Health, Education & Welfare Committee — 2021-09-20
Attendance
Christopher Cinella ; Jack Eccles ; Maya Jamaleddine ; Leila Migliorelli ; Robb Stewart ; Cory Thomas
Agenda
- Call to Order
- Public Comment
- Orders
- ORDER-2022-15 : Reappointment of Douglas MacDonald, 47 Botolph St., to the Cemetery Commission for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2024
- ORDER-2022-14 : Appointment of James Oosterman, 54 Ellis Farm Lane, to the Affordable Housing Trust, for a two-year term, said term to expire the last day of January 2023.
- ORDER-2022-28 : Appointment of Seamus Kelley, 259 West Emerson St., to the Affordable Housing Trust, for a one-year term, said term to expire the last day of January 2022.
- ORDER-2022-27 : Appointment of Anthony Chui to serve as Health Director for the City of Melrose
- Adjournment
Minutes
CITY OF MELROSE HEALTH, EDUCATION & WELFARE COMMITTEE CALENDAR● SEPTEMBER 20, 2021 Web-based remote meeting Remote meeting 7:53 PM , Melrose, MA 02176 The public should take notice that the Melrose City Council may, on certain occasions, have a quorum in attendance due to standing committees of the City Council consisting of both voting and non-voting members. Members attending this duly posted meeting are participating and deliberating only in conjunction with the business of the standing committee. Attendee Name Title Status Arrived Maya Jamaleddine Chair Present Leila Migliorelli Vice Chair Present Jack Eccles Voting Present Robb Stewart Voting Present Cory Thomas Voting Present Christopher Cinella President, ex oficio Present
ORDER-2022-15 Appointment Reappointment of Douglas MacDonald, 47 Botolph St., to the Cemetery Commission for a three-year term; said term to expire on the last day of February 2024 Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2022-14 Appointment Appointment of James Oosterman, 54 Ellis Farm Lane, to the Affordable Housing Trust, for a two-year term, said term to expire the last day of January 2023. Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2022-28 Appointment Appointment of Seamus Kelley, 259 West Emerson St., to the Affordable Housing Trust, for a one-year term, said term to expire the last day of January 2022. Recommend Passage City Council
ORDER-2022-27 Appointment Appointment of Anthony Chui to serve as Health Director for the City of Melrose Recommend Passage City Council City of Melrose Page 1 9/28/2021 10:25 AM
Transcript
▶ 1:33:20 Maya Jamaleddine: law. This meeting of the Health Education and Welfare Committee will be conducted via remote participation to the greatest extent possible. We will post a comprehensive record of these proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting on the City of Maros website and on mmtv slash mmtv3.org the public can find online access instructions to view this meeting at www.cityofmirrors.org slash remote meeting with that i would entertain motion to open public comment motion public comment we have a motion to open public comment made by uh Councilor eccles and seconded by Councilor stewart if there is no objection public comment is now open if you're here to speak on the health education welfare committee meeting any items on the agenda please
▶ 1:34:34 Maya Jamaleddine: raise your digital hand or make it known at this moment i do not see anyone with their digital hand raised or a check mark by their name okay thank you seeing no motion uh made um i would um close and make motion public comment is there is no objection seeing no objection public comment is now closed and um we have before us order 2022-15 the appointment of uh douglas mcdonald 47 without street to the cemetery commission for a three years term set term to expire on the last day of february 2024. this order is offered by mayor paul broder And Mayor Brother, you're muted. No, I'm not muted. I was just saying I saw a counselor. I saw President Sinella with his hand up. I wasn't sure if he was trying to have the floor before I spoke.
