Disability Commission Advisory Board - Regular Meeting

Folks are trickling in. My name is Andrea Patton with the Disabilities Commission. The open meeting law requires that I notify the public that this meeting is recorded. Therefore, please be aware that an audio and visual recording of this meeting is being made by Boston City TV, a part of the City of Boston Office of Cable Communications, and is being broadcast on Xfinity channel 26, RCN channel 13, and Fios channel nine six two, as well as live streamed on YouTube where the recording will live later on. With that, I will turn the meeting over to our board chair, Jerry Boyd.

Good evening, everyone. Good evening. Thank you, Andrea, for for for that kickoff. And now it's time for happy to to share the February meeting, and it's time for introductions of the advisory board. And I will start off with Tara.

Hey, everyone. I'm Tara Sothard. I live on the Jamaica Plain Roxbury Line. I am a woman in who used an electric wheelchair. I am also of little stature. And today, I'm wearing a pink leopard sweater.

Great. Thank you. Paul.

Hi. My name is Paul Caron. I live in the West End Of Boston. I serve on the Disability Committee Advisory Board and serve as a mental health advocate for families and friends and work as a supervisor in the City of Boston Planning Department. Thank you.

Great. Thanks, Paul, and thanks for all you do. Olivia. Olivia? Olivia, you're muted.

How's this?

Oh, we can hear you now. That's great.

Okay. My name is Olivia Richard. I come from Brighton, and, I serve on the board as the vice chair. I'm a woman in her forties with closed cropped hair, glasses, and I'm wearing a red T shirt and headset.

Great. Thank you. Thank you, Olivia, very much. And let's go with Zari.

Hi, everyone. My name is Zari. I'm a person with a disability. I use a wheelchair wheelchair and I live in South Boston.

Great. Thank you so much. Carl.

Yes. Hi. My name is Carl Richardson. I live in Brighton. I identify as deaf blind, And I am a middle aged guy with salt and pepper hair, and I have no idea what I'm wearing for a shirt. Can't see it. I just put it on. So

It looks like a blue polo to me, Carl.

Okay. Then it's a blue polo. Occasionally, I randomly match my luck.

And it looks like you have a polo tag on as well or a sweater on.

Yeah. I'm not very sure. Thank you.

Great. Great. Awesome. Great. Andrea, I will I will rely on your eagle eyes. I don't think I'm missing anybody. Did somebody come in, and maybe did I miss anyone?

I think Paulette. You

missed me.

Paulette. I'm sorry, Paulette. Please. That's the last. Go ahead, Paulette.

That's what I get for logging on early. Good evening, everybody. I'm Paulette Duret. I'm a older black female living in the area of, and I'm a member of the board.

Great. Thank you, and my apologies for that. See? Jerry. Richard as well. Oh, and Richard as well. Richard as well. So you you you you ahead

of yourself. You saved the best for last now is what you meant to say. Right? Okay. Alright. Alright. So Richard Klosky. I am I live in Back Bay. I am severely hearing hearing impaired. I hate to admit it, but I have a fair amount of gray hair. And I have a sports a blue shirt, a sport jacket that's brown, blue, and black, and it's nice to be with everybody.

Great. Thank you, Richard. And I am Jerry Boyd. I am the chair of the advisory committee, and I live in West Roxbury. I am also a power wheelchair user with salt and pepper hair.

I have eyeglasses on on currently. And even with that, I I miss introducing my colleagues on the advisory committee. And I am wearing just a t shirt. At this point, a gray t shirt with a with an American flag on it from one of our our retailers. And moving right along, we have the approval of the the minutes.

Do I have a motion to approve? So move. Okay. Richard, do we have a second? Also can second. Okay. Paul, sure. We have a second. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Great. Any nays? Any discussion? The motion passes then.

And next on the agenda, hold on one second, is a presentation on curb ramp construction by Dolores Carbone. Did I did I get that name correct? Yes. You did. Great. Thanks. Go right ahead.

Just thank you all for inviting me to present here today at the Disability Advisory Board. You all do amazing work. And if it wasn't for the advocacy that came out of this group, my job wouldn't exist and this presentation wouldn't exist. So thank you all for being here today and for always advocating for the community for persons with disabilities. And with that, I I'll introduce myself.

I'm Dolores Probona. I'm the senior ADA manager with the streets cabinet. I've been with the city for about ten years. Before I was with the streets cabinet, I did disability reasonable accommodations and grievances and appeals with Boston Housing Authority. So I have a long history of disability advocacy and strongly believe in the Disability Commission and its purpose and everything that this board stands for.

So with that, I'm gonna screen share and present what we submitted on behalf of the city to CLASS council in response to the consent decree. So I'm gonna hit screen share. And then at the end, I will pause for any questions. Okay. So confirming that you can see my screen.

Yes.

Yes. Same here. We can see it.

Awesome. Okay. Just wanna make sure that okay. Awesome. Perfect. Alright. So just a brief overview of what we're gonna dive into with the presentation. We're gonna be chatting about how many ramps we constructed in 2025. We had an amazing construction season. We began construction on 2,152 ramps and completed construction with completely compliant, all the way done, everything with 1,723 ramps.

And the remaining 421 are 29 are slated to be completed at the beginning of the construction season. We're also going to chat about our adoption of PROWAG as well as our third party review. We did a huge update with our geospatial asset management environment that somehow went seamlessly without any issues even though they were all much anticipated. So, yeah, we're gonna dive into a well rounded view of the ADA compliance program for the streets cabinet for year 2025. So this chart that I have displayed on

the

screen represents different ramp data throughout the life of the consent decree. So we're looking at 2021 through 2025. And there are different lines here that represent different things. The red is the gross deficit. So we made a commitment to build 1,630 ramps every year.

And the beginning of the consent decree gave us some grace so that we could update our staffing, our funding, all of the things that we needed to actualize rent construction. So at the beginning, we had this high deficit, which grew, and now we are starting to to eliminate because now we have built up a system to support the needs of ADA compliance for the city. Now moving on to the next line, the blue line shows actualized construction year over year, whereas this this short dash line at the top shows gross cumulative construction over time. So this blue one shows with each dot, you can see year one, we did not reach our goal of 1630. Year two, we did not now reading this out loud, I realized I should have had a control line that's just stood still at sixteen thirty.

But, basically, so I can highlight it for you, 2022, we barely made it over sixteen thirty. And then 2025, this was our first true year of surpassing our goal and diving into that deficit. And we have constructed, over the last five years, 600 6,448 rims. And to give you a picture, we have about 30,000 rims in the city of Boston. Jumping into my next slide, we adopted PROWAG.

So for some context, the Americans with Disabilities Act gave explicit instructions for the Federal Architectural Access Board to sit in a room with their team of experts and draft a guidance document specifically for the implementation of the ADA in the pedestrian right of way. And the city made the decision to adopt this document effective the 2025 construction season. So this time last year, we began to roll out tradings both internally and externally, and we worked very closely with our construction contractors. And this year was actually the first year in the consent decree where the response by class counsel was not picking apart our designs. So proag has been very beneficial.

It offers clear guidance. And whenever we have a question about compliance with pro ed, we go to the MAAV, we go to the disability commission, and we make sure that whatever decision is being made is in alignment with with what the community wants and needs if it's not explicitly stated in the rules. So moving on now, I'm gonna go over a bunch of ways that we ensure compliance with ADA. And one of those is reviewing plans with the Public Improvement Commission. So the Public Improvement Commission reviews requires that any development impacting the public right of way, like cutting construction, changing something in the sidewalk.

