attending our board meeting last month. And it was a pleasure to be here with you. When I walked in the room, I didn't recognize her because of course, she was wearing a mask. It's two different worlds. There's all kinds of people that just don't look. We don't recognize each other. Different venues. But thank you for joining us. Oh, thank you for having me. For all of you. Thank you. And it was a delight to be able to meet people in person. I have to say, I had a lovely time. The friends group is really fun. You know, lots of brainstorming about how we can bring in millions of dollars for the senior center. Besides the friends are friendly. That's right. They live up to their name. Keep your friends close and your enemies close there. Excellent. Thank you. Moving right along. Okay. So topics not reasonably anticipated. I, I want to throw something out. I think this qualifies and if I'm. Of course here. Feel free to correct me Haley. But the property tax hike. That is being proposed in the article that was in the Gazette. The website. I'm going to float the idea. Should we look to contact town council. To request. A forum where we could invite. To talk about how this is going to happen. What it's going to mean for us and why. Yep. That sounds good. Sounds like something everybody on the council is comfortable with and would be. Yes, yes. Yeah. I would be interesting to me to know. Of our senior population. Do we have any statistics about how many seniors are homeowners and how many seniors are renters? Good question. Yeah, I mean, not that renters don't have their rents go up if the landlords taxes go up, but it would be good to know that when if we're going to approach town council, we really want to have some numbers there. Yeah, because what we would be talking about and people who are who are affected directly and indirectly. Nobody is being excluded. So all voices should be at the table. Good. Well, you want to take a question from Dick, he's got his hand up. Oh, thank you. Yes. Let me. Yes, my landlord is so proactive that my last lease, if the taxes go up. There's their opportunity to add that to my rent does not occur at the next lease renewal. It happens as soon as they're billed. I get the total amount and I have to pay it immediately. Wow. So we definitely need to have the conversation. Yeah. I totally agree. I think, I think you should put it in the minutes and that there should be a motion that Jean, this is just my recommendation that Jean write a letter to the town council, so that we can try to get a form together. Yes, yes. May I ask, what would the, what would the form look like? What are you suggesting? Um, it could take a couple different forms. I think it would just be really nice to have the counselors, or I'm assuming then that Jean that you would share this, since you're bringing this up that we invite all the counselors to this forum and that we just, you know, property taxes are going to go up by $500 for one project and there's still three that are on the docket and those are also going to necessitate increases. You know, as the counselors are trying to decide, you know, how best to move forward with these projects, I think that they should hear about the people that it's most going to impact. Um, you know, and it's not, not to say that those are bad projects, they are needed, but there's a real economic reality that a lot of folks can't afford to live in Amherst already and that's not going to get any better. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right, so is everybody in agreement that we should go ahead and try to make that happen. Yes. Yes. Right. Um, the first thing to do would be to send a letter to the town council. I guess I don't know the logistics on this. So I was. Yeah, I don't know how. So a phone call is not as as the as a town employee, what what I would recommend you do is that you would send a letter and just explain that. We have many older adults who live on fixed incomes, who will be financially impacted, not only by this current property tax increase, but by future increases due to the, you know, big scale projects we have in the on the horizon. And then just, I would just invite them, you know, it doesn't have to be we're not throwing the hammer at them, but that we would like to invite the town council to come at their convenience for a forum at the bank center so that we can have older adults speak. That sounds like a great idea. Yeah. Yeah. Sounds good. Yeah. Okay. Our next meeting. Norma has, Norma has her hand up. Norma has. Oh, there you are. There you are. Sorry, everybody keeps moving. I can't wait to work. I'm not going to say anything except I will talk next, next time. Because we have another nutrition meeting the day before your meeting next month. And we'll be very brief, but it wasn't clear whether I was on the agenda or not. Then my computer didn't work so I didn't get it. Otherwise, it's a good meeting. I can, can I really appreciate a statement that I didn't write down said it's not enough just to make the elders happy, but you want to make them safe and comfortable something to that effect that it sounds like a beautiful statement. A beautiful statement. It's important to make them happy, safe, comfortable or whatever. Safe and secure. Before, you know, on the hierarchy of needs, safe and secure comes before jolly and happy. Absolutely. I just want to remind folks we did a notice about a special meeting and now I'm blanking on when it is daily. Thursday, February 23. I think at five o'clock. Yes. Yes. Sorry, I was quickly. Yeah. Hopefully you can all save that date and time. It is a special meeting in that it won't be our normal council meeting, but rather we're getting the P, the PC. Right. We're getting there. Pioneer Valley Planning Commission, the agent dementia project results for Amherst so they'll be presenting those results to us, which I think will be really interesting and potentially depending on what is said food for thought for us for potentially long term goals as well. It will give us the ammunition for our goal. Yeah. What's that date again. February 23. Hopefully you all got an email. We'll certainly send another one out. Is that will be pay the that will. Yeah, you'll have to send the zoom link. Yeah, I'm going to have Al create the meeting and send the agenda in on Monday. Awesome. Good, good, good. Does anybody have any, any final thoughts pearls of wisdom. Not a pearl of wisdom but I'm going to ask everybody to do this. I took a drive home from Springfield to Amherst after dark and by vision after dark like most people over 65 is not as good as it used to be. I noticed that coming into Amherst as I passed the various towns. Some of them had very bright of white marks on the right side of the road and I was easily following the road. When I got into Amherst, they seemed to be spotted dulled out in some places. So would all of you when you drive, if you drive at night, take a look at where those white lines that are so helpful to older drivers where they're fading. You could track that a little bit. Maybe it's only my imagination that they, you know, that everything, like, they're more potholes when you get it. But the white ones have got to me and I thought I'm not the only older driver that's very dependent on the brightness. Excellent point. All right. Well, I think we have come to the end of our agenda. I just want to say thank you to all of you I was really heartened and excited about you are your input and your ideas and I feel like, you know, we're, we're going in a really good direction so I just want to say. Thank you. I'm excited for the, for the future. And would somebody make a motion to adjourn. Same here. So I so move. Second. Well, thank you. Good job today, Jeannie. Yes. Very good job. Thank you. I still can't wait until we can meet in person. All right. Well, thank you all have a wonderful night. And we'll see you in a couple of weeks at the special meeting. Take care. Bye everybody.