e so how we do this is we're here till 7:30 we just sit here till 7 because public comment is on at 7:30 you can't it's a public hearing therefore you can't not be here until 7:30 that's why I if I know first I didn't even look at that but you think you get you a few people I didn't think nobody but we should anyways if we're all here we should call it the meeting to orders really I guess we can do that can first oh sorry you have plenty of time car because we're not going we're going to be here for a half an hour looking at each other okay so this is just a dress rehearsal that's right y nobody um cool hi everybody we don't need bulletproof vests for tonight okay thank you I just didn't think anybody needed to see me kind of you know throwing my stuff this what a beautiful day and night okay okay you know we we we didn't specify that this is um time or I mean this could be Atlantic time well it does say up here 7 p.m. is the time that's but just not which time zone what time zone yeah I was thinking if it was a different time zone then we have to say okay so we can call the meeting to order I have a motion to call the hearing do we need to have rctv on first they are on they are okay okay I think so actually you just you call the Board of Health is is it a Board of Health meeting as well right so call the Board of Health meeting together and then and then I we can motion okay and I'll make a motion okay let's convene uh the Board of Health uh can we do a roll call um starting with Joe here yes Rick Lopez yes Carrie Dell yes PA cin yes great can I have a motion to open the public hearing reing the community health Improvement plan so moved second second second roll call Joe yes L yes RI yes Carrie yes paa yes I know we're all very used to it but we don't actually have the r please we're together oh we don't oh yeah the roll call is when we it's redundancy but weing the te's don't the I it's just it's weird right we're so used to running that way yeah so I I think we should um hold off on the agenda until or if we get some public members um would you agree yep I there was we've already we've already seen the yes assessment yep so we'll just hang tight for now and we'll see did we hear from anyone that they might be interested in one or two okay yeah any of our Community Partners that weighed in on the yeah well you know the plant is not terribly controversial it's kind of like motherhood and apple pie and it's all it's a really good plant it is it very good say is not here what's going on who announces when we get a visitor online oh you still do no what who announces when we get a visitor online we're not doing Zoom oh there's no Zoom it's Sol in person got it well RCV they're G broadcast but it's it's recording on broadcast got it thank you so why wouldn't we do the presentation for rctv for the public to see oh we can do that that that would make sense a good point I was I was thinking we might wait to see if there's anybody here but um but the public comments at the end anyway so right but the purpose of the presentation was to educate the public the public right so that's the maybe they're watching yeah yeah we can all follow the point I think you I think it's a good point you go through the motion okay um so let me just let me just make a comment or two that you know um oh great so this this public hearing is uh really held to provide feedback and suggestions to the board on this community health Improvement plan which is the outcome of a year-long process um that the board undertook um of a community health needs assessment which was done with uh a planning committee um and with several Town entities and boards and commissions as well as with the assistance of peer Associates our Consulting Group um the focus of of the hearing is not the process the health Improvement uh Health needs assessment process or the nature of the three goals but really on action steps um as to how to achieve those goals and uh really this whole process is very much a uh best practice in public health that really most um Boards of Health um you know should be creating every 3 to five years a assessment of the health in the community as well as um Health Improvement plan um the last one done in Reading was in 2015 uh probably we would have done one in 2020 but uh we had something called the pandemic uh which was a little distracting um and so we've been undergoing this process over the past uh year and a half um so for this hearing um we want to hear from the public um if there are any comments and suggestions we're really not um going to take a vote tonight and uh our purpose is not to engage in a dialogue or back and forth but really to hear any suggestions that uh the public would would have um we uh the ground rules uh are basically for anyone who wants to make a comment to sign in at the signin sheet and then when your name is called uh stand at the podium uh give your name and address and um pre you know please limit your comments to five minutes um and I I'll let you know or raise my hand um but before we begin I thought we would ask uh Jamie hcky from uh Pierce Associates who we've been working with to provide an overview of what the process is that we've undergone and where we are today um to uh kind of get everybody up to date as well um the complete document or draft of the complete document is on the uh Board of Health Website um and on and can be accessed through the QR uh code on the agenda for the meeting that was posted so with that I'll just turn over to Jamie great thank you so much Dr Lopez so um as was mentioned this has been a yearlong process to really first start with a community health needs assessment so through that assessment process we were able