Senior Resources Committee - Regular Meeting

We'll begin our meeting tonight, and Lois, thank you for filling us in on that. Our goal will be to wrap up everything we need to so that we can have anyone who would like to attend who can, because these are kind of once in a... I don't know if anyone else went.

Yes, you did. She and I went to the Leach Library last Saturday on the Common. It was poorly attended. I was so disappointed. The Leach Library put on the African drummers and dancers. They were wonderful. Last Saturday, they were wonderful. They were wonderful.

But there was nobody there.

But this.

There was no. Well, not nobody.

And I'm concerned about tonight. This is also going to be excellent.

My grandson is going to dress in his Minuteman attire. He's doing it tonight? He's just going to go dressed in his Minuteman attire. He's probably going to go soon. He's hoping to get dragged in, you know.

It's so wonderful being over here. You hear the little kids, you know, and they're active. It's never a boring moment. They always have so much going on.

We did turtle chia pets today.

My grandson did that earlier. But I'll make a motion to open our meeting officially. We'll say the time is 518. I'll second. Thank you. All in favor? Aye. Good. We do have a lot to cover, but we're going to try to move along quickly and efficiently due to a wonderful activity at the library and also the weather conditions outside. So as far as our attendance goes, Valerie did reach out to me. She is unable to attend tonight, but she is already ready to sign up for our slots in the morning at Old Home Day. That's kind of what she usually does there in the morning, and she continues until just after the parade. We do have another meeting in August, which is great. That's perfect timing for us, so we can tie up those loose ends. Kelly is here. Lori is here. Ilona is supposed to be here because we've talked a few times, so she might have just got tied up. But she should be coming in. Patrick reached out to me. He had another obligation tonight. But we know Patrick is always on everything, and he's already accomplished everything he needs for the expo and any help we need with the old home day. Bill, not here at the moment. Tim is here with us on the school board. Maridel, thank you. And James, we need to take off our list. Mary Ann. And John, thank you, John. And then we have our Elizabeth. Deb was planning on attending, but she worked late for me today, and she's just not feeling great. But she put in a lot of extra time, so grateful for that. Lois is here. Tom is here. Tom, thank you. And Dan, I know they had another meeting last night that went till around 10, so that might be part of the reason. But looking at our agenda, TO REVIEW AND THE ACCEPTANCE OF OUR MINUTES FROM JUNE 2ND. I DID BRING A COUPLE OF EXTRA COPIES IF ANYONE DOES NEED A COPY OF THOSE MINUTES TO TAKE A LOOK AT THEM. I LOOKED AT THEM. KELLY, I CANNOT THANK YOU. DOES ANYONE WANT A COPY TO REVIEW QUICKLY? I'LL TAKE IT. I'LL PASS SOME AROUND. IF ANYONE DOES, IT'S ALWAYS MY PREP FOR OUR MEETING. IS THERE ANOTHER ONE UP THERE? YEAH, THIS ONE. IF YOU NOTICE ANYTHING.

That was it. I will say I will not be able to attend next meeting. My son has a procedure. He's totally fine. But, boy, my son comes first. So I don't know if Deb would be willing to fill in to take notes or someone. But I apologize. Also, I could just watch the recording. Oh, my goodness.

So you guys let me know. You've gone above and beyond on these. So, you know, wonderful. I'm sure someone either that night or Deb would be more than happy to make sure that they're done. So thank you.

SUMMARY OF WHATEVER HE DOES.

