evening it's 7 o'clock and right now by my count it looks like we have a quum uh so what I would like to do is take attendance read the uh script for the remotely uh conducted open meetings and then uh get started get some business done tonight okay I'm going to run down the uh list for attendance uh Mary miskovich is not attending this evening Paul Guthrie present Deb yes I'm here Jack here Maryann here you uh Liz Dury will'll discuss a little later she is not in attendance I am here Josh Mor will not be attending this evening he is a meeting conflict Dan yes sir there Amy I saw you there you are y I'm here all right Stephanie present all right thank you uh Linda Holt is a non- voting member she is not attending this evening Lindsay mccon not here and Chris SOA you okay thanks Chris uh we have a quorum uh so let me take a moment here and read the little script we've got hold on to right piece of paper so this is an open meeting of the senior Cate committee is being conducted in person and Via Zoom speakers on the agenda may be participating remotely and the chair may allow the public to provide comments after the agenda is completed if a member of the public wishes to speak please raise your hand in the meeting room or on your computer and when called please state your name for the meeting minutes the senior senate committee would welcome public comments and if there is further action that is required by the committee the clerk will add the matter as appropriate to the forthcoming agenda depending upon the comment the committee May if they are able within the confines of the open meeting law respond within in with information as opposed to needing to deliberate on the matter please note that while an option for remote attend and our participation is being provided as a courtesy to the public this meeting will not be suspended or terminated if technological problems interrupt the virtual broadcast to individual attendees unless otherwise required by law accordingly Please be aware that other folks may be able to see you so please make take care to not screen share your computer anything you broadcast Maybe captured in the recording the end so I will kick this off first item on the agenda as usual is acceptance of the meeting minutes uh most recent meeting which were the minutes from the April 4th 2024 meeting uh everybody has seen them um I sent them out again the other they were sent out I think a couple of times so everybody's had them uh are there any questions edits that need to be made before we vote everybody thinks they look good I'm in agreement yes okay I would entertain a motion to accept the minutes of the April 4th 2024 senior senate committee meeting I make a motion to accept the minutes second thank you Maryann thank you Paul via VIA roll call uh we will excuse me vote in the minutes Paul uh yes Deb yes Jack yes Maryann yes I'm a yes Dan yes Amy yes Stephanie yes okay that's it minutes were approved unanimously um next next item on the agenda is and the agendas are going to look similar to this for most meetings at least I believe they are um so I I think the first thing we're going to hit is working group reports and the first one on the agenda is the prly asked questions page uh I think I think Deb was going to give an update on that is yes um the page with added three more items to it so I think there's a total of 28 or 29 total questions and answers at this point has everybody had time to uh look at the FAQ on the website I hope perfect perfect uh has anybody heard any comments from the public about the FAQ any good bad indifferent they like it hate it think it's useless no I'm not heard anything just curious well that didn't take long okay next one uh Finance there unless somebody has something on finance at this moment tonight tonight's meeting I do not believe uh that we have a finance update um I don't think anything has happened on the finance side I don't believe that anybody has gifted the town a few million dollars to cover a new Senior Center uh if they have I've not been notified um and I I don't think that has happened so I don't think there's anything in the finance area tonight um we'll talk around that subject as we move through the next couple of pieces here uh does anybody have any any issues on the finance any comments that uh we should all be aware of okay good so we don't have a big part of money sitting somewhere that we've not been told about all right moving right along CA Center visits coordination um Maryann uh I I you know if if you've got the the time and the ability to give a brief report on that we've had a few visits um I've attended two I thought they were both excellent and now I'll be quiet go ahead Maryann please okay uh so far we've uh visited three local senior centers we've gone to Acton Lunenburg and Millis um we have set up a drive folder it's on my personal drive so I have to share it with folks um it's been shared with everyone on the senior center visit committee and I will send the the read link to everybody on the committee so that you can go through the documents we have uh we're filling out the same checklist with the same questions for each visit um and what I've done is um compile the checklists I've received so that we just have one checklist listed that we're not putting multiple multiple checklists uh for each there is a folder for each Town we've visited so far um we have an upcoming meeting um visit to Stow on May 7th um I have created a spreadsheet that will have the schedule of the past visits who we've spoken to who has attended those visits and list the upcoming visits um that will be all of you will be able to see um let's see what else we have photos from two of the visits we have photos up on the site from Lunenburg and Millis uh we are we've had a little bit of technical difficulty getting the ones from the acting visit but that should happen this week um and we wanted to um open it up so that if there is anybody else on the committee who was interested in attending the visits um as they're coming up I will email everybody on the committee um and if you're interested you have let me know ahead of time we can't just have people showing up because we do have to keep um underneath the five voting members so that we will not have a quorum um at the visit um like I said Stow is coming up and we hope to possibly do Wayland that same afternoon um and we are still waiting to hear from Hudson um and we have we we need to circle around and look at the list of uh local senior centers and the demographics on those and see where else we would like to look I know a couple of them that are more analogous to us are actually in construction right now so there's really not much to see both Littleton and air I think are in that in that situation excellent great great great update Maran thank you very much um one comment on on your statement of of making sure that we uh don't exceed having the five people attend anyone the meeting so that is important only because you know in public meeting law once you've got a quorum it's now going to be a posted meeting 48 hours in advance uh so not that we're trying to exclude anybody from going if we need to make a second visit to a particular site well then you know so be it we'll we'll have a second uh if we think it's important enough and enough people want to visit that particular uh Town Senior Center uh will add it to the schedule and and and do it again