Whenever this is done, we receive the plan set, and we go back and forth with the proponent until a design is provided that is compliant with PROACT. So this right here is you're not really supposed to be able to read it. It's a really zoomed out shot. But, basically, the there are little pink and and purple boxes circling different components of the ramps with different notes about engineering design, elevations or grades that might need to be changed so that we can make sure we get that compliant design. And then that plan will not move forward or be approved by the city until it is confirmed by our team of engineers that this is ADA compliant.

Moving on to the next. This is our review when things are actually constructed. So you have to get a permit to cut into our sidewalk. And when you want your money back, you have to prove that it is two city standard, which includes PROACT. So we updated all of our documents to the public, say, hey, it needs to be PROACT compliant.

And so we inspect and make sure that it is PROACT compliant. And if it's not, you are going to the MAAV. If it's not PROAG compliant, but also it doesn't violate an MAAV rule because MAAV rules aren't that direct either, they're also updating to align with PROAG, then we will ask them again for that maximum extent feasible argument so that we're making sure we're having that same analysis that MAB would have even if no rules cover. So that we're making sure things are compliant before giving them their money back. Another thing, jumping into the current request system, this is directly tied to the consent decree.

Anybody on behalf of a person with a disability or a person with a disability can request that any corner within the city of Boston be brought into compliance. It will be captured within a two year timeline within the consent decree, and we will make an immediate action plan to either have it designed, brought into a project, or field maintained to ensure that it is brought into compliance immediately. And any patchwork that needs to be done, like immediate repair, that gets done immediately. I'm going to be circulating the report if Andrew hasn't already, and we have very detailed information in there on that data if you wanna get into that. But we were very timely with our curb ramp requests, so feel free to utilize that system when requesting curb ramps.

It's the best way to get to us and get things in our stream. Now jumping into some challenges and resolutions that we came to throughout the year. So just at the forefront, like, just that notable accomplishment that the team was able to begin construction on 2,152 ramps and deliver seventeen twenty three compliant. This year, we hope to deliver 2,050 compliant, so more and more each year. But that was an incredible accomplishment.

And construction planning, we updated our geospatial environment. And with that, we we didn't have any hiccups or issues. So our asset management database and system is a lot easier helping navigate knowing where construction is happening and just facilitating that planning process. And we also enhanced our variance program. We began a very direct, affirmative relationship with MAAB, keeping a very open, honest line of communication about any ramp question, any trigger so that we're we always have an action plan for any particular ramp that we may need to address.

And then spatial asset management is a separate contract that we have just awarded where we are hoping to have the city surveyed annually for, excuse me, for pavement quality index and for different data that we can get to know the quality of our assets and what we need to do for each specific thing. And then in terms of construction and making plans, so it will give us basically a heat map of the city to know which areas need to be addressed and when. And then staffing. Our staffing is exceptionally poor. We are functioning basically at a 50% staffing deficit.

We continue to post, and we hope to continue to seek positions, but with the residency requirement and lower wages that we continue to fight against. Last year, we got the position boosted, and we continue to advocate for higher wages for engineers. This is something that that we deal with. And as a result, this year, we have we were able to secure basically a staff supplementation contract for that team that we hope to phase out as we increase staffing. But that is a continued challenge that we continue to face.

Another thing that we focused on was training, like I spoke to earlier, making sure that everybody that is involved in ramp construction from planning to design to construction execution compliance is aware of the rules. And then the last thing that I'm gonna chat about is increased cost for a ramp construction. So one thing that we did this year is we did an in-depth analysis of cost. We looked at every contract that constructs ramps, and we figured out that we are spending between 7 to 14,600 to construct each trip. And we were funded at 5,000 per ramp.

So we had the team over time learning to make these decisions that sacrificed different components construction trying to reach compliance with this budget that was really not working in anyone's favor. So we brought that to the office of business management, and we advocated long and hard, and we're able to get a budget of 15,000 per ramp. And we were able to get the city to fund the construction of 2,450 ramps annually with 1,000 of those ramps being designed by an engineer as opposed to in the field. So this is huge. This is the most the city has ever put towards grant funding ever.

It is basically going to be the focus of the cabinet for this year is solely designing the corners and ramps. And with that, I advocated for the fact that we have these lovely ramps now, but we're ignoring the sidewalk in between. And that is unacceptable because we need an accessible ramp to an accessible path of travel to another accessible ramp. And the pavement between the ramps also needs to be accessible. So we were able to secure funding for a sidewalk only contract too, one focused on brick and one focused on concrete.

So that way, we can have our ramp contracts focused on ramps, and we can bring in our only sidewalk contract to do portions of sidewalk so we're not leaving the big pedestrian right of way in disrepair like it has been in the past because we didn't have a vehicle that considered both. So we are hoping to do more sidewalk work in conjunction with our ramp work over time that we'll be able to do more and more. So we secured this funding for the next three years. And I think that is just incredible that we will be able to actualize this through the staff supplementation, through the contract construction contracts, through the design contracts, that this is something we have all of the tools at our disposal. That if all goes well, we will be able to execute properly.

And that is all I have for you. I'm gonna pause right here and open it up to questions.

Thanks so much for your report. Does anyone from the advisory board have any questions? In regards to the presentation? I know I do. So so let me be the be the first.

So when you say construction, I I didn't look at the I didn't look at any of the materials, I apologize, sent out prior to this meeting. So when you say construction and building out of of of new ramps and and, you know, you know, the certain percentage, are those new new curb ramps throughout the city? And and was there a particular area of focus? Any any neighborhoods that were focused on? Could you could you provide some clarification in in terms of that?

Yeah. So I think brand new complete every element of the ramp construction was about 50% of that number. Like, it's slightly over a thousand. The other were elements of construction that were either incomplete for years prior or didn't need a complete reconstruction. And I'm sorry. What was the second part of your question? Oh, neighborhood.

Yeah. So

we have ramps in all of the I'm actually I'm looking for a map that I can pull up to show you. But we have ramps all over the city that we that we brought into compliance. We had our contracts focused up by neighborhood. So last year, we had work done in Dorchester, High Park, South Boston, North End, Brighton. And then this year sorry.

I'm trying to look on my other end. If I can't find it now, I will share it. I'll have Andrea circulate it. But I have a map that shows where every ramp was that we've constructed this year is. And you can click on it and see the report for each one and where it is.

Okay. Great. Now how how are the the those ramps identified that you need to go in and work on?

So we first, we look at three one ones and the curb ramp requests, and then we work with the disability commission so they will also tell us. We also try to figure out what are what's triggered. What are we triggering? What other work do we need to do that's going to result in this ramp needing to be constructed? And by before the consent decree, everybody was doing their own ramps.

And now that we have this expert ramp team, we like to funnel everything to go to just the ramp team. So folks will let us know, hey. I need to move this push bullet. I need this push button. I need to do this work.

I'm gonna be triggering this ramp, and they will tell us, and we will add that into our workload so that before we look at anything else, we're looking at what are we triggering, what are we responsible to do. And then after that, we have our chain of command that's outlined in the consent decree that's like, first, we're gonna look at hospitals and facilities, and then it goes down the chain of command from there to identify which ones. And I'm hoping that this time next year, we'll be able to add in that heat map to the mix where we can literally see a visual representation of which ramps are worse so that we can also throw that into the conversation.

Great. Thank you. And I see Zari has a question or comment for Dolores.

Thank you, Jerry. This is great. I really appreciate all the work you've done. My question is about how you the process in which you identified where these ramps should go. And is there a plan in the fee for the future if if community can be more involved in helping you identify where the ramps should go?

And when you talk about ramps, are you talking about actual physical ramps to buildings, or are you talking about ramps that go into a certain section? For example, all the hospitals should be physically accessible, but I just wonder what you mean by maps. Is it does it I I would like to send you talk about curb cuts.

