 Hi, thanks for joining us. Welcome to Pathways to Progress. I'm your host, Lisa Savage, and I told you we'd have a surprise this month. I'm here with City Councilor Victoria Pelletier as always, but Councilor April Fornir has joined us this week this month. So thank you for coming and making time to do this. It's going to be fun to be in a conversation with new perspectives and a lot of the things that Councilor Pelletier has told us, you can debunk some of that. So do you want to introduce yourself to the audience a little bit? Yeah, absolutely. So I'm April Fornir. She her pronouns. I am Diné, our citizen of the Navajo Nation, but an at-large Councilor here in Portland, Maine. I'm a mom. I am a former early childhood special education teacher. I play a roller derby, and I like music and karaoke and also trying to figure out how we get more representation for our community and how we make sure that all voices that are impacted are part of every conversation that we have and making sure that when we say democracy, we really mean it. And also, this is not your first term on the Council, right? You were re-elected. Correct. Yeah, my first term was back in 2020 and then was just re-elected this last fall. Great. Yeah, congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. We're lucky to have you. Oh, thanks. So we basically discussed what the work of the City Council has been, including committee work in the last month or other issues that have arisen. I know there's been some exciting developments about housing, but maybe let's check in with Councilor Pelletier before we plunge into that. And then I have another surprise for everyone a little later in the show, so stay tuned for that. I can't wait for the surprise. I'm good. I'm here. I mean, I'm definitely... It's an interesting time between now, I think, in March at City Council. It feels like a little bit of a lull because we're just starting to talk about the budget. We haven't had a meeting or public comment on it yet, although we're receiving it via email. It just feels like the calm before the storm a little bit. I think everyone's coming off of the holidays. We're getting back into the swing of things. We're starting to have committee meetings more regularly and it's like we're getting ready for what I know will be a really busy spring and definitely summer and fall. So it's been a very slow start to the year, but I think that that's good because we were so packed all the time last year and we had a really busy summer. We had a lot of things that we were navigating specifically around the encampments and around our on-house community. So going now into 2024, I think with a new Council as well, welcoming a couple of new members, new mayor, I think that we are trying to still navigate how we all work together now in a similar but different environment. So yeah, it's been a good start. Great. And Councillor Fornir, I think you're the chair of the Health and Human Services Committee for the City of Portland. What does that role entail? So this is my second year being chair of Health and Human Services. Prior to that, I was chair of the Legislative and Nominating Committee. And so as chair, you're working with city staff, so because we're Health and Human Services and Public Safety, we work with the police chief, the fire chief, as well as the director of Health and Human Services, which right now we have an interim director, the former director, Kristen Dow, left at the end of last year for another position and so we have an interim in that position which is challenging because of course it's one of the busiest and most important departments that the city has. But as the chair, you're meeting with staff, so those leaders as staff to really talk about what are some of the staff priorities that are coming forward and then of course working with your fellow councillors that are on the committee for what are their priorities. And we like to try and finish our work by the end of the year and that doesn't always happen and sometimes there's some carryover that you then put on your agenda for the next year. But it's really just listening to what is the community saying for feedback and what are some of the important issues that they have, what are the things that are personally important to us and then what comes up for staff. So we try and keep a little bit of space to be flexible because things change. So like for example last year when we were building our agenda we knew in March there would be the HSC opening or the homeless services center and so really making sure that we understood what does the opening plan look like? Have you thought about things like transportation? Have you made sure that we have storage for belongings and also working with community partners to say this is what we're hearing from staff, what is your experience and then trying to really weave all of that together to make sure that whatever policy we're putting forward as a council or whatever decisions we're making are really inclusive of these multiple perspectives. But then of course you chair the meeting that we have each month. We do the agenda setting and then just kind of the follow-up to make sure that all of the committee members feel like they're well informed and they know what's coming and then connecting with the other counselors to make sure that they know what's coming. So it is definitely a little bit of a busier role as a chair but I have a really great committee that works really well and is very informative so I think I have it I don't want to say easy but it's definitely it's not super difficult to work with my colleagues so that makes it a lot easier. That's nice. I know that city staff and counselors don't always have the same priorities or agenda especially about health and human services so that can be tricky I would imagine. Yeah I think you know one of the things that I've done in my life prior to the work that I do now for my day job is I worked in special education and so one of the things that you have to do I was a case manager or an individual education program administrator for early childhood and so