um and I and once Maryann sees the list you know I'm very happy at any given time if I'm going I'm very happy to drop off and allow somebody else in you take my space and and and go visit um but I have to least personally say of the two I went to was lunberg and uh Millis I was very impressed with the the people the activities um the two physical facilities were drastically different but in many ways the same they had a lot of Separation they had different rooms for different things you know they had pluses and minuses as every town will have I don't think we're going to go to a town that they're going to State everything is perfect um but I I think all of us who attended uh unfortunately Mary miskovich is not here this evening and Linda Holt isn't they were both both uh at I think Acton and I know at lunenberg um so I I was very impressed and uh I I I just thought it was a great and I would love to be able to see everybody on this committee at least visit one of the senior centers we go seek just to have you some of you may have been to many senior centers and you know all about them I have not um so for me it was I won't say it was eyee opening but it was certainly refreshing uh to see so many people enjoying themselves people having great positive comments about the center uh they weren't griping they were praising everything maybe they were you know paid off ahead of our visit I don't know that but but they had all good positive things to say and I I just thought that was great it it was extremely uh upbeat and up lifting when we left these visits at least my impression was that way uh you enjoyed so Maryann you certainly enjoyed the the Millis visit I did and I also did acting and you did acting okay and acting is unique in that that you know they are the only one around that is a least space and um they're very pleased with the least space okay good good that's excellent that's excellent um so okay so we're going to open up to everybody in the committee I just trying to repeat myself a bit umry yes go ahead given that the visitor schedule for example was a stove visit on May 7th um I would urge us and maybe you know Maryanne could be the coordinator that if enough people basically you more than the five show up it's fairly simple to post immedately so yeah you're right if we if we know enough in advance you're correct you're correct yep yep is that true 48 hours ahead okay Jerry I have one question this is Amy have you been up to the current Senior Center uh once once I was there with uh the school superintendent and Mary right presented about getting a new perfect I'm I'm sorry I work both I work both ends of the spectrum yeah I forgot about that good okay I wanted to make sure that you'd been up there perfect so I worked the seniors and I worked the pre prek to third grade so I got both ends of the life Spectrum uh committees that I happen to be on uh yes I was there once uh that was it it's I don't know it's unfortunately very small as we all know and you know one one room in in in in Millis was larger than our entire Center which is too bad but we'll get there we'll get there that's all I I think we're learning a lot from the other Senators the other thing thing that I think that we're learning and we need to pay at least I think strong attention to how the centers became what they are how did they get them how did they whether it was they built a new building how did they acquire funding if they did a lease how did they uh go after the town to get that lease approved okay to get the funding for that um what is the Staffing level uh how many people do they serve on a on a daily weekly annual basis how many different programs that they have and I I I think that when it's time for us to go to the town we need to go with uh you know all of the positive things that we can to go to the town when we're asking for money whether it's money for a lease or it's money for new construction all the positive things not the the war with me our place is too small but look with this kind of space we could do the following programs we could involve X number of seniors uh you know young seniors old seniors whichever the case might be um and and and that was reinforcing conversations at at least at the two centers that I visited and I'm going to be guessing it was probably talked about in the act and visit also so I think we we have to stay positive and we have have to ask a lot of questions of the staff um at each Center regarding how they how they got there how did you do this because we're in the throws right now we're figuring out how we're going to do it so if there's any hints positive and negative if they learn something that they tried that didn't work we want to know what that is too and we don't want to get down that same R Hole uh and and end up you know failing in our approach of how we acquire funds so I think I've talked enough any other questions comments on the uh site visits senior site visits I don't see any hands up perfect um the next one real estate review I'm going to turn that over to jack for a little bit and uh see where we can go with this one um there haven't been any official meetings but there has been communication among the working group um Josh can't be here tonight but Josh put together um and circulated I think it only went to the Real Estate Group a very comprehensive Matrix on how to evaluate um well it be a basis for a matrix to kind of come up with a point ranking across sites which we identify and he literally uh excuse me I suspect it's a form he used in Newton but it was [Music] um his effort to list every single publicly available uh piece of land in the town and he went through with the um identified it how big that particular site was what it was its distance to the nominal center of the town so the rest of it was just his suggestion on a point Matrix of factors to way as these sites were evaluated um I have made but haven't circulated using the same form um a version for the shortterm stuff which is basic basically one of the documents that we already have in our document file which was the list of sites considered by the Senior Center focus group that if we come to a point where we need to do this evaluation and rank the things it will provide a basis for uh or form at least to rank these sorts of things so Josh has been contributing that um sort of my comments are going to be f focused on the short-term stuff uh we have been informally in contact with the mained crossing folks they have identified a site um it's only 4,100 square feet and their way of going about it they're obviously interested in coming back in terms of okay how much money do you have and when you going to have it which is something I'll come back to in a second but and I need someone with more expertise in you know how real estate leasing works but the brief thing we got back basically said $25 a square foot uh the town would be responsible for all fit out whether we did it with our own contractor or use the main and Crossing contractors and then an additional $7 square foot for triple net uh other kinds of things so I'm over my head but it's what a looks like about $32 a square foot which sounds High one of the other things we need to begin to understand is what is a competitive um square foot rate for the kinds of things we're looking at uh second point is I did talk to Bill Nemer about what's going on at the Royal Beijing school which was one