Reappointment of Ellen Cobau, 79 Otis Street, Melrose to the Melrose Council on Aging for a three-year term, said term to expire on the last day of February 2029.

Transcript (~15 min @ 14:22)

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▶ 13:44 Ryan Williams: we have talked for a long time about the Community Preservation Act, members of the council, members of the Affordable Housing Committee, it's come up. I know that members of the Conservation Committee are supportive of this, and it's one of the best ways to finance conservation purchases, direct land purchases, as well as parks and fields upgrades and improvements. So, for anybody that is watching this recording in the future, since apparently there's nobody online- ... look into that because it's a great way for us to have a targeted source of funding that goes specifically to those needs. Mm-hmm. Yep. Okay. Vote time. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? Nobody's opposed. Thank you very much again for coming in. Thank you. Really appreciate your time. Next, we have ID 2026-30, Reappointment of Ellen Kabau, 79 Otis Street, Melrose, to the Melrose Council on Aging for three-year term, said term to expire on the last day of February 2029. Hi. Hi, neighbor. Yes, welcome. Did you ride your tandem bike over, or did you- No, I did not. No? Okay. All right. I walked. Thank you for joining us. If you could just take a few minutes and talk to us about your experience on the Council on Aging, what you hope for the future in the few years ahead, and share anything with us that you want us to know.

▶ 14:53 Speaker 3: Okay. Yeah. So, the first three years were awesome because we were in the middle of a, we rolled out a big, what do you call it? An evaluation of the town to see what the needs were. And we got the surveys, came from BU's School of Gerontology. So we had to get folks to be stakehold-- We went around and got people we knew. I had a friend that's a professor in sociology at Northeastern, so I brought her in. So we had all different stakeholder groups of what we think we need to do to age in place at Melrose. And then they had other groups that they talked to, like the fire department. I work at the hospital, so I'm sure they see, "I've fallen and I can't get up," kind of situations. And then the police do a lot with seniors fraud. And they even interviewed the schools to see, is there any way we can do a multigenerational kind of stuff. So, it took a long time to survey, get the results back, and so right now we're kind of piecemealing. We started implementing things right away, but we're kind of looking at, is there anything we're missing? For instance, one piece that kind of came out is that it's hard to engage men. Women will hang out and they'll cluster together. And even if you have a field trip that's like, "Let's go see Fenway Park," the women all go, the men don't. So we're really working to engage men because I know from hospital, it's a big social determinant of health if you're not engaged socially. So we just instituted a, I didn't, but we advised them, and they implemented it. They have a men's coffee hour that seems to be working really well. And then the hope is to maybe move out from there to see if they want to do a men's event day or something like that, so we're at least getting the men. And then the other piece was we were trying to make Melrose a dementia-friendly town. So, there was some grant money for that. They had social worker and folks teaching all the people in the restaurants, because a lot of times in restaurants, you'll talk to the one spouse, because you don't want to avoid talking to the spouse that has dementia. So, just how to engage with folks like that. And then those restaurants got a siting that's called dementia-friendly siting, so we're working on making Melrose a very big dementia-friendly community. And we're even doing caregiver cafes at the senior center. Because a lot of times the spouse that's taking care of the spouse is so isolated, so they can come in to the caregiver cafe. And the other thing we're doing is we're doing a lot of trying to reach out to other senior centers instead of just recreating the wheel. So, we're finding if Stoneham's doing one on Monday, we'll do ours on Tuesday. So, if someone wants to go to a few, things like that.And then my personal thing that I want to see, but I don't know if this will happen, is I think we need a bocce court in Melrose. And so we're actually look-- I say, I used to be-- BB school up my kids, so we used to always go to Gucci Park, but it doesn't seem like Gucci Park is used all that much, so that might be good. And then it's near the senior center. But I think a lot of senior centers, and that's getting people out, moving, balance, all that good stuff. And then it might engage the younger seniors. And so that's kind of my hope. But I think the director's working on like maybe some grant activity that we could get some money for that. But that's kind of like what's been happening in the past three years that I've been there. And I have a tandem bike, and we're very involved in transportation stuff, so we looked at what can we do transportation-wise, because that's going to be a big thing as people age in place. And, so a lot of it, we're looking at more transportation at the senior center. We're looking at just if people need information about getting T-passes, The Ride. And then we work closely with, do you guys know SDM? The- Mm-hmm. Yeah. So we work closely with them because digital literacy is huge. Yeah. I find like when I-- I'm at Mass General, but like when I discharge a patient, if they're in there with the... I just had a guy now, he's 80 whatever and lives in Nantucket, and he's like, "Well, I think I'm going to go back to Nantucket by Cape Air." And he's doing his whole discharge stuff. I was like, "Oh, I don't have anything to do." But I think that we could keep seniors in the digital literacy group, and there does seem to be even some good intergenerational work with that.