Yeah. No. That's a great that's a great point, and I should have been clear because even in five twenty one CMR, ramp means so many different things. Yes. So thank you. So I'm just narrowly talking about a curb ramp to cross

a roadway. Right. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. So based on that, for example, how did you prioritize which hospitals, which areas? Was it communicated through those businesses, or was it from community feedback?

So definitely both. And you, like, the public, anybody can also be a member of being a deciding factor in where curb rep should be. Even if one doesn't exist right now and you would like one there, put in a curb rep request, and we will do a safety study to see if a curb rep can feasibly go there. And if it can, we will install it there. So when it comes to deciding location, there are a few things.

Number one is, like, do we have a crew there? Where do we have our crews is really where we're constrained the most, and that will really dictate how we go down that chain of command of what's most important is having construction crews in a certain place. And that's really our biggest limitation is getting into a geographic area. And then once we're physically there, we can pick up whatever we can pick up. Whatever can be done in the field, we will do.

It's just hard to get people to move their construction operations to different parts of the city. So that's why each construction season, we have our city planners map out where our construction should be. And in doing that, our city planners will look at where were we physically last year? Let's not go there. Where were we physical so that we're just narrowly focusing on, like, minor things in areas we were poor, and we can we can do, like, operations in areas of the city that we didn't touch that year or the year prior.

So that's really what dictates. And then we will go down that chain of command to be like, okay. We're stuck physically here. Where are the hospitals? Where are the schools?

Where are the community centers? I go down that list that we have to go down. But usually, we trigger so much work doing other things, like fixing other assets, or maybe a tree needs to go, or maybe, like, a pole box or a utility pole. So usually, what we're doing is playing catch up, and we're running after our own tail to fix all of the ramps that we couldn't touch because we didn't have the resources to touch when we were there for the original project. So that's where most of the resources go.

I really hope that we'll be out of that game soon now that we're moving towards using, like, data and science and having the CPAP that we'll be able to strategically plan based off of pure need and build up. That's my goal for the future.

But right now, we're doing a lot of playing catch up and

just making sure we're not triggering something and forgetting about it because that's the problem. We if we trigger something, we need to own it. We need to make a plan for it, and we need to come back to it and bring it into compliance. And, unfortunately, that's the game that we're playing right now is saying, what do we what did we trigger ourselves in some other work? And where we can, we go down that chain of command based off of physical location.

This is Andrea. Dolores, if you don't mind me adding, this program will continue until all the ramps, you know, have been touched. So we're doing as many as we can, and we love the public input on which one should be prioritized. But I I feel somewhat comfortable saying, rest assured, we'll touch yours eventually. If it's one that that is a ramp and needs to be a better ramp or one that's not a ramp and is safe to be a ramp because we do sometimes get requests for crossing that are not safe places for pedestrians to be in the street. So we won't add a ramp just anywhere in the curb. But if there could and should be a crossing there or if there is one now, we're gonna touch it, and make it compliant.

Great.

Thanks for that. Will be here until all ramps are compliant. And even then, there is a requirement for ongoing maintenance so that the city is not back in this position. So this will be a forever effort of the city.

Thanks for that clarification, Andrea, and thanks for all your hard work and your commitment, Dolores, of of your staff and your your your department and the city as well.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for your your report.

Thank you all so much.

Great. And next on the agenda is actually my report, which is gonna be very, very brief tonight because we do have we do have, a packed agenda, and and most important on the agenda is elections for the for the new executive committee and and chair. So I don't need plenty of time for that, but I I just wanted to reiterate as I as I did last month, what an honor it has been for me to be to be me to be, you know, chair of this, body yet again for a second time, and and I wanted to commend everyone on their their great work, this past year. And I just really look forward to continuing to work, you know, with everyone, you know, as part of the the commission and the executive committee if lucky enough to be elected, for for this coming year. So I appreciate that, very much.

One of the highlights of of last year that that was very, very meaningful to me was the and I wanna thank again Andrea and the commissioner and and and everyone's staff putting it together was the was the ADA day and particularly the march down down Tremont Street. I think it was tremendous to have so many advocates and so many people. I think over fourteen hundred hundred people marched with us last year, and it was a it was a tremendously tremendously moving event and and energizing event showing showing how much work that we've done and the city has done and so and how much more work we have yet we have yet to accomplish, you know, in the thirty five years since the ADA. So I look forward to to continuing that work in the coming year with the with this body. I really do.

And with that, next on our agenda is the commissioner's report. Go ahead, commissioner, whenever you're ready.

Thanks, Jerry. I believe Andrew is gonna float my slides. Excuse my voice. I have a little bit of a sore throat happening right now. Hopefully, the weather's turning a little better, though. It was a little warmer today than it's been. Okay. Welcome, everybody. I'm happy to share my report with you tonight. First up, I have some updates from the city of Boston.

So as I was just speaking about, the weather has been pretty rough this winter. On January, we had a snowstorm that dropped two feet of snow. It was actually the eighth biggest storm in Boston's history, which I was surprised to learn. But, you know, it was very cumbersome because it was a lot of snow in one storm. And afterwards, the temperatures were freezing, so we didn't have a lot of melting.

So even now, we still see a lot of giant mountains all around the city, but melting has finally begun. I think it was over 40 degrees today with rain, so I saw a lot of melting in my neighborhood. And I just wanted to touch base to let everybody know about some of the city's responsibilities. I know Andrea did a presentation last month on snow, but it's actually been four years since we've gotten a major storm. So, you know, you can kinda forget about it when it's not in front of you.

But when it's right in front of you, it's like, oh, boy. What's the city doing to help out? So the city always prioritizes cleaning streets and sidewalks as well as city property at the libraries, Boston Center for Youth and Families, and Boston Public Schools. The City Of Boston snow ordinance requires property owners to shovel sidewalks and curb ramps set up at their property. The city gave out hundreds and hundreds of violation tickets for people who didn't clear their sidewalk or who didn't clear a wide enough path. So enforcement was working. The city plowed the streets. They did a bunch of snow removal, which they do in big storms. But all this to say is that we know it wasn't perfect. We did hear from residents that they had a hard time getting around some curb ramps, some sidewalks.

But just to let people know, like, the main responsibilities are on property owners, and the city does what it can do with the resources resources it has. They did deploy over 700 pieces of snow removal equipment, everything from big trucks and plows to the smaller vehicles that can go on sidewalks on city property and did the best they can do with clearing and removal. Next step, I wanna let you know about the mayor's office of housing. They are seeking input on some grant funding upwards of $27,000,000. It's gonna be invested in housing, homelessness assistance, and community development programs.

They're offering two information sessions where people can give input. One is in person on March 4 at 6PM at 26 Court Street. That's directly across from Boston City Hall. The second one is March 5 at 6PM, and that's on Zoom. So registration is not required, and you can request interpretation for Spanish, Mandarin, Cantonese, and other languages, including ASL.

So if any of you would like to attend, that would be great. And if not, I'm really hoping this is one of the opportunities that you can share with your networks to see if people are interested in giving input because it's a lot of money, and we wanna get a disability lens on where it is spent. Okay. Next slide. So now I have some updates on our department.

So we have a couple of dates to run by you. The Disability Community Forum is confirmed for Tuesday, March 5 at Suffolk University Law School. Again, we hope the board will play a significant role in attending the forum. And with new leadership, we may have some new input on how you wanna work the forum if you'd like to make any changes. As you know, typically, we all sit at the front and invite residents and staff from the city to talk about what's working, to listen to input from the residents about what's not working or what could be improved.