of the other potential sites and that's a bit up in the air because at the moment the town is fairly deeply into discussions with the Beijing school people about using that site as a potential Avenue to address the MBTA housing zoning kinds of requirements and while there's nothing concrete the apparent um Direction subject to probably a lot of change is they will tear down the existing building and propose multif family housing which runs into our water rest rtion and so all of that is is very visible in terms of conversations with the planning department and the office of Municipal services but it basically says that the Beijing school is probably not a likely short-term uh kind of thing going forward uh third one um as far as we have been able to determine uh again through informal conversations the buildings six or building eight RS the mill and main properties spaces are still available but the current information we have for pricing on those is uh a minimum building six I think is now 18 months old so we need a process to both confirm that that space is available and what current pricing might be offered or current Arrangements maybe rather than pricing and um at our last meeting when I kind of ran through a list of short-term things I also mentioned the um state police crime lab which Chris has mentioned but Chris commented at that meeting they're there until November of 2026 so that's you know well beyond what we're trying to get to on a short-term thing so the effort continues on the short-term things but something that um we need or I feel that the senior center committee you know needs ask of the Council on Aging there was building six concerns relative to parking relative to the slope of a hill so forth and so on so I have a request for the COA board that says is the COA board supportive of that location and if there are issues can we get the COA board board to Define what the issues are so that there's an opportunity to address them um now I'm I'm segueing a little bit here but uh and now I'm I'm sort of going back to finance a little bit um in the conversations that we had at our last meeting when Josh moris was going through um some of the options that he was thinking about we narrowed it down to three um conversation included the fact that for a feasibility study there are potential opportunities for Grants what we haven't done and need to do is complete come to agreement on what a uh feasibility study piece of paper might include so so that we can in fact have a document that uh we can apply for Grants or at least submit in terms of Grants and the second part of that which was also Josh's draft that was shared I think maybe two meetings ago was a request for information process not a request for proposal but a request for information and this is extremely urgent in terms of the short-term kinds of needs so that we can identify places and under procurement circumstances which means the town would probably have to post it but it is a request for information that we need to come to agreement as a working committee as a full committee I guess in terms of what does that include I have been in my casual conversations basically saying 5 to 7,000 square ft over 5 to 7 years for a 5 to S year lease but again that's been a conversation that we've had we haven't come to a conclusion and agreed as a committee uh so Josh not being here I don't know whether there's been further conversations with Greg Johnson to uh you know actually move forward with something like that but I do know from email traffic that um relative to the um feasibility study there have been conversations between Josh and Greg and Greg has reached out to the people I think that did the feasibility study for the school and confirmed Josh's estimate that a feasibility study would be 150,000 so that there is a written response to a town request that says yep you're in the right Ballpark and the email I saw um included in that 150,000 the evaluation of the current site and potential new building and a third one which I don't remember so that's a little bit of a finance and real estate kind of thing but I think we have some action items that we need to close on and agree in order to move forward Jack let me let me add just one one thing through that then we'll certainly open this up to any questions and and comments but one is and this goes to the COA uh to Amy and to the board um so what I what I don't know and and Jack alluded to this is is always stated you know 5 to 7,000 square feet well we think that's right but we don't know that's right um and I can't tell you the square footage of the two sites that I went to see I can tell I can describe them but I can't tell you what the full square footage is we can get that number but what we don't know at this moment and we do an RFI looking for a space we have to sort of know is the five to 7,000 square foot the right number and the only way that I think we can figure that out is through I guess through the COA figuring out what kinds of programs need to be run um and what are the space requirements for those types of programs uh to kind of calculate what the uh expected or anticipated space might have to be so I'm just throwing that out because again to Jack's point you know we think five to seven but we're not you know seven might be asking for too much five might not be enough I don't know Amy any comment on that please so the five the the five to seven um that I've given a lot of my initial materials when I was in contact with Mill and M regarding building 8 I had sent a proposal to Mill and M and I turned a lot of that information over to the focus group so I I think the concept of the five to seven that all that went to the focus group and so I had sent a draft to Mill and Maine and that's where they sort of proposed uh the space in building a which is larger than 5 to 7,000 square feet so I don't know if that's posted on the documents the resources um because I I turned that over to the focus group so I'd have to look and see what was posted again um as far as you you know that's a tough one I mean my my my initial draft was looking at just structurally um probably what you're looking at at this when you're evaluating senior center spaces um what you're seeing and anticipating so I can pull up that information again that I had but I think the focus group also has that information would you P it may and it may be online I I I don't I've looked at but I don't remember that I saw it there didn't I don't I don't not recall Jerry is an FYI Millis Millis is 6,000 sare feet oh it is ah perfect perfect okay thank you I think that's I think that a part of the vision so I think you know I think one thing I think the senior center tour group The working group I mean I think incorporating into you're looking at these space I think you you do need to look at the space in building six and the space in building eight incorporate that into what you're visioning so however you can do that you know is just you know with in Maine contact them say Can We Tour these two spaces this working group the senior centers and start comparing what you're seeing so you're looking at Millis and you like Millis and you also got what's available in Mill and M in your heads too and the space in building eight is a little different it's not as cut apart the same as the space in building six but I think you need to get that Vision to get those things in your head so