you had to hold meetings to decide services for children with special needs and part of that is negotiating what is free appropriate public education and what is necessary services to help children advance you know for whatever needs they have and so a lot of that is you know there's only so much money and only so many services and only so many providers that can do that but you're negotiating between parents and providers and then you know the education system itself so I think a lot of the kind of the the negotiation trying to find common ground trying to figure out where we have tension points and where we have agreement points so that we can start to move things forward and so I think the the previous life that I had prepared me well for to be able to kind of sit in this role you know and I think as a mom I'm a mom of adults and teenagers so there is negotiation that's the best case yeah in the best scenarios yes so uh cancer pelleteers some exciting things have been happening in housing opportunities potential here right developments in the city portland can you tell us a little bit about what the committee's been working on yeah so we just had our I'm trying I'm like what month is we had it we've only had one meeting because we meet every single month so we're meeting on Tuesday which I'm really excited about because at our initial meeting we had conversations around like what our priorities are how can we make sure that we're advocating and supporting the unhoused community how do we make sure that we're talking about it all the time rather than just uh this is our January or February focus but really weaving it into all of the conversations that we have um I'm really excited because we on Monday unanimously voted in support of the home program which is hope program thank you which is what's the acronym stand for something something oh something encampments yep nope it's the home hope program and eventually we're going to figure out what it actually is it's something something providing for people in encampments but basically it is getting individuals from encampments into permanent housing so instead of moving from encampment into shelter it's from encampment into actual permanent housing because that was a lot of the feedback that we received and a lot of what we talked about too which is that while it is great to have the option for shelter and while it is still the role of the encampment crisis response team to actually get individuals from the encampments into shelter we know that shelter isn't actually permanent housing and so being able to actually have the step to support a pilot program that's working to house individuals that are currently housing and securing and encampments is a really exciting step that I think that we all unanimously supported and I think is the first time that we have had a pilot of this kind at the city level and the they're going to work I think to to try and place I think 45 individuals into into housing and we're just really excited to be able to support that within the committee I think that will be a lot of the conversations that we have is how can we support those efforts how can we make sure that the encampment crisis response team is still actively working and how do we balance these two things and then also I think having conversations with members of the public as well about both of these programs about what we're trying to do the weather naturally is going to warm up eventually and then that will I think create additional encampments as things get warmer so it's also what's the protocol now that we have these two programs that are working towards getting people housed in a shelter how do we make sure we're addressing barriers that exist at the existing shelter because that was a lot of the feedback that we got from the unhoused community as well was there was they didn't want to go into the HSC based on some of the existing barriers there so I think all of this is kind of in this realm of what we're hoping to focus on within the committee and now that we have four members it's really exciting to be able to to push more of of that work forward so this is sounds to me like kind of the missing piece in terms of what the city has been doing because it's been crisis management well the pandemic and then you know right after that then the house encampments and so forth but all the research that I've read indicates that programs that get people into housing real housing not not just emergency shelter and give them the support services to succeed there that those are the programs that really address unhoused is this going to build housing or this is just funding to access existing housing this particular project is just to create the positions of three navigators that will exist within the health and human services department that are specifically working on that trajectory and so I think a component of that of course is if people are unsheltered I think we heard in the meeting earlier this week that we have probably about 40 tents still existing in the city of Portland and so those navigators would be able to work with those who are intense to try and get the monetary trajectory towards housing and so I think that one of the discussions you know that we had and you know gotten feedback from different community partners is you know to your point you know you need to make sure that you have supportive services if you're getting someone into housing so just going from a tent right into an apartment might not be successful but if they're able to do a tent to a transitional space whether that's the hsc or one of the other other shelters that we have they may be able to then get on whether it's medication assisted treatment or mental health services they're able to now get that continuum of care that's going to make that a much more sustainable solution so having the navigators though and just being able to have someone who can specifically work with that single population is just so important I had worked within the main med pediatric clinic as like an early childhood navigator for parents and you know once you have a