▶ 19:35 Speaker 4: So that's kind of what we're doing. It's fun.

▶ 19:38 Speaker 1: Thank you. Councilor Fronk-Geral.

▶ 19:42 Speaker 3: Thank you. Mel, thank you so much for being here. I love your enthusiasm. Yeah. It's great. I love the fact that you want to do this again- ... and all your ideas because it's really important, and we have an aging population in Melrose. We do, yeah. I think it's like 20% of our population is 65 plus. I believe, yes. Yeah. My parents don't like to be classified as elderly, but... You only have to be 60 to join. I know. So it doesn't even matter. Yeah. But I love that you are, it's called a certified SHINE volunteer. Can you talk about that a little? Yes. Oh, yeah. I did the training. SHINE means Serving Health Insurance Needs of Everyone. But really, we just do Medicare, and I think of these MassHealth situations we get in. So I went through the training to show people, because even navigating Medicare, I'm heading into that direction myself, so I was like, my friends are all like: "You're going to help us, aren't you?" I go, "Oh. I'll see what I can do." But, so I went through the training. It was a lot of intense training. It was like this time last year. And then I got everybody through open-- you probably heard the buzz. Open enrollment, you see all the ads on the TV. So like, there's a big open enrollment period in September, in the fall. Then there's another open enrollment period in January. So I just got everybody through both of those open enrollments. I was actually physically at Mystic Valley in Malden, and which I liked better. Melrose has a SHINE counselor in the office, and they were trying to say, "Why don't we have two days a week, and you can come here?" But I feel like I can learn there because the person that knows all the stuff is there. So like, if I have a question, I just go to her office and go, "Oh. Look what's happening to this guy," and she'll tell me what I can do. But that's another whole piece. People don't realize. And you need digital literacy because now everything they're saying-- I feel bad for these people. They all have to have emails. If you don't have an email, you're screwed. And then they want two-factor identification, and these seniors are like, "What does that mean?" You're like, "Oh, God." And just to log on to SSA, Social Security, and all that stuff requires so much digital literacy, so we really need to catch up. We're very lucky in Melrose to have SDM because I know other communities use that service.

▶ 21:45 Cal Finocchiaro: Yeah. Health insurance is confusing. It's very confusing. If you want to help me with mine, I'd love to take you. Sure. So I think that's a really important piece that- Yes ... you're offering. So, thank you. Oh, thank you.

▶ 21:58 Speaker 1: President Freeman.

▶ 22:00 Bradley Freeman: Thank you very much. I actually had the chance to tour the Milano Center a couple of weeks ago with Erica, the director. And she was amazing, and I was just blown away by the programming. My favorite thing was I walked in, and she explained to me that they were doing Oscars Month- ... where they were showing a different movie that was a nominee for the awards. And the turnout, it was a really robust center, and I really appreciate all- It is ... that you and she does. One question I do have for you, and you mentioned open enrollment, and how is Melrose doing in reaching out to the senior population about various tax abatement programs that are available to them, and how can we do better? Particularly in light of what's happened in the past six months, how can we better provide the resources to let them know what's there, and then help them navigate that process?

▶ 22:43 Speaker 3: I almost think we should be trying to push more-- We do a lot to the seniors. We do a lot of mailing. We have a newsletter. Some people can get it online, some people mail out. But I almost think we should be looking at more the end of your 50s, you should start thinking about what you're going to do in your retirement. And that was one of my things I was thinking, I'm going to try to locate people, if any of you guys have any ideas, who are people doing robust things in their retirement. I think it would be cool to have a panel and just have people come and see what people are doing. Because there's a lot of people out there doing... You can be a Fulbright in your retirement, join Peace Corps. You can do all this stuff. So just to see what people are doing, I thought that would be kind of a cool thing. How'd I get off on that tangent? Yeah. So, I guess I wish that we could try to reach the younger folks more. Like, I just went to the-- We had a really good lecture offered there on ADUs. Mm-hmm. Do you know what those are? You guys probably are writing some of the regs about them. But like, I'm thinking, like, that's such a good idea. You have an elderly family member, and a lot of the people in their 50s, they do. And then, do you put them in an ALF or an SNF, or assisted living or a skilled nursing facility? Or can you maybe build a unit-And then, but who showed up was seniors. And I think once you're 80 or whatever, that's too old to be thinking about, "How am I going to navigate out of this big house?" And that's what they found in a lot of the studies, that we're all sitting on big houses, big Victorians that we don't need, but where are you going to go? Myself included. I don't have big houses. But we had kids. The kids are gone. It's me and my husband. I'd like to downsize, but there's nothing around, as you know. So, I think that's kind of an issue. And so, I think sometimes maybe we need to get the younger people aware of these things now. Maybe they should think about investing. Instead of putting in a solar panel, start thinking about putting in an ADU in your backyard. I don't know. Mm. Mm. So that's just kind of an idea, is that... I don't know how we can reach that population. We actually have a technology person that's... I think he's a volunteer, and he's putting up stuff on Facebook and all those kind of things. But I still think a senior is probably looking at that. But to reach the 50-somethings, I think they're probably a group that we're not reaching. But it isn't our mission, really, in the senior. The monies are really more toward the seniors. But if this 50-year-old's helping seven-year-olds, if they knew it was out there. And that happens at a lot of our open houses. A lot of family members bring their-- It'll be the kids coming in with their parents going, "See? There's things for you to do, Mom and Dad, besides watch the TV." And they get them engaged. So we try to have open house twice a year. Sometimes we run these things, bring a new member, and we'll give them... But it's hard to engage the men. They're a tough group. I see it in the hospital. It's just a tough group.