So we really value your partnership in this event and are looking forward to having all of you who can attend. Our ADA day is a save the date at this point. We're looking at Wednesday, July 15 at Copley Square Park, and that is because the FIFA World Cup games are gonna be playing in Foxborough, and there are gonna be a lot of parties on City Hall Plaza. So the plaza's gonna be pretty much booked up in June and July. So we don't have any dates that we

can do on the plaza at

this point, so we're looking at Copley Square. And we had our AD and D there five or six years ago, five years ago, and it worked out pretty well. So now they've renovated the park, and it has a lot of hardscape. So we are looking forward to posting our event there. And I know we've talked a lot about elections and voting access, but just wanted to give a brief update let you all know that we are continuing to work with the elections department, people operations, and the registry the city registry to improve access for voters with disabilities.

Sylvia is currently working on training for city poll workers, and we are exploring some policy issues, including technology that may be more reliable for voters with disabilities. We don't have anything in the mix yet, but we are in conversations with all these colleagues, and we'll be implementing trainings at least in the next few months. Another thing that we're working on in my office is a disability commission civic academy. So our office had some funding. We are working with the disability policy consortium to create a Civic Academy, which will be a cohort of residents with disabilities who will learn about civic engagement and share information with their communities.

We're currently in the planning stages of the curriculum, and and we're hoping to launch in late spring. We're really hoping to get residents with disabilities who haven't been involved in advocacy and things like that because we really wanna reach people who who don't reach. So if you have any recommendations of neighborhood groups or people that you know who don't regularly do advocacy but may be interested, please let us know. And we'll be doing a lot of outreach once we get the curriculum a little bit more solidified. And then finally, from our department, our disability housing task force is starting back up.

I know, Olivia, you were on it a few years ago when we made some policy changes. We created a brochure which kinda give an outline of ways you can acquire housing if you're seeking it whether to rent or to buy or if you're experiencing homelessness or eviction. So we'll be pulling that together, hopefully, meeting next month. I will get an email out soon. But if anyone on the board is interested, please email me.

Next slide is some advisory board updates. So elections, again, announced last month were Zari for a chair, Jerry for vice chair, Olivia, and Tara. So looking forward to the elections tonight. And like I said, new leadership is always exciting, and we thank Paul who's stepping off the executive committee and thank all of you who've been on the executive committee. Several of have already been on and psyched it off. So thank you all for your hard work. Looking forward to that. And we will be welcoming three new members very soon. So stay tuned for more information on that. And at last month's subcommittee, we discussed some subcommittee ideas.

The executive committee meeting, we discussed some subcommittee ideas. One thing I wanted to run by the board was there's a group in City Hall called the mayor's youth council. And this is a group of youth who engage they're engaged, become engaged and empowered in civic leadership and community development to voice their opinions, collaborate with city officials, and develop solutions to young people's challenges. So I thought it might be nice if you were interested in having a liaison from the NYC to the board. We did something, like, similar to this a few years ago, but it might be nice to reach out to them and ask if they wanna pick one or two people who would like to attend our board meetings and and work on some initiatives with the board.

Other ideas were for legislation. I know Carl always updates us on state bills, but people could pay attention to city council hearings that have come up that you might wanna write a letter on or testify at and propose ordinances like the captions ordinance. That would be something to look at. And then we've talked about disability history, Boston's two hundred fiftieth anniversary is this year, and other ideas. We've also done architectural access in the past, which is a heavier lift.

But if anyone is interested, please let us know. And then some other advisory board updates are some opportunities that you can pass on. We'll go to the next slide. Oh, sorry. A few more advisory board updates. The Mass Office on Disability is the state office that sort of oversees all the disability commissions in the state. And they provide resources, support, and guidance to all disability commissions. So if you're interested, you can click on these links for guidance and disability rights information. You can always contact MOD for a one on one consultation if there's an issue you're interested in. They have come to meetings in the past to do different presentations.

So if you have suggestions for that, you can let the chairperson know. And they're also looking for advisory board members to complete a questionnaire. And the link is right in the slide deck. They're looking for as much input as they can get. So every member of the board can fill out a questionnaire and let them know, like, what you're working on, what you're interested in, what kind of support you need. They do a great job. They have a lot of, like, one pagers and trainings on their website. So I would encourage you all to go on their website and take a look at the support that they offer. And it might spur some site some ideas about what you wanna work on. And they also offer a statewide commissions on disabilities board boards meeting.

You can learn about their initiatives and meet other CRDs and get tips on achieving your goals. There are two dates, April 15 and October 8, and you can click on those to register. I'm actually not sure if they are in person or virtual, but maybe my staff can check on that. But we can definitely let you know. And then, again, just sending a shout out about the monthly CODA meetings, the Commissions on Disability Alliance, which are organized by the Disability Policy Consortium.

And these are a group of local disability commissions who meet once a month, the first Wednesday, from noon to 01:30 on Zoom. I know a few of you were interested in attending. I'm not sure if you actually did, but these are great resources to, you know, to network with other towns and see what problems they're dealing with, what issues they're finding challenging, or what's working, like, as a success that we could implement in Boston. And then my next slide is some opportunities for you to pass on. We really appreciate it.

I know a big part of your role is to give us input, but the other part of your role is to share the information that we give you. So the Boston Public Library is offering a whole series of free ASL classes for the community. They're in a bunch of they're on a bunch of Saturdays in February, and then there's an ongoing one from March to April. And that is at the central library. So we would love it if you would pass this information on.

Most of them are in person on-site, but there is one that's virtual on March 12. And they had one just last week at the central branch, and over 70 people attended. And that was the emergency ASL training. So very excited about this prospect, and we'd love to see this information get out to the community. Again, the city is doing free tax print through the Boston Tax Health Coalition. It offers free tax services and provides accommodations for people with disabilities. Anyone who has an annual income of $70,000 or less is eligible. And I believe Lynn is here to do a few slides on tax prep. So I will turn it over to Lynn.

This is Jerry. I saw her on. I don't see her now.

She's on mute.

Oh, she's on mute. She's in.

Lynn, I'm sending you a request.

There you go.

Okay. It's off now. Right?

Yes. We can hear you.

The mute's off now.

There you go. Okay. And I have Christine I'm sorry. Colleen, I've put a group I'm sorry. I don't know if it's there. Hi.

Hi, Lynn. We're excited for your few minutes. Would you like us to share your slides?

Please do. I am a white woman with clear glasses and a black sweater with a maroon scarf. And I'm here at the office, and behind me is my wherever you wheel, remember to yield poster that I love. I haven't left it from my space when I got it a few years ago. It's one of my favorite dis displays of activity. So is the Okay. Okay.

I am sharing slides now so you can

get Okay. I'll be quick. The Boston Tax Help Coalition. Next screen, please. The Tax Help is the keystone of the Center for Working Families since 2001, and we provide direct services to low and moderate income residents, but also out of the city of Boston near my nearby locations.

Next, please. This is all it's under the IRS, and it's called VITA. It's a veteran volunteer income tax assistance program. And people are trained to be it's volunteers that are trained to be volunteer review and tax prepare for over 100, 200 it's very active location in the different places. There are different 35 25 different cities.

You can go to the next when I say cities, organizations with the local communities, 25 sites. Here is the Boston get your taxes done free. The initial poster that's going out on the backside of it or the opposite side is the list of all of the 25 different locations as well as the list of the documents required to bring to get your taxes taxes done. Next, please. An issue actually, go to the next next screen.

The free tax preparation is for the for the disability community, and it was over a decade ago that this program began initially with Deaf Inc. And over time, we have expanded, partnered with the Mass Commission for the Blind. And right now, the program outreaches the specific location is to the Copley Square Boston Public Library. Next. Saturdays, 10AM to 3PM at the public library.