to really think about what does Health mean to the town of reading um and in particular really identify this need to think about health in terms of Upstream drivers of Health so it's more than just someone's access to health care as we know it it's also more than just the presence or absence of disease it's really thinking about some of the other factors that we know impact someone's ability to lead a healthy life things that could be like your income education level um access to basic resources like food um and quality food in particular are all a part of how r and the planning team and and the folks we heard from in the community think about health so that really served as the foundation for how we put together the community health needs assessment through that process there were two primary data sources that we used the first was to think about what's available quantitatively already through National sources State sources and local sources of data so things like the Massachusetts Public Health Information tool um that's put out by uh the Massachusetts Department of Public Health as one example and there's some Community profiles and information about reading we were able to Source there um and then there's some larger Public Health uh population level data sources that we used things like the behavioral risk factor surveillance survey that's put out by the CDC to look at adult related Health behaviors and risk factors and then a complement to that is there's a youth version of the same tool that is conducted did here within reading public schools and other schools across across the country where we were able to PST some information about health um and behaviors and and some of the risk factors so we took those data sources and then we uh constructed some questions and opportunity to hear from the public so we did some key leader interviews where we connected with folks in the community to hear about their experience with health and reading and an opport Unity to listen to what they felt were the health needs and the leading issues to be addressed within within reading and then also where are some of the strengths and areas to build on and reading certainly has a lot of strengths as well um and then we did some focus groups with Community uh members as well and heard from uh Municipal like local Town leaders we heard from um some of the general population um and folks that um might have loved ones or they themselves might be experiencing disabilities um we reached out to a larger uh racial and ethnic population and make sure that we were thinking of things in terms of equity and hearing from all voices and we also talked with youth leaders about their experience with children and some of the things that they were seeing um so we did four of those types of focused groups to hear from individuals and then lastly we conducted a survey tool that we put out to the community as a convenience sample so there was no um sort of scientific base behind it but you don't typically see that as a part of a of A needs assessment process it's just an opportunity to again hear from the community um as one way to get feedback about what are those Health needs what are some of the strengths and then where are some of the opportunities and I feel like the real power and some of the feedback we received is what you would do about some of the things you're seeing locally within reading and we were able to get a lot of great feedback in that way from the community we took all of that information and distilled it into the needs that you see within the community health needs assessment and then from there the planning team that was meeting further prioritized those needs and identified three areas where we really want to dig into in terms of the community health Improvement plan for rting realizing that all of the needs and information surfaced within the community health needs assessment is certainly important it's just where do we have the leverage an opportunity to make an impact in Reading within your chip or your community health Improvement plan so certain considerations for understanding how those priorities were arrived at were things like the ability to control the need and make an improvement So within public Health as we know there's a local Health Department but a health department in and of itself cannot move these larger scale health issues it needs to be a collaboration and a partnership across town agencies across Community Partners and nonprofits across schools and lots of entities um coming together to make a difference so the ability for collaboration um and in consideration on some of the needs that were raised was an incredibly important point as well so all of that was taken into consideration and what came from it was three distinct areas the first is about preventive Health screenings and treatment services um the second area is about healthy environments and inclusive programs and the third priority area is about healthy eating and active living under each of those areas the planning team worked together to identify goals for how we want to take action within those three primary priority need areas um so under preventive Health screenings and treatment services the two goals there are around increasing awareness about what already exists within the community and through some of the healthcare partners in particular um and also thinking about access to so things like Transportation barriers are cost for folks who really want to access preventive primary healthare so really getting into screenings like uh mammograms and choral cancer screenings blood blood pressure screenings um and your ability to access care ahead of again ahead of disease um prevalence