child all of these things are thrown at you there's wick there's tanaf there's you know being able to apply for main care and get all these services and if you don't have someone that can kind of navigate you through that you know we we see it all the time that you know the outcomes for the children and the whole family at large are not as good as those who have that support and so when you add in these additional layers of asylum seekers who are coming that don't get access to those federal programs and they may not be eligible for main care but their baby was born at main med so their baby is eligible for main care but you don't have someone who can just have an interpreter on the phone to be able to go through the wick process or the main care process so I think again having me in that position as a navigator I was able to to get parents through some of those barriers and it's very similar for those you know who are existing in our encampments they might need an ID to be able to apply for housing or to be able to get their housing vouchers and so now they have the what office is it that that helps so we have I think it's dhs that goes dhs is going to um state dhs is going to the hsc twice a week to be able to help with those applications and getting people identification and being able to again help them with that continuum so that they can move into housing but I think what we're seeing and the reason we're seeing some success is it's not just one stream moves forward it's really all things you know we had this hsc that opened in March that by and large was you know almost entirely the asylum seeking population which it's not designed for they have very different needs from language interpretation to being able to make their appointments for asylum at you know the Siley court which if you don't have those supports and services in place you know it's kind of not functional I think we saw that and that resulted in a lot of the encampments but then when we started to create a shelter that was specifically designed and supported in partnership with community so not just falling on the city shoulders but in partnership with the main immigrant rights coalition we start to see some of that movement and so they were able to get a shelter that was much more designed for them to be able to have the language services the job placement services the court supportive services and then you know be able to have some movement you know with the increase in beds at the hsc to be able to help people you know into the shelter for those that you know it was able to to be workable for but then we start to see the other services can fall into place and now we can have medication assisted treatment at the hsc so that for the people are like I can't go there because I you know I still am in active use so if you cut me off at 8 p.m. I'm gonna start to go in withdrawal and you know things are not going to be okay now we have supports that are going out there to be able to provide that assistance so that that's one of the barriers as Tori mentioned that we're able to overcome you know working with you know the humane services for people who have pets and working with couples to try and figure out how can we navigate this to support getting extra storage so that people don't feel like they're losing their belongings you know I think the biggest piece still of course is the loss in autonomy which that's so so hard but if we're able to again have more direct work with individuals to help them find what's going to be this right path for you I think we're again moving all the streams forward instead of just trying to say well this one thing is going to work it's not one thing it's gonna definitely continue to be a community effort didn't the council also vote to um more permanent not permanently but extend quite a bit the 50 extra beds that were yes yeah we voted we yeah we did that on monday too and also it's housing opportunities for people in encampment thank you because I'm really mad over the acronyms and I was like I need to know what's not gonna be awake to it no I was I was like I had it in my brain I was like something something people say it one more time housing opportunities for people in encampments the hope program cementing now it is cemented um but yeah we did we voted to extend um the 50 beds that are currently in the hsc also on monday and I think like councilor forn here was saying a lot of pieces are now starting to come together into this puzzle of what I think we've been working on since last year yeah really trying to make sure we are not just saying like okay here's a shelter go in the shelter but also receiving the feedback of the shelter has barriers I can't bring my pet in I can't stay with my partner and then now having those conversations there were some individuals that were saying the shuttle to and from the shelter is is like very early and I'm not able to get to it or it's not coming to a location that I'm in and now those things have been starting to to be talked about and to be amended and I think a lot of that was the advocacy of our community partners the advocacy of a lot of us on the council who were saying okay this is helpful this is a step but it's still not addressing a lot of the issues that our unhoused community has seen and I feel uh enthusiastic and optimistic now looking at the fact that we have like I said expanded or extended the the 50 beds for now we have the HOPE program we are now again continuing with the encampment crisis response team we have all of these things in place that we really didn't have last year and I think those conversations we were having last year it was just sweeping encampments and a lot of us were like well that's but what else what are we doing right and so I think now when we can have these things in place we can hopefully not have to say well we have to sweep encampments there's nothing else to do we can say well we have a lot of programs that are actually working hopefully to provide people with shelter or permanent housing I feel like what I'm hoping is that we can continue to build this level of trust with our