▶ 1:36:05 Paul Brodeur: President Sinella. Thank you, Madam Chair. When this is a reappointment, I wasn't aware that the mayor was going to be speaking. but i'll be i will certainly be brief because um for at least some of you point of order i think we have to suspend the rules so i'm supposed to suspend the rules second second we have a motion to spend the rules made by vice chairman seconded by president stanella the rules is now suspended and our floor is yours mayor brother thank you madam chair again i appreciate the opportunity while this is a re-employment to reintroduce uh you to doug mcdonald if you look at his um really a simple statement of his community involvement you'll see it as a long and storied career both in the predecessor body to you guys the board of
▶ 1:37:03 Paul Brodeur: alderman and to a host of other civic activities both directly related to the management of the city uh and to many many um philanthropic and civic minded affairs rather than think of a lot of your time i will turn it over to uh commissioner mcdonald for any comments or questions that you all have thank you mayor brother commissioner mcdonald if you would like to speak the floor is now yours um i would love to speak i i don't know if you can see me or not in there we can but we can hear you all right uh you know it's it's a pleasure to serve the city i've been doing it for many years i appreciate paul broda putting in a reappointment uh the cemetery is a real important part to the city uh we do a we do a pretty good job down there
▶ 1:38:06 the public works does a good job the superintendent jack rossi um and my board dan o'neill the chairman and um and eileen hamlin our latest latest member and you know to the board i'm sorry to the council if you have any questions about the cemetery or if you'd like to come down and look around or give me a call feel or any one of the members uh feel free to call me or to stop by we're always welcome to chat with your people thank you um commissioner we appreciate all you do and we have next um counselor garpe thank you uh madam chairman i'll be quick i just wanted to haven't worked on the council i mean on the cemetery commission with with commissioner mcdonald i just want to thank him for his continuous service uh to this great community
▶ 1:39:10 of over 40 years um so i just wanted to acknowledge him for that and thank him for continuing to serve um thank you thank you mark thank you and uh president fenella thank you madam chair i just want to echo uh council Garipay's sentiments and at this time i would make a motion to recommend the reappointment of former president mcdonald to the football second thank you we have a motion to recommend made by president sanella seconded by um Councilor stewart um mr clerk if you'd like to call the role sure chair Jamaleddine yes vice chair migliorelli yes counselor eccles yes counselor stewart yes counselor thomas yes president sanella yes six yes thank you um next we have we have order 2022-14 appointment of james usterman 54 else
▶ 1:40:41 Paul Brodeur: farm lane to the affordable housing trust for a two years term set term to expire the last day of january 2023 and this order is offered by mayor paul brother again thank you madam chair for those of you been in the community for any length of time you're familiar with the many ways in which mr usman has contributed to the community from his active membership in rotary to his long service at the Melrose Cooperative Bank, both in a senior role as a vice president and chief lending officer, but also being very connected to their good work throughout the community through their foundation and prior to the formation of that foundation. If you know Jim, you also know that he has been involved in affordable housing advocacy in Melrose for over
▶ 1:41:35 Paul Brodeur: 20 years. He was an initial member of the Affordable Housing Corporation, if memory serves, and also has a great deal of lending experience, knows an awful lot about the marketplace, but also the community we seek to serve here in Melrose. Jim also had long service on the Melrose Housing authority, but also serves on the board of Mystic Valley Elder Services, which I think is really critically important because one area that we need to focus on in terms of offering housing options to members of our community is certainly our aging population, both from an affordability standpoint and in certain respects from a production standpoint. So I couldn't be more delighted that Jim has agreed to serve and I offer his nomination for your
▶ 1:42:31 Maya Jamaleddine: consideration thank you I would like to echo mayor brothers words and appreciate you stepping out and everything you've been doing for our community the floor is now yours if you would like to speak before we hold on that disorder no thank Chairperson Tremalli, I'm honored to be asked. The Affordable Housing Trust is something that the Affordable Housing Task Force started advocating for many years ago. I've been known, if Denise Gaffey knows one person who's been advocating for it, it's been me pushing with other people on our committee saying, let's move this along. And we're really excited to have this finally finally happened i long advocate for not just creating new affordable housing in the city
▶ 1:43:26 Mark Garipay: but also doing what we can to maintain the affordability levels of housing for a lot of people whether they're struggling for the rent ownership opportunities wherever it might be um so i'm looking forward to making the best use of the city's money in this fund and to make sure that it gets put to the best use possible thank you and is there any um Councilor thank you chairman uh chairwoman uh jamal dean uh i'd like to just thank mr usterman for volunteering for this appointment he's been a long uh member of the community uh very active for many years and his experience uh will be a huge benefit to the morris housing trust so thank you thank you for volunteering thank you counselor echo um i think i would like to also thank mr