you can look at Millis and say you know the space building eight could you know suffice to do the same sort of things that are going on at Millis you know okay okay no good point go ahead uh for the records that we collected the six m in main site apparently was 5,160 Square F feet the 8 mil in main site that was looked at uh a little bit farther back than the six Mill main fight uh was apparently a 6,000 upgradeable to 9,000 something in years let me yeah I should explain that sorry to cut you off Dan but I should explain that so the space the space in building 8 which is right across from the post office there's a circular Drive the space in building 8 technically is 9800 square feet when we toured that space we did a couple times it was my the previous um COA board composition it's not the current seway board when we looked at that space um it's a different it looks different it was 9,800 square feet the interior of that space is sort of open and the rooms are around the perimeter of the space and when I said to Millan main there the amenities everything about it is great the location I said you know the interior of this space is kind of empty I'm not sure you know how we'd use this and I said to them you know I was looking at something you know five to six 5,500 to 6,500 square feet and that's when the proposal came back within just one email where they redid the proposal and said yes and they the first like 36 months they were going to lease it as uh 6,000 square feet even though the space is 9,800 square feet and that was the moment when we had to say we had to stop talking about it it's not to say the interior of the space is unusable I was just sort of playing with them so to speak to see you know and we couldn't negotiate any further who knows they might they might put the lease in for 6,000 uh square feet for the whole 98 you know for five or seven years or 10 years so that's where that's where that weird split came that was just a conversation and that's why they tweaked the the proposal and we didn't go any further for this conversation though it sounds like the the 5 to 7,000 square foot that we're kind of using as a first guess is in the ballpark based on what we've looked at most recently right exactly I think the I think the spa the space in building six is a nice space it's that's a nice Nifty space and that's 5100 square feet you know that's a nice space there's I have a question as well okay um Amy was building eight the building that you brought us in that had um columns all the way down the middle yeah on the side yeah so that yeah that's exactly the space I think I I I that's probably on your documents and on one of the last pages of their proposal um they do the little draft so the space itself has the original beams down the center and all the rooms around the outer and I remember you saying that it wasn't possible for you to do anything with that room unless you had separate offices for certain things when we were there yeah you were where when we were there when you brought us in there to show us the room you said you looked at it and it was you couldn't figure out how you would make it into a center other than to break up the offices oh so the the offices you know you can they they're they're offices but you can take you can take a wall out to make a larger office which in essence becomes a larger room that all can be reconfigured when they when they do construction on that and so there's there's a number of different things that they can do within that space adding a handicapped bathroom there's the kitchen area in there um and the center of the space is is is open so it's just um a lck be done with it you would have wonderful chairs and tables and places to sit and have coffee and you know you have to would actually have to say it it's up to the up to the group but I was trying I was well clearly coming back to my point we seem to be you know five to 7,000 um to Jerry's point of how many additional programs would that be what would the additional cost be to manage that so forth so that we have we need to come to a conclusion for the short-term solution a document which says this is what we're looking for with as much detail as we can provide ex exactly Jack because it isn't to your point it isn't just the cost of the space cost of the retrofit of the space but also having more space which is a great thing now what do we have staff how is that going to uh increase uh Staffing requirements and you know are we going to use a lot of volunteers uh for a lot of the programs like a lot of the other towns do I don't know I um leads to another question that I hope the visit group is asking each time they visit are they asking for excuse me information about what is the Staffing how is it done what is the number of programs so you have some some piece of data on staff to program ratios I'm not sure that's valid but Staffing information I think is going to be fairly valuable on the visits so Maryann I don't know if you can answer that but I know we saw Staffing at because I know I didn't look at all the Miller documentation but I know lunenberg had documentation regarding Staffing uh and volunteer te I'm looking to see if I have that piece of paper right now I probably don't so um we do have Staffing information it since these are all public entities it's all public information um you just drill into the town website you can get all the Staffing information as part of the budget uh listing every year uh so we're pulling that that information on each town and getting and compiling all of that together um I think the smallest staff we've seen so far is for full-time full-time headcount in the um the smallest the smallest yes yeah and are we capturing the number of participants that that staff supports at least we we have't acted I have an email out to the director of um Millis we actually weren't able to meet with the director when we were there on Tuesday we met with their Outreach coordinator um so I have an email to her asking specific questions um luckily every every Senior Center we've gone into has a my senior center computer setup that people check into and uh it tracks participants and how many people overall use the system use the facility um and I know Acton is 200 a day on average um which you know we really can't compare to because population is so much greater but um we will have that information for and included for each town that we go to good super yeah yep that that's excellent um hey Jerry yeah go ahead Jerry um I mentioned earlier that Josh had put together you know a matrix that we could use but one thing that he did that I just wanted to share with the group that I kind of thought was a nice touch and Josh admitted when he he labeled this Matrix makeal um and he explained what it was and it might be premature but the mayard center for active living which I thought was kind of a a nice touch I'm not proposing we do anything with it but um I thought that was a a nice way of beginning to address other needs s etc etc so I just want to share that D Josh is not here so to your to your point Jack the word you know for active living uh sort of denotes something other than just you know how do I say it old people looking for a place to go it's it's active living how do you you know whether it's active living in your 50s your 60s your 70 80s whatever uh and and I think I think I think he's 100% right we need to be able to you