e e e e hi Susan oh I can't hear you can't hear you at all Susan yep gotcha oh there you go how are
you I Lally got here oh hi Janice so um the three of us may be it for a while until Mary Joe can get here around 6:15 cuz um Janette said she wasn't sure
whether or not she could make the meeting okay so thank you both Jessica I saw that you just sent me the um f that earlier I'm sorry not to worry um
and Janice thank you for reading the chief's uh paragraph and making sure she got the gave you the correct information I could see it go both ways so yeah if anybody sent any emails out I
just got back from cly Dickinson minutes ago literally and I my email thanks a lot for coming Janice because even I mean I know you've been rushed but this gives us a quorum oh good yeah I got stuck at the top of my
driveway backing in oh no so that took five minutes this last storm was enough to make you go Bonkers I know you know I realized today the post office is not delivering my mail oh no and our our mailbox is not
shut shuttled out so they wouldn't anyway well that's why they're not doing it and in the past we used to get a message stuck in our box that said you know out so we can reach your mailbox but that was in the old days when our own mail
deliverer I really kind of miss having our own I don't I don't have delivered mail but I hear a lot of people complain now that Amis has taken it over yeah yeah it wish better when we had our own
person okay so we need to so I think we're going to call this thing together at let me see we're at 5:34 oh I'm trying to turn the heat on in my office well that was a good idea well I
haven't done it yet oh okay we'll do it so you're more comfortable I need to get out of my chair to do it oh come on I can do it this way oh we have a feline visitor yes
I'll probably be doing that a half a dozen times so um the first item on the agenda is the minutes does anybody have any changes they need to make in the in the minutes not for me Janice I think I made
the corrections that you sent me I don't know I I will double check after after we've approv the minutes I think it was only a punctuation and a grammar of subject verb noun verb agreement
thing and I think you got it all right now I can turn on my heater so is there a motion to approve the minutes of January 8 I don't have them in front of me I'm
sorry I I don't either but I put up a motion to approve the minutes for over the January 8th okay and is there a second second oh thank you okay seconds because I I know I at least looked at
them I know you did I know you did and you sent Corrections and it weren't a lot so we have a motion made and seconded let's have a vote um let's see Janice oh great sorry I I'm still trying
to get my head in place I understand gray I make p i millinger I thank you Jessica how about the financial report so the financials for um
January um there the um hold on let me pull them up um oh darn it hold on a second I should have had them opened no problem um so our
balance before our previous balance was $ 24986 in which the Foot Care by nurses um um bill was $415 and we received $55 for donations for that
month um so it ends up being um $2,836 is our new balance uh there was um I'm not really quite sure what happened but we got a um email from the footcare by nurses say that we didn't
pay the December no the November bill I think it was no was it January we didn't have it in in January so it was the December bill was still outstanding I did finally
after emailing the the um accountant for a week she found that neither our foot care by nurses bill or the mass mocha or the mass um COA were paid so she just put those in for payment on
Tuesday okay thank you I'm not sure why they how she missed them she didn't explain anything just that she looked them up and said they were they weren't paid yet so well thank you very for pursuing that because I know that's been kind of a
pain yeah I don't I don't understand where the disconnect was on that I know because Gail's pretty good I think yeah yeah so I don't I don't know anyways but they're paid now good um I was going to email Vanessa from the um
the full Care by nursers and let her know I just got word yester that they were getting paid so good okay so at least she knows that that the money is on the way yeah that is that's definitely good and I guess um I should probably send um the
m Co people a little note saying that it's on the way yeah the the payment I think went out Tuesday she said okay so but I did see Miss Miss gomberg's um I call her Miss gber I I grew up with her her daughter uh Susan gomberg's um
um email saying that that 300 and something came in today at the footcare clinic yes which is a really nice amount 348 what was it I don't remember the exact total yeah I don't well and also I got the mail at the last minute and ran down
and gave the bill to Susan as she was pulling out so oh okay I'm not sure whether her she will have that figure um um she told me $342 came in today okay so our normal bills are about
400 and something so that's a really good chunk of change it is a good chunk of change a piece of it was me it was one of my foot care uh days and I gave a big donation and somebody else was paying somebody who had been at the last
month but didn't have a lot of money to give last month had also in a good check size check for two months okay so um we just have to make sure to keep it up right on this note if I haven't said
this before one of our spring um responsibilities is to find a replacement for Susan because she's quitting as of May right so um that puts pressure on us to get more people to join us to take on