▶ 1:44:24 Maya Jamaleddine: easterman for stepping up and if no one else has anything to add i'd make a motion to recommend for passage at this time madam chair second we have a motion made by Councilor eccles seconded by president sinela um mr clerk can you please call the role chair Jamaleddine yes vice chair migliorelli yes counselor eccles yes counselor stewart yes counselor thomas yes president sinella yes six yes okay motion passes thank you mr lusterman thank you all very much and now we have order 2022-28 appointment of steven kelly 259 west emerson street to the affordable housing trust for a one-year term set to expire the last day of january 2022 and this order is offered by mayor paul broder thank you again madam chair just a
▶ 1:45:37 Paul Brodeur: quick point of clarification the reason why the some terms are of different lengths is because as a new body uh some terms are going to be longer than others to make sure that there is not a wholesale turnover of the board or commission at any at any particular time uh mr kelly comes to us as a real seasoned public servant and really um with significant quality expertise both in the legislative and executive arenas in particular i want to highlight among his many accomplishments is his service as a legislative director at the executive office of housing and economic development uh for several years i believe in the in the uh 2007 to maybe 2011 range uh a lot of housing legislation and debate happened during that time and uh dhc d actually
▶ 1:46:38 Paul Brodeur: um executive office of housing and economic development is where um is where that policy lives and where it gets implemented so in in mr kelly we have a candidate that has certainly been through the ropes at the state level knows what programming is out there recognizes the populations we're trying to serve with expanded housing options and most recently served on our housing production plan advisory committee uh for the last year so as a particular lens into what we can do here in melrose to really expand what is available both to our current residents and folks that might want to come here start a family work here in particular and make life a little bit better for folks so i'm very excited to tap his experience and offer him for your
▶ 1:47:36 consideration thank you mayor brother and um we have mr kelly uh the floor is yours if you'd like to speak uh great thank you very much i really appreciate what the mayor had to say and for his appointment and to be before all of you today um as he mentioned as the mayor mentioned i do have a background in housing the first administer the first patrick administration i was a legislative director executive officer of housing and economic development primarily focusing on affordable housing very low income housing and public housing so i think i have a in homelessness as well i should say so i think that gave me a pretty solid background at the state of play what's going across the state and then also uh now within greater boston having been on the
▶ 1:48:21 the housing production advisory committee really saw some of the data that exists about what's going on in melrose the challenges that current residents face seniors face people that want to move here um so i think this is a good opportunity to use this trust to really tackle a number of projects um there are there are a number of things that can be done financial support for construction affordable housing money could go to rehab of existing homes um you know i think there's a there's a bunch of different things that can happen including using this fund to try to um get other sources of revenue to beef it up to really be able to support housing in the city thank you so much and we have counselor Stewart Thank You madam chair we should
▶ 1:49:19 Robb Stewart: be up to speak in addition to mr. Kelly's impressive background that seems custom fit for this role I have the pleasure of also having mr. Kelly in my ward and he's additionally an active person in the community it reaches out communicates and I think he's gonna be a great addition to this so with that I'd like to recommend him for passage on this order we have a motion made motion to recommend made by Councilor Stewart and second that I believe by vice chair make the early and mr. clerk chair Jamala Dean yes vice chair Margolis early yes counselor Eccles yes counselor Stewart yes counselor Thomas yes president Sinella yes that is six yes okay motion passes thank you Mr. Kelly and we have now ordered 2022-27 appointment of Anthony Chu to
▶ 1:50:41 Paul Brodeur: serve as Health Director for the City of Monroe's this order is offered by Mayor Paul Broder and do we have Mayor Broder yes ma'am and again I want to thank you you for the time and consideration that you're putting into this nomination. Hopefully, some of you have had an opportunity to meet Mr. Chu at the Victorian Fair, where we extended the invitation and he offered to stop by for a couple of hours and ended up staying around five hours, getting to know, starting to get to know some of the folks in the community and hear about their concerns I am extremely proud to offer his name and denomination as you know this is something of a joint appointment would be the health director of the Melrose and Wakefield district but in past of course is prologue with this
▶ 1:51:44 Paul Brodeur: position as you know we went through a very thorough recruitment process and quite frankly had an initial round of applicants that we weren't entirely satisfied with and decided to reopen the search and I'm happy to say that paid tremendous dividends when you're trying to fill a position that is occupied by someone like Ruth Clay retired after 25 years of service to the city and really built the Health Department from the ground up it was very very reassuring and in confidence inspiring to see Anthony step forward for this position and really to distinguish himself among a very high quality group of applicants. I certainly want to thank Ruth Clay for setting the table. I want to thank our now interim health director