know make statements like that if if we're going to try to convince uh residents of M it that they ought to be approving some amount of money in the future I I think I think you're 100% right I think Jos is correct in doing that I like it y um so one of the other things that is going on and I have to readily admit I do not know too much about it and it's the uh aging assessment that is in progress right now by UMass um I did fill out my survey I think the second day that the survey was available I don't remember what the questions were I don't remember how I answered them but I did do it um I don't know uh how well that is going Amy would you like an update yeah just yeah you you I assume no more about than the rest of us right yeah so I perfect yeah so I spoke to uh Mary Krebs from UMass last week so at this point in time um online and paper surveys uh have been completed it's been closed in terms of submitting any more information so the key informant interviews are done the focus groups are done the surveys been completed and now they sort of things go quiet as they begin to uh and analyze the data so we technically I won't you know have to be in direct contact with them for a period of time of course you know if they have any questions about what they're processing they'll be checking in this point into probably August that's what they're going to be doing is is assembling the report going through all the data and the goal is to be back in contact with them in August about setting up uh looking at the I guess the draft and the formal presentation to the general public the report will be done in for October so now it's just data analysis and they felt and they were uh they were pleased with the key informant interviews they were especially pleased with the focus groups they thought that they had just a wonderfully uh Dynamic engaged um participants in those focus groups so uh they were pleased with the outcomes may I ask a question Amy who were in the focus groups who were in the focus groups it was varied individuals so um I don't have the list here it was varied individuals I took guidance from um from UMass I asked members of my uh seway board to uh provide uh members names of members of the community uh UMass was specific about wanted a focus group that would be on the uh sort of younger seniors that potentially hadn't attended uh any activity at the council in aging and then they had a a focus group that they want comprised of people that were I think uh Comm you know sort of more prominent community members they wanted someone from realer Banker in banking uh they had categories for that and then they had a third focused group that were just seniors at large and um so I just assembled some individuals um and also I got support from the council and aging board two members of the board providing some names so um okay thank you make a comment go ahead Jack um I was a member of one of the focus groups and I want to share something within the group that I was a part of five six seven eight of us whatever it was there wasn't handicapped individual uh Dan Resnik who um I had run across before and so forth and what I walked away from as kind of being in that conversation we are not cognizant enough of the needs of handicapped individuals as we go through this process uh Dan was he's been in town eight years loves it here um but made some observations about the consciousness of the town and clearly as we go through this process we need to maintain a high level of awareness of ADA and what it really means to be handicapped on a daily basis in terms of site visits and things you can do there programming and so forth I I really became conscious of it as as his presence there and I spoke to him afterwards and I asked him to be as visible as he can be you know throughout these things across town you Jack that's a very interesting uh uh comment and perspective and and to that I will have to say when I was impressed with in both lunenberg and Millis uh was handicapped access to all of the rooms all of the functions that the the people have to do um it it in Maran you could you know chime in if you if you choose to uh but basically you know in in lunberg for example you had a good front entrance handicap accessible um they had the handicap uh you know push button access uh whether you coming in the front of the building or you out to activities in their beautiful back lawn area they also had the push button access just hit it like you do and you know in you go you it's very easy for somebody in a wheelchair or crutches or a cane or walker uh to get around and I observed similar ease of access and uh movement around in in Millis also the only negative in Millis it had had out in the corridor uh it was like walking through the the existing Green Meadow School you've got the skateboard ramp uh which doesn't quite uh meet ADA requirements but out outside of having a ramp in the Millis one in the the hall going up to a couple of rooms the rest of it was very very accessible either via you know again wheelchair cres Kane uh Walker had good ramp system coming into the building um so I think they and their parking was good so I think they've certainly thought through the process quite well and and you're 100% right that is a a very strong thing we need to be considering absolutely any other comments on that anybody wow what a quiet group tonight quiet group um what was I going to say next next next is there any new business that we need to attend to go ahead Dan um I will be going away for a while in a good way oh I was gonna say I was gonna question that if we decide to have a meeting two weeks from today I'll be here um but I would miss the first meeting in June I could conceivably attend the second meeting in June if we have one but then I'm basically out for July and August um out in such a way that I can't be counted on even to do the minutes by looking at the recording like I had to do for the previous meeting um so I think it's time we do need an alternate clerk who I could train in advance on the steps there's it's not a whole lot but there are things that really do have to be done and they have to be done in a certain way in order for the committee to function um I would love to have someone jump up and say pick me pick me uh now's your chance um uh training will be free of charge at your convenience I don't see anybody jumping up not that I can see anyway you know some committees kind of take time off in the summer I having talked to Jerry a little bit about this I don't think our committee is a candidate for doing that because we've got some deliverables that we really need to try to pound into place um to try to get on the fall meeting um so um granted the working groups are are the engine of this committee uh and they can continue to function without the whole committee having meetings and they can send out email notifications to keep everybody informed but I I would think at least once a month we'd have to have meetings and I won't be here to to do the clerk work and if that work doesn't get done there's no meeting um so we really need somebody to volunteer for this and I'll I'll be happy to work with you on your own schedule so the one thing we could do we could make this almost like being in the service and you know how that works Let's see we have three uh voting members who are not in attendance this evening certainly amongst give that to you one week