okay welcome this is the Board of Health for Gardener city of gardener we are um it is May 20th 2024 and we are starting the meeting at 4:34 p.m. meeting is call to order first item on the agenda is approved minutes from April 22nd 2024 oh make motion to approve minutes for for for I noted one correction bottom of page two the identif identification of the recording needs to be updated what the identification of recording oh she didn't update it need be able so I'll give that to her okay any other Corrections or suggestions think there some discussion to go yeah I I just sort of um I just remember was having a conversation about the motion relative to the city council on that and feel like that one sentence is a little ambiguous yeah I agree I think that I mean we we in our intent was to just send the information over to the council for review we were not that we were we were interested in it but we had no specific recommendation as to how they act on it we we were just kind of uh the motion I believe was just to recommend that they review the uh information review the information so maybe just being more specific on the motion all right so if I were to have her updated to board of board members approve the motion for the city council to review the information provided by paint Stewart legislation or encouraged um how about the board members I would say a motion uh recommending review by the city council with no specific actions suggest recommended yeah right with no specific recommendation from this board I mean I I think isn't that what we have to go back and listen to it I guess but was wasn't that your we wer we weren't all we were doing was saying approving the fact that we will send the information to the city council members for them to review or do whatever they want to I don't know if we even needed a formal motion for that anyways but um we're certainly interested in it if it's something that you know but we we had seen any proposed legislation so we could make a recommendation so board members approved a motion recommending the city council review the information with no specific recommendations from the board yeah all right I'll update that and have it ready discussion on anything else any others okay so we will wait and um approve the meetings next time okay one more thing sorry um Eddie is our new food inspector um second page so you would like to add his last name there yeah that would make sense make sense going forward when we refer to him that it first just right well I mean we yeah in this situation where being introduced I think for the record makes sense I think it's appropriate yeah okay um Health Department updates and we have these too that can go in under the updates so the first thing we're going to do is pass around the funeral director permits for Signature those always require a wet signature from you guys so I uh they were I I neglected to print them prior to the last meeting and I recall that immediately after I left the office that day so here they are for you um and then the attendance sheet is going around also other updates um so mic gave this to me as a health department updates as um all on one kind of outline would you like me to break it down to new business and old business or do you want me to just run through this as the updates he didn't really give me anything for New or Old business just run through it and we will discuss again about separating it so um for the uh Outreach coordinator position um Gardner high school and GF had the health fair on April 24th and that was well attended uh we also had her organized the PA walk fundraiser with gdd and that was on April 27th uh Veronica did a organize a pre prom speaker and that was on May 1st that was geed toward you know prevention of drunk driving and intoxicated or drug induced driving um for pra goers she's also working on drug story theater at g u and she did that on May 14th there was a comedy night for the a foundation on Saturday this past weekend May 18th huge successe success and we actually had it in City Hall aium and it was packed and even in the um in the um balcony so it was good was they were very good glad to hear it was a successful event I actually worked really hard on that one um she continues to do Game Changers and tab training at the mount and that is a six week program that is currently underway um and she's planning to continue for National Night Out which is coming up on August 6th at the transfer station in the landfill keep guard your beautiful hosted a NP hunt trash cleanup um on May 4th the event there was also very well attended it was a beautiful day we had a larger turnout than I've seen in the last three years um so that was very um nice to see uh they also had a rib ribbon cutting for keep Gardener beautiful at the transfer station there is a new um metal container box down there where Diane light can keep all of her supplies her bags her vests her litter Grabbers uh her buckets when she's um storing nips in between drives CU she does continue to pick up our city week by week um she does get donations for the nips so she collects them there she previously had been storing them all in her basement of her home and in her her personal space so we were able to secure a container so that she could move all of her stuff be centrally located at the transfer station so she doesn't have people dropping off bags outside of her house or she's not collecting garbage at her house to then later bring down to the trans transer station it's a much more sanitary use of her property and it's a better use of her time so I'm glad we were able to um attend that with her and you see that happen for her it's just a after 10 years of cleaning the city it really something that she deserved to have her own space that the uh City helps provide for her um mik is still working on the grant applications to add structures of transer station for more recycling capacity and a possible Swap Shop um and he's still in the process of begin quot for the landfill transfer station projects and I know he has met with Dane from DPW and I know that um we just had a reminder or an extension on the Grant application came in today so I'm going to follow up with him on that tomorrow to see where he is in that process to make sure that we're moving along um for housing and nuisance complaints now that we've hired Eddie as our primary food inspector I've transitioned into doing primarily housing and nuing inspections um there has been a significant increase in housing and nuance complaints recently but we've had no new condemnations two of our previous condemnations both of them one was from just before Christmas and one was from last year in May um are on my schedule to be inspected for Fitness for occupancy this month so that's re that's really encouraging because a lot of times once we condemn a property or a unit um as unfit