▶ 1:52:40 Paul Brodeur: or former interim health director, Elaine Sylvia, who, as you all know, came out of retirement to help us bridge the gap between Ruth's retirement and where we are today. She has been an incredible asset We were very fortunate to have her, and I hope that she rejoins the Wakefield Board of Health to continue her service in that community. But it is now my distinct pleasure to talk a little bit more about Anthony for the health director portion of the Melrose part of the job, I guess I would say. If you've had a chance to read his resume, I think you'll agree it is outstanding we're very fortunate to have Anthony here. He is an epidemiologist with two bachelor's degrees and things that we could all use a little bit of education in these days with biology and applied
▶ 1:53:37 Paul Brodeur: stats. And also significantly, sorry about that, has a master's in public health from Yale University. He comes to us from the city of Manchester, New Hampshire, where he served as a public health specialist. During that time, he developed community prevention strategies to address disease and health risk mitigation behaviors, particularly pertaining to opioid or substance misuse. He was also responsible for disseminating COVID-19 response information, as well as conducting data analysis related to community spread and outbreak investigation things that obviously uh in our in our current situation are critically important to the work that we are doing and will continue to do um also lining up with our city's goals and
▶ 1:54:31 Paul Brodeur: objectives anthony was appointed chair of the diversity equity inclusion committee in manchester and we are very fortunate to find a candidate of such outstanding qualification that also shares our commitment to advancing public health through an equity lens The technical skills alone that he brings, along with his strong educational background and his experience really working on the front lines of COVID-19 response, really identified him as the superior candidate during what was a very rigorous recruitment process. I look forward with the opportunity to work with him as we continue to respond to the pandemic and take on all the other public health challenges that we know exist. so i again am delighted to recommend him for your consideration and urge your uh consideration and
▶ 1:55:25 Maya Jamaleddine: approval of his nomination thank you all very much thank you mayor brother and if you don't mind we would like to it's 8 5 16 right now actually and would like to go to um full council meeting and then uh we can suspend the rules and go back and uh vote on this order madam chair motion to adjourn motion for recess we have motion uh for recess made by um counselor sewer seconded by president scanella and for um mr shu please uh thank you for your patience and uh if you can just stay with us until they're back Mr. Clerk we lost we lost Mr. Clerk happy to call the roll if you'd like Ms. Freda is present with that she could call the roll all right so I'll call the roll yes please Yes, great. Welcome to the September 20th City Council meeting. The time is now 818. I am Councilor Cinella and pursuant to an act extended to certain COVID measures adopted during the state of emergency signed by Governor Baker on June 16th, this meeting will be conducted via remote participation.
▶ 2:02:39 So, as a little bit of background, my background is in epidemiology, and so one of the focuses I've had in the past was infectious diseases. When I first came to my role in Manchester as a public health specialist, one of my focuses was on substance prevention. So, one of my main focuses was on substance use prevention, and a lot of the work revolved around data analysis. And so, based on our partnerships with public health and public Safety. One of our main partners were police and fire and so we worked closely with them to work in a harm reduction framework and this moved away from kind of an enforcement kind of classic way of enforcement around drugs and we wanted to move towards harm reduction services.
▶ 2:03:37 So one of the things one of our main focuses here starting as the health director will be to hire a strong candidate in the substance use coordinator position. That is one of the things I wanted to address as early as possible. Also, the COVID, the ongoing pandemic is something that will also have much of our attention in terms of keeping our children safe in schools, as well as having our nurses perform the contact tracing that they've been done. I believe that former director clay and our interim director elaine silva has laid a great framework in terms of which which direction department is going and one of the things i hope to contribute is to bring a data data mindset to the department we i have a very strong interest in evaluation
▶ 2:04:30 Cory Thomas: one of the things that i hope to bring to the department is a transparency so everyone can hold us accountable in terms of the mission that we're pursuing and that's uh for a lot of for a lot of issues including covet as well as um substance use in mount rose so i want to say thank you again for everyone for considering my nomination thank you mr shu and uh we have next uh counselor thomas thank you madam chairperson mr shu welcome um your credentials are impressive And as an epidemiologist, you're absolutely qualified to lead during the ongoing pandemic and beyond. I was also pleased to see your password pertaining to substance abuse. As a public health director, you have many responsibilities, including hiring a new substance abuse prevention coordinator.