some of these tasks although Susan's no longer a member of the um COA so we can get somebody who's not a member to take on the task right somebody who'd like something to do you know once a a um
once a month and no meetings to go to okay so thank you very much for that report um let's see we were going to you were going to talking about requesting a an increase in the town budget line
where are we on I did talk to um Gabe the the Town Administrator and she said that we would have to really look at our own budget first um we don't really have a budget we never really got a formal budget in
um but she was when I was talking to her she she we were looking at at at some of the expenses and he said that that we're donating a lot of our money and then we're asking for more money which seems odd um she said that you know if if we
can not donate much money then we would have more money but we're right now we're we're donating a third of our our grant um and not to co-sponsor things um and
she said that if if we we cut back on that then we would have more money and plus with the with the um the Foot Care um she she said to to make to to put in a budget request we have to have line by
line items of what we' spend it on we couldn't just say you know like well you know it would have to be you know like we're you know like you do like the newsletter or something of that sort um so if we wanted to go move forward with
that we would have to come up with with like exact reasons that we would want to use the extra money yes um and I I'm thinking okay um thinking that if we get the
grant that the for coas and life path have uh and the village neighbors have applied for yeah we will be asked to do extra things for that and one of them I think will be to do more frequent newsletters Janice has pointed out to me
that we don't have to have a eight or 12 page newsletter we used to four page newsletter that we put out ourselves because that was doable right and we we need to think about I I depending on what what comes of the
grant proposal I we need to think about more frequent small issues right and again it also said like with with with donating like the $3,000 to the library for the fitness classes he said that if
we could find and ask like how many are actually um over over 5 that we're are using it then we could say well we're going to donate an XX amount of portion for it and not the whole thing if we
wanted to cut back on that as well if if if that was something you know if we're looking to save a little bit of money that's a good idea I I'm not sure that how um easy it will be to get Maryanne to give us those kinds of
figures but but it's worth it's worth pursuing you know there's also there's also sorry I didn't mean to cut you off there's also a recreation department that could go in and maybe fund it half and half at the same time you know
because there's a recreation department too that that that's counts as Recreation as well so yeah however I have to say I've been looking okay I spent a considerable part of my afternoon screwing around with and
finally having some success with the Court format that we use for the what used to be the executive office of Elder Affairs and is now the a called age AG in it's of um so
that's aging and Independence and I don't know whether they're calling themselves the Executive Office of Aging and Independence but I think so anyway I've been looking at their report and I found two interesting
things one is that most coas get the bulk of their money from their towns oh that the chunk that comes from the state is less than 10% often oh wow
yeah but but some of these organizations are big ones that have senior sors with paid staff and and have you know our paid staff are people that we have to count like the nurses and the nurse and the and the PE the fitness instructors
those are P staff so but we do need to think about um about what what the town could um maybe consider giving us and I think presenting what the P the general
picture for coas would be important right um and they break it down and they tell you what some of the smaller coas pay or and get um but what I started out to say is that a big chunk of what the coas do is Fitness
related okay so we can emphasize that I think we could demonstrate um you know that the most of our of the money for the fitness classes is going to people who are over 60 right that would be
important but you know the fact that they're run from to 10:00 on a weekday morning suggests that they're not pro they're mostly probably are retired I would right in this age you know younger women are going to be working mostly
right but but that's definitely something that needs to be pursued the other thing that I was thinking about um was that we need a dedicated space it's really not satisfactory to have a room in town hall that we have to share with
variousness sorted we have to share at election time we have to share when people are having meetings there um and I was wondering and actually somebody was talking to me about this you know
Wendell um turned their former Library into a senior center yep and so I think I'm going to go in and talk to Gabe about you know what would be the possibility of us getting the library as a senior center
because if we had a dedicated space that was set up with coffee pot and teapot and chairs comfortable chairs and people could actually get used to going to it and finding it a comfortable space to meet and talk with people of course the big expense there would be we really