for human habitation it just never comes back into um the inventory of available housing because people kind of give up on it um so that's really encouraging to me to see those properties you know being improved and I um and one of them I did an inspection on she just had to do a couple of other things for the building department before we could actually issue the occupancy but um it was really good to see the amount of work that's being done into some of these um restoration projects um for food we now have Eddie uh who's currently still training he's been conducting some of his own uh inspections independently he's gone up and done some follows on my outstanding violations for food so he could just check what was my last report mark it as corrected or needs more work um and close out those reports when appropriate and he is starting to do some inspections on his own some of the smaller establishments some of our like little retail convenience stores which are more simple operations just to kind of get them up to speed while I'm busy doing housing um and I'm still continuing to work with him on some of our more complex challenges um but the inspections are ongoing luckily we had um we' always try to repeat within 6 months or we had been trying to repeat within 6 months although we've shied more of a risk-based schedule so I had a whole bunch of inspections in February and March and then April and May were a little bit lighter for food Inspections just because of the way of the flow and how it worked um so we have worked out some software challenges with our software and um Eddie's starting to get the flow of it now that he's got his iPad working correctly and we're both on the same version of the program which was great cuz I was training him on one version of the program and when they installed it on his tablet he had a different version than I had so that entire like 3 weeks of training I had done with him he's like why does it look like this and I was let's see if we can't get on the same version so that we can both be learning the same way is this off a state program no there is no State program that didn't think so that's why you had to purchase B Health had to purchase B Health licenses for it the IT department pays for it but um it's been in practice for about 4 years now um we're really starting to use the software to its fullest Advantage um over the past two years um so I really want to make sure that Eddie has a really good comprehension and we all start to back slide and the progress that we've made in that area um Gardener seasonal food trucks are all now open they're all inspected and there were no concerns with any of them um it was a great time Eddie and I were able to do all of those inspections together F trucks um we typically only do those in the spring and then at the summer food truck festival so it's a good learning opportunity before we hit the food truck festival we have 25 trucks to do in a day um and you got to come up and do a couple with me we had no additional food born illness complaints since our last meeting which is promising um we are still waiting on the floor plans for Chipotle and Jersey mics sa will be locating to the former um Southside Grill over on Broadway uh and the food truck festival preparations are still ongoing uh I'm coordinating with Mark lant from wood trucks to make sure that we have the apprpriate permits in place for all the vendors that he is um signing up to participate so he is he's recruiting and organizing and doing a layout and we are just permitting and I'm wor with P potties and the dumpsters for garden but it's it's taking a lot of load off of not only our department but also a couple of other City departments that we have this person who coordinates fre truck festivals um for many municipalities doing it this year versus us trying to scramble every year and squeeze it in between the other work that we do so that's been really fortunate um under Public Health we receive two sunscreen dispensers through the monachus public health network and they are going to be going in at one at the pool and one at the dog park um and Beach water testing began today the beach anticipates opening on Memorial Day down at the Lithuanian Club so yeah weekly from now until Labor Day um one of the health agents has to go collect a large sample and drive it TOA and air um we do that for them because it does need to be a third party doing it and we have to take Greenwood pools anyways and when they open in a week or two we'll be taking those two samples out to in the short analytical weekly how do we get those results back dare to okay yeah we'll know before they open again typically I get it by email within 24 hours and then we get a written report typically within 3 days they're really great they have a great turnaround yeah what about the other pools like um do we do anything with like I know Haywood and there's a few apartment comp so we have three what they call semi-private pools in Gardener one is at the Haywood one is at Ridgewood and one is at the Greenwood pool um so which is a public pool the other two are semi-private uh we go in and we do a pre-opening inspection for their pool license but we do not do water testing as they are considered semi-private so they're responsible for their own water chemistry we do the Greenwood pool because it has a higher BET right and it's more susceptible I think when you have a lot of children younger children with swim diapers and things like that accessing the pool more frequently and duns is done by the state DS is done by the state yes we we do not over see D before um but we will get on those inspections I'm working with our new human resour ources director is also the manager of the Greenwood pool and she's going to be learning to do the permitting and the uh preing inspection over there so I'm going to be working with her on that um Staffing mic is in the process of completing his title five soil evaluator certification he had his field test last week he will wait about a week to get his results but he did really well on his written exam so I'm I am very hopeful for him and you've already done that I already completed that that last year in November so yeah it's a really hard certification uh it's probably one of the hardest things I ever had to do um and it's been many many years since I had to take a course like that which was similar to a college science course but um my gu seemed to be getting a pretty good grasp on I gave him some things that helped me when I did it so um I gave him all my notes also so I think he probably will come out better than I did but um you know and it's the license that we we pass for so okay um we've done a couple of perks this spring already too so that's been helpful um when he had something come up I can just slate it because position is we don't have to reschedule a perk which