▶ 2:05:25 Cory Thomas: Notice has not had a substance abuse coordinator for almost a full calendar year amidst the ongoing pandemic. Many adults in an increasing numbers nationally teams have turned to substance abuse during the pandemic. How will you help bring awareness to the dangers of drugs and alcohol abuse in our community? And once hired, how will you help our new substance abuse coordinator to bring awareness and education on the dangers of substance abuse to our most vulnerable students at the middle school and high school in Melrose? Thank you for your question. So in terms of the substance use here in the community, it goes hand in hand with some of my experience in the diversity, equity, inclusion framework as well.
▶ 2:06:08 A lot of the ways we talk about substance use and health nowadays, a lot of the focus is on language that we use. And so we want to make sure that everybody's kind of on the same page in terms of this being an ongoing disease that individuals will struggle with. And so when we look at that in that framework, we want people to understand that there is different pathways to recovery. And so it's not kind of a one-size-fits-all type approach. And so, when we look at, you know, services out there such as MAT, Medication Assisted Treatment, there's also sober living houses, so there's many different pathways to recovery. And so, we at the department will hopefully bring that mindset. In terms of hiring a strong candidate for that substance use coordinator position, I
▶ 2:06:58 will say that I was in a very similar position actually in my previous position in Manchester, New Hampshire. They had actually not had a substance use coordinator position, and my public health specialist role actually filled that and the epidemiologist position. So I do have a great appreciation for someone who has that ability to do coalition building, that relationship building. We actually have a great partnership here at the Mystic Valley Health Coalition. That's the surrounding area, the six communities. So there is a lot of work already being done in surrounding communities. And one of the things I hope to find in a strong candidate would be someone who appreciates Um, you know, the value of data, but also someone who appreciates the qualitative part of it. So they're able to do those focus groups. They're able to do those interviews and really pull out, you know, those underlying factors that individuals struggle with.
▶ 2:07:45 Cory Thomas: And then we can find, um, services that we can connect them with related to that. So, um, 1 of the priorities that we'll be looking for in the visuals is experience in substance use, but more importantly, that relationship building. Thank you Mr. Chu. There has been a lack of programming and a lack of involvement with the substance abuse coordinator's office, not only for the past year when the position has been vacant, but even years before that. I've talked to the principal at Melrose High School and the principal at the high school said that there was no real connection between the students and the substance abuse care with the public health office. Would you want see more programming at the Melrose public schools the high school and the middle school
▶ 2:08:30 about the dangers and awareness of drug abuse? Yes absolutely so really it's that question we have a great partnership obviously with the town of Wakefield they have a model program and youth action teams so they do a lot of great work in terms of youth advocacy when it comes to awareness of drug drug use and so we have a really strong staff in Wakefield that already has this program in place and realizing that Melrose and Wakefield are not the same community each community has its own struggles and they have you know unique pieces around them I believe that you know engaging the elementary and middle and high school level it never it's never too soon to start I believe and having you know having that framework already in Wakefield hopefully we can
▶ 2:09:14 Leila Migliorelli: find someone that can partner with them and bring that here as well and then tailor to the needs of Thank you again. I'm very familiar with the programs that Wakefield has over there. It would be great to see similar programs in the Morrill's public school system. I thank you for your openness and honest answers. I look forward to voting for your approval. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Thomas. And next we have Vice Chair McGeary. Thank you, Madam chair, and thank you, Mr shoe for being here tonight. As you can see, you probably appreciate that. This public health is such a huge topic right now. And the intersection between public health and so many of the other issues that are affecting our city right now is something of great importance.
