Disability Commission Advisory Board - Regular Meeting

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, part of the City of Boston Office of Cable Communications and is being broadcast on Xfinity channel 26, RCN channel 13, Fios channel nine six two, and livestreamed on YouTube where a recording will be at the end of the meeting. And with that, I will hand it over to our chair, Gary Boyd.

Great. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the October Disability Commission Advisory Board meeting. As always, we have a very robust agenda, so I will not take too much time. I will call this meeting to order, and we will start with introductions. And, please, Andrea, help me if I miss anyone or, you know, anyone jump up and down and let and let me know if I miss anyone. So, Carl, why don't we, why don't you introduce yourself?

Yeah. Hi. My name is Carl Richardson. I live in Brighton, Massachusetts Brighton, in the neighborhood of Brighton. I identify as a deaf blind person. I have salt and pepper hair, and I am wearing a dark polo long sleeved polo shirt. Great.

Paulette, why don't you introduce yourself, please? Good evening, everybody. My name is Paulette Duret. I live in the Mattapan section of Boston. I'm a African American senior citizen, and I'm glad to see everyone tonight.

Great. And Olivia, why don't you introduce yourself, please?

Sure. My name is Olivia Richard. I am a resident of Brighton, and I am a middle aged white female with glasses and short brown hair. And I use a manual wheelchair.

Great. And, Wes, why don't you introduce yourself, please?

Hi, everybody. My name is Wes Ireland, and I am using sign language interpreters this evening. So you will hear female voices because I am using American sign language, but I am a man. I am a white man, wearing a white shirt with pink stripes and the Patriots logo on the left chest. Very excited about their fourth win and hoping for future successes. I am an advisory board member, and I live here in the North End Of Boston.

If I may, it was very difficult to hear the interpreter. So I don't know if there's an issue with the microphone or or what.

Agreed, Rachel.

Okay. Thank you. Laurie, can we switch? I'm gonna put in my headphones.

Great. Should we wait till or or

So this is Wes. Would you like me to repeat what I just said with my introduction?

Sure. You can go ahead and repeat. I it was hard to hear. So

Can you hear the interpreter now?

Yes. Yes. Very well. Great.

So hi. Yes. This is Wes. And like I said, I'm a white man. I'm a deaf man. I'm using American Sign Language through the duration of this meeting, and I have two female interpreters, two female sign language interpreters, so you'll be hearing their voices going into English for what I have to say in sign language. And my visual description is I'm wearing a white t shirt, polo shirt with pink stripes, and I have a Patriots logo over my left chest. And because I'm I'm doing that because I'm honoring the fact that they've just won their fourth game so far, and I'm hoping that they're going to be successful going through the season. And I'm a board I'm a board member, a different board member, and I live at the North End.

West, you're sure they have a game. They won Yeah. The fifth game. Fifth game.

No. It was the fourth. They won the fourth game in

I'm gonna differ with you, Wes. This is Carl.

Number five. On Sunday.

They did on Sunday. It was their fourth game on Sunday.

No. No. No. Their their record is five five and two west. They won their fourth game in a row on Sunday.

Moving on.

Alright. Yes. Fourth in a row. Fourth in a row. Yes.

Great. Anyway, hopefully, that's the only thing we disagree on tonight. So, anyway, Paul Paul, go ahead, please.

Hi. My name is Paul Karen. I live in the West End Of Boston. I have short cropped hair. I'm a Caucasian male. I serve as a mental health advocate through family members and friends and colleagues with mental health disabilities. I work as a supervisor in the planning department, and I'm also a vested member of Labour's Local one fifty one.

Thank you, Paul. And Tara, would you like to introduce yourself, please?

Hi, everyone. I'm Tara Suthard. I am a little person who uses a wheelchair. I wear glasses, and I have dirty blonde hair. I live in Roxbury, and I am an executive board member.

Great. And Richard, would you introduce yourself, please?

Jerry Richard Glevsky. I live in Back Bay. I'm a white male. I have severely limited hearing. And I'm wearing a bluish sport jacket. And I have I hate to say it, but, Cherry, you can relate to this. I have mostly gray hair.

Right. Right. Yes. I I I would I would very much be able to relate to that. Zari, please introduce yourself.

Hi, everyone. My name is Zari. I'm an outstanding. I'm from South Boston. I'm a white female wheelchair user and happy to be here. Happy National Disability Employment Awareness Week.

Fantastic. Thank you for that reminder, Zaryn. Yes. Happy it's a national disability employment month month, awareness month. And I am Jerry Boyd again.

I live in West Roxbury, and, has been as has been alluded to. I have salt and pepper hair, mostly salt at this point, not pepper. And I I'm wearing a a Kelly green Kelly green t shirt, and I wear glasses, and I'm I'm also a wheelchair user. So did we get everybody from the advisory board, Andrea? This is Andrea.

This is Andrea. Yes. I believe so. I don't see any other names, but if someone is present under a different name, please raise your Zoom hand and get introduced.

Yep. And, commissioner, do you wanna introduce yourself at this point?

Thanks, Jerry. Hi, everybody. I'm Krista Makosh. I'm the disability commissioner and ADA ten zero two coordinator for the city of Boston, and I'm happy to be here tonight. Oh, I'm a female with blonde hair and an image of city hall in my background.

Great. And next on the agenda is the approval of last month's minutes. Do we have do we have any a motion to approve the minutes?

This is Carl. I make a I make a motion to accept the minutes.

Great. Any seconds?

This is Carl.

I second the motion. Great.

Any discussion? All in favor signify by saying aye or waving your hand or Aye. Aye. Great. The motion, passes unanimously. Excellent. And next, we have a presentation from the personal care attendant workforce council. Justin, I don't wanna butcher your last name. So if you could say your last name before you give your presentation, that would be great.

Sure. Hi. Thank you. Yes. My name's Justin Griceffa.

Great. So

yes. Yours yours. Oh, okay. Great. Thanks so much. Since as I'm the I know so I was invited here by Kristen. She serves on the Mass PCA Council with me. Her and I go way back. She was actually my peer mentor when I was first injured in the at Spaulding at a time when I probably wasn't necessarily, you know, receptive to maybe to all that I had to offer back then, that she had to offer back then. But definitely much more now.

I am a C5 quad wheelchair user. I've been injured for a little over eighteen years. Yeah. And so and I've been in the PCA program for for, you know, over eighteen years. Currently, I've been serving on the Mass PCA Council for just over three years.

And, you know, was part of the last collective bargaining agreement among several of those subcommittees as well. But yeah, so Kristen asked me to come and just share a little bit about the PCA program and what some of the challenges and stuff that are going on. So I will start to share my screen.

Hopefully oh, this isn't the right one. Sorry,

everybody.

Come on.

We can add Andrea share if that's more helpful.

No. I got it. I just need one sec.

For whatever reason, it didn't pop up on the top here. Alright.

Alright. So the Massachusetts PCA Workforce Council. So I'm gonna talk

a little bit Can I sorry? We have an issue with the interpreter. Would you mind pausing just one second? Sure. Laurie's video is frozen.

Rachel is here now. Can you hear me frozen in

the mic?

Okay. We've got you, Rachel. Okay. Great.

Go ahead. Thanks. Gentlemen, go ahead.

Great. Thank you. Yeah. So I'm just gonna talk a little bit about the PCA program right now and then, you know, who it serves and then some of the you know, what the PCA workforce council is and then some of the challenges that are facing the PCA program down the line. Alright.

Sorry. This is oh, sorry. It did not go to the beginning. My apologies.

Okay, here we go. That's better. The Massachusetts PCA program, and I'm the current vice chair of the Massachusetts Council. All right, great. So who the program serves.

The PCA program is meant for individuals with permanent or chronic disabilities, keep their independence, stay in the community, and manage their personal needs. So for, you know, I myself, spinal cord injury, that's definitely a permanent disability, but you know, there can also be for more chronic disabilities or debilitating ones, things like MS, Parkinson's, cerebral palsy, but it can also be for people who are blind, have hearing issues, have speech issues, as well as several forms of autism, elderly people who have dementia. So it does serve a wide array a wide array of people in the disability community. So I'm just going to move this down so I can see my writing. Okay.

So the Massachusetts Special Care Program provides support and funding to the MassHealth members who are permanently or chronically disabled and need assistance with their personal care. It enables people with disabilities to control their own routine and it facilitates independent living in the community rather than institutions, nursing homes, assisted living centers, etcetera. The PCA program allows individuals to hire, supervise, and fire their own PCAs who is and they're paid through MassHealth. In order to be eligible for the PCA program, individuals must have MassHealth standard or common health and must need hands on help with at least two activities of daily living. What makes the PCA program unique?