is typically you know you have to get an escavator there the person to operate the escavator and the engineer who is the design professional who creates the system to do the perk test and then if something happens that morning and you have to reschedule it's very frustrating for a lot of professionals um and sometimes rearranging the equipment and the professionals to be there it's not easy to do so it's it's nice that we have two of us in the city now if something happens one of us can slide in there okay any um else on new business that anyone has to bring up I have a couple things um one I as on my way here I noticed in my mailbox was the um report of the testing for the water I know that the Board of Health doesn't do that but um inside I just looked briefly but inside there was a nice discussion about p and everything so for those people who were um questioning about our water and what was p and everything there's a nice little um discussion in there so I'm looking forward to reading more on that thank you and then the other thing I wanted to bring up is social media um I've been seeing um there's a um food pantry of sorts that had started in a residential home and um you know it's a very good thing that it's um people are wanting to help out but I am very concerned about um whether or not there's sport of Health involvement because um you know the foods even though they're not prepared foods they're all packaged foods but in the it's it's outside under a small um contained tent or something kind of facil you know building but um I'm very concerned about the temperatures on the foods and um especially now with you know the Heat going to be up this week and humidity so I the the and also again social media but um I notice frequently people there seems to be so many of these popup bakeries out of people's homes and are they like you know supposed to be inspected and along with that whole thing is maybe we could do something of um reminding people maybe on the the on the social media page from the Board of Health about food safety and handling food especially with the heat coming up and um about permitting um to remind people that they can't just you know all of a sudden open up a bakery outside of their home and sell Foods there's reasons for why we have licensing um permits and have inspections to to um prevent foodborn illnesses and then if a food foodborn illness was to erupt how we can quickly um identify it investigate it and prevent it from spreading so um you know not I mean I just in educational purposes um I think we need to do something and then as far as addressing things y so um on the first point that you made regarding the um food pantry so on on Thursday we became aware of it uh we were contacted by a couple of different local media sources for our comments on it um I did make a comment U with Micah's permission regarding um two specific questions and one of those questions was um can you operate a food pantry at a private home location and by Food Code no you cannot um it's prohibited by the Food Code 100% you cannot run a uh any type of food service other than a retail kitchen for home sales which is small bakeries which we'll talk about next out of a home and it is required to have a permit under Massachusetts General law so that is something that Michael was going to address on Friday unfortunately he got called out of the office unexpectedly um and he continued to be out of the office today for the same reason um so he was going to follow up on that I will follow up with him tomorrow to make sure sure that we close that Loop to make sure that that person is aware of what their requirements are and their responsibilities under the law and the reason for those responsibilities because it is for food protection and protection of the of the obviously people need you know food and resources I mean we do have a food pantry and if that's not accurate I mean that's not fulfilling all the needs then we need to address that certainly but um I just am concerned about you know spreading fruit B illnesses right so we my my concerns for the location and for the operation that's happening right now would definitely be um protection from Pest and protection from um uncontrollable elements like so she this is an open shed Greenhouse type shed that um is unmanned and the food is just setting out there for people to come and take which seems really easy to do you know it makes it less confrontational less embarrassing um doesn't impact people you know sense of um you know they don't feel ashamed to go and to participate however that also lends to the fact that somebody could tamper with the food that's there it also LS to the fact that animals or insects or other pests could be getting involved with the food and as you mentioned this is actually a miniature Greenhouse this food is set up in as the temperature in the sun increases even your canned and bottled foods and your dried shelf stable foods which don't require temperature control um are going to become impacted because they're reaching temperatures that they should not be reaching if they were stored correctly um so those are just some of the concerns that I have about the actual operation is the food being collected at that site or so it's all being donated some people are purchasing food and dropping it off and some people are just going in to take food but it's not so there are some questions about um the availability of parking the accessibility for ADA compliance and for obviously the food code which is our component here and um it's very very tight restrictions under the mass food code I looked up and wrote a determination already um that I gave to the two media sources that requested it um so it just needs to be brought to um that that facilities operators I mean it's a great idea and and I commend you know I it just we have to do it with following some guidelines and safety Nets and stuff so yeah um so the other thing is is we do have plenty of permitted food pantries in the gardener and greater Gardener areas we have the CAC right on here on Pleasant Street that works very closely with the Gard CER I know the AL the senior Cent on on Central Street has also one um many and what a lot of people don't realize as many of the area churches who do have food per already do have a food p set up for their parishioners or other people in the community that they feel they can help so there's a lot of resources available um the two media sources that reach that we did publish a list of at least 12 in the greater Gardener area that where you can get food that has been you know um stored in a an inspected facility that needs the requirements of the Massachusetts food code for protection so um you know those are it's very it's very challenging and frustrating to spend so much time and effort on somebody um and something that is not wanting to follow