would need to have running water and plumbing toilets not you know not composting toilets right but I think it's time to start thinking about that and talking with people about that so they get used
to the idea if have a senior center from their old library why couldn't we right so things to think about she was also um the other thing she was telling me she so she lives in
um Gabe lives in New Salem and she was she was telling me that there's Counsel on Aging um they even do like bus trips and stuff like they have a like a you know and and I wonder if we could um start thinking of other things
that we could do besides just um you know like maybe like a pizza night or I I know that like you know a lot of people still work you know at you know you don't have a choice but if we did something maybe early evening once the
the days get get um longer of course not now cuz people don't like to drive at night but if we could get to get maybe people get out that can't make the community lunch because they're working or you know it's just not
convenient um you know Janice will remember that that Maryann tried that and didn't get much response but you know again we need to build up we need to build build up responsiveness right right and I was I'm
hoping that if we get the grant we'll be able there heck a lot of shoots people who are busy as Village neighbors and do things for Village neighbors and get some of those folks doing things for us um that would be one way to sort of
try to build up a a constituency right right but I think that's a good I think the idea of thinking of new new kinds of things to do at different times of the week and day is really good yeah I I think that we could well
like I we would need more members too to to kind of shoulder that as well y you know someone that that would actively be able to you know if they we let's say we had a like a a coffee hour or something you know someone that would be able to
do that set it up as well as you know that's I think that's the one thing that uses back right now is that we don't have the members I think you're right but you know it's kind of a vicious circle if we did more we would attract more people but so we need more
people to support to come out to um talking we were talking about this today because I came early and to my foot um thing appointment and Susan was talking about how the vinsky had a coffee hour there's a sign about Monday
coffees that's still behind the sofa in the senior Lounge oh wow and Susan went once and they were really excited to see her and they said that she was like one of the few people that had ever come to their coffee hour of course it turns out they have coffee or tea at the coffee
hour and you'd like to have something some nice munchie along with coffee but right right right so that's our getting numbers in for Staffing and volunteering and also for um showing up at events
so I'm going to try to get this into the minutes and I hope I'm successful um so the grant proposal update so if we said all that needs to be said about increase in the uh I think so if if we can come up with some line
it that we want to you know we're we're more than welcome to ask as long as we can have you know some line items of what we want to use it for okay and it could be you know coffee hour or you know even if it you know whatever
yep y Travis can you shut her up please my dog's barking at us oh well um so we'll we'll need to talk keep talking about that and it's and I know Gabe said we'll need to go to the finance
committee and maybe it's too late to do anything this year but we can build up a case for next year right right yeah okay so the grant proposal update I don't have one it got sent in on and got turned in at good time and it looked
good to me so I think we have a good chance of getting it but I don't I think sometime early March we're going to find out if we got the grant proposal because that's I mean that's going to be some new programming that will attract people and also some things to spend money
on um the Foot Clinic L letter is is still being given to people when they show up and it does seem to be getting some responses so that's good transportation if you all you know if you all want to
say something about this item don't let me just go on to the next one okay this transportation is something that I was thinking about well two things one is the idea of getting out more information about the um yeah the bus um
connection and when I found out that very few people are actually signed up for um Town announce that's disc enaging um because I thought of that as a way to get out information I'm still hoping I need need to focus on getting a
list of the people who don't have Broadband so that we can send a regular nail mail to them and I'm wondering if we should advertise on um shoot you know whatever sh the shsy
ETC email list for the transportation sorry for the transportation yeah about about the opportunity for the the bus connection the on demand service we have we have not in the past
we've limited ourselves to town announce because it's Town business but I don't think there's any reason why we couldn't what is it you know the shoot next door next door thank you very much there's no reason why we couldn't
put up an announcement on town next door right I don't see why not the original R this is Janice speaking the original rationale uh from Becky and maybe others maybe the select board I don't know is
that next door shury has commercial information on it and uh advertisements from elsewhere and that we're not supposed to use it as a town and I I don't know if I agree with that but
