ORDER-2015-185 : Substance Abuse Prevention Collaborative Regional Grant Fund 4505

Transcript (~6 min @ 1:15)

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▶ 0:59 Scott M. Forbes: We have a motion to close public participation. Duly seconded. All those in favor? Aye. Public participation of our finance committee is now concluded. And before we get to our four orders, I just want to remind everybody that this meeting is being recorded on MMTV in accordance to our Massachusetts General Open Meeting Laws. First order before us tonight is Order No. 2015-185. It is a Substance Abuse Prevention Collaborative Regional Grant, Fund No. 4505. Motion to suspend the rules. Motion to suspend the rules by Alderman Byrd. Second. Second by Alderman Mortimer. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. All right, the rules are now suspended. Ms. Clay, good evening, how are you?

▶ 1:42 Speaker 3: Great, how are you? Great.

▶ 1:45 Scott M. Forbes: Can I make a comment or statement on the order that we have before us tonight?

▶ 1:49 Speaker 4: Sure. This is a grant from the state health department with federal funds for substance abuse prevention, different than our drug free community grant. It is a regional grant with Melrose as the lead, with Melrose, Malden, Medford, Stoneham, Wakefield, Winchester.

▶ 2:13 Speaker 4: It's $100,000 a year for five years. No, seven years, sorry, different grants, different years, seven years. And it's modeled after the opiate regional grant that we're part of, that Medford is the lead within our public health coalition. We try to spread the wealth, so to speak, and different communities are the leads on different grants. So we do have a separate grant specifically to deal with opiates. So this grant will be dealing with other drugs for all six communities. to get us to do things um in a similar manner similar policies similar board of health regulations

▶ 3:02 Scott M. Forbes: motion to recommend for passage got a motion to recommend by all the mortimer second second by

▶ 3:09 John N. Tramontozzi: alderman byrd any discussion all the chairman so uh thank you um is this the um any uh city matching funds necessary for this no actually and just getting and just sitting um in layman's terms What is the money used for? What type of programs?

▶ 3:23 Speaker 4: Well, it's not used specifically for individual programs for individual kids. The thinking in substance abuse prevention at this point is, they call them environmental changes, but changes that affect the whole community. That things like when the Board of Aldermen are really strict when there's sales to minors. that you really enforce it that changes the atmosphere of the community so that liquor stores know that we take it seriously about selling or serving to minors things like that things like working with the school department to make sure that their chemical policies are up to the latest information but not just Melrose's that the school departments in the six communities try have similar policies because these kids play each other in sports they know each other so it's important that there are the same consequences whether you're on the Melrose football team or the Wakefield football team or the Malden football team so it's those kinds of things so most of the money is used to pay a person a staff person in between salaries and benefits you know how that adds up a full-time person who is trained in substance abuse prevention practices to coordinate those efforts great excellent thank you that's all

▶ 5:00 Scott M. Forbes: that's all yeah all them Adair's I'm not a committee member I'm sorry I saw you raise your hand I'll remember I apologize you have a floor not a

▶ 5:04 Jaclyn L. Bird: problem mr. chairman miss clay can you just repeat the duration of the grant how long it's for and then what our plan is for funding after that if we okay

▶ 5:12 Speaker 4: It's a seven year grant.

▶ 5:13 Speaker 2: Seven years, so we're not taking that far.

▶ 5:16 Speaker 4: Okay. Bunch of different grants, and we all have different time frames.

▶ 5:18 Jaclyn L. Bird: That's good news, right? Seven years, yes.

▶ 5:20 Speaker 4: That's like an eternity.

▶ 5:22 Speaker 2: Okay, excellent, that's all. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

▶ 5:25 Monica C. Medeiros: Now, Alderman Madure. Thank you. Thank you, so just to clarify, the $100,000 is for the entire group of communities. It's not all coming to Melrose specifically.

▶ 5:35 Speaker 4: Well, the money is coming to the city of Melrose to be used for all the communities.

▶ 5:41 Monica C. Medeiros: doesn't say one employee that would be filtered through our right system right

▶ 5:46 Speaker 4: and that person will be a Melrose City employee and then just are we looking at

▶ 5:49 Monica C. Medeiros: when we're talking about like the kinds of things we're talking about keeping them all up to speed and up-to-date I'm hearing stories about drugs that are like stickers and things about like dry alcohol or those kinds of things we're

▶ 6:06 Speaker 4: looking at the sticker ones that are like the old LSD yeah it's making a big come back you know it's it's kind of like whack-a-mole you know you deal with one and another one pops up so parents should keep an eye out for those

▶ 6:20 Speaker 4: absolutely and we just actually our substance abuse prevention coordinator just came out with a resource guide for a substance abuse that is really soup to nuts talks about counselors that are available inpatient places outpatient places housing assistance and it's a hard copy right now and we're putting it online so that we'll be able to keep it updated because you know as soon as you publish something it's out of date but we do have the hard copies that we're distributing and hopefully in the next couple of weeks we'll have it up on the website so you can look at the Health Department website and then go to prevent substance abuse prevention that's great and glad to know some

▶ 7:03 Monica C. Medeiros: treatment information as well thank you thank you okay this order has been

▶ 7:08 Scott M. Forbes: recommended and had duly seconded all those in favor all right any opposed all right this order will be recommended before the next board meeting which will take place on June 15th miss clay I think you're going to be speaking on behalf of the next order as well I believe it is two zero one five dash one eight six a transfer of nine thousand five hundred fifty dollars from health health salaries and wages to health professional services and health seminars and schooling as set forth within.