It's called the Kerstein Business Center at 70 Boylston Street. And the days, it starts next week, this weekend, and ends April Saturday, April 11. Next, please. And here is the poster for this specific program. You saw just a minute ago the one for the entire city.

This one is the specific for the disability community with the dates, the Copley Square branch of the Boston Public Library, and the specifics. You can click through. The next one is yeah. It's not in order. But the thing that you can do is contact me about signing up to whether you want to attend and the dates and times on a Saturday of the public library from ten to four.

The questions about the tax coalition and what's going on, and that's something you can also you'll see the disability my disability address and the boston.govdepartment center working families, the entire email location to go to to get more information about the disability preparation disability community. So any questions? I know I want to get through this, but, basically, it's been really well attended. We have four, five a day on Saturdays depending on times. But right now, everything is getting booked very quickly, more so than we ever have.

I think we've given more information or information out to more organizations and more. And we just went to the Carroll School for the Blind yesterday, and that's just one of many places that we are fortunately getting connections with in different ways this year. And I'm really glad to have the chance to talk with you directly. And I'm gonna sit through this meeting a little longer because I really enjoy getting to see and going what's on. Thank you.

Great. Lynn, this is Jerry. Thank you. It's always good to have your presentation annually. You said the slots are booking up. So that that's that was my question. So the so the spots for the disability community, whether wheelchair users, whatever, at the at the central library, you can't just walk in. You have to make an appointment. Is that correct? Or

Yes. Yes. So that we can have the the specific timing organized. There is a you can go into the organizations. There are the 40 different organizations that are accommodating.

And this one is the specific that you can make a plan for getting your entire tax filing committed all at once. The majority of them require your information, your tax information is to drop off and pick up. And so that's one thing that I really like being able to do is to have someone get their taxes filled all right then and there. So and it's essentially 10:00, 11:30, 01:00, 02:30 are the time periods that we have available. But as time goes on, they're people are gonna be more interested, and so we'll see how it goes with getting people curved in to the process a little bit more within the time period.

So I am very excited for this to be happening so well this year. So thanks for giving me the time to talk.

Thanks so much. Any quickly, any questions from the advisory board for Lynn right now?

Jerry, can I just make one comment? Lynn also sent us a flyer, which we will send out to the board that you can share. You can just email it on to your networks. And there's also a flyer for the ASL classes. We'll So make sure that we get both of those flyers out to you. It's very, very easy to just forward this information and get it out to

all your networks. Yes. Definitely. Yes. Great commission. That's a point.

Yeah. And that's the flyer that I put out and showed, but that's exactly the source that we have, that flyer. Good.

Awesome. Thanks. That wraps up my report too, Gary. Great. Thanks. Happy answer questions.

Thanks. Any questions for either Lynn or the commissioner? Seeing none, we'll move on to the next part of the agenda. We've we've decided to to shift the agenda a bit and move up move up elections for for the executive board members now to make sure that we give each other we give, enough time for that. Andrea, if you wouldn't mind going over the going over the process again? I know it's a little bit, can be a little bit complicated.

Absolutely. So we are ready

to

take votes. We have nominations. However, there's still time to make more nominations. What will happen is, Jerry will say, sorry, Miyhosseini was nominated to be chair of the board. He will ask for any additional nominations from the floor.

He has to make this request three times, give everybody a chance, to nominate themselves if they wish. Then assuming there are no additional nominations, he will open the floor to motions. Someone else needs to make a motion to vote for, in this case Zari, as chair. We vote a full vote, yes, nos, abstentions, but no discussion. And if she's elected, great, then we move on to the next one.

Although, Jerry has the ability as chair to see if, the incoming or outgoing person would like to say a few words. So he'll repeat the nomination, ask for nominations from the floor three times, someone else, one of you needs to call for a vote, and then the vote is taken.

Great. Clear clear as as can be at this point, Andrea. And if if I if I screw up, I'm sure somebody will will correct me yet again. I will hold folks to that. But we but I think we're ready to move forward with the with the election, and the first nomination on on the slate is for chair.

And as the commissioner confirmed in her report, the nomination that was put forth by the commissioner last time last month Fourth chair would be Azari. And, you know, this is my first call for, do we have any additional nominations for chair from the floor at at this point? Seeing none, I will ask again, do we have any additional nominations for chair either either yourselves or or another person from the floor? Seeing none, I will ask for the third and final time, any nominations for chair from the floor currently? And seeing none, I will ask someone to make a motion to to to accept or to elect Azari to as to a one year term as chair of the, disability commission advisory, board.

Don't be shy. Someone has to nominate. I mean, someone has to move, or we can't move forward with the elections.

Juan Carlos?

Yes. Hello, everyone. This is Juan Carlos. Apologies to everyone. I was able to join to that meeting. This is Juan Carlos, board member from Boston South Bend. I would like to make a motion to nominate for voting for vote Sari as chair of our board.

Great. And we need a second. Is that correct, Andrea? I second. Okay. Paula seconds. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Leroy James. Aye. Aye. The motion carries. Zari, welcome. Welcome as chair of the advisory board for the coming year. I'm sure you'll do I'm sure you'll do a great job.

And would you like to say any a few words at this time? Zari, you're muted.

This is Andrea. I'm afraid she may be frozen, actually.

Yeah. She She looks frozen. Well, if she comes back on and and I'll give her the opportunity to say a couple words later on if we you know, if she comes back on. So the next is for the vice chair. And correct me if I'm wrong, Andrea, since I am nominated for that position, I cannot control this I cannot chair this part of the elections. Correct?

That is correct. Luckily for you, Olivia is on and ready to run this vote.

Great. Go right ahead, Olivia.

Yep. Alright. Step one,

Call for any additional nominations.

Okay. Does are there any other additional nominations? Take one. Are there any other additional nominations? Take two.

Are there any other additional nominations? Take three.

This is Carl. I make a motion that we accept Jerry Boyd as vice chair by unanimous consent.

This is Paul. I second the nomination.

Okay. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any nays?

Aye.

Alright. The ayes have it. Congratulations. You are vice chair.

Thank you, Olivia. Thank you.

Jerry, we can have Zari back if you wanna rec I just wanna let you know.

Great. Zari, congratulations on your on being voted on as the chair for the next year. Did you wanna say did you wanna say a few words before we move on with the election? No pressure. You don't have to, but I'm giving you you the opportunity to if you'd like.

Thank you, Jerry. I'm sure there'll be plenty of time to introduce myself, but I just wanna say thanks to you for sharing this group and really leading it. I really appreciate all the work and effort that you have put through the past couple years, and I'm sure we'll make a great team with everyone. And I'm looking forward to really kind of moving you know, I really believe in that term, nothing about us without us. It's not just a value to me, but a responsibility.

So I hope as we move forward that we can work as a team and really make some the important change in for our community. So I would put to them to go on. The door is always open to the community even outside of these meetings. So, hopefully, I get to learn much more about how the how this works, and I've been here forever. But I appreciate your your words.

Great. Thank you, Zoe. I know I know you're gonna do a great job. But moving along with the election, forgive me, Andrea. Who is the next what is the next office we're voting on right now?

Olivia Richard was nominated to be secretary.

Great. Great. So that that's our next task right now is to vote on that nomination. But in order in order to do that, we do have to follow through with the process. And this is, again, the opportunity to to either nominate yourself or or others from the floor. So does anyone does anyone choose to nominate themselves or anyone else from the floor for you said it was secretary. Correct, Andrea?

Correct.