that's that's the background that I have well I do know that like Waste Management uses it and uh the police department use it so I do know that some Town governments use
it so I don't know well Janice I appreciate because I didn't have any collection of the history I appreciate your knowledge of the history because it sounds as though I ought to ask it started off without
advertisements changed and that's when the boom came down from whom I don't know I wasn't part of the Council on Aging then okay but the times are changing so yeah
well the challenge is to communicate with the community and the community does have a tendency to pay attention to next door I think since they don't seem to pay a lot of attention to town anounce okay so that's okay so that's
one issue um transportation and getting information on to about it onto in V out in various ways the other thing about transportation is giving rides other than Med rides um
and I don't know why the COA decided only to do med rides and not to make rides available for other causes but there two things have come up one is if we get this grant different
towns will do different have different programming so the idea would be people will need to go to other towns to attend programs and um the thought of the person who was of Barbara bodson was that they could use
Village neighbors Transportation which is for um any place that people need to go for social for shopping for social for medical not just for medical the big problem here is that Village neighbors
transport rides are supposed to only go to people members people who are members of Village neighbors and it's true that Village neighbors doesn't cost anything to join but somehow it's a little bit to me
a little awkward to tell people well you know you have to be a village neighbor um member to get their service also um they have to be Corey checked now for us the drivers of Med
rides had to be cor checked but passengers did not but apparently the rule is for Village neighbors that to use Transportation maybe to use I don't know how many of their services whether it's true for membership but it's
certainly true for rides the passengers have to be Corey checked too and I don't want to be in a situation of telling people if you want a ride a free ride you have to be Corey checked right I so that made me wonder if we could
provide if we could talk to our drivers who used to do med rides and see if they might be interested in doing um more doing local rides either to another of the four towns or you know I think we might get more business at Community
lunch if we could advertise you can have a free ride if you call what this number right so um so I'm hoping that we'll talk about so is it okay if I go ahead and talk to the former Med ride drivers
and see if any of them will be interested in who did the med rides well I think oh I'm having senior moments about some of the people who did one of them was Andy Fairfield who's no longer alive
um oh boy one of them is a person whose face I'm seeing but whose name is escaping a former select board member very active in town you all would know exactly who I'm thinking of if I could think of her name I was just curious that's all there were
I think there were a handful I never had anything much to do with it Linda ran it but I I think I think between four and six people drove oh wow and they had regular um
passengers in cas and unfortunately some of their one we didn't start up Med Rides Again is because the passengers several of the regular passengers died wasn't the call for it anymore right
right so I can probably get a somewhere get a list was it Elaine yes thank you you're welcome Elaine was pretty much in charge so I thought I would ask
elain so is that okay if I would move on that I agree with that okay greatrees oh thank you do I need a mo do you think I need a motion to do that I don't think so not
at this point we're just exploring the option okay previs so um the silverine connection Janice there yeah um I finally made voice
contact with Brenda fleser who is a volunteer with life path um and putting together directory I must have spent 10 phone calls and emails and not getting
anywhere and she finally spoke to me um and said she was running way behind in this directory of different councils on aging and stuff and ours referred to the former mid rde program
and that was all and I said well we're doing a lot more now but I couldn't figure out how much she wanted so she said so some towns are sending in a lot some are only saying a little I haven't heard it all from anybody um she
said write it up as a word doc and email it to me because I couldn't figure out the computer thing wasn't working so I emailed it to her and I have I followed up saying let me let me
know that you got this because there seems to be some flaky communication systems there and I have not heard I sent her basically what's on our website about
what we do that makes us special not the generic programs of L you know but like the community lunch and the Foot Clinic and uh there I could send it all to you but
I wanted to make sure she had it and I don't know that she has oh jeez she has not responded to my saying please please confirm for me that you received this we have a meeting tonight and I heard
nothing well it sounds like she's sort of overwhelmed I think she is and she says she gets like 300 emails a day from different towns so I don't have a a good answer for you but you're making progress well at