community partners but also with the unhoused community directly who has no reason to trust or be an ally of the city which is inherently oppressive you know I think like city government is looking at the systems that are in place and enhancing them and so if I was somebody that was housing insecure I'm not going to like look at the city of Portland and be like this is going to be great now I feel like because we on the council and community partners and staff have really said okay let's let's address some of these barriers and take them seriously and are actually hearing feedback and then making changes I'm hoping that that will add to some of the trust that we are hoping to build with a lot of our under-resourced community members and I think it's going to take time I feel like we said that a lot last year with individuals that were wanting immediacy and you know wondering why they were unhoused to people everywhere and what's going to happen and I think it took a year but HSC hasn't even been open for a whole year and now I think it's you know we're starting to really put things in place but it's going to take several years for us to really be like a well-oiled machine working in this way and so I'm looking forward to all of that and I'm excited for us in the committee to be able to support that work however we can and hopefully get to hear feedback from the community of saying oh this is this is great I'm excited to hear this I saw you know the article posted about the HOPE program and people were very excited about it it seemed like they were enthusiastic and that felt good because I feel like we never get that so people were like oh my gosh great good job for the city council and I feel like we never get that um so that was nice yeah well speaking of feedback I promised you another surprise we love it we often have opportunities for the public to pose questions to counselors we've done it different ways sometimes they come in sometimes we go out in the street and find them today we have a question from a nine-year-old resident of Portland Gigi and she has a couple questions they're they're not really related but she's going to ask them together this was pre-recorded so well Warren when you're ready will you roll Gigi's questions how do we get more local businesses in Portland or how do we like local cedars or local shops or another one how do we get more playgrounds both good questions I love it great different questions different questions the answers are gonna be different yeah yeah mr. foreigner would you like to I'll pick one of those I'm gonna start with the playgrounds question it's fresh in my mind so actually last night I'm also a member of the finance committee and so last night we had our first meeting to review the capital improvements budget or the cip budget and so what this is is these are some more of the just that like the the vehicles or playgrounds or some of the the more concrete infrastructure improvements that we have to make for the city and so they're really long-term investments and so some of the things we're talking about that were brought forward by the different departments were like improvements to the riverton pool because we've know we've had a lot of challenges with that or you know we need to replace one of the vans that goes out to the hsc to make sure that you know it's able to continue to make those trips to go and do all of that and so one of the things that comes up through parks and rec because they oversee all of of course the parks in the city but all of the school playgrounds and so they are on they under see the school play yes yeah I did not know that yeah and so they're constantly looking at when was the last time we replaced this particular playground because playgrounds I think the director said have a shelf life of between 20 to 30 years just depending on the materials the where and kind of where is in the city and so they are bringing forward the different playgrounds that are coming up and so it's not always just the school playgrounds but it's also some of the neighborhood parks that some of the structures may have you know fallen into disrepair or some of the things just need to be updated one of the things we're able to do it was either last year or the year before in the capital improvements budget was actually do a fund match for a local skating group a skateboard group that had asked for an expansion of the skate park that's right behind ochre's and so they were able to just grassroots raise all of this money and then we were able to match those funds so that we could actually do an expansion of that park and so it can be it can be something that's brought forward by the city or it's something that absolutely can be brought forward by community partners and just saying hey we really want to have a playground in this space tell us what we need to do and our parks and rec department can you know look at the space and say so it's going to be you know 100,000 200,000 to do that if you're able to raise some we might be able to get this you know in our capital improvements budget and so this probably isn't going to make me popular but it's always struck me that the western prom is a lot of grassy parkland but there's really no playground there they do now have the carousel of woodland animals yes which my two-year-old grandson but it has struck me before I was like it's kind of odd that there's not a playground in this yeah there's actually I think it came out last year the year before the western prom has a parks plan that the western prom neighborhood association and the parks department and I think also landmarks and the historic preservation group all put together for what is the next 10 years on the eastern prom look like and so you can find that on the city's website I think the eastern prom also has one but that gives a sense of when this community comes together and talks about this very big space what is you know the view and then it gets into some of what's protected land and where do we have to have certain trees especially for something that has erosion potential and then you know so there's