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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1982-01-11-HSC-min.pdf Human Services Committee Minutes of the Meeting of January 11, 1982 Present. Steve Baran, Ilene White, Ruth Nablo Nancy Zarle, Roberta Black, Howard Reynolds, Judy Zabin, Stan Finkelstein, also Bea Phear The meeting was called to order at 7 40 pm Minutes The minutes of January 4 were approvdd as ammended. page 2, para 1 RePlace wants to pay additional consultation fees to those who now volunteer page 2 para 3 Ruth not support additional consultation fees page 2, para 2 Add new sentance The Town Manager will ask the School Department about funding for Replace from the school budget page 3 Add new paragraph CoA subcommittee will try to contact the director of Minuteman Home Care Corp and ask him his views of the CoA and elderly problems in Lexington Cable TV Bea reported that Adams Russle will be having a meeting for Lexington agencies and citizens groups on the use of Cable TV The organizer is Lauren Goldfarb, and the date will be February 19 Bea does not yet know the time Forum on Aging Bill Page and Jack Gardner had held a meeting with Lexington representatives to the White House Conference on Aging, Lucille Shuck and Ted Vielle, prior to the Conference, and now a post-mortum is scheduled for January 27 at 8 00 pm in room 111 Any interested member of the Human Services Committee is invited Youth Commission The Youth Commission wants to exchange minutes Judy and Roberta will receive them for the Human Services Committee Steve asked about their survey Bea said that she had not been present at the time, but that they decided to table it until spring RePlace Steve talked with Ernie Cook of DMH, who reported that drug money will be coming out of Dept of Public Health rather than DMH in FY83 Steve felt that RePlace should strenuously find out who to contact Judy and Roberta had another long meeting with RePlace and felt that the need for increased staff was well documented Service statistics show an increase; there is very good use of volunteers (but a requirement that a staff member be present at all times) and the pressures of burn-out they believe will be relieved by increased staff as well as by increased space There was discussion about other sources of funding Bea reported that the Town Manager had not yet discussed school funding, but was planning to do so Services provided to the schools might be partially reimbursed through 766 Services include testing, counseling, outreach/education, consultation and psychiatric evaluation In addition there could be money through the Concord District Court's family services department, DSS (although the fact that Replace serves only Lexington is seen as a problem by Monique Doelling of DSS) and more active fundraising for contributions Roberta recommended that we look at a projected budget she drew up, using level funding Human Services, January 11 page 2 for consultation fees, equipment, supplies, and telephone This would make their expenses $94, 251 excluding the rent expense which is a paper transaction If we assumed contributions of $11,100, and increased 'other' revenue to $500, the Town would then need to subsidize at $58,628 After discussion, it was decided that the Committee would recommend funding at 51,628 suggesting that the new counseling position be only half funded by Lexington and half by other means This is not to say that the Committee felt that the new position was not needed, but rather that the search for outside- money should be encouraged Steve suggested that the Committee continue to work with RePLace and help them focus on getting other sources of funds Committee Role/Credibility There was some discussion about the credibility of the Committee and the role regarding budget recommendations Judy asked if we had to assume there was a finite pie to be divided The Committee felt that its role should be to look at programs and make dollar recommendations outside of the context of thk Town Manager's sense of limits Stan then asked if we were to be advocates for human services Roberta felt that was an issue of credibility, and how we could best make a point Bea felt that there was no credibility problem if the Committee looked at each program and recommended increases in some and decreases in others CMARC Ruth discussed the memo she had distributed with last week's minutes Judy requested clarification regarding Ruth's recommendation that they not accept unfunded clients Ruth had meant to express that they should not repeat the FY80 contract which required taking all unfunded Lexington clients, but that if the Board decided to have a limit and accept some, she would notobject, although she was concerned about the agency's viability if they took too many Ruth had a conversation with Bob Renna in the School Department, who thinks there will be no new Lexington residents going to CMARC from the school system until 1985 There may possibly be one from a residential program Since the CMARC request was to cover new unfunded clients, Ruth recommends not funding this proposal at this time, although CMARC is a good program Steve felt that this was a beginning at looking into the needs of the developmentally disabled, and maybe we could go back to CMARC in future Mystic Valley Stan began by saying that he and Tom had very little additional information They had looked at last year's coorespondance and found it difficult to understand At the meeting last week, they had asked Don Lund to forward copies of the Safehouse evaluations, past correspondance, and resumes, but nothing had been received Steve felt this was a continuation of past patterns of unresponsiveness Stan also said he considered the larger question to be "Is Lexington getting something from Mystic Valley? to which the answer has to be "yes and probably more than $10,000 Another issue is that MV las substantial outside funding, and by giving them zero, we are penalizing them for the very actions that we encourage in RePlace Tom and Stan agreed that they do not recommend funding for the elderly services part of the request, as the need was not well documented They recommend funding Safehouse for less than the $10,000 requested, with the provision that Tom and Stan not abandon the efforst to do a thoroughMV review of the total program They -recommend $7,500, recognizing the value of donated funds, and the domino effect on other communities It is clear Human Services, Januaryll p3 that there is a short time to deal with this uncertainty He feels. they need to have their wrists slapped for not being responsive, which it why he is not recommending the full $10 000 Ruth said if it were "at this time she would be prepared to support the $7,500 Howard felt that his perceptions as a former Safehouse board member were that they were walking a very fine line, and didn't have any "fat" Stan thought there might be fat somewhere in Mystic Valley, and had been concerned that the Safehouse administrative share was greater than the agency wide 15% Judy said that the discussions were based on how cooperative some people were, and it was a question of credibility of the Committee to use that as a reason for reducing funding Roberta said she is interested in the worth of the services provided, and, if it is more than $10,000 she doesn't feel that is the best way to slap wrists It was decided that $7,500 and $10,000 were very close anyway, and Stan said he would agree to go with the $10,000 if the committee wanted Council on Aging Nancy spoke with Joan Melcher on Friday, who said the CoA now uses Mystic Valley consultation time without cost, which they need As of FY83, it will no longer be free Nancy also she was concerned that the CoA is not pushing for more outside elderly money If they want mental health consultation they should write a grant and then pay Mystic Valley Nancy does not recommend funding the Mystic Valley elderly program directly She also thinks they should not pay for the pianist Howard felt the general consensus was that outreach is the weakest area, and the $4500 is a modest salary which they should keep Ruth asked if it would be appropriate to remove the funding for the Senior Citizen's Club and fund the outreach worker Ilene said it was a question if the other two would do more outreach, but Howard said that the phone rings constantly, and there are limited hours The Committee decided to recommend that the outreach worker salary be funded, and money be added to purchase consultation time from Mystic Valley for Friendly Visitor training, but the Senior Citizen Club and pianist be eliminated Summary Each sub committee will have a brief report to Steve by Friday Next Meeting 7 00 pm, with Jim Crain on January 18, in room 111 The meeting adjourned at 10 25 pm Respectfully Submitted ) D 'r Beatrice Phear