the rules but we're going to have to step in and and unfortunately do some enforcement which may require a hearing before this for or may require some citations to be written so I'm I'm very and the by that and the other issue with the home bakeries and the stuff I don't really know certainly I'm on Facebook so little um and I'm not going to be trolling or policing who's there we can't that's not how things are done but I am concerned that there are so many popping up there are a lot popping up and there is a path to get a permit for a residential cottage kitchen that includes having um an application and inspection I open three of those such kitchens this year already there are five total in Gardener that operat bakeries and we have one who does um pickles oh good and uh so they do have certain requirements they have to be under the Massachusetts food code I have a special inspection form for that I was even able to open one with Eddie uh a few weeks ago um in Gardener for a bakery that well that's encouraging that people are following and coming in and getting the right some people are following some people do not when I do find something that I can identify uh whether I get a complaint or a report of I do send a cease and assist letter that tells them what the steps are but they have to immediately cease production of food in their property until it has a permit and an inspection so unfortunately there's not all I can do I can't you know they they're in residential knocking down the door to try to gain entry to inspect but um other things that I would encourage the public to do is if you're curious about whether or not the person that you found on Facebook has a kitchen license in the community which they're working on they can call our office and ask and we're happy to give them a list of permit holders so that can help you know um ensure that their food is safe and that they're not supporting somebody who's doing something that could not only be unsafe but they're also doing it illegally they're not operating as a proper business they're not paying any taxes that would be due they're not having inspections that they should have these are you know just some concerns that we have yeah so maybe we can also share something like that on the I mean I just you know we need is one foodb illness that I mean it a cross contamination unknown even that can really um cause a lot of issues is there a cost to the permit and the inspections so it's $25 annually which includes the permit and the inspection it's really um very it's not C prohibitive it's not cost prohibitive um and it really I mean it takes us about an hour of our time for the inspection and the permit review so it's relatively you know it's not we're not trying to pull in the money off of anybody who's trying to do this but you want to make sure people are you know um Serve Safe um and you know use understand about just because of allergies and stuff I think about you know so anybody who has a retail kitchen for um Bakery sales and it's it's very restricted to what products they can make at home nothing time control for safety can be produced um they so mostly like cookies cakes uh pastries that don't include like cream cheese frostings or any like um custard fillings um they do need to be sered safe certified they need to have an allergy wearer certificate and they need to have an inspection with us they also if um we do have one cottage kitchen and Gardener that is operating on septic and well so they need to have annual water testing submitted to us to make sure their Wells not contaminated and um while they're not required to have greas Interceptor we've encouraged them to consider the threat to their septic system by having a possibly an increased of GRE in use so those are things that uh we're kind of on thank you I just was you know wanted to know and if we can share information with the public to just remind them that I think that's um a good thing to do yeah I've made a note to do some more social media campaigns and now that I'm moving more towards housing and Eddie's starting to operate independently I'll have a little more time to do that and my other plan for the spring summer if I have time is to reorganize the Health Department's web page on the city hall web page because it's been kind of a a little it's a little well yeah some of the challenges are that um even though I have access to edit it there are some sections like the um left side navigation panel is locked by somebody I can't move it around so I want to organize it more effectively and it's stuck so I can figure out who to talk to regarding that couple of other things but I'd like to be posting um having a page for housing concerns or for environmental concerns or like have a page for food concerns just with some of what our policies are what some of the state laws and regulations are and have it an organized way I've plan of been looking at lemonster and um a couple of other communities that I like the organization of their pages and I'm just going to you know snag that or an outline for and put put up some of the um some of the handouts and other information that I've collected that help me learn to have them available to the public because there's some really good tools out there that you know but you have to know where to look for them like Community sanitation page food Protection Program page the FDA page um there's a lot of information out there but it's not readily accessible for mebe your people don't look far enough for it if I pull it all into to our page and can have our like oh you have this concern but you don't want to make a complaint you don't want to be identified here's our page go to this link and you'll find some information about that we had one of those calls today from somebody who doesn't want to identify themselves they were concerned about mold in their house so I just took her email address and I sent her a bunch of information and I said please feel free to contact me if you want more help with this but you know here's a good place to start so okay um do you want to set up the next [Music] meeting of those to sign yeah is this I was just wondering is this one a new per or is that a r this is a renal it is y they do no [Applause] is isn't there um juneth is that um the 17th Jun is by 19th oh okay so it's either the 17th and the 24th um I do the 2 4 I can do either if I need to but the 24th is probably easier for me if we're not pressed to get anything done sooner than later yeah that that's usually the week we're away but I'm not sure what we're doing jackon looking for just go 17th so yeah I mean I can do the 17th or you know we can always change it if you want to try for the it's no big deal to me at all so okay all right all righty so the next meeting is set for June 17th at 4:30 p.m. are we good to adjourn um motion to motion toj okay all favor