▶ 2:09:58 Leila Migliorelli: So, I'm, I'm excited to see read your resume and hearing more about your background and seeing what you can bring to Melrose. I just wanted to ask a question a little bit. I heard. I think. um you would had to develop some a successful strategy for communicating to the public about um covid and i was just wondering what kind of practices would you bring from your experience to this role um and and what are you seeing as maybe improvements you can do in communicating about the you know various stages of pandemic as we move through them um with the greater community great uh thank you for your question so in terms of covid um in terms of communication i think one of the biggest things that I'm taking from previous experience is we had created kind of an
▶ 2:10:44 all-inclusive dashboard so that includes easy to read graphs including interpretations as well for the City of Manchester. We were working closely with the state as well to provide data that is relevant to the citizens of our city and so we're hopefully going to bring that as well to Melrose. my my goal is to build internal capacity as well so myself i have experience doing the epidemiology doing the data pieces as well but we have very strong staff on hand that have that kind of flexibility in terms of their abilities to work in the public health realm and so there is interest in building out that capacity for epidemiology and so one of the things that one of the things that i want to focus on is the data pieces data you know is very important and very useful but
▶ 2:11:35 it's only as useful as you're able to communicate them to the public in that fashion. So I think that once we build out this kind of dashboard that lists out the metrics that are relevant to us right now, then hopefully we'll have kind of an open line of communication. People have questions about how to interpret data at a certain point, then we can point out what trends we're seeing, how it reflects currently, and how it compares to the prior stages of pandemic as well so hopefully we'll be able to build out that framework and then have you know the contact tracing pieces the resources as well as clarifying a lot of the different policies that are changing so that's including cdc guidelines the destiny
▶ 2:12:16 Leila Migliorelli: the department of elementary and middle education so secondary education so having those policies clearly listed and then kind of justifying which policies we are really holding to And maybe, you know, policies that we are holding to a stricter standard here in Melrose. And so, you know, clarifying the reasons why we have certain policies. Thank you. I appreciate that answer. I think it's, it's such a complicated. amount of information to kind of digest for any one person and people are often seeking different sources. So it's gonna be helpful to have you in this role to help centralize these communications and what's driving your policy decisions for the city of Melrose. So, thank you very much.
▶ 2:13:00 And if it would be okay, I just want to expand a little bit on some of the COVID data that we're seeing. So one of the issues that I wanted to tackle was we have a lot of focus here and rightfully so on the spread of COVID in schools. And so, to protect, you know, protect parents and protect children, we have a lot of DESE guidelines in place that, you know, in terms of close contacts, we have test and stay programs. We, you know, in terms of testing, we have pool testing, and then we do the, you know, protocol. If there's a positive test, we have two BinaxNOW rapid antigen tests. But a lot of these policies are just layers of protection. Other layers of protection that we're hoping to address, and this is both true in Melrose and other surrounding communities, is after-school programs.
▶ 2:13:42 A lot of these after school programs, children participate in programs that may not be directly linked to the schools. And so this is also an avenue of exposure and this is something that we want to focus on. We want to reach out to these organizations and kind of express the importance of them following similar DESE guidelines because they are not part of the school system. We can't enforce DESE guidelines with them, but we can do the education and we can, you know, show them that That what their, uh, what the implications of the testing and the distancing that they have going on in their programs can affect, um, children, um, in their school systems. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Shu. I, um, I want to thank you, um, uh, for, for stepping up and taking and applying for this position and for helping our community, uh, improve.
▶ 2:14:36 Maya Jamaleddine: Of course, I just point of clarification, you know, you mentioned about your interest in working with the to focus on substance use and working with this population. It is very important to clarify that the difference between. Substance use and substance abuse is just because we have mentioned both terms. So there is a big difference between the substance use and substance abuse. And we just want to take into consideration that because I don't know how important that for this population question, how are you planning to collect the data? We know that this is a very wide population that is not limited to age or to race or to any different criteria. So, how are you planning to collect your data?