▶ 25:39 Bradley Freeman: Thank you. I love the idea of engaging the younger generation to help out, so I appreciate that.

▶ 25:43 Speaker 5: Yeah. Thanks.

▶ 25:45 Speaker 1: Vice Chair Vandiver?

▶ 25:46 Kimberly Vandiver: Hi. Thank you very much. Thank you for being here. I love the enthusiasm and the variety and the huge scope that you have.

▶ 25:54 Speaker 3: Erica is awesome. She runs that place. And Jim. They do so much. They know everybody. They're just awesome. I can't say enough good things about them. Sorry. Yeah, go ahead.

▶ 26:06 Kimberly Vandiver: So I had two questions. One, piggybacking off of President Freeman discussion, I don't know if you've used at all the voter registration rolls or the census to find people who haven't yet participated who are in the right age range and live in Melrose and haven't been in. But if not, I know the voter rolls are a public record, so that's something you could consider doing a mailing to people who've never participated.

▶ 26:34 Speaker 3: I'm sure Erica is. I'm just advisory, so I don't get into that, but I know she, when they come in with the statistics, I think we're hitting probably all the seniors. But we're definitely not going into the 50-somethings.

▶ 26:49 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. Great. Yeah, I have the perception, and I don't know if it's correct or not, that in my area of Melrose, kind of in the southwest, we do have a lot of older folks, but I'm not sure. I think a lot of them stay close to home, and I don't know if some of those neighborhoods have been reached, and-

▶ 27:04 Speaker 3: That's a good-- That actually came up in the survey, and we were kind of contemplating. We might still revisit it. Do we have any clubhouses towards Saugus, toward wherever, that we could say, "We're just going to just..." And just see what the turnout would be. Mm-hmm. Just run something at a place like that. So that is true, because I look at Wakefield's, because for a while, I was the public health nurse in Melrose, so I was giving everybody their H1N1 shot and stuff. But in Wakefield, theirs is way out of the way. The senior center's way out of the way. At least we're kind of centrally located. And we also provide free transportation. But I think that you're right, that it's almost visibility, that if we could... And there was some talk, and I think we're going to revisit it when we revisit things that came out of the survey, was that maybe we should do a trial of trying to find somewhere that we could run a senior event that's not at Milano.

▶ 27:59 Kimberly Vandiver: Yeah. And the area that I'm in, I don't know if there are many rentable options. Some of the big apartment buildings. The other thing is, I know some people who might be happy to even offer their yard or their house or something like that- ... if you ever wanted to connect on that or try to figure out ways to host some of those more various locations within Melrose local events. Yeah. Well, thank you. Have fun. And then my other question was about languages. We have some seniors who speak Chinese, speak other languages. That's a good question. Do you have anything as far as outreach there or programming there or anything like that?

▶ 28:36 Speaker 3: I know she does do outreach in different languages, and I know we have access to... And I want to say there is a group that, I don't know which language they speak, but they play mahjong, and they don't speak English. So, I don't know how they all connect, but that is a good question. Are we missing any people that don't speak the language? But I think usually, I'll bring that back to Erica. I know she knows the folks that don't speak English, and I don't know how she manages that, but...

▶ 29:07 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay, great. Well, yeah, a couple things to consider, but yeah, again, I absolutely love you do a huge amount of good for so many people, and that's awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Mm-hmm.

▶ 29:20 Kimberly Vandiver: I'll make a motion to recommend. Great.

▶ 29:22 Ryan Williams: Second. Okay. Motion to recommend by Councilor Vandiver, seconded by Chris Park. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Any opposed? No one's opposed. That passes. Thank you so much, Ellen- Okay. Yeah ... for coming in. Yeah. Thank you. Appreciate your time, as always. Last but not least, ID 2026-355, Reappointment of Joe Viola of 134 Howard Street to the Affordable Housing Trust Fund for a term of one year, said term set to expire on the last day of January 2027. Thank you very much for your time tonight.