The Massachusetts PCA program is a self direct care model. The people with a disability, the consumer, are in direct control of how and when their care is going to be given. The direct care model comes from the independent living movement, which disability movement. The PCA program is very different from the traditional medical model of having a certified nurse assistance come in to take care of you in your own home. And then consumers are able to live at their home with dignity and stay out of medical facilities.

And the PCA program represents a hard hard fought and won, you know, living independently in their homes. The PCA program, again as I said, is a self care program, meaning consumer is the employer. The consumer employer is responsible for managing their care and overseeing their personal care attendance. Know, MassHealth essentially considers consumer employers to be running a small business from their home. MassHealth is providing the funds, but the consumer is doing all other aspects of that business.

PCAs do not work for MassHealth, an agency, the PCM, the Personal Care Management Agency, like the Boston Center for Independent Living, or the fiscal intermediary. PCAs work for the disabled consumer. They are the boss, the employer, the supervisor and the scheduler. Consumer employers recruit, hire, fire, determine work schedules, train, supervise, approve time sheets and evaluate the PCA's performance. They're kind of the be all end all.

Consumer employers must follow all program rules and regulations and keep track of their available hours to make sure they're not violating any rules. And then PCAs should not be hindering a consumer's ability to want to live independently. They are there to help you, assist you with everything that you're not able to do yourself. If 's anything that you want to try and be doing independently, that is their job to do and they should not be trying to prevent you from doing it if you feel that you are capable and wanting to do so. So the eligibility for the program, you know, to be in order to be eligible for the program, must need assistance with two at least two forms of date forms of hands on activities such as ADLs.

These are things such as mobility transfers, passive range of motion, transportation to medical appointments, bathing and grooming, dressing or undressing, eating and toileting. They're all the kind of direct care, hands on aspects of the program. They're getting you in and out of bed, they're bringing you to the shower, they're getting you dressed, so the core principles of it. In addition to that, there are the instrumental activities of daily living. They're called IADLs.

They're things such as laundry, shopping, housekeeping, meal preparation and clean up, transportation of medical appointments, maintaining medical equipment. They're not the hands on direct care aspects of the care where you're dealing with the consumer, but they are essential to living a comfortable and independent life. We all want to wear clean clothes, live in a clean home, have good food prepared for us. Some of the program logistics, there are approximately 60,000 PCAs in Massachusetts. There's about 45,000 consumers with disabilities served by PCAs.

About 70% of the consumers are served by family members or friends who work for them as their PCA. The remaining 30% of consumer employers hire PCAs independently. A significant portion of PCAs are women of color and immigrants. Many PCAs work for more than one consumer and PCAs are represented by the eleven ninety nine SCIU PCA Union which engages in collective bargaining with PCA Workforce Council. So the inner workings of the PCA program.

There are three main companies that make up the program and allow it to function. That's the Personal Care Management Agency or PCM. These are things like the Boston Center for Independent Living, Stavros, among others. They complete the annual assessments to determine the number of hours that a consumer may need. Then there's Massachusetts Medicaid or MassHealth.

That's the MassHealth standard or common health must be enrolled in the MassHealth program to take part in the PCA program. Then there's the fiscal intermediary which is Tempest Limited. They're the ones who are providing the paychecks and pay stubs for

PCAs. So

this is kind of just going into the personal care management agency again. They are the ones who are sending out the evaluators to the consumer's home, doing the time to task, of them or evaluation of them. They will provide you, you know, or ask you the types of services that you think you need. They will provide you with training if you need to. They'll inform you of all the rules and regulations, responsibilities within the program.

And then all of that information gets worked up into the service agreement, which is then submitted to MassHealth. MassHealth will receive those prior authorizations, determine the consumer's eligibility for those services. And then once they've made that decision, they'll inform the PCM, the fiscal intermediary, and the consumer of their choice their decision, and then provide them the money. And then the fiscal intermediary which is Tempest Unlimited, they receive the funds from MassHealth for the services. They process the time sheets.

They process the payroll for tax purposes, the W-two forms, and then they'll report any fraud to the attorney general's office should it occur. So the program challenges going forward. So there are a couple of significant challenges as the program continuing. There is the continued growth. The PCA program is a substantial part of the MassHealth budget.

I believe it is on track to be about $2,000,000,000 of the budget. So it's definitely a significant amount of money. MassHealth is concerned about the continued growth of the program. It does get larger every year. So that is definitely a top concern because being able to sustain that growth.

The state is bracing for significant cuts to Medicaid funding. All know that federal funding is under attack right now for Medicaid dollars. Massachusetts itself is under attack. So in every meeting that the council has, all they talk about is upcoming cuts. This could potentially result in cuts to the PCA services and prevent future individuals from getting on the program.

Shortages of workers. There is a severe nationwide shortage of healthcare workers, and this is going back to before the pandemic. I know this is something that I've experienced firsthand constantly is having trouble finding good quality PCAs. Then change to immigration status has exacerbated this issue and created lots confusion. Know, as I said, a lot of PCAs, you know, are immigrants and changes to status, you know, has affected some people's ability to be able to work and put a lot of fear out out there.

I didn't put it as a slide just because the sorry, this keeps going forward. I didn't put it as a slide, but there are a bunch of some new regulation changes that are coming to the program as well. We were informed of this at a council meeting most recently. That is going to create additional challenges to being able to hire a PCA and get them working for you as quickly as a consumer might need. All right.

So the Massachusetts PCA Workforce Council. So we are our creation and purpose. We are a panel of consumer employers you know, living in the Massachusetts community. We were established in 2006 by the Massachusetts legislature. We are part of the governance structure of the PCA program.

It is we are designed to support and strengthen the self direct care model of people with disabilities and we help to ensure the stability, quality, and accessibility of the PCA workforce. Our responses our purpose and responsibility. We represent the employer of record during the collective bargaining process for the PCA contract. You know, I was part of the last collective bargaining process for the current contract, and they are you know, we are already gearing up for the next negotiation, which will begin next year, which I believe Kristen will be joining me on. So looking forward to that.

It is a very interesting experience, but a very important one as well. To support consumers' right to self direct and help amplify their voices, we are that representation of the consumer employers on there. To improve the quality and stability of the Workforce Council or of the PCA workforce, we want to make sure that there are good jobs out there and good people that are fulfilling them. To develop and maintain the PCA directory, there is a MassHealth directory for PCAs to post job or sorry, look for jobs. Consumers can actually post jobs as well and you can find out, you know, what their availability is, the types of things they need, all that sort of stuff.

To advise the state on policies affecting the PCA program, you know, that is kind of a very key thing. We work very closely with them to explain to them how these policies are going to have an impact and the importance of getting the information out there. We also work very closely with the eleven ninety nine SCIUPCA union. We have several joint committees with them. We talk to them on a regular basis.

They are our partners in this. And to promote fair wages and benefit fair wages and working conditions for PCAs through our subcommittees. We have the labor management committee, discusses all issues that come up for PCAs, the training committee to develop new training programs, the racial justice committee to talk about inadequacies and the, you know, deep racial divides that can happen occur within the program. Our recruitment and retention task force to find more PCAs and keep them going. We also this past year developed a task force on developing new training materials for consumer employers and how the program works, is a little bit how this presentation came together as well as another to prevent abuse and neglect of consumers and kind of fill the holes and gaps in the system that are there.

So how can you help? Disability advocates are encouraged to educate legislators and the public on the program's importance. You know, that's really the only way to get it out there. A lot of people don't even necessarily know that this program is out there. To advocate strongly for funding and policy support, you know, there's so, you know, so as I said, so many, you know, attacks coming and with budget cuts, the more funding the program gets, the better we are.

Attend public meetings, you know, meetings such as this, our council meetings, our subcommittee meetings. There's also the Disability Alliance. I know there are other advocacy groups meetings that occur within the state on a regular basis, so going to them. Writing letters of support and concern, especially to your elected officials, any news outlets, anything that you can get out there. And then to reach out to your contacts and get them to be active too.

What's this group I can imagine is doing and why I'm here talking about the PCA program. All right. That's kind of just, you know, the brief overview of the program and then what the council does. There's certainly a lot more that I could go into about it. So if, you know, if you have any questions or anything you like to discuss, you know, now I can take some questions or if not.