or or issues with um conditions related to chronic diseases and then we also uh for the second goal focused in on mental health and behavioral health treatment services uh for those in need of support and that came out of a lot of the feedback we received from the community and Community leaders broadly defined around the inability to access timely Support Services as it relates to Mental Health Services and it was across the lifespan so it was for children and adults likely having access to um uh access issues to mental health and behavioral health treatment services so ways to support linkages to existing programs and also potentially build and bolster Partnerships to improve access to those Treatment Services um the second area that I mentioned was healthy environments and inclusive programs so this one is really about creating those healthy places spaces and programs for people of all ages and abilities and I want to underscore here we heard loud and clear from folks across the community that it's not necessarily about creating a new program for someone who is experiencing um a disability or creating uh program specific to a population that speaks another language other than English it's about looking at existing programming and adapting it so that it is inclusive and so that you're you're building out that opportunity to ensure that what is offered here is welcoming to all also under this area we talked about increasing opportunities for Community connections and Supportive Services is so really thinking about um where are some of the community places where folks could come together um and support one another and there's a a fair amount of um existing uh wonderful events that happen within reading that could be built on in particular to really support those connections and certainly some talk while we were doing this around um the senior center and to our community center location to really build that community connection and provide those types of Supportive Services um in a centralized manner um lastly under this category is about building resiliency for Youth and Young adults again thinking about getting Upstream like so so getting ahead of some of the risk behaviors and supporting youth to um avoid tobacco use supporting youth to think about their mental health and plug into enrichment programming and services um to really help connect them to community as well well and then lastly there's an area on healthy eating active living and this one is really about um healthy behaviors and the promotion of healthy behaviors across the lifespan um with a focus on trying to make the Healthy Choice the Easy Choice so when you think about healthy eating um in particular thinking about opportunities for farmers markets and ways to bring healthy affordable food options into the community thinking about the way um trails and other resources locally are built for destinations and walkability within neighborhoods and thinking about destinations like schools or the senior center other places for recreation um and really um embracing that healthy eating active Living Concept that other communities have um across across the country so tonight as Dr Lopez mentioned the focus here is to really think about those uh goal areas and the strategies themselves um we're not necessarily talking about whether those the are the right goal areas at this point but talking about what do we do about the goals that were raised and what are those opportunities for strategies and to hear from the public about their ideas um to move the chip plan forward so with that the last slide here is just a recap of of the priority areas that I went over for um any public comment and further discussion great thank you Jamie appreciate it um at this point um we are open for public comment um if anyone in the audience wants to make a comment feel free to come up to the podium um we are going to uh keep the floor open until 7:30 per our agenda um and we'll kind of go from there so right now um Marilyn I didn't put my name um I'm Marilyn chapley 11 John Carver Road and I've been part of the planning on this um for the sake of the zoom in there knowing um it's a challenge we I'm on the Council on Aging um I'm here Nancy zimac is our current chair I was chair when I started on this committee but um passed it on to her capable hands one of the challenges we face is that uh that I struggle with anyway most is that people are not of the frame of mind or experience to think of older people as part of the community in the same sense as younger people and how you make younger people realize that having programs to support all these things you're talking about up here for older people benefits the whole Community not just older people and I think that people grasp that will when you think for example about schools and personally I'm very supportive of everything that's going on to improve the school situation in town but I'll never set foot in that new school when it's built almost certainly I don't have children I don't have grandchildren I'm not worried about anyone of immediate relation to me and their educ but I absolutely understand having really good schools is really important for the whole country not just the community so that makes sense and my vote will go that way unless something bizarre happens but the reverse doesn't happen very much I don't think people's and one of the things we're working hard to do is support the position the select board came out with in the beginning it's not not either or between old people in schools or anything else there's another project out there competing as well they're not competing it's and it's not or but and you can get people to hear those words but to get it