▶ 2:15:40 Thank you for your question. So, I'm glad to clarify just the in terms of terminology language is a very big part of the substance use tackling the substance use. um and epidemic a lot of the you know the stigma that revolves around substance use is based on you know outdated language or you know misunderstanding of individuals that struggle with this disease um and you know there's a wide spectrum of individuals and what and what they struggle with and to what degree they do i think um in terms of delta data collection i can speak to experience in the past i've worked closely with the new hampshire state department in terms of collecting data from the emergency department setting so in in that sense we can also i will
▶ 2:16:23 also be reaching out to the state level to talk about a data sharing agreement in the emergency department setting that becomes a kind of a strong piece in terms of having a chief complaint text form so and then we also have diagnosis codes and so that kind of gives us the basis of kind of quantitative data in terms of who's visiting the ED environment, to what severity they are being seen. We also had response unit numbers, so we had AMR, American Medical Response was the main agent in terms of responding to calls for service when it came to opioid use and substance use. And so we also worked closely with them to understand what patterns they were seeing in terms of when they arrived, was there a naloxone administration,
▶ 2:17:14 what condition the individual was found in, and we wanted to really understand what factors contributed to refusal of service. And that was one of the big pieces that we focused on was what factors prevent individuals from accessing resources that are already existing. And so one of the other ones we wanted to work with are sober living houses and shelters. We wanted to seek out individuals and do this kind of qualitative interview and qualitative analysis and thematic analysis to see what themes we could pull out in terms of what resources may already exist but are hard to access and really understand what barriers there are that maybe we haven't considered in this community. So each community obviously has different factors and we wanted to
▶ 2:18:01 Maya Jamaleddine: really understand that so i think group interviews and specific qualitative analysis is definitely one of the main pieces we're going to go for thank you great to hear your plans it's really important to see what is it that you're going to bring to our community especially we know that we have a good number of our residents that can benefit from those plans that you have for us. I would also love to see the work that's going to be between our new social worker and your department that can be expanded and support our residents and on any level possible. And on that, I would also remind and ask again to expand our social worker services. If there is no one, oh, I have Councilor McMaster. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm a non-voting member of this committee, so I would defer
▶ 2:19:14 Shawn M. MacMaster: to any committee members before speaking but i did want to at least get in queue at this time i don't think i have anyone um that would like to speak so you're on if you'd like thank you madam chair uh good evening mr chu happy to have you before us this evening you uh the mayor talked a little bit about your experience um of uh prevention work and risk mitigation relative to COVID-19 you talked a little bit about that as well can you talk about how you can transfer that experience to an issue you heard earlier tonight when we discussed the rat problem you know based on your experience and based on some of your academic background and again very very impressive academic background what are the some of the things you think we can be doing as
▶ 2:20:10 Shawn M. MacMaster: as the city in terms of having a robust prevention program. Councilor Migliorelli mentioned earlier, we are limited in terms of what we can do in terms of passing laws. And I think we all stand committed to looking at other ways for effective code enforcement and to working in collaboration with Mayor Broder. But in terms of some of the other things that you think that we can do based on your professional and academic research experience, what might those things be and what would they look like to the public? Thank you. Thank you for your question. So, in terms of the rat issue, since it's coming on, I've definitely had the time to hear about many sides of this. Many people have spoken to me about this, and so I've had the chance to talk
▶ 2:20:56 a little bit about this with other communities as well. So, one of the things, one of the most important things, so there's, I believe there's a two-prong approach to this. One of them is making sure that we have a strong a strong partnership with other areas that are dealing with similar issues and so the rat problem is really a regional issue and so we have a great partnership with our mystic valley health coalition and so we've spoken at length and there is a program that we are working on right now uh internet involves messaging involves clear communication as to risk mitigation techniques and so uh one of the issues i was heard earlier was about the garbage disposal um there are many there are many other things that we can do we can help promote in terms of
▶ 2:21:42 messaging but in a positive manner um a lot of the a lot of the negative kind of connotations that comes with enforcement may not be as effective but if we talk about in a sense you know how we can partner with our citizens here to do the risk mitigation is definitely an important piece so one of the things that we've talked about in this messaging and once we've developed this This kind of consistent language with our partners in the Mystic Valley Coalition, we will be releasing more materials, more education pieces, as well as other resources that we can turn to for residents. And so one of the things that we've talked about is disposal of garbage in a proper manner that includes barrels and includes dumpsters. And we've talked about regulations and this is a little bit further down the road.