Correct. Okay. Seeing none, I will ask again. Anyone from the floor choose to nominate someone for secretary? Seeing none, I will ask for the final time. Any nominations from the floor, either for yourself or others to to be secretary of the decisioning commission advisory board? One second, colonel. Go right ahead, sir.

I move that we close the nominations and put in Olivia Richard to secretary by unanimous consent.

Great. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. The motion carries. Olivia, welcome as as secretary. You can't get off the executive committee, Although even though you may be trying, you have you haven't got off in a while. So congratulations. Would you like to say a few words?

I being vice chair was fun. Secretary is gonna be fun, and I look forward to continuing the good work of the board.

Great. And we continue thank you for all you do, Olivia. I really appreciate that. And, Andrea, if I moving along, if I'm correct, it's Tara for treasurer. Is that correct?

Yes.

Tara, you have such a hard I I don't know if you realize what what a hard job you you'll have, Tara. But but, anyway, this is our our election for the last person on the executive board for treasurer. This is the opportunity again to nominate yourself or someone else from the floor for treasurer. Seeing none, I will ask again, does anyone want to nominate themselves or someone else for a treasurer for the next year for the Boston Disability Commission Advisory Board? Since then, I'll ask for the final time.

Does anyone wanna nominate themselves or anyone else for treasurer for the Disability Commission Advisory Board for the next year? Jerry? Go right ahead, Carl.

I move that we close the nomination process and put in Tara and treasurer by unanimous consent.

Great. Paula, I second. Great.

So let's vote. All in favor of having Tara as our treasurer for the next year, say aye. Aye. Aye. Great. Tara, welcome welcome as treasurer and continuing on the executive committee. Would you like to say a couple words? If not, that's quite alright. But if you want to, I'm giving you the opportunity.

Hi, everyone. Thank you very much. I look forward to being as frugal as possible this coming year.

Great. Thank you. That was the that was the election of officers for the for the coming year. That process went a little smoother than I than than I thought, so that was great. Thank you for all your your hard work in making that as smooth as process as possible, and and thank you for choosing to, you know, putting your trust in us to to move the group forward for the coming year.

I know we'll work great together as a small group and as a as a larger group. I I continually get I'm so impressed by the by the commitment of of the larger group. I I really, really enjoy working with all of you. So so the work continues. And towards that end, the next thing on our agenda is the architectural access report with Patricia Mendez. Is Patricia here?

Hi, Jerry. Thank you so much.

Hi, Patricia. How are you?

I am awesome. Congratulations to the new board. Congratulations, Ari, Jerry, Olivia, and Tara.

Great. Go right ahead, Patricia.

My name is Patricia Mendez. I'm the director of architectural access. I have a very brief, architectural access update. I'm basically going to share a flyer that I received from the parks department. I'm going to share my screen. This is going to be fast. Oh, actually, I don't see how I can do this. Sorry. I'm getting oh, I'm kinda stuck with my my windows. I don't see the window that I need to share.

If you drop the link in the chat, Colleen can share it.

If I so I have my person in in my tab, but I'm not able to see the

I think Colleen got it.

Nope. It's not on the window.

Technology.

You think we get it. You know, you think we have it by now. But

Oh. And now she's got it. Okay.

Great.

I'll just iron it up. We've got it, Patricia.

We see it, Patricia.

Okay. Now I'm try I need to change I'm so sorry. To change the the to the next slide.

Down in the corner, bottom left.

Thank you. Okay. So the update is about the Ringer Park, and I'm sharing the flyer in three languages. The first one is English with a QR code, and the date is Wednesday, February 25 at six to 07:30PM, and the information for joining virtually is on this flyer. And the next graphic is showing the same information about the park in Spanish.

And then the last one is in Chinese. And if you would like me to email this flyer to you, I'm happy to to do that. Just shoot me an email.

Patricia, can you say what neighborhood Ringer Park is from?

Oh, yeah. I I was gonna ask the same question. Thanks, Andrea.

What's the question?

Where is Ringer Park?

In Brighton.

What's the name of the park again? I'm not here.

Ringer Park, R I N G E R, Park.

Okay. Where is that located in Brighton? Do you know exactly?

I do not have the address from the top of my head. I'm sorry.

Okay. Because I know that I'm also seeing signs around Rogers Park also being ready for upgrade too under the QR code outside the park. So they must be working on a couple parks in the Brighton area.

Yes. That sounds correct.

Carl, looks like Ringer Park is behind the West End House Boys and Girls Club. It stretches sort of from Comm Ave, Alston Street up towards Cambridge Street.

And we can include this flyer along with the other ones that we'll mail to the board after the meeting.

That would be really helpful, commuter. I appreciate that.

And one more question. We really hope you'll share this information with your networks.

Alright. So with that, that is my favorite part. Thank you so much.

Great. Thank you, Patricia. And and apologies on the slides not working. We'll get that technology someday. You know? It's always a battle.

Thank you, Jerry. Thanks, everyone.

Next on the agenda is board member shout outs. Don't don't feel shy, but this is the opportunity or don't feel put on the spot, but this is the opportunity set aside every every meeting to talk about for us individually to talk about the great work that we've been doing since since our last meeting. So if anyone has anything to share, please feel free to to do so.

This is Paul. I just wanted to give a little shout out on some mental health advocacy. Please, Paul. Yeah. There's five c's of mental health, provide a framework for well-being, focusing on developing essential strengths, most commonly cited as competence, confidence, connection, character, and caring or compassion.

Though variations exist with some adding control and community, these elements help build resilience by fostering a sense of capability, self belief, belonging, ethical behavior, and empathy, supporting personal growth and healthy relationships. And I think during this time of year and, you know, although we're leaving wintertime, as we still are in the midst of winter, it it goes a long way with the weather and the way people are with mental health and strength. And on another note, I just wanna say thank you, Jerry, for a great year. Seems like we were just having this conversation with Wes who did a great job, and I'm glad you're still serving on the e board.

Oh, thank you very much, Roy. I appreciate it. And, thank you for all your years of service as well, and thank you for always putting a spotlight on mental health. I think it's, you know, it's so important that that we, you know, that we keep that in the forefront of all the work that we do. So Of course.

And any other folks have anything they'd like to share for this month? Again, no need to be put on the spot, but if anybody has something, now would be the time. And seeing none, we can move on. But I know you've spoken up, Juan Carlos, but you did come in late. So, you know, I I wanna give you an opportunity to introduce yourself as well.

Yes. Of course. Hello, everyone. Again, sorry to the board. I haven't at home late after work. My name is Juan Carlos Ramirez Tapia. I live in Boston South Bend. I'm a Hispanic with a spinal cord injury and having living in Boston for a while. I'm very happy to serve in the board. And, again, just wanted to echo what everyone agrees. Thank you for all the work that the board is doing to represent us and to advocate in many manners. And to everyone, all the staff who is always involved in making the best of of this council. So thank you, everyone. Thank you, everyone, again.

Thanks, Juan. Appreciate it. And thank you for your work. Seeing no more shout out shout outs, we'll move on on the agenda. We have an old business item of the Abilities Expo. I know that commissioner shared shared a letter that she composed to the to the director with the director commissioner of the Abilities Expo. Did we send that out, or do you need a vote on that? Or or what's what would be the appropriate next step?

Yeah. It's the the new owners. The previous owner sold it a few years ago, and he had already stopped coming to Boston before he sold it because the price point of Boston is really expensive when it comes to hotels and transportation. It's very much one of the places in the country. But after the board expressed interest in having them return, we did reach out with a letter, and that was last May. And they were interested in looking at future abilities experts coming to the New England area. So I did reach back out to them. I haven't heard from them yet as of today, but if I don't hear from them again, I will reach out again next week. And, again, it wouldn't be this year. It may not be next year, but maybe they would keep us in mind for, like, 2028.