translated into action to to make people aware of all ages being part of the community and that if you let older people suffer it's going to Cascade through the community in a million different ways is a real challenge that I would love to hear more thoughts or engage in a dialogue in how the Board of Health could help make awareness of that key to how we go forward because there are lots of issues facing us there's lots of people were up to 7500 age 60 plus people by next year at this rate there'll be 8,000 which is about 30% of the total population of Reading if you took just of the voting age people I haven't done the math but in my head I thinking it's creeping up towards 40% of even voters and even to make them aware you have a way to speak and you have issues that relate to so any thoughts on how the Board of Health can help make this a community challenge I think that it fits right in with this and whatever I can do to help I would be excited to do it so anyway and thank you for this and I was really glad the of the opportunity to be involved to speak up on behalf of older people's perspective in this and I know sometimes that was really noisy but anyway thank you for listening to my racket I think it paid off thank you thanks maryn appreciate it you're a good Advocate thank you that's try as Marilyn said I'm the current chair of the Council on Aging my name is Nancy zimac um I really was is n planning to speak tonight but but number one up there preventive health screening and treatment services um I one of our problems is being able to reach out to all of the people that either need the services they need to know about the services and in this day and age it's very difficult in the old days I live an IP switch we had the ipswitch chronicle everybody got it on Thursdays and everybody read it it was full of local news about where to go for blood pressure or you know whatever but we don't have that nowadays and um we're we're struggling um trying to figure out how how do we reach out you know is it um which which ever uh postcards or letters or personally I use the town website but I don't think everybody does that I think it's an excellent resource of information um it's kind of it's the local paper online and um uh but um you know for all of these things it's getting the word out to the people that need to hear it getting them the services and uh um and and then doing the followup so um and I and I have a feeling this whole reaching out and trying to discover you know who are the groups out there it it's not just us at the Council of Aging it's probably the Board of Health too and conservation and whatever whatever groups are out there so I think I think that's a um I think that fits in with number one and it's just something I wish I had an answer but I don't but um I I uh um did not thoroughly read um the uh report but I do appreciate I was getting reports from Maryland and um and I do appreciate the emphasis or the um inclusion of the older adult community in this whole discussion because you reading we're into sports we're into the kids we're which is great but we also have to remember that there are other people out there and so thank you for doing that thank you so much appreciate your comments I think um at this moment we'll we'll probably um wait a minute or two see if there's any additional members of the public and we'll kind of go from there just sign the sheet since we SP please I put together some comments based on that nhb mhm that and I'll I'll email it to you tomorrow you can edit it thank you for my own things I didn't include you know no boo because I didn't think this was going to be controversial you may need to do that feel guilty leaving you high and dry well I'm not high and dry I'm Kevin's gonna be here and John's gonna be here a day but I'm gonna missing gas will be [Music] here I think um [Laughter] okay okay give me a second so we are um just a clarify so we're not taking a vote so we're just closing the public comment section of the public hearing that's correct and we're continuing the public hearing to our next Board of Health meeting no I think the idea was um when the notice went out for this hearing people were invited to either come to the this hearing to give comments or to send written comments uh to a day um you know by the end of the day today um and so I think we have all the feedback we're going to have I think at our next board meeting we would have a discussion of um where we stand with the needs assessment Health Improvement plan want to make any modifications based on the comments we received um and try to finalize I don't think we would necessarily have you know extend the hearing extend extend the hearing to next meeting because we we do have some other issues uh that we need to go over yeah no the the reason I'm bring it up is because then you can just close the public hearing today yes that was my okay that was my not just the public comment section of the public hearing right so there's two there's two trades of thoughts if you want to keep it open so then when we go when we do meet next we can just vote on it y um obviously discussion vote um at that time and then but I don't think it matters one way the other I think we could just have it as a normal item as well too if that's the case you just close the whole thing today okay so at this point I think I would make um ask for a motion to close the public hearing and public comment um so moved second happy to second okay roll call Joan yes and uh with that I'll also adjourn the Board of Health meeting um or make a motion to do so do have a second second second roll call Joan nothing Rick Mar and thank you all right and thank you for coming thank you