didn't we yes I I recall that and that's really why I kind of want to do that and I spent time in the service too so um yeah so we could certainly assign uh I'm only kidding well someone is there anybody who would do it it isn't again Dan I'm not going to be little what you do you do a great job at it but it you know so maybe when Dan's absent the minutes aren't as detailed as what Dan does but we just need to capture you know the the general theme of what went on not who said what and who answered back to that but just a general theme that's it do I see any hands maybe maybe my screen is dirty and I'm not noticing hands going up it might be Amy's hand that's up to do minutes I actually have to I have to do the minutes for the own Council my own Council on Aging board because I I can't get anyone to step up to do the minutes yeah CH your experience that's absolutely true I can't get my own board members to step up and do the minutes so I um I'm G to decline if I wasn't doing that but the good thing Amy is you have experienced doing it see so you would be an extremely experienced clerk still not interested H okay well yes uh yeah it's it's uh if we're me you we're meeting twice twice a month right that's a lot of work Jesus we are right now yeah how about if we met once month Amy why are you pushing me around on this guys it sounds like you talked about this before no no no we did not we should have but we didn't no we didn't no that's all we get we get time we we'll figure it out we'll figure it out okay we will all right I'll be calling each person individually then and asking you so you don't have to say yes in front of everybody does you have the meeting recorded right it's it's really not about the minutes it's about working with Jerry in advance at a certain point in time not urgent but it needs to be done at a certain point in time to establish the agenda document you've seen the agenda documents they're about the same now but you have to create one you have to take the step of talking to the town of mayard to get the zoom link which is different every single time you just have to send a message get the zoom link pasted in the word document it it it really isn't hard but it has to be done or else there is no legal meeting you know just it doesn't take a ton of time but it needs to be done uh the minutes can be much shorter than what I do I tend to do Epistles because well I can and and because uh early on at least I wanted to have more visible but it doesn't have to be that way uh the the minutes of some of the other committees basically are the meeting started we voted on these three things the meeting stopped and we're done and that's about all they one pagers I mean there's no real literary requirement for the content but we do need a volunteer or the committee comes to a stuttering Hal we we'll we'll figure it out so I I'll start calling around and maybe I could talk every and one of you through whatever the concerns you have and um and then we can move forward okay so you do that everybody think a little bit about it it's it's not Yan's work to get it done as Dan just said um there is one other thing we do need to talk about on new business and that is that uh one of the voting members uh repres pres the friend Mania seniors Liz Rory has uh needed to resign from the committee and we need to replace her um we we need to figure that out I don't know if anybody else I mean I don't personally know Liz uh I don't know that many members of the uh friends of Mana seniors you know organization so I I don't know who could or would take her position uh but I would like to get us back to 11 voting members because right now we're at 10 voting members which then tends to impact our quum so now we have to watch out for five before we could go had a quorum when you hit six people now we have a quarum when we had five people it's half the people so uh um and we need to get this uh sent to the select board and approved by the select board and lizz's uh uh term was going through I made a note 2026 is when her term was going to expire so if somebody came in they would be filling that slot um I'll I'll I'll leave it open to you folks if any of you have already talked about this and I am unaware that's fine uh or we can certainly take this offline and figure out who can fill in that slot well the friends is a formal organization can we just ask the friends to you know make a formal request to the friends that nominate someone or nominate or ask for a volunteer Mary MaryAnn's hand is up yeah Maryann I think is going to answer that yes I have I have already asked for a formal volunteer and have not gotten a response back um what I had talked to Jerry briefly about and I've talked to Deb about it today Deb is on here right now as a member of the focus group but she is also on the Friends board um so I didn't know if Deb could effectively take the second friends spot on the senior center committee and look to another focus group part participant to fill in the open [Music] spot well that potentially opens up um electing or finding an at large member if that works yeah y could do that I think technically we're all at large except for the Council on Aging Representatives who are officially already sworn in town committee members who are appearing in that behalf everyone else is technically an atlarge member in my understanding yeah so I don't see it's a big deal all right so let's hold off a week or so and Maran maybe you will get an answer back in between I don't know maybe you and Deb I don't know Deb you could I don't know I don't know I cannot split myself in two Jerry sorry oh come on come on come on well we could what you could do to invite entice the the offer a little bit would be say oh and whoever joins could also be a temporary clerk that would really that would really help the situation yeah all right let's uh let's sit on that for a week and uh let's uh let's you know behind the scenes see what we can do to uh uh get it field and and the jack point could be in that large position opening up but let's give it a week and and see where we get um is there any other new business anybody would like to bring up or anything that I've missed and sorry I think I would like to follow up with what Dan said about meetings through the summer yeah I think it's important that we keep going just because of the fact that we have town meeting coming up and one of them is the Fourth of July too so we kind of need to figure out how we want to work around that okay our first meeting in July is scheduled for the 4th so how do we want to work with well let's take a look at the calendar July July my two sense is we really do need to meet with some urgency so monthly meetings are off maybe two weeks in a row are we do July 11th and 25th are we talking about July right now or yes have we settled on May do are we going to need to meet on May 16th or do we skip into June for our next meeting I I've got written down we want to do the 16th but you know it it's a matter of having a meeting for the sake of having a meeting isn't necessarily productive having a meeting because we actually have some good information uh to pass on and some decisions to be made okay that's that's worth everybody's time um well you're having people still go visit buildings are community centers and I think it's important to hear that and add the other information that you've um asked of Mary Beth Maryann and the