Yeah. I would hope so. And I don't know if the commissioner, the do you have any sort of do you have any sort of not poll necessarily, but do you have any sort of creative ideas or creative ways that maybe we could incentivize, you know, the abilities expert account? Do we have any discounted rates on on hotels or space that we could we could we could, you know, offer?

Yeah. You know, they hinted around at the same thing. Just saying, like, oh, if if there's any any places you can point us to that, you know, may make it work for us. They did mention that they were looking in Connecticut. I don't know what's in Connecticut, but, you know, we can certainly explore if there are any, you know, any businesses that we wanna get involved in hosting them. Again, it will be hotel rooms and convention space. So we'd have to reach out to

our

office, community inclusion office to see what they would say. But we can do that. And, we can lure them back to Boston.

Yeah. Well, I appreciate your continued advocacy efforts on it. I know that, you know, I enjoyed going there the couple of times that I was able to attend. I know when I I used to play soccer with the breakers, we used to do demos, you know, at either one or two of them in the recent past. So so I think it is a good good resource. So, I mean, if we could get it back here, I think it would would be a win win for for, you know, exhibitors and and, you know, the disability community in in in Greater Boston. So

And if anyone is interested in traveling, it is still being held live in different cities. The next one come up is in New York. It's actually in New Jersey right just South of New York City, and I believe it's in, like, late May because I've gone to that one before. It's probably, like, a four or five hour drive. And then they they're also held still in California, I think Chicago, and possibly Texas. But there's a website that's still active, Abilities Expo. People can check it out.

Great. Yeah. I've seen online that they have, you know, several coming up or or whatnot. So I do know that they're still active, but it would be great if they if they came back to to Boston or New England. That would be great. So thanks for your advocacy on that, commissioner, and keep us keep us posted. Next, under new business, we have several we have a couple of of items anyway, is floating machines, and I think the commissioner did touch on that, you know, on her report. I don't know if either she or Andrea or staff has anything thing to add. It's Carl. And or Carl. Go ahead, Carl.

Yeah. I the commissioner and Andrea, and I put this on the agenda because many disability groups are working with DLC to try to reach out to the secretary of State's office to buy new machines because at this point, the Automark machines, which they make to the disability community, are falling apart. They're fifteen years old now, and we need to buy new machines if we wanna make sure that people with disabilities have full access. However, DLC and many other disability advocacy organizations have been frustrated with a lack of communication from the secretary of state's office on what the next steps are. So I was wondering if we could possibly if the city of Boston could possibly work with other CODs or their government office could work with other towns and cities to approach the secretary of state's office to ask them what the next steps are and if they can make funding available to purchase new accessible voting machines.

And I'd like to, I don't know, bring up a motion and just say, can we write a letter or start a collaboration or something? Whatever we think this form should take.

Commissioner, I don't know if you or Andrea or any of your staff have anything to add.

Yeah. I can say that we brought that up with the the chief of the registrar of the city of Boston registrar who also oversees the elections department. So we we told him that there was a lot of advocacy around getting new equipment. And the elections department knows that the automark is not great. We did get detailed information from them about the maintenance of the machines, the testing of the machines, the replacing the machines, even, like, day off if they're reported to me not working.

And they are vigilant about all these steps. However, we know in the field, people don't experience that because, like Carl said, it's very old technology. So despite the election department's best efforts, the automark has not been super reliable. So we did tell the city registrar that we were interested in exploring other technology. We are scheduling a follow-up meeting with them. So if the board does have any advocacy they want me to forth, I can certainly do that. I've already shared my desire to look at that. But if the board wants to take a vote, write a letter, I can share that as well.

Yeah. I would support I would support, you know, at least as a first step, you know, writing a letter to the secretary of state and, you know, ask them to to explore new technology. Because I, you know, I think we discussed in in prior meetings that one of the barriers right now is that that, you know, it's it's by state statute that that that the automark is the only machines that can be used currently. So it would be up to the secretary of state's office to to, you know, re to, you know, get a a new technology. So so I definitely think we should should at least write a letter and and begin that process of having them having them explore new technologies.

And I'm disappointed that that so far, you know, other agencies haven't haven't gotten much traction from the secretary of state's office on the on this so far.

Yeah. I know that my counterpart, who's on the COD in Worcester, is also approaching the the city of Worcester to do the same thing, and they have serious concerns. I know that there are probably other CODs such as Somerville and Cambridge that probably do so. I think the potential is I think we would have a greater impact. It's a number of us. Certainly, Boston because we're the largest city in the state. But I I just think so I would like to at least make a motion to at least start with the process of writing the letter letter and maybe explore potential collaboration with other cities.

I think that's totally reasonable. Who wants to make a motion?

Alright. I'll make it.

Who wants to second that, please?

I second the motion. This is Olivia.

All in favor, say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed?

Any discussion? So so I'll be happy to work with Andrea. Yeah. Okay. So Carl will work with Andrea to draft a letter, you know, encouraging the secretary of state's office to begin to explore other technologies to use to use for accessible voting for people with disabilities.

Can I just ask that you copy me, Carl?

Oh, yeah.

And I can share it with the city registrar. No. No.

I would never not copy you.

Yeah. Great. And, yeah, we can bring you can bring the draft back to the board for our final approval and vote.

Yeah. Definitely. I I wouldn't want I wouldn't want us to send something out without without the final a final vote anyway.

Going out from the commission anyway.

Yeah.

This is Andrea. So the letters that you all draft come on special letterhead with your name and the board's name on it. There we have a different process for whether we send anything signed by commissioner. But as you heard, she's definitely, you know, talking about that as well.

Great. Awesome. Thank you for bringing that up, Carl. And I also see under new business is a service animal state legislation. So that's something that, again, I think you can speak to, Carl. So go right ahead.

Yeah. There are two bills in particular. One, I think, is further along than the other one. So I'll I'll start with the first one who I think is further along, and that's s seventeen fourteen. And that's an act to form a commission to study the discrimination against service animal users because a number of us have pointed out to the legislature that the current system found through MCAD is not a good process to find people who are denying service animals from places of public accommodation.

That would be a joint task force between DLC and DPC and MOD and members of the legislature on that commission. That did get out of the children, families, and persons with disability committee. It is now in Senate Ways and Means. And I would like to suggest that we write a letter, and we only have to write a letter to the Senate Ways and Means members only, which I think is, what, seven of them? Eight of them might forget how many, but we only have to write a letter to senate ways and means because the goal is just to get out of this senate ways and means to get on the senate floor. Because if it gets on the floor, it'll pass. We just have to get out of the committee.

Is it?

Yeah. I would suggest that we write a letter saying we support the legislation and and send a letter to the Senate Ways and Means Committee.

Carl, has this already been what's the house process? Has this already been voted on?

The rules are different this year. Okay? They're totally different. Although, in theory, they're joint committees. If it's an f bill, only senators can vote on it. If it's an h bill, only h people can vote on it to start with before it gets out of committee. So the house has no role on getting that out of committee.

Well, what about making it making it state statute, state law?

Well, so once it gets out of committee, it would go to the senate floor for vote. The meaning of the senate floor at large with the 40 senators, and then it would go to the house floor. I just wanna get it out of committee first, and very rarely do the legislature put things out of committee onto the floor that won't pass. But we just have to get it out of committee. Does that make sense?

It it does. It does. Okay. So who would like to make a motion that we that the Disability Commission Advisory Board write a letter to the senate No. Ways and Means Committee and ask them to to move this bill along out of committee?

I'll make a motion to

Go ahead, Carol. Any seconds? I second. Tara seconds. All in favor? Aye. Any nays? Any discussion?