Thanks, Justin, for that very, very thorough, overview of of the program itself and specifically what your what the council does. And I I wanna thank you and and your other council members for for your hard work and for, you know, advocating, you know, for the program and for those of us who use the use the program. I really appreciate, I really appreciate that. Any questions from the advisory board? No? Great. Let's see.

This is Andrea Jerry. I don't see any questions from the board. There is one question from the public in the chat if you'd like to take questions from the public after the board.

Justin, this is Jerry again. I had I have a question. You said at the beginning, and at at various points throughout your presentation that you're you're involved in collective, the collective bargaining. But just just, to be clear, you're you're there, you were there, bargaining on behalf of of the consumers in the program. Is that correct?

Yes. Yeah. We're we are representing the consumer's voice in that I mean, it or in those negotiations. We are when we do those, I mean, we are sitting on the MassHealth side of the the table and do caucus with them and discuss the proposals that are on there, but we are still representing that consumer voice on there. Again, really kind of anytime when the union makes a proposal, we're trying our best to explain to them why we think it might be good, you know, or or why it might be, you know, or in that's in that aspect.

Sure. And I see that commissioner has her hand raised. Go ahead, commissioner.

Thanks, Jerry. One thing that was recently approved too was a pay differential for PCAs who engage in complex care. Yes, Do you want to talk about that a little bit, Justin?

Sure. Yeah. Well, there's actually two different things that were approved this past year. There was the wage scale differential. That's for PCAs who've been working as a PCA for a long time, going all the way back to 2008 when they unionized.

So if you've been working for as a number of years, it's based on the number of hours you've worked. But if you've been working for a long time, you are eligible for a pay raise, you know, kind of a way to keep, you know, PCAs in the program, to keep working to get those pay raises. And then the complex care differential really is, I I would say is predominantly meant for wheelchair users. It is oftentimes the people who are wheelchair users have a lot harder time finding people PCAs to work for them. And so this was kind of a differential that was put in place to be a little bit extra incentive to get consumers who have those more complex issues who need more than some of just the more basic ADLs.

We'll get an extra $3.25 per hour. I'm not 100% sure if MassHealth has officially announced what that criteria is going to be, but it is going to be a consumer who does a bowel program with stimulation. So if you know if you have a bowel program, then you'll be eligible for it. Then if you have intracathinal feeding tube. Those are the two main criteria that MassHealth is looking at apply for that complex care.

And they are open to expanding it in the future, but they kind of just really need to see. They've never done anything like this before, so they just have to see how the program goes first and how much money it is. You know, they're just working off their estimates right now. They don't have any hard numbers yet to determine exactly what the cost is gonna be.

Justin, this is Jerry. Do we know when that's gonna, go into effect?

Yes. Complex care starts in, January, 2026, so next year. And at our last council meeting, they did tell us that the letters, because they they are going to inform consumers, who are eligible. Those letters of eligibility are going to be, start going out in December.

Oh, that that's great. I thought maybe, consumers would be responsible for being for saying, hey. You know, how do how do I get evaluated, or how do I, you know, how how do I, you know, see if I meet that that criteria or not, but they but MassHealth is is automatically, do doing that?

Yes. Yeah. They do have, like, they do have all, you know, all all the data supposedly, you know, the of who who the people that would apply for it. It's already notated on or sorry. Noted or at least it's supposed to be notated on the prior authorization.

So that's where that's where they're getting their that's where they're getting the estimate of how many people it will be. You know, certainly, you don't qualify and you think that you should, you can appeal it. And the main thing is that it comes from your primary care doctor putting it on your PA. And MassHealth did inform us that it will be something that has to be done yearly, that there will be a specific form that needs to get filled out yearly by your primary care noting that you require rectal stimulation or the use of a feeding tube.

Sure. Sure. Thank you, for that. And, just one other question. You said that, you said that the council was just informed of some, regulations that could could make it difficult to either find or or retain PCAs. Are you able to go into any of that now, or or is that gonna be coming down the pike?

I mean, I can talk about about it a little bit. I mean, I I I personally don't even know all of it myself. You know, they did just introduce it to us. I think there are some some I think will be less severe than others. I think the big ones are going to be, you know, right now when PCA, you know, you hire a new PCA, generally, I have them start, or at least for me, you know, I don't know what your everybody else experiences, but, you know, generally, I have them start right away.

We get the paperwork handled. You know, afterwards, you know, it takes a little time to submit it. Sometimes there's a lot of there can be a lot of issues with it. And then MassHealth but eventually they get on and MassHealth does the back pay for all that time. They have informed us that they are no longer going to be doing that.

It is I guess that does violate strict labor laws. So it will be that all new hire paperwork will need to be submitted and approved by Tempest before PCA can start. So there, you know, there will be kind of a time gap or, you know, between, you know, like I said, you know, when I hire a PC, I need them to start immediately. As and we've worried about the back, you know, the back pay afterwards, but that is going to they are no longer going to do that, which, you know, is definitely going to cause, an issue with delays of service. MassHealth is really pushing their electronic new hire system, which is called Paperworker, and it's, you know, a guidance system that, you know, walks you through step by step what needs to get signed and and everything that anything that is missed will will get flagged.

So, you know, the either the, you know, if the consumer didn't sign a spot that they were supposed to sign or the PCA didn't sign it, you know, it will show up and can't be submitted until that's fixed. So that is will be the fastest way of getting people on there. But that is but, yeah, there will still be a delay. Sure.

Thank you for being able to being able to share that, and thanks again for for coming to the meeting. I know, Andrew I was just speaking to you.

They are gonna be announcing some listening sessions in November for the upcoming changes.

Okay.

I don't have anything in front of me, but, look, you can be on the lookout for them.

And I know, Andrea, you said that you said that there was a member of the public that would like to ask a question. I know we typically wait until public comment, but but if there's a if if we have time, you know, I I don't see any reason why we can't pull out that question now.

Sounds good. It's a pretty quick question, but I also saw Wes raised his hand with the Zoom hand function. Not sure if he has a question.

I don't see his hand raised, at least on my view. But, anyway, if you do have a question, please, Wes, go ahead.

Hi there. It's Wes. Yeah. I did I was just I did have a question, and I don't know if maybe it's not part of the presentation, but was there any other thoughts about the PCA services now in terms of the exempt services, the exempt category?

What do you mean by exempt?

Oh, yes. The estate you know the the the estate the requirement that you have, the estate recovery, the new estate recovery ruling that just happened? Is there anything more about that? Is that related to does that impact the PCA services?

I'll be honest, I'm not familiar with that. I don't know. Kristen, I just saw you came off. I

do. Yep. Yeah. So that was passed, Wes. It hasn't been implemented yet. But previously, MassHealth would start to track all of your earnings and assets at age 55. And then when you pass away, they would go after what they call state state recovery, which means the state would basically keep track of all the billing that they spent on you from age 55 until you pass away. But now that's been resolved, so they they are not gonna do that moving forward. And that's just difficult for people who, like, worked for the last thirty, forty years and have saved and bought a house. They wouldn't have been able to leave that house potentially to their family because they have to pay MassHealth back for all the money that MassHealth had spent on them.

But that has been resolved, and that will no longer be the case

moving forward.

That was actually I have a question.

Alright. That was a big victory for advocates. A really big victory.

Can I can I ask a question about

that? Absolutely.

So now, like, for instance, can can somebody hand, like, hand down a house to some like like, could I like, could my could, like, my mom give me her house? Because right right now, the house is in a trust. Like, I

That might be a little bit complex. We should have a one on one about that. But

Yeah. Because I know there's, like, things with acid.

Yeah. Acids, tests, and things. If you're on common health, it wouldn't affect it. But if you're on MassHealth standard, it could affect it. Okay. So what what what Wes was referencing was the estate recovery specifically, which has to do with people on the MassHealth program who are working, earning, have assets, and income. And previously, they would have be liable for anything after age 55. Anything that MassHealth spent, they could recoup. But now that that is since with a lot of hard work from advocates, that's been changed, and it's no longer in place. That's that's a great thing to point out. Thanks, Wes.

Right. Thank you. Sure.

Thank you. And do I think we would still have

time today. And I'm actually I'm I'm curious. This is Wes again because yeah. I I was just curious about this because of the I was just curious about the status of that that particular practice. So I appreciate that.

Great. Andrea, do we have that question from the public?

Yes. The question is, is the Massachusetts PCA program open only to US citizens?

Yes. Because you have to be well, I mean, you have to be on MassHealth for or have some form of MassHealth. So, yeah, I guess it's whatever the status is for for that.