least I discovered I I thought she was another example of um someone who had left and they hadn't updated the phone directory or the email so it was going into a void
and that's so I called somebody else at life path and I said does she exist and does the Silver Line exist you cannot find the silver line on their website and after a while uh Brenda
called me and we had a pleasant conversation and um but I I I haven't had a resp have an acknowledgement that she actually received what I sent her that's my report yeah well that I mean you have made progress and it
sounds like sooner or later she's going to make the corrections and give correct information is what we're doing I sort of vaguely remember something about you know originally her deadline was January 16th basically she gave people a week to
update um and I mentioned that we were past the deadline she says don't worry we're we're talking April at this point so yeah I'm smiling because I I realized when I looked at the um the um the document that came
from uh yeah EO age um that the original deadline was the middle of January for them wanting the survey responses but now they've changed it to end of March
so I mean people have plans and then they get overloaded and dates change and that sounds like that's happening too incidentally did you all get copies of the um the documents from Adam
Frank at eeo age uh because I can send it to you it's it's I found reading the report from of fiscal year 73 uh 23 pretty interesting and you might like to see it too it's
not that long I don't remember seeing that but I might have okay well I'll send it to you again all right what am I doing I got too much stuff going on here just lost my
no I think that we are to um skip over membership recruitment because that's mostly going to be a matter um Mary Joe I asked Mary Joe I don't know if I sent copies of it to you all I've cced you all I asked her to tell a little bit
about herself and her interest in this organization okay so I did so she said so she's preparing that and I told her that she might that she should expect some questions and that she might get asked why she's interested in COA uh how did do you know how she came
up upon did she join herself or did somebody ask her I'm just curious I did oh okay yeah I didn't know I didn't know if she just saw it and wanted to join or somebody you know like I go to her
occasionally for a massage okay I was seeing she she was I was getting a massage I asked her I was I think I was talking about the workload on COA right interested in joining so we ought to deal with um
unanticipated business and the main unanticipated business is the police chief's request and everybody has seen that so what are you thinking I'm thinking that I'd like to do it for them I think it's I think it' be good to
to be part of that especially when it goes to just for yes you know and I do I I see them all all the time down there filling buckets for people it's great actually do you yeah when I go by I'll see them backed
up and fill in buckets oh especally after especially after this last storm I mean you can barely walk in your driveway so yeah and I do know personally a few people that get them too and and they're
very very prompt and you know really big help for people good I actually want to join the group that gets them because I have a very tricky top of my driveway um okay so do we have a motion that we're talking about $100 right Five
Buck oh 20 buckets at five bucks a piece yes corre so do we have a motion that we would um give the uh the police chief for her sand for Senor project
$100 just to buy 20 buckets I put on a motion to provide the donation for the police chief to have 20 buckets at $5 a piece for sand for seniors great
seconds thank you both so my question is do we if if we send them the money or do we go and buy them ourselves and get reimbursed for it I don't know how long
it will take for the warrant to go through and to get them the money if they need it now is what I'm thinking well um it would not be it take us some time to get reimbursed too right right for I wouldn't mind going and
buying them and waiting to be reimbursed is what I'm saying I um they may have money in their budget to buy them and would like reimburse I I mean she didn't ask she ask us to buy them right she I
just I just I just don't want them to wait too long if they need them now is what I'm thinking or I'm I'm sure that you know I don't know well I just don't want to have happen like with the other warrant and they you know bookc Care by nurses
waited two months yeah well we're going have to um be be sure Gail responds faster to requests for warrants I think yes I yeah
um you know I maybe it's if it's an Town thing that might be quicker than an out of town thing I don't know yes it's just it's going from one office to another right maybe if I I put in a note saying that it's urgent for them to get them the warrant done or the the money
quickly so they can get the sand for seniors I just I also I'm thinking I mean I would go down and pay my own money and get reimbursed but I don't want to deal with 20 buckets right I think it'd be easier I mean the
the police department is used to doing this right be something that they're already doing I would you know if you want to we could ask her would you um like us to get a warrant for you to to to spend the $100 on your 20 buckets or
do you want us to buy the buckets and be reimbursed okay I think it's I think it's cleaner to have to let them do the bot purchasing okay so let's what I'll do is I'll fill out the warrant tonight um and I'll just WR tell her that it's