definitely a lot that goes into it from a planning perspective but yeah if people are interested in their park being updated they can always reach out to the council and that's something then that we can go to the city manager and say hey I've gotten some requests to take a look at this park I had a request I think it was last year for the Lyman morer basketball courts because they just felt like it just kept getting overlooked and overlooked and so that's also something that we as counselors can advocate for as part of this cip process which is happening between now and the end of February the finance committee will vote on it and then it goes to the full council for discussion and public hearing and all that so gg should organize her friends and cousins absolutely absolutely I love it I'll take her out for chocolate milk do you want to talk about maybe small yeah this is like local theaters local theaters local business I mean the great thing I will say about Portland is that we are a melting pot of a lot of really great local businesses I think that's one of the best parts about living here is that you can have a lot of local options especially I think being in Maine and being on the water and being in a Portland's community that is welcoming of a lot of different perspectives and identities and races and ethnicities and cultures it's really great to be able to support that I think it's also really challenging to start a business in Portland and everywhere right now I think it's really in Maine I just think it's it's it's challenging to start a business anyway but I think given where we are from a financial standpoint as well it's just it's a challenging thing to start a business so I don't want to say like oh it's so easy you can just move here and start a business we're lucky that we have some programs that are supportive of people who are either starting businesses or who want to sustain their businesses we have grants that we provide for businesses as well through the community development block grant so that's really great too to be able to advocate for a lot of local businesses especially us counselors if we meet with businesses and they have really incredible programs and they want to uplift that we can try and amplify that ask to the finance committee when they're making their allocations as well and then I also think that it is tied right into the price of of living the cost of living here as well so you know I think it's really challenging and the conversation of opening a business or opening a storefront I feel like is very similar to trying to find an apartment here or trying to buy a house here it's just extremely expensive and I think that that's across the board nationally so I'm hopeful that the best way that we can encourage more businesses here is to really continue to support our local businesses as much as we can that's also having fair employee practices within the businesses that's also making sure that employers are paying their employees a living wage it's all I think a it's all kind of a path to really making sure again that we're doing what we can to provide and support from a city perspective with grants and then from a community perspective from shopping local and instead of going to big box stores shopping at your local food stores or your local clothing stores as well to keep these businesses sustained and again just being able to to provide and support as much as we can and be the welcoming city that I know that we are so that individuals who are looking to start businesses here and who are looking to move here and provide back to the community are feeling welcomed enough to do so but it's a very challenging thing and I think with COVID-19 as well it really impacted a lot of our businesses and a lot of the people aren't going out the way that they used to anymore people are ordering more than they're actually leaving their homes and so I think that's going to take a lot of recovery for our businesses as well my son was noticing that first Friday was done at 8 p.m. last week he's new to Portland oh yeah I think that's just a winter yes it is yeah you know he snoozed and he he got there and it's like it's over there is yeah that's a weather warm so in July it's going to be great yeah happen well do you have any closing thoughts that you would like to offer to gg or or the viewers in general we're about two minutes from our moving in it's been great hearing more about positive things let's just show in it I know I know you actually came when it's like a little bit more positive I think I'll just say we're getting feedback via email which is great but we talked about wanting feedback about the budget that's coming up that vote is coming up public comment is always so necessary it's going to be a really challenging vote as it always is with the budget city budget and the school budget so I encourage people to stay involved in that process as much as they can come to the meeting send us emails as well because of course your your voice and community input is really necessary during this time with that vote okay yeah absolutely I would just echo that show up for public comment sent us you know public comment ahead of time and then if you like are really really interested in getting involved we have a ton of board and committee positions for land bank and planning board and we'll be eventually getting to the police citizen oversight board that was voted on in the charter and the community development block grant so there's lots of different ways that people can get involved depending on their schedules and what their interests are and so they can find all of that on the website and you are so welcoming as counselors and still being like thanks hey we're out of time thanks for being with us thank you so much the Portland media center a wonderful tech crew we couldn't do it without you thank you to our wonderful city counselors thank you to Gigi and thank you to our audience at home we couldn't do it without you we're here every second Friday of the month that's from seven to seven thirty so be well and get involved in local government