And, Justin, just one other thing before you go. You have to be a you have to have a not not only do you have to have need assistance with the ADLs and IADLs, but you also yeah. You have to have permanent disability. Correct?

Yes. Yeah. Pretty permanent or chronic disability.

Yep. Great. Okay. Thank you so much. Appreciate it.

Oh, thank you.

And next on the agenda is the chair's report. And I'll make my my report very brief. It kind of piggybacks on on the the report that that Olivia gave in my my stead. I wasn't able to attend last last month's meeting, but I know she and the commissioner talked about early voting and and different ways that that folks can vote. And the election is is fast approaching.

The election is on November 4. And I would encourage everyone within the sound of my voice and even not within in the sound of my voice, everybody here on the meeting to to get out and vote either early or on November 4 and and to encourage all their family and friends to to do that because as we are seeing, elections have consequences and sometimes dire consequences. And and disability advocates for years have have said people with disabilities should vote as as if their life depends on it because it does. And we are seeing the result of the of this last election cycle that truer words have not been spoken. So early voting in the city starts on Saturday, October 25, and I believe that there's early voting in every neighborhood in the city, and and early voting lasts through until Friday, October 31.

So, please, I would encourage everyone to to to get out and vote. You know, I take advantage of early voting whenever I can. You know, I use the auto mark machine because because, you know, I have dexterity issues. You know? I'm happy to report that over the last couple of election cycles, you know, the election staff wherever I voted, you know, has been very good about, you know, knowing how to use the machine and and whatnot and make sure that it's in working order.

So kudos to the elections department for for, you know, all the their hard work and all their trainings and and the commissioner and and and staff for helping with those trainings because it does appear to be it does appear to be working, and and I I just can't encourage everyone enough to to go out and vote, you know, you know, vote in this this election. Because, again, even though the mayor does not have a challenger, she, she has not been been voted in for the next election, so we do have to go through the election. And there are, you know, city council city council elections throughout the city. So this this election cycle is very, very important. So I would encourage everyone to to to get out and and vote where they can, when they where they can and when they can, during the early voting period or on election day.

So with that, we will move into the commissioner's report. Take it away, commissioner.

Thanks, Jerry. And, yeah, I just wanted to extend my thanks to Justin. Like he said, we've known each other for a very long time. And if any board members have any questions that do come up, you can always reach out to me as well because I've been on the PCA program for many years, and I know a lot about it. So with that, we will share my slides, and I will give my report.

It's a little bit brief tonight. So we will start with just what Jerry was talking about, municipal elections twenty twenty five. As Jerry said, in person voting is on Tuesday, November 4. Again, mayor Wu is running unopposed, but many many city councilors are not. So if you don't know your polling location, there's a link in my slide deck.

You can click on that and find out where you should vote. Early voting, as Jerry said, is October 25 through October 31, Halloween, and you can find polling locations at the link in this deck also. And as Jerry said, they are different dates in different neighborhoods and also in Boston City Hall. The deadline to register to vote is October 25 at 5PM. So you still have time to register if you haven't yet.

And the deadline's coming up quick, though, so please pay attention. One other thing I wanted to update people on because you may not have heard of this, but it's a very interesting day that we have in Boston. So I I thought I'd share it with the board. It's called Boston Deployables Day. So this is a day when the city the city does a lot of work behind the scenes on flooding and mitigating climate change.

So many city buildings and many private buildings have temporary barriers that they can deploy in the event of a predicted flood. And there are metal barriers that form like a fence around a building to protect the building's infrastructure and systems from flooding. So the city has one day every year where all the buildings who have this system in place deploy it, and they put it up so people can see what it looks like. My office does a lot of work behind the scenes to make sure that people with disabilities are considered in all flooding and other emergency situations. And with deployables, particularly, we make sure that when they are deployed, that there's an accessible path of travel still.

People can still get in and out of buildings if they're using a wheelchair. Recently, there was some discussion about channeling people into a bike lane instead of the sidewalk in a on a flooding event and if deployables are in place. So we wanna make sure that the bike lane is safe and accessible to people with disabilities. And if you click on that link, there will be some pictures. You could see what the temporary flood barriers look like.

It's just a really interesting thing, and I figured you may be wanting to see it to check out the barriers and the access that we've worked on to create in case of an emergency flooding. K. Next slide. So some department updates. As we know, this is National Disability Employment Awareness Month, and we've been hosting our four annual webinars that support disabled residents who are seeking employment. So our webinars are always on Wednesdays in October, and they're open to everyone. We've held three so far. The first one is Pathways to Employment with the city of Boston. That's finished. And has the recording been posted yet, Andrea? Do we know?

The Pathways to Employment is posted on our YouTube. The others are coming soon.

Cool. So the Pathways brings together human resources departments from the four main city Boston agencies that do hiring. That's the general city Boston website. That's most of the jobs in city hall. And then the Boston Public Health Commission has a separate human resources department, the Boston Public Schools, and the Boston Housing Authority.

They all have different human resources departments that have different requirements on residency and hours, virtual work. They all kind of do things their own way. So we bring people with disabilities on so they can ask questions and learn about how to apply for jobs with the city. The second webinar that we always do is know your rights as an employee with a disability. And that's really important because it talks about, you know, what rights you do have, talking about reasonable accommodations that you can request, and all the essentials you need to know as an employee.

The third webinar that we have was on banking and savings and other tools for financial empowerment. As Justin mentioned, you know, his mother has a house and trust. There are all kinds of issues to consider when you have a disability because you may have to not save that amount of money or you might not be able to have too many assets, or, you know, you need to figure out what to do with your paycheck once you get

it if you haven't worked before.

So that's a super helpful webinar, and you can always watch that once it's posted on YouTube. And then the big one still coming up a week from tonight is the triple a's of housing, finding accessible, affordable, and available housing. And that's with the city of Boston, the mayor's office of housing. We'll talk about lotteries, first time homebuyers, and other products and tools that are available from the city to help get people housed. Another event that we do every fall is a civic engagement event, and we usually do this in person in City Hall.

We usually invite people to come into City Hall and to see city council chamber and meet their representatives and, you know, register to vote. But in order to accommodate people's busy schedules, we held an evening session this year. And since no staff are there in the evening, we did a virtual information session. It was well attended for our first virtual event, and so we're gonna just try to assess it over the course of the year and see if we wanna do another virtual one next year or if we wanna go back to the in person event. But it's always one of our favorite events because we really love it when people with disabilities use their voice, whether it's coming to these board meetings or testifying at city council or even, as Jerry said, just going out and voting.

So anything that you can do to get involved in local government is gonna really be impactful, not only for you, but for everyone with a disability. Next slide. So just a few updates about the advisory board. One thing I did want to mention was that the Disability Policy Consortium had an event last week where they presented the John Winsky Award. As many of you know, John Winsky was a longtime board member on our board.

He passed away several years ago. He was a lifelong advocate and founder of the d DPC. John was an amazing board member, friend, advocate, and we love John. And this year, Carl Richardson was honored with the John Winske Award. So really proud of Carl.

And the award is presented to an individual or a group who's gone above and beyond service to the disability community, from grassroots activists to systems change catalysts to legislative leaders. And we know that Carl does so much work at the state house to improve accessibility, and he's just a huge advocate as far as communication for people who are deaf and blind, his work with the FCC, and then all his advocacy about transportation as well. So congratulations to Carl. We still have free open seats on the advisory board. The openings have been advertised.

We did a press release, and we received a lot of interest. Myself and Andrea are currently doing interviews with prospective candidates, and we hope to make recommendations to Mayawu by the end of the month. So stay tuned. It would be great if we could have these three seats filled in January. And then just a note about in in person meetings.

Just checking on board members' interest in resuming in person or hybrid meetings in January. I know we've brought it up now and again, but it has been five years since the pandemic. We've been meeting virtually five years. It's gone by pretty quickly when I think of it, but just wanted to open that up to the board to see if there's any interest. We could always do hybrid, but wanted to see if anyone was interested in coming back in the first.

This is Andrea. I'll just add one extra sentence, which is that with, a good number of potentially new folks who need swearing in and a number of you who are on holdover status who may need re swearing in, part of this, is us asking if you all want to come in in person in January, do all that together, and we could invite wait. One, you're all doing it all at once, and we may be able to invite the mayor as well. So even if you're not ready to say, yes, I'm gonna come back, all 10 meetings next year, wondering your interest in January at least for an in person event, with your new members.