other people um I think that's really important also um maybe to get some of those directors to come here and speak oh and we can kind of ask them questions that U would be interesting for the group as a whole to learn some new ideas about how they went about getting um their senior centers and the funding for them I like that yeah so I think there it's not just having a meeting meeting for a meeting I think we have enough stuff that if if the finance committee gets together and we get some more information from them um the also the the people that are touring buildings get information from them and probably try to get some of the directors come in and talk with us like the focus group had Allison um from sto come in and talked to us last year and she had a lot of good ide and told us all the steps that it took her to get her senior center and um it opened up a lot of eyes so I think that might be something that we could try to to put on our agenda in the future yeah I like that I like that I hadn't thought in that direction I I kept thinking we had to go to them but you know there could be a chance we could get one or or two possibly uh to come visit us that'd be great it' be a great idea the very fact of having a deadline of a meeting is an important thing in this process yes and the 16th is important because Dan will be here yes yes why am I as Jack s there with a smile on his face yes very good Jack oh I'm just describe can really can we put any meaningful content together in time for the 16 if yes then sure we should meet but if not maybe we should really aim at having a Powerhouse meeting on the S I think the six I think we can do the 16th because we at least have one if not two uh tours coming up next Tuesday uh stow and I forgot we just said the second one was going to be way yeah so let's assume for a moment we could visit to um I don't know if there'll be another one could be scheduled sometime before the 16th I don't know yes or no but that could be a couple anyway that could be uh talked about we may I will talk to Jack and we may uh be able to get uh something set up to get over to miln main uh maybe we can get to take a look at one or both of those spaces if we can find out uh you know from the mill and M folks if we can get in there is everything still available uh as previously defined I don't know but I I would like to be able to hope we could maybe get in there in the next two weeks and give even a a cursory update on that well important too the other thing we should push for as I mentioned earlier that really can't sit around for another month is what is our definition uh do we want to push in our fi do we need to uh put some pen to paper and get get it approved by the group in terms of what the um feasibility study would look like I mean this some we got yeah we do have some action items so I can I can start we can push the RFI um and we can also start to talk a little more detail about the uh feasibility study I'm just writing a note about that now but defitely getting an RFI out definitely uh yeah we get that so we've got enough for the 16 now the next question comes up is do we then meet because May is a long month the way it's broken up we meet the 16th do we meet on the 30th or do we go to the 6th of June that's two in a row the original oh yeah yeah in our original meeting we specified first and third of every month correct we could choose to meet again if there was a compelling reason but conceptually we we aimed at first and third Thursdays right right and and people have scheduled their other commitments and what have you around that schedule I I agree 100% uh but in in you know dealing with some urgency to to Jack's point to get some things done and done more quickly um do we do this and I'm not saying we do this we definitely do the 16th May 16th next meeting that we're going to schedule next question is do we do the 30th of May and then the 13th of June or do we just move into from the 16th of May and then go to the six June which brings us back to our original schedule of the first and third uh Thursdays of the month which I think could be fine I think we can do the 16th do the 6th of June the 20th of June and if we uncover some information I in my estimation anyway that causes us to think wow we really got a lot we we got to get together on this uh that we can we can call for another meeting in between them we have [Music] to that sound okay I would yes I would say but the first and third pretty much Tuesdays till we find that we need to you know do something in either direction either stretch it out or shorten it yep okay people need to plan right that's it that's it yep no I agree I agree I mean why why Dan has planned his trip for half the summer I I don't I don't know actually I think he's in the witness protection program and but I I don't want to talk about that so anyway so the next meeting is the 16 is there any other business and and and Chris I'm gonna ask you for a minute Chris silver if you could uh just unmute for a second say hello and uh do things appear to be from your uh High perch uh the select board appear to be going in the right direction here you're still on mute buddy I think he's talking to somebody else oh he could be not while he's doing that I have a question for Amy Amy in the Aging assessment thing did in any of your conversations with Mary Krebs who is the person running it for the UMass people has she made any observations in the sense of Impressions whatever you want to call it Impressions how so Jack be more specific okay specific example I said I was in the focus group during the discussion she made an observation that they've done 70 of these but she basically said maned was kind of standing out because it was the first one she'd run across where they want really want a community community or or a senior center so just has she has she made observations to you about how the process is working observations about differences similarities say that again so you jack you uh you said that she Point she said to you in the focus group that mayard was the first Community what I didn't catch that last part but you said the your first community that what in in her phrasing of it that first one she'd run across that really wanted a senior center my question to you is any of the dialogue with her she made any observations about the interactions something might unique or the same or whatever she yeah so she said to me Jack she said to me that because I I didn't um I didn't attend the focus groups um I felt that it people really needed to be free from uh the presence of the COA director Andor a town official but the theme she was it was overwhelmingly from all three focus groups um everyone was concerned about the space EV the was dominated by the discussions were dominated when it came to concerns um regarding seniors and seniors needs it was uniformly um people were just very concerned conc ered about the space we had and the lack of space we had and the accessibility and the whole situation over there and no matter if it was seniors in the group that were young seniors and had never attended a program it's it's throughout the whole community in terms of uh that it's unacceptable and people have concerns and then she she just said that dominated so that that she did tell me last week that it was just was on everyone's topic of everyone's uh sharing of whatever thoughts and feelings they have about