I just have a quick question.

Oh, go ahead. If you

can add the bill number, because I just wanna learn more about it. If there's anything that I can read, I can put that in the chat.

Yes. I can I can send you a link when the meeting's over to the actual bill? It's

f. Okay.

Is there a one is there a one pager, Carl?

I'll just send you the link to the well, I mean, it's the text of the bill, but I'll send you a link to the website that the bill's on, and you'll be able to see the text of the bill.

Thank you.

And, Andrew, just put it in the chat, the number of the bill too. Great. Thank you. Thank you, Carl, for your

And then I got one more, as you can see.

Bringing those to our attention. Yeah. Go ahead, Carl.

Go ahead. Age twenty sixty six. This one's a little more problematic, but, basically, it's a bill that will find shared transportation drivers if they deny access to service animal users. There was a hearing back in November. We had more than 22 people testify in support of this bill from the disability community.

They all did an amazing job. But because of the fact that the drivers are in the process of forming or trying to form a union based on the referendum last year, the legislature is hesitant to do two things. One, find the driver because they don't wanna they think it might hurt them in terms of of forming the union, and they don't wanna upset the union. And b, they're worried about many of the drivers are from the minority community. And given what's going on politically, they're worried about finding drivers and the appearance of that, even though if that's the expense of violating civil rights of people with disabilities and being prejudicial towards them.

So this one, I I I'm a little more concerned will not get out of committee because they're trying to find alternatives to finding drivers. But it is my belief that unless they think the driver faces consequences, they will not stop denying us access to shared transportation. And it gets to the point where sometimes I've been late for work or sometimes it's taken me an hour and a half to get home because I've been denied three times in a row. You know? So it it to me, it is I will admit, I'm I'm a bit biased on this one, and it is a bit personal.

So I'll I'll say that upfront. But so it's 08:26. It's currently with labor and workforce, and we would have to send a letter to the chair, McNultry, to try to get this out of committee. And and and this is, Again, an act to find service chair transportation drivers when they deny access to service animal users.

Harold, this is Jerry. Thank you again for all your bringing these to our attention and and your your your diligent having your your your diligent work in making sure that that that this party has always been aware of of legislation that can impact people with disabilities. I appreciate that. Going back a little bit, and you said that that that this had a hearing back in in November, and I and I seem to remember that a lot of disability rights organizations, you know, were were there and were advocating for Correct. For for this.

Is it would it be possible for us to sign, I mean, sign on to a lawyer, or or or do you think we

should Yeah. I mean have our own? I know that Kat I can't remember her name, but Kat with BCIL is involved. Right. I think I think DPC might have been involved. So that's the there is a possibility. I I I haven't reached out to them. And I just so I'm open for suggestions, but I also would potentially like a letter sent to on behalf of the commission sent to House Labor and Workforce.

Yeah. Well, what I'm saying is is if if we could sign on to a letter, do you think that would be effective, or do you want do you think we should send our own?

I'm open for discussion on that one.

What any any thoughts from any other members of the commission?

Oh, I would be willing to support you in any way. If we need to write a letter, we write a letter. I think maybe we can read in more about it to understand what's going on, but there are other than just finding the drivers, maybe including something about education and awareness around service animals. So people are not just getting fined, but at least we're making an effort into educating people as well.

So let's does anyone wanna make a motion to to write a letter in support of this of the house legislation?

I'll make a motion.

Any seconds?

I second. Carl seconds. Okay.

Let's vote on the motion. And all in favor say aye. Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed? Any further discussion? So what we will what we'll do is we'll have Carol work with the work with Andrea and and the commission on drafting a letter in support of this this legislation as well.

To the appropriate party. Lot of work to do with Andrea. Darn from that.

Well, again, you're you're a great advocate, Carl.

I don't care.

Always a pleasure to work with you, Carl.

Great. Great. And now I think it's time for public public input. So Andrea, if you could do your do the rules for public input, please.

Absolutely. Thank you, Jerry. Hi, everyone. This is the time when if you have a question or a comment that you would like to make to the board, you are free to do so. You do need to be recognized by the chair so that we can, you know, call on you and and work through everyone's questions and comments.

You may have noticed that you cannot unmute yourself on your own. We ask that you please use the Zoom raise hand function if you're able to indicate that you have a chat or a question. You can also use the chat, to either ask your question if you don't wish to voice it, or to indicate that you have a question. I will also scroll through the gallery. If you turn on your camera and just wave, I will try to find you that way as well.

You will have two minutes to make your question, to ask your question or make your comment. If you wish to ask your question in ASL, please indicate that in the chat or on screen. I will pin you so that in the recording, folks have access to your question if they rely on ASL as well. With that, I will turn it back to Jerry and I will keep my eye out for any chats, hands, or Zoom raised hands. Thank you.

Please do. This is the opportunity for members of the public who are attending tonight's meeting, and we thank you for your attendance to have their voice heard and your community's voice heard. So please feel free to take the opportunity to to be recognized and and to share your thoughts with with us, please. So, Andrea, I am not seeing anyone. Am I missing anyone here?

If you're missing them, I am too. I don't see anybody. No.

Oh, okay. Well, we have a time every month at these meetings at at the end for public input. I would encourage anyone and everyone to to avail themselves of of the time to to participate.

We do have one comment in the chat from a previous, commission staff member who you all may remember, who says they are yielding their time to current Boston residents, but they really admire the way this board operates and they miss working with you all. So thank you for your comment, Kai.

Is is she all the way down in The Carolinas accessing our meetings? Wow.

Yes. They are down in North Carolina, and they join us pretty much every month if they have time. You bet, they say.

Oh my goodness, Kai. Thank you so much. I didn't know we were nationwide. My goodness. I'll I'll I'll have to dress up next time. Guess What do you wear on

for t shirt today, Gary? No.

No. Prussprings need. It's an old navy shirt. It's an old navy shirt, but it does have the flag on it. So, anyway Can I make a motion? It is your time, Carl. It is your time, and this is my last time last year, at least for for this round anyway. So go ahead and make a motion, please.

Okay. I make a motion to adjourn.

Is this Paul I second?

Great. Great. Last official duty, Paul. I appreciate that. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Great. Everyone have a safe safe month. Let's bring let's bring winter to to an end, and and we'll see everyone next month, and we'll have Zari as chair, and I know she will do an excellent job. I appreciate everybody's hard work. Thank you so much.

Thanks, everyone. We'll see you next month.

Finding yourself in a hurry to get to class on time? College in a big city means there are lots of people using the busy streets and side walks all around you. It's important to remember to slow down and be mindful of the unique needs of pedestrians with disabilities. Together, let's make the city of Boston accessible, inclusive, and welcoming to people of all ages and abilities. Boston, Massachusetts, home to legacy, history, and traffic.

So, naturally, riding your bike is a great way to get around, but it's important to remember to share the space with pedestrians. This includes people with disabilities who face unique challenges when navigating our city. Let's take a look at some of the common safety rules we all should follow. White cane law. When you see a pedestrian walking with a white cane, this indicates that the user is blind or visually impaired.

You must come to a complete stop and allow them to safely cross the street. Bike parking. When parking your bike, leave at least four feet for pedestrians to get by. Never block sidewalks, curb ramps, cross walks, or accessible parking spaces. Holes that designate accessible parking may not be used to lock your bike. Obey traffic laws. When cycling through the city, always give an audible signal before overtaking or passing. Be aware, someone who is deaf or hard of hearing will not know you're approaching, and older adults may not be able to move quickly out of your way. Avoid riding on sidewalks. Always use bike lanes when they're available, and only ride on sidewalks