I will I will say, as, this is Jerry, to chime in, that, we did discuss this at at the executive committee meeting this month, and and, you know, I'm definitely in favor of of of, you know, an in person swearing in for January. And if we combine that with a meeting that, you know, all that's all all the better too. So Yeah. We can see how it goes. Count count me as a count me as highly in favor of a of a in person swearing in anyway.

And that would be great if we had the had the three new three new members. And and if the mayor could could participate and swear us in, that would be even better. So

And this is Carl. I totally second that because many of you many of the newer members I've ever actually never met in person. So it would be kind of cool to meet some of us in person, and we don't have to do this all the time. But occasionally, I think it would help to have an in person meeting.

Great. I saw that Olivia had her hand up, and my report's gonna pivot in a minute. Did you have a question about something we just discussed, Olivia?

Sorry. I had a comment. I'm very much in favor of in person meetings. I think it'll also give us a chance to boost public attendance and make us more accessible to the Boston that we seek to represent.

Okay. And for those of you who aren't able to attend in person, I see Tara's comment in the chat. Don't worry. We will at least be hybrid, but it would be great to see everybody in person. And we can use January as a little test to see how everybody feels, how it is to get back into city hall. So thank you for those who commented. I'm gonna go to the next slide, and I'm gonna turn it over to Andrea for an update on the airline rules and regulations.

Yeah. Hi, commissioner. Thank you. This was a request from an advisory board member to update folks on, particularly because as we've reported to you all as as a commission, as an office, we have met and did some work on this back in 2024. So to recap, in December 2024, the Biden administration finalized a new regulation or rule related to wheelchairs and airline travel.

The rule, for example, requires annual training for airline staff and contractors who handle wheelchairs or who support people with disabilities. The rule created specific expectations for what exactly airlines must do if a wheelchair is damaged or delayed and a whole bunch more things. But there's not a lot of room on here. So regulations like this are typically given a specific effective date, you know, a few months later to give affected entities time to plan. Right?

They had actually had to develop those trainings if they didn't have them already, that kind of thing. When it was finalized in 2024, the effective dates ranged depending on which portion of the rule was being impacted from January 2026 to June 2026. Sorry. That should say January 2025. The Trump administration recently announced that they are pushing back that effective date for a number of new requirements.

Basically, what they're saying is we are not going to enforce the following four things. Airlines liability and their specific requirements for mishandled wheelchairs, the annual frequency that was required for the refresher training, pre departure notifications, and fare differential when it comes to reimbursements. So for those four things, the Trump administration has announced they are not planning to enforce that until 01/01/2027. And that is in part because they've announced that they want to release their own proposed rule on these topics and they've announced they plan to propose that in August 2026. So the whole rule isn't rolled back and everything that existed and was required before 2024 still required.

It's just they wanna put their own spin on these four areas. So still a right to travel. The Air Carrier Access Act is still the law, but there may be some tweaks to what the Biden administration tried to tweak.

Great. Thank you, Andrea. And then another thing that we do, every couple months is get an update on the Boston Public School Transportation from Dan Rosengard. And I believe Dan is with us tonight to give another update. Welcome, Dan.

Yes. Thank you, commissioner. And, yeah, thank you to the the board for I think this is the the third consecutive year that I've had the the privilege of joining this meeting around this time of year. Briefly introduce myself for those I haven't, had a chance to to meet before. My name is Dan Rosengard.

I'm the executive director of transportation for Boston Public Schools. I'm a white male, with short brown hair and a purple checkered button up shirt and live in the West Roxbury neighborhood of Boston. To to briefly give an overview, I'm happy to take more questions. Boston Public Schools Transportation, we provide yellow bus service for about 20,000 students in the city of Boston who attend both Boston Public Schools as well as, charter, private, and, special education out of district schools. Within, you know, that transportation, that includes just over 6,000 students with disabilities who receive yellow bus service, including many of them who receive either door to door bus service or bus service that includes a bus monitor based on their specific individualized education plan.

We also provide free m seven MBTA passes to all Boston students in grades seven through 12 to help both navigate travel to and from school and their extracurriculars as well as to have access to the MBTA outside of school and on the weekends throughout the year. Gonna share my screen. I have just two slides that I want to present. We have and this is some those of you who may have seen been here when I've been here in the past, we have a couple of different metrics that we use to measure the performance of our operation and want to update, you know, all of you on on that performance now that we're a couple months into the start of the most recent school year. So the first and kind of key measure of our performance at our operation is what we call on time performance.

On time performance measures in the morning the percentage of buses that arrive at school prior to the bell. So that's making sure that students arrive at school prior to the start of, classes in the morning, prior to their morning bell. And in the afternoon, or what we call PM on time performance measures the percentage of buses that arrive at school prior to the scheduled departure time, which is, typically ten minutes after the afternoon bell to give students, you know, a few minutes to transition from classes to the bus. We've had so far this school year, we've had although we're not where we, you know, want to be, we've had a a very strong start to the school year, particularly relative to past years. So on the the first day of the school year, we had the highest on time performance on record for day one of the school year, both in the morning and the afternoon, which we were very happy about.

And so far this school year, our morning on time performance has averaged 89, which is the highest on record for, you know, this up until this time of this, you know, period of the school year. And in the afternoon, our on time performance so far this year is 83%, which is our our second highest on record. We were in 2023, '24. We were 85% so far through this period of the year. So on time performance, that's kind of the primary measure of our performance.

We also are very focused on what we staffing and then what we call coverage to make sure that we have staff and we're providing the service that's needed to all of our students. And so we started this school year with 700 fully staffed with both bus drivers and bus monitors. We had seven twenty six bus drivers at the start of the school year, which is right in range with where we've been the last two years. We've seen a slight uptick in the number of our trips that have been what we call uncovered so far this school year, which basically means there's not a driver or bus available at the scheduled time. That actually has not been driven by bus drivers, but has been driven by bus the availability of the buses themselves.

Our fleet has been aging over the past several years, and, we saw some delays at the start of this fall with both, we had, 40 new buses that were supposed to arrive over the summer that were delayed until, the fall. Those are starting to arrive over the next couple of weeks. And we also saw some parts that we had ordered as far back as last February that were supposed to arrive over the summer. And because of, unfortunately, some of the what we're seeing happen on the federal level with tariffs and trade in general, those parts were delayed getting into the country and then arriving to us. So we saw some challenges with our bus maintenance and just availability of buses at the beginning of the year.

And as a result, we saw the percent of uncovered trips ticked up from where it was last year at 0.16% to this year. It's been 0.48% so far this school year. And we're working hard to get that number back down as close to zero as possible. And then we started this school year with seven thirteen bus monitors. A bus monitor is an additional adult on the bus who's there to support students with disabilities who require, you know, additional support, to ride the bus safely.

And we have, one thing that we've been, very focused on and very pleased to see is we've continued to see decreases year over year in one of the most important metrics that we track, which is the number of students each day who don't have their required bus monitor. And so two years ago, you'll see in 2023, 2024, over 150 students every day were not receiving their required bus monitor. Last year, those numbers improved somewhat. It was sixty in the morning and 111 in the afternoon on average last year. We've continued to make progress on that front.

So far this year, We're averaging, 47 students in the morning and 76 in the afternoon, not having the required bus monitor. And that's for, just kind of a point of reference, that's out of a little over 3,000 students who require a bus monitor on a daily basis. So our goal is to have this be, of course, zero every day. We wanna make sure 100% of of students are receiving that, you know, any required supports and service to be able to ride the bus safely, but we're continuing to work to make progress. So that's just a it's a very brief update.

Like I said, I I really appreciate it's a it's a privilege to be able to come and and present to this group each year. So I really appreciate the opportunity, and I will pause there. I'm very happy to take any questions that anyone has.

This is Andrea Jerry. There's a question in the chat from Wes I can read out if you'd like to recognize.

Sure. Yeah. Thank you for your, report, Dan. Glad to see that there's there's improvements, but we, but we also recognize that even though there's 89% on time performance or 83%, that there's that still leaves, you know, 10% or or 11% of of of buses that are on time, that that, you know, parents' schedules get disrupted, students' schedules get disrupted. So I know you're continuing to work on that. But, yes, read Andrea, please read read read Wes' question.

Yep. So Wes Ireland in the chat has asked, does the on time performance metric include the door to door service? Also, is there any data available on the coverage and reporting KPIs on the door to door service portion?

Yes. Thank you for that question. Great. That's a great question. So we one thing that's very important to us is we route our buses inclusively.