anything in mayard they were just extremely concerned about the space okay that's what I was looking for yeah yeah it was pretty profound my conversation with with her and um yeah okay good good good feedback and not surprising but certainly good feedback yeah I was I was surprised I was surprised because yeah the the focus groups I don't know who actually ended up participating we sent her lists of names I don't know who was in those rooms but I know that it was a wonderful cross-section of the community in people on these lists and that's what dominated as a big concern I'm sure there's other things but that was a big concern related to to seniors and being a senior good thank you good good good information uh any other pertinent information uh that we need to address right now let me address Chris again one more day Chris are you available to oh there you go um are we in the right track do you think when you look from your perch on high on the select board yeah yeah I yeah yeah everything seems to be like you know I think what what we would have expect you know what we would have expected in terms of the select board what you know where the direction that um everything's going and you know the information that you know we've talked about in meetings where we've given updates no one's no one's you know raised a red nothing's raised a red flag right but yeah we're we're on board good and I was you know I spoke to um Maki who's going to you know unless something happens between now and four days is going to be the newest member of the select board at our first meeting in July and she you know she knows what what we're trying to accomplish and what this committee is trying to accomplish so she and she's on board with that whole you know the whole idea as well so yeah no everything seems to be making sense to me from from I sit and and I don't think I don't think that you know I'm misaligned with any of the other you know four members so I think that that's a good sign good you know Greg has his and Greg has his you know Greg's has his things but his things are more you know what what rules he has to follow and what what things are in front of him to follow as far as you know regulations procurement law all all these other things and that's those are the kinds of conversations I have with him to make sure that we we don't run a foul of those things as a as a group or community at some point okay good yeah I I I did want to just check in because we've not talked for a while now on this and I just want to make sure that you representing the board feel comfortable that we're we're not off on some tangent somewhere that you think is a wild goose chase completely and we're in the wrong direction so no no I don't think I don't think that at all it's you know you know the other the the thing is it's it's just it's just like every other thing in in man it it just comes down to where we going to find the uh funding yep funding grants you know all those other things yep agreed agreed um so right now you you know so let's let's assume it's a part of gold sitting somewhere uh we don't know where it is yet we're going to try to find it but right now I mean if we can get to deliver back to the select board a direction uh we need you know example we need 7,000 square feet we need handicap access we need you know parking uh we've found a facility it's in downtown M it and it's going to cost X number that's what we want to be able to bring back to the select board so the select board can then say wow yeah that's that's the right direction let's you know you know double team and get to the town meeting and see if we kind acquire the the funds whether they' be capital or they be uh expensed to pay for a lease I I just want to make sure that we're getting ready to deliver the right package to you folks I think that's the proper path I think you know that's we I think that's what we um I think that's the I think that's the direction in the in the path that we were um we were expecting it to to follow you know when we when we created this committee and when we you know when we heard what we heard at the um previous special town meeting last year you know in last fall so I think yeah we're I I think we were on the same page all right good perfect any other comments from anybody else on the yeah I have a so we met I did meet with um Steve Silverstein and and Greg and a couple other people with the guy at um the state police crime lab and um he's you know he's he's got till the end of 2026 that which we know and I don't I don't know if the building's going to stay there or they're going to put a new building up or whatever but he's he's certainly more as we you know as we look kind of long term he's more than willing to um you know do something to accommodate a senior center within whatever he builds or or changes so that's that's a good thing it's just a matter of when when that all is going to take place and how because the uh one of the issues is that this he was not invited Ed his company was not invited that property was not invited to participate in um the RFP for that project which is to create a new building for the state police crime lab one of the things that's happened in in the in the interim is they found out what the price tag is for the new State Police CL crime lab and um for all of the things that are in the building on Acton Street the state of Massachusetts is looking at upwards of you know $20 million and um so that's that whole process he believes that that whole process right now is uh stopped or has been delayed because they started to get into the conversation uh prior to any rfps or anything officially going out that you know developers and Builders and and um the state police I and you know other um other offices that have offices within there you know I guess you know biological stuff and all that it's a lot of money so I don't know he doesn't know where that's going and he'll keep us posted but you know it's it's also a conversation that he's here he's got he's got some room in that building that he's not using so it might be even if that doesn't take place we might still be able to impose upon that facility to find us a spot but and you can't beat that parking lot there's plenty of parking that's parking lot it's easy in Easy out [Music] yeah last time was when it was DTS and maybe we could you know just for for another program and and Amy you can certainly pay attention to this maybe we could get some of the seniors working in the biot terrorism lab or something in there you know and give them that would certainly be something we have in the main the senior center that I can assure you they will not be another Senior Center offering those kinds of programs I think that's very unique thank you Chris I appreciate that update that was good thank you problem good information uh any other issues at the moment I think we're we're about 819 right now uh if there are no other open issues I'm going to ask somebody if they might uh make a motion to adjourn next thank you Jack is there a second second second perfect um and our next meeting will be on the 16th we will get an agenda out to everybody on that uh let me read down the list and vote excuse me get everybody's approval for ad joury PA sorry I think it looks like yes Deb yes Jack yes Maryann yes iy yes uh Dan yes thank you Amy yes Stephanie yes sir perfect that's all the voting members we are officially turn