▶ 2:22:29 So, we haven't had some talks about what the city can do in terms of cleaning up dumpsters and talking about monitoring of those. But for private residences and other areas, we can talk about trimming trees and shrubs to remove overgrowth and this prevents some of the habitation areas for rats. We've talked about feeding wildlife that has been one of the issues that has come up. uh pet waste is actually a source of food for rats and so cleaning up pet waste and removing standing water that actually hits several several areas including mosquitoes and vector vector areas where they can breed and then just keeping generally a clean area in front of residences and around the residents these are all risk mitigation techniques that we can communicate
▶ 2:23:19 Shawn M. MacMaster: public you know you know in an efficient manner where we're also working from our end to regulate you know that's cleaning air public areas but we also want you know to make sure that the public citizens understand that they also play a role in what we can do here Thank You mr. Chu for that comprehensive answer one of the things that we saw at the mayor's educational forum was an actual tangible map of certain problem locations in the community. Although I appreciated that, I do think there are some opportunities with heat mapping, and it sounds like you have some of that academic experience to perhaps do that in a more visually effective way, in a way that is able to look at real-time data, where the rats are, where they're moving, and to perhaps do that in
▶ 2:24:09 Shawn M. MacMaster: collaboration with some of the other communities in the Mystic Valley area. So I'd really encourage you to look into that, and to the extent that we can be supportive of that, I think we would all like to be. My other question relates to the idea of community partnerships. You discussed that. You have some experience in that arena, and it touches upon something that Councilor Migliorelli astutely said, which is the intersectionality of social issues, and that's something that she and I and Council of John Maldon have had conversations about in a meeting a few months ago, among the three of us to discuss different ways that we can respond as a city in a less siloed way. So when we talk about multidisciplinary teams, oftentimes, it is
▶ 2:24:55 Shawn M. MacMaster: formal community based networks, but I'm wondering what the opportunities may be to develop a more systemic connected networked team across city departments understanding that individuals facing substance use disorder domestic violence serious mental illness or any other number of issues where we do see that intersectionality that we are able to approach it in a real robust way where the police department is talking to the health department in the fire department and other city departments that may not be obvious like our librarians who are engaging public so what opportunities do you see to create that networked team approach across city departments and what might that look like thank you for your question so I think I see great
▶ 2:25:51 opportunity in terms of the crossover between departments so as you said traditionally there may have been some kind of siloed work in terms of public health staying in that realm and you You know, please say in 1 realm and fire 1 of the things I will draw on from my previous experience is the sharing of roles. So. We actually in my previous position worked closely with police in terms of positions and so we've actually had. We actually had communications, public information officers employed at our department as well as the police department. But they reported to the other department, so we've actually had those positions shared between between groups and those actually have allowed us to have different avenues of collaboration in that aspect.
▶ 2:26:38 We've also had community health workers, so 1 of the things. You know, the list of priorities I have is to have community health workers that really reflect those populations that we are trying to serve. And so having those work closely with law enforcement, we're really trying to integrate them into the community as well. So that the community can build that trust and that relationship with the police as well as having those community health workers that may have lived experience that they can help explain certain issues, or they can help really understand what is going on. I think also for the public library system, I see a great opportunity in terms of education. And so for diversity, equity, inclusion issues, it's still
▶ 2:27:22 Kind of a large kind of heated debate nationally as well. So I'm sure it's not indifferent here. We want to do is we want to include the library as a place for education. We want to be able to hold seminars that kind of have people explain, you know, what struggles that they face in the public realm. And we can talk about, you know, how we can foster that environment and we can reach out to different groups and really do that kind of recruiting in terms of having them fill positions that traditionally they may not see as open avenues. So, I think having shared positions is definitely something I'm looking forward to have to discussing with police and fire as well as the public library. I want to see that collaboration and turn to data collection we've had in the past emergency management coordinators that have been hired by our health department, but have worked in the fire department.
▶ 2:28:09 And so we've been able to work in both places and have them kind of share their experiences with both places. So we can really get better. Thank you Mr. Chu, and if your appointment is voted favorably out of committee tonight, I do look forward to voting to support you tonight before the full council. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you Councilor Master and Councilor Thomas. Thank you Madam Chairperson. I'd like to make a motion for recommendation. 2nd, we have a motion for recommendation made by Councilor Thomas, seconded by Councilor Stewart. Mr. Chair Jamali. Yes, vice chair. Yes. Councilor Eccles yes. Councilor Stewart. Yes, Councilor Thomas. Yes. And President, yes, that's 6. yes. yes and motion passes and thank you again
▶ 2:29:31 Mr. Hsu and with that do we have any motion for adjourn second we have motion to adjourn made by president Sinaloa seconded by vice chair McClure early mr clerk chair Jamaleddine yes vice chair Migliorelli yes Councilor eccles yes Councilor stewart yes Councilor thomas yes president sanella yes six yes thank you and we're adjourned thank you back to you clerk what i am here i'm just waiting for host privileges back thank you Let me know the opposed privileges. Still recording? I guess I can go. We left off the resolution. So, at this time, if there's no objection, I would like to suspend our rule so that we can hear from sponsors first, and then I think we have a couple folks with us tonight. Madam Clerk?