And so we do not transport door to door students separately from general education students or students who are receiving corner stop transportation. So we don't have a a separate metric for on time performance for door to door service. So that on time performance metric, it does include all of our students receiving door to door service. We have done some analysis in the past to try as best as possible to look at how service for students receiving door to door transportation, is specifically, and we found that it's it it is, you know, very much in line with the overall on time performance. It doesn't seem to be higher or lower.

And then you also asked, is there any data available on the coverage and reporting KPIs on the door to door service portion? So I think, yeah, my answer would be very similar, which is because we are routing and transporting all students, whether they receive door to door or corner service together, we don't have KPIs specific to door to door, but those coverage KPIs would include students receiving door to door. And then I I do see there's there's two other questions in the chat. And, Andrea, if it's okay, maybe I can read those out and answer those.

Defer to the chair, but I am thinking he'll say yes.

Yeah. This is Jerry. Go go right ahead. Or if the, if the advisory board member who who who is asking the question wants to wants to ask it, you know you know, verbally, you can go ahead and do so. But if you want Jane to read it out, go right ahead. So

go ahead, Dan. Thank you, chair. So I see there's there's one question from from Tara. How are uncovered bus students getting to school? And then there's another question, which I think is very similar from Aaron Gatchel. Hi, Dan. Thanks for your presentation. Happy to see some overall improvement. I'm wondering what the plan is for students when buses are uncovered or if there is not a monitor available. So excellent questions.

And yes, that is really, really important is making sure that we're getting all students to school. So when a bus is uncovered, so meaning that the entire you know, there's not a driver or a bus available for that bus, what we will do is we will communicate to families and to schools who are impacted to let them know that there's not a bus available at the scheduled time. And then as soon as a bus or a driver frees up completing their normal their regularly scheduled trip, another bus or driver, we will then send coverage for that trip. So we will always make sure to send coverage for every trip. Unfortunately, when a trip is uncovered at the scheduled time, it typically means that that coverage is going to be you know, delayed and potentially significantly delayed.

And similarly, if there's not a monitor available for a trip, and that means a student who requires a monitor is maybe not able to ride at their scheduled time, we'll communicate that to families and offer and can provide as needed a backup bus with a monitor as soon as one is available. And then it looks like there's a follow-up question there. What about when students are stranded in the PM run? Who stays with them in school at school and ensures their needs are met? And so, pre question.

I think that from from our from the transportation side, the process would be very similar, which we would communicate to the school and family and then get a backup bus there as soon as possible to to transport any students home who are stranded there. And, the school and typically some combination of the school leaders, school admin, teachers, the school will coordinate to make sure that there's staff there supporting those students. And then, Chair, I see another question in the chat. I don't know. Do you want me to read and Go respond to ahead.

And I think that that would have to be the last last question. But

Thank you, chair. So there's a question. When I report a school bus driver driving dangerously or aggressive, what happens? This happened twice in the last year. I really appreciate that question.

So bus drivers are employees of a contractor TransDev who we we work with. They employ and oversee the bus drivers. And every one of our school buses is equipped with two onboard cameras as well as a GPS telematics system, which collectively is monitoring the driving of the school buses and flagging any potentially unsafe driving behaviors. So anytime we get a report, whether it's from a school, a parent, or a member of the public about potentially unsafe driving behaviors, we take that report, we report that to TransDev through our ticketing system, And then they their safety team, the TransDev safety team, they have 15 safety trainers. They would review both the report as well as the the camera footage and the GPS foot telematics footage from the bus to, you know, verify, validate it, identify you know, and then based on what they find, that driver may be sent for for coaching, for retraining, or for other, you know, appropriate steps as needed to ensure that, you know, they're driving safely.

And with that, I'll pause and just conclude again just saying thank you so much for the opportunity to be here. Really appreciate it. And I'll pass it back to you, Chair.

Great. Thank you so much again, Deanna. We look forward to, you know, we look forward to any time that you're available to come to to the meeting to share share data. And, you know, I I know we'll probably, you know, get an update at least one other time, you know, during the school year. So thank thank you for your availability and and being able to to tackle our tough questions and and tough questions, you know, from from our our our school families out there. So thank you. Do you have any other anything else on your report, commissioner, or should we move on on the agenda?

Yep. That wraps up my report. Thanks, Jerry. But I see Paulette has her hand raised.

Oh, go ahead, Paulette. I'm sorry.

Thank you. Would is he still here?

I don't I think

Hi, Paulette. Even if Dan's had to hop off, we can follow-up with him if you need. So go ahead now.

Oh, there he is. Dan's there. Dan's there.

Okay. Sorry. So I'm thinking about the statistics and you're saying that the numbers were included. Wouldn't separating them make it easier for you to see or to pinpoint issues that come up with students with disabilities?

Yeah. So the reason it's I appreciate that question. The reason it's difficult to separate is because students with disabilities aren't transported separately. So the vast majority of our buses have both general education students as well as students with disabilities on board. And so it's hard to kind of separate out specifically students with disabilities.

But we do try to dive in on the data and cut it in different ways to see if there are any specific kind of trends or different kind of subgroups of buses that are being disproportionately impacted in any way.

So I just wanna add to that. So aren't the daughter doors the students with disabilities? Yes. So those numbers could be separated out from the kids that get picked up on the corner. Correct?

Not necessarily because many most buses will have some corner pickups and some door to door pickups.

Okay. So it is possible to have the door to door statistics, but not to separate out the the corner pickups if you follow my reasoning. Like, everybody everybody could be on the bus. Right?

Right.

But the but the door to doors are only students with disabilities. Correct? Yes. So you could keep those numbers separate?

I I guess. I I think all all the routes have basically a a mixture of both corner and door to door.

Okay. Yeah. Alright. I hope you think about that.

Yes. So I'll we'll definitely take it back and try to think about other ways to to cut the data.

Okay. I know we had another question in the chat, but in the interest of time, I really am gonna move us forward, and we can respond to we can get you an answer to that question, the person that put it in the chat. Thank you for for, raising the question. And, again, thank you, Dan, for for your presentation. And we can see how we can see how, you know, families out there want answers to their questions, and and it's a it's a it's a hot topic.

So we definitely will either have you back soon or we'll get more more data from you on a regular basis. Thank you so much, Dan. Thank you. Alright. Next on the agenda is the architectural access report from from Patricia. Go ahead, Patricia.

Thank you, Jerry. Hello, everyone. My name is Patricia Mendez. I'm the director of architectural access for the disabilities commission. I am wearing glasses, and I have short hair, and I'm wearing black today. Today, I'm going to briefly talk about the new cutter school. So I'm going to share a brochure. I hope you guys can see it. Can you see my screen?

Yes. Yes.

Anybody give me a nod?

Yes. Yep. We can see you.

Thank you. The new Carter School is a brand new Boston Public School, and it has been opened. And our commissioner McClage was invited to the ribbon cutting. It serves 60 student, ages three to 21 years old. And I am posting I'm going to share the whole brochure, and I'm sharing the the name and email of the principal and the assistant principal.

Okay. Now I'm sharing the second page of the brochure, and it's showing two photographs showing the students with disabilities posing for photos and in the classrooms. Now I'm going to the next page, and, this page shows one of the outdoors spaces, and it shows some trees and greenery and also the outdoor space that has an accessible route. It's all flat with a great accessible surface and open air, and you see the blue sky on the outdoor space. And the other photo is showing the literacy center, which is an indoor space, and it looks very open, and it has a lot of light.

These spaces are going to be therapeutic spaces, and there's a music therapy and expressive arts space and also a literacy center. Okay. The next the next page shows the amazing swimming pool, and it has a zero step entrance and is an aquatic therapy space. And the other photo is showing an indoor gym with half a court of basketball court. The next slide shows three different photos of students with disabilities having fun and receiving instruction.

Okay. Then that last last slide shows an overview photo, like Bert's perspective of the new building. And after this brochure, I'm going to show more slides with more photos, and I'm going to invite Commissioner McCosh to tell us about the photos.

So I can jump in if you want, Patricia.

Please.

So the Carter School was it's a brand new building. It's built on the site of the former Carter School. And the programming used to be what was called multi handicapped students. And it's students with complex medical needs, sometimes called medically fragile. People yeah.

Students with mental cognitive disabilities and physical disabilities who are really, you know, lucky to be able to go to this school because it has so much, you know, built in space that benefits them. It's like the the building is actually part of the therapies that they get. So the zero entry pool, like Patricia mentioned, they have a rooftop playground, which is fully inclusive. And I got to go to the school yesterday or earlier this week to do a reading with students. And I got to try out some of the play equipment that's all accessible on the playground roof.