urgent that that the police department gets this money so they can replenish their buckets for sand for seniors and then hopefully she'll be right on it yes especially given the weather yes and if we get any more ice
oh yeah let me let's do that well let's put in in a note saying that it's urgent for for the you know this donation to go through quickly as possible um so that that the seniors in town can get their buckets of sand quicker yeah and I'll
put it in tonight before I go to bed okay and I it's okay I'm going to send the chief a notice saying that we voted we approved her money and warrant coming okay I wrote a little note I guess did I send it to everybody that thanking her
for the um for the for sending in the the the proposal and for correcting it with Janice's note and said I would get let her know after the meeting okay yeah when I when I saw the
20 for five bucks I thought but that's really cheap yeah but the thing is I then went to the Home Dep website and looked at looked at the buckets and you can get a you can get 20 five gallon
buckets the orange kind um for $339 or something so I'm thinking wait a minute this is cheaper than what she's citing but she said around five and maybe yeah I I don't know I didn't want
to get into the weeds but I thought are they getting them delivered to shs fairy or you know is there some tax there shouldn't be I would think but I don't know not on a I would think no tax on a Town purchase I
would think so yeah I mean that's always something that's happening in the cemetery commission when Walter purchases stuff he's always telling say telling us no tax because this is a town purchase well you know so she's she's guesstimating and if there's a little
extra for an extra bucket or two that's fine with me right I agree okay so I think we have gotten through our regular business and we are waiting for um um Mary Joe to be able to get
here does anybody have anything else they want to bring up for discussion tonight or in the future I don't think so I've been collecting mail but none of it is really terribly
exciting one of them is the notice about our environmentally Preferred Product purchasing policy which is quite a name and since we don't do that much purchasing I would hope the pre that the the chief is aware of our environmentally prefired product
purchasing policy oh I wanted to ask who's doing the the potluck I heard that Sally um fell down and broke an arm or a leg Yeah Sally broke her hip her hip well she she was out she was out of it
she was still in Maine recovering from surgery last time and she supposedly sent de O'Brien and I I've been helping her supposedly sent Deborah O'Brien to help me but didn't show up so I did it
and it wasn't that big a deal to do it as one person it's just more fun to do it with somebody else right right yeah I need to um s Sally puts the announcement on the sandwich board and I need to stop off at Sally's and get the the letters
and numbers to change the Sandwich Board to have the the correct date so be coming up yeah well I hope covers quickly that's no fun yeah it's the first of the month comes up of the fast
especially you know if you have c monthly calendar Pages you don't really necessarily pay a lot to what's going on at the beginning of the next month right right yeah I'm going to take a quick break
before before um Mary Joe gets here just run to the potty I'll be back in a minute sounds good I won't bug you by asking your personal information Janice I I was wondering if I should volunteer it because we're kind of on a
break yeah had some good news today I didn't expect um hang on recorded oh never mind wait a second let me see if I can I don't know if we are because we're
on um the particular um Zoom that link that we're on we don't share with the Board of Health and they're I think the the group that's coming on at 7 so they be on a different
Zoom so I just re turned the recording on again which you probably saw so I'm thinking I don't know what you think but I'm thinking we should reschedule may Joe for next month yeah
probably right agrees and okay so where's my calendar so I know what the second Wednesday is next month one Mon and I'll be right with you the second
Wednesday of March is March oops uh the 12th okay so we shall we meet again on March 12th at 5:30 is this an okay time and date for you
Jessica yeah yeah thanks for giving us all this time since I'm sure that you've got plenty to do at home well I have to go actually I go to work after I leave here do you I take I take care of an elderly lady in Hadley I get her all set up to go to bed get her washed up and
her night gown and every night seven days a week I put her I go down there and do that so how long does it take I mean usually I takes about maybe 20 minutes but I stay we watch a a game show whether either either watch um
Wheel Of Fortune or Jeopardy and um together and then I get her ready for bed she likes to company too that's nice I'm sure really appreciates that she does she does but she's 97 and she still
lives alone wow so we're GNA try to keep her there as long as we can yeah wow that's fantastic so thank you all very much for um hanging in and I think we will adjourn the meeting at 6:52 if
that's okay with everybody with me oh I suppose we have to have a motion to adjourn sorry motion to is there a motion to adjourn no moved great thank you Janice and and we have a second I'll second
it and a vote Janice Ray i m p i millinger i okay we are officially closed thank you very much thank you stay warm guys yeah