Do you have those pictures, Patricia? Yep. Here we go. So that's a sound machine on the left. And you just pull it or you can bang on it, and it makes all kinds of acoustic noises that are stimulating for our students. And then on the right, we see a communication board. The students can point to different letters or emotions. Those who can't communicate verbally can use a communication board to let teachers and assistants know what they need or how they're feeling. So that's a great tool. And then the next slide is pictures of me on a swing and on a carousel.

Two things I haven't done in a long time, but all the ePlay equipment is fully accessible. So it was a it was a treat for me to be able to try it out. And then the best part of it was an accessible trampoline. Do we have that picture?

Oh, it it gave us

a video so I

can Oh, okay. That's okay. We can send it out afterwards, but I was able to try the accessible trampoline, which was really fun. So I'm just highlighting some of the fun aspects of the school. There's a a longer shot of the swings that are all accessible.

But like I said, the the building is really built for fully immersive learning. Like Patricia said, there are bright open spaces. They paid attention to acoustics and all the features that are necessary to help kids thrive and learn and grow. And our architectural access team, Patricia and her staff, worked with the public facilities department of the city of Boston to do the plans for this building. So we were really excited to see it finally built and open for the students who go there.

I think right now, they have 52 students, but they can go up to 60. So it's it's really a model for inclusive learning for students with multiple disabilities. And I was really happy to go do a reading, especially we talked about National Disability Employment Awareness Month. And we read books by disabled authors, and I answered questions for the students. So it was a very nice outing that we had, and I look forward to going back again. Turn it back to you, Patricia.

Thank you, commissioner. No. That's it for my report. Short and sweet.

Great, Patricia. Thank you so much, and thank you, commissioner, for highlighting the work of the school. Before I saw before I saw the information on the news this week, I'm glad it did get coverage. I had no idea about the about the school. So that's great that it's such a such a a model for, you know, accessible and inclusive learning and and that the play structures are all all accessible.

And, you know, if you do go again, let us know. You know, maybe some of us on the on the advisory board, would be happy to to go to represent, you know, our different communities as well. So and I see Zeri had a question or a comment.

Yeah. Thank you very much, Patricia and, commissioner. I think this is such a beautiful model. And now my question, has to do especially since this is National Disability Employee Awareness Month, I wonder if there is any thought behind perhaps hiring faculty and teachers with disabilities in the school or would be mentors as well? So that's one question.

And then the second question is around the disabilities that are included within the school. Is there specific disabilities or any kind of disability that is complex in nature?

Yeah. So those are two really good questions. One thing I will say, one thing I was really happy to see was one of the students who I mean, I'm sorry. One of the professionals who works in the library is a former intern of ours at City Hall. She was a Boston Public School student with a disability, and she did an internship with us probably about ten years ago. And she went on to college and then graduate school, and now she is working at the Carter School as a librarian. So I was thrilled to see her there. And as far as teachers with disabilities, I'm not sure how that would work. I know that, you know, anybody is I'm sure they, you know, they hire I mean, I'm sorry. They interview people who apply.

I'm not sure how they I just don't know what those statistics are. But I do know that one of the reasons they wanted me to come is because I do use a wheelchair, and having that representation is so important for students, like you said. Because one of the questions that they asked me was, who do I see as an inspiration? And, like, who inspires me, someone with a disability? And I talked a little bit about Judy Heumann because we were they're actually reading her book, Rolling Warrior, about her life story.

So they all knew Judy, and we're happy to hear that. And then I also talked about, you know, some of my mentors in Boston, how we have a lot of disability advocates who started the independent living movement, like Charlie Carr and John Kelly and a lot of other people who are have been in the movement for years, and Zari, you as well. And then just talked about the students themselves who inspired me to do my work. So it's it's a great point. And I I can say I don't know, but I did see one of the the staff members, not a teacher, but staff member at the librarian who who has a disability. This was the other question.

Go ahead.

Commissioner, it's about the the student population. And my understanding is that the population is students for whom inclusive general education is not the best fit for them, which tends to mean students with multiple and complex disabilities. BPS is committed to inclusion. Every school is an inclusion school. But this school is is designed for students who need additional supports that would be difficult to get in an inclusion school. So that does tend to be the the superintendent has described them as among the most medically fragile students in the population.

Great. Thank you again, Patricia, for your for your report, and thank you, commissioner, for for, representing us at the, at the school. You know, it seems like a very, very, cool cool place. And, again, just thank you for for going, and representing. And the next part of the agenda is just the, board member shout outs.

Don't be shy, but don't feel like you have to shout out. But if there's if there's anything that you haven't shared yet tonight that that you wanna share about something that you've done since the last meeting or maybe something that you forgot to share at a previous meeting, feel free to now is the opportunity to share. And I do see Olivia with her hand raised.

Yes.

One of the things that's happened since the government shutdown but was put into place before it is that continuums of care, which are organizations and systems that take care of people with chronic homelessness, substance use, and which are disabilities, no longer can use their continuum of care funds for housing, which is huge. This is threatening tenancies for some of the most vulnerable and chronically ill tenants that Boston has. CHAPA is fighting back on that. I'm part of the public housing group, but I wanted to raise this as an issue that will be coming across resulting in increased homelessness.

Thank you for, raising that, Olivia. Just another, consequence of the government shutdown. Let's hope it let's hope that both sides come to their senses soon and and gets the government running, and and those funds can be can be used. So, Carl, you have your you had your hand raised.

Yeah. There were two things I wanna bring up quickly. So the first thing is that next Tuesday on the twenty eighth, the city of Boston is having a hearing proposing an ordinance on autonomous vehicles where they're doing a study to look at the financial impact on union drivers and things, while I don't think that's a bad thing, what concerns me about the study that they're proposing that the mayor take on, it does not really have anything from the resident point of view, not just people with disabilities, but the elderly, those to which owner of vehicles is a barrier, those who can't always access public transportation. I think there's a lot of potential benefit. I do think that, you know, we need to ask the right questions, like, are there gonna be wave vehicles or wheelchair users?

And, you know, so I think there's some questions to ask. But what concerns me about the hearing next Tuesday is they're not asking those questions, and they're not really looking at it at the potential impact. They're only looking at it on how could it affect drivers. So I would ask anybody on testifying the hearing next Tuesday. And, you know, just if you don't feel like going, at least watch the hearing after the fact, and maybe you can learn a little bit. I just so that's Tuesday, the twenty eighth at

02:00

in the City Hall Council Chambers. The other thing I wanted to ask was a number of months ago, Jerry, I, and others from the Boston disability community participated in this with iATD. I'm looking at bike lanes for people with disabilities. I believe on behalf of, you know, the city of Boston. I was wondering if the commissioner's office could maybe share what was done with that study and with and and and what's gonna be how they're using it. So that those are my two things I wanted to talk about. Thank you.

Yes, Carl. Thanks for highlighting that. I know I was able I participated along with you in the in the bike lanes study as well. I don't know if we have time right now. Andrea, do you wanna share do you now have any information about about the upcoming hearing that you can share really quickly? And or do you have any information about about the I h IHCb bike lane study?

Yeah. I'll give very quick, and then we can definitely get into more details on the bike lane study at our next meeting. On the hearing, it's a hearing on an ordinance proposed by city councilors. It's not an ordinance that has been proposed by the mayor's office. So I will say it is not mayoral priority in terms of how to address autonomous vehicles.

That's all I know for now, but I can present more when I learn more. On the bike lanes, we did finish IHCD did provide us, a report that we have, met with the streets cabinet about. We've developed a handful of next steps related to bike lane design. Some of them involve research. For example, are there things like speed bumps for bike lanes?

We would not that we know of that anyone's done. Let's find out. So some research questions that we're taking on as well as some design priorities that we're gonna start trying to standardize from green paint and signage to reflectability on dividers between parking lanes and bike lanes to make sure that they're visible. So I can definitely provide some more details next month. I don't wanna get too technical without slides and images and text in front of me, but definitely some action items came out of that report. So thank you both and everyone else who participated.

Great. Thank you. Paul, you had your hand raised.

Yes. Just a quick on mental health day. It was October 10 from a mental health perspective. And October 20 sorry. It was October 10. October 2025 is a significant month for mental health. We just had World Mental Health Day, and on October 7 was a national International Day of Prayer. It's also ADHD Awareness Month and Depression Awareness Month. So and that October has been a pretty important month for mental health and disabilities. So I just wanted to run that by everyone.

Although the dates have passed, still plenty of resources for the whole month throughout the world. And then one more thing, I was able to attend a documentary last night at Bass General called White Nine. I don't wanna go into it too much. We're able to go and meet executive producer Bill Barton, and it's about three gentlemen who have experienced physical disabilities and the awareness they have brought to housing and civil rights over the last three decades for physical and mental disabilities. I don't want to give too much away, but if folks could maybe look up White Nine.

It's a disability documentary. It was shown last night at the Russell Museum at Mass General. It'd be well worth people's interest. Thank you.

Thank you, Paul. And Zari, I see you have your hand raised.

Sorry about that. Yes. Hi. Paul stole my thunder, but I'm glad he did. Yes. The film was wonderful last night, and it's going to be introduced to public soon. So as soon as we have it out, I'll make sure we we make sure that people can view the film. But Charlie Carr was one of the people who was showcased in the film, so I highly recommend it if you have an opportunity to see it. But I also had, if I may, two announcements to make. One is from one of our attending physicians.

His name is Richie Sapp. And doctor Sapp is an emergency physician at Mount General Hospital. And he's hosting a MGH disability health day. And basically, they are looking for people with disabilities who would like to share their experiences and help teach residents how to provide better care, they want to have a small group session where residents can practice talking with and learning from people who are deaf, blind, nonverbal, or have intellectual, developmental, or physical disabilities. If you're interested, we would have you join us that afternoon, talk with residents, and answer their questions about your experiences with health care and if you are able to participate in a structured interview simulation.

Please reach out to me. I can send you his information, but I think this is a great opportunity for community to have an impact in how residents connect with the community and learn from them. So I'm happy to share that information. And although this is coming from Mass General, I think your voices will impact how we can initiate the conversation with all hospitals. So this is this is a great project.

And then the second event is coming up next week on the twenty ninth, and I put put the information in a chat. But, basically, it's sponsored by our disability employee resource group at MGB, and we are currently at celebrating disabilities and elevating voices. Our keynote speakers are Charisma and Paul Sidner who are YouTube sensations, and they're gonna be speaking about interabled relationship and how they have marketed themselves to other business. And then in the afternoon, we have internal resources where we are working with community to support employment within health care and even outside of health care. So we would love to invite you to join us.

And if you need more information, feel free to contact me. Thank you.

Great, Zari. Those are are great opportunities and resources. Thank you. Rich, you you have the floor, sir.

Oh, thanks, Jared. So the Baker Center for Children and Families, which is the premier entity around this area, if not throughout the country, that deals with kids' mental health and helps their families cope with the challenges their children face is having at Super K Walk on Saturday morning on the Esplanade. It's a very inexpensive event to attend. And if anybody would like to or even be able to attend as my guest just to familiarize yourself more with the Baker Center, just let me know. It's a family event.

So if you have a spouse, a significant other, children, or parents, or others you might like to bring, they're more than welcome. I think you'll enjoy it, and hopefully, the weather will be warm enough for all of us. Thank you

so much, Rich. In the interest of time, I am gonna move on. Thank you for everybody who shared. And if you have anything else to to share, you could, you know, definitely put it in the put it in the chat. But thank you for everyone for sharing this month. And next on the agenda is old business. And forgive me, but I think, Andrea, I think you we said at the exact meeting that that we didn't have any old business. Is that correct?

That's correct.

Awesome. Awesome. So moving right along on the agenda then is new business. Does anybody have any new business that they'd like to propose for the advisory board? I'm not seeing any any new business either. Is that correct, Andrea?

This is Andrea. Not seeing any hands raised or comments in the chat.

Awesome. Awesome. So we we will have a few minutes for public input then. This is the time that we have set aside. I do do know that we've we have we have answered several questions in the in the chat from members of the public.

I appreciate that you that you raised those, you know, at the appropriate times. We do, you know, value and rely on your your public input every every month. But this is the time of the meeting where where you can ask about anything that we've discussed tonight or any other matter. Andrea, there are there are some rules though. Is that correct?

That's correct. Mostly technical rules. Hi. This is Andrea. If you have a member or if you have question or a comment that you would like to make, you may notice you can't simply unmute yourself. Please use the Zoom raise hand function. Turn on your camera and wave. I'll scroll through the gallery to see you waving. Or note in the chat that you have a question. Once you are recognized by the chair, I will send you a request to unmute.

Or if you would like to sign your question in American Sign Language, I will pin you so the interpreters can find you. We do limit public input to two minutes. So you will have two minutes to make your question or comment before we move to the next member of the public. Jerry, I will let you know if I see anyone raise a hand or put a comment in the chat.

Yeah. Please. Because as of now, I don't see anyone. I do know that we we had several members of the public join us this evening. So, again, I would want, any members of the public to have an opportunity to to have their voices heard. So please, please feel free to ask a question if you have one. And I don't see I don't see any hands raised or any any oh, wait a minute.

I see someone asking if they can put their question in the chat, and absolutely. Please go ahead, Roshma.

Yeah. Go ahead, Andrea, if you wanna read that out.

I think she's typing, so I'll give her a second. She said, can I put my question in my chat?

Oh, goodness. Okay. Can I can I ask a question? Yes.

I Yes.

I saw that late. Sorry about that.

No worries. And here it is. So the question, I have an observation. I don't know if it is relevant to this meeting. It is about auto generated captions for online meetings.

Whenever I attend online meetings with auto generated captions, I noticed that some of the words in the captions are either misspelled or not culturally relevant. For example, this morning, I attended an online workshop with this facilitator called Adrianne, a d r I e n n e. However, the captions and transcript spelled out Adrianne, a d r I a n. Now, if I were to look back at the transcript, I would think that a male person called Adrianne, a d r I a n, hosted the workshop. I am sure that the AI algorithm or whatever they call it at the back end is smart enough to capture the names of participants and spell them correctly whenever someone mentions their name.

The spelling of someone's name differently in the auto generated captions might be a small issue, but it certainly doesn't make one feel included. That is all I have. Thank you.

It's a very good point. I appreciate that. Does any does anyone who has experience with AI captions have any comment or or any any thoughts they wanna share?

I'll just say this is Carl. We are using the human right up for this this meeting tonight.

Yes. Any other members of the public with a comment before we adjourn? We do have about three minutes left, and I'm sure the the interpreters will will have to will have to leave at that point. And we wanna maintain communication access for everyone. So but does anyone else from the public have a question? And I do see that there is a

There's a shout out to our CART provider who's wonderful and does these meetings. This is Andrea. I'll just add on that note, Jerry, that there's a lot more technology out there these days that can do transcriptions to varying levels of accuracy. At least when it comes to title two entities, so we're referring there to ADA title two covering local governments, we are required to give, you know, first consideration to the specific accommodation someone requests. So if someone requests specifically that a CART captioner provider be scheduled for a meeting, we are required to, you know, do best efforts to get that and only use, you know, AI or other if if that's the alternative.

So the city of Boston does have contracts in place and procedures in place to get CART providers for any of our meetings if you're able to request in advance. If you're ever not sure who to request that from for a City of Boston meeting, you can contact our office and we can try and figure it out for you. But, yeah, it's it's a wild world out there of technology working or not for transcriptions, unfortunately.

Sure. And Zar Zari had a comment regarding this too. Andrea, if you wanna read that out.

Yeah. Sure. Her comment in the chat is, I wonder if we can discuss use of apps such as text to speech, including AVA as an alternative to CART.

I wouldn't I wouldn't be opposed to to having that as a future agenda item. I don't know if the commissioner's office has any thoughts. Or, Andrea, you wanna have a comment or anything?

We're always happy to learn about new tech and make sure we're using the thing that works best for people with disabilities. So always happy to hear from the board about what works well for you.

Great. So maybe we can discuss it at a future meeting. But in the interest of time, Carl, do you wanna make your motion?

Why are you picking on me? No. I'm kidding. Yes. I'd like to make a motion to adjourn.

I second.

Paul, I second. Okay. Paula and and and Paul, could we can have co seconds. All in favor, aye. Aye. Aye. Thank you for a very low lively meeting tonight and a lovely meeting tonight. Please, please, please remember to vote either early or or in person, and we will see everyone, on the tenth. We do not have a meeting in November. We have a combined November meeting on December 10. So see everyone then, and have a a good start to your holiday season. Take care now.