PERFECT. THAT WORKED GREAT WHEN YOU DID IT AT THE LAST MEETING, TIM. WE HAVEN'T HAD THAT ONE. THAT'S JUST NICE TO, YOU KNOW, A LITTLE BIT OF WHAT'S GOING ON. SO NO, THANK YOU FOR LETTING US KNOW. YES, SO THEN ON THE MINUTES, EVERYONE NEED A COUPLE MORE MINUTES TO JUST LOOK THEM OVER? IT IS HOW I PREP FOR OUR MEETING, BECAUSE I JUST GO BACK AND IT REMINDS ME OF EVERYTHING WE'VE ACCOMPLISHED AND NEED TO LOOK AT. And what we can do too is you have copies of them. We can wait to actually accept them if you want. If anyone wants to still kind of take a few minutes going through them. Or on the other hand, we can move forward and then if we need to make any changes, we can certainly do that in the reverse. So why don't we do that? Could I have a motion to accept the minutes as they are with possible changes? I'll make a motion to accept the minutes. Thank you. Thank you, Marion. All in favor say aye. This is the one warrant article 22 subcommittee update that there's been a lot going on behind the scenes. We all know that the warrant 22 passed so the voters spoke and they want us to move forward with this. There's a little bit of concern with the wording of it as to what we need to do now to accomplish what the subcommittee has been working on. And our number one goal, and this is where John's heart started two years ago, was extending the hours and services of CART. So I'll turn it over to John to give us a summary of that. Basically where we need to head is at the next town council meeting, on July 20th.

And I have some notes written down to go along with John. Wonderful. I don't know that I have enough. My printer ran out of ink.

Thank you. But we might just make it. And remember, our subcommittee is Marydell and Marianne and John. There was a meeting that kind of spurred the moment, came a vote with our town manager, Sean Mulholland. He was a huge help in kind of like expressing to us what he thought we needed to do when we present to the council. Marydell, I appreciate you doing this, because the key here is, I think, is to kind of keep it condensed so that we can hear.

We don't have to read it all tonight, but I wanted to give everyone the chance to have a little bit of background. So the first part of it is just an explanation of what CARD is for everybody that's not familiar with it.

Do you want me to do that? We won't hear your melodious voice tonight, John.

We won't hear your melodious voice tonight.

You have it all up here.

All right, so basically the first part is just explaining what CART is. And a lot of this I got off the website, so I don't think there's any errors. then I went in here to kind of tell you some of the terminology so for instance keep New Hampshire moving is the state's Trent public transportation group and they have a website you can get a lot of good information on that I put the website in here the basic structure is the state and they have counselors so you have your your state coordinating counselors or committee SCC and then you have your regional which is RCC and there's just these different layers and all of these other people that these are the people that most affect us so we are Region 8, Londonderry is Region 8, so we're in this group with seven, no, more than that, I think 11 other people. I just reiterated in here, look at how close the vote was. You know, we had the yes vote on the article, 2211, versus the nos of 2112, and there were 339 undervotes. What's an undervote? An undervote is people that skip the question. Okay. So had they gone either way, We might not be here talking about this today, so we were lucky, and I think we have to grab that momentum and keep running with it.

It's very good that you put that there, because it's a good reminder.

I'm not going to read it, but I reprinted the article in case anybody needed a refresher of exactly what the article was. Next page, Londonderry, we're looking in the neighborhood of about $140,000 that we're going to pay. That's a really generic, we're kind of guessing it. We haven't received an invoice or a commitment for the increase in hours yet. We're thinking maybe $140,000. federal subsidies tied to CART, every $5 that we are putting in there from these registration fees collected is matched by the federal government. So we're paying, let's say we are paying $140,000, the feds are also going to pay $140,000. So we're basically getting a 50-50 match, which is nice. We began April 1st collecting the $5 fee. I'm not actually sure, I'm guessing on the name of the of the fund, as it's called, like the municipal transportation. I have it in here somewhere. It's being accumulated. It's being collected. We estimate we're going to get about $200,000 from this fund if all goes as planned. So, we have some play with if it's not $140,000, but we also have some play that maybe there are other things we might want to do with it. Please.

I just want to interject. Through the end of June, so we collected three months, and it was just shy of $52,000. Nice. So, we're running... According to plan. Yeah, we are.

We are.

Right.

We just don't know what the fleets register, right? We don't. Because that would affect the numbers.

And we've had some fleets come through. So that definitely, because it's based on whether most of them are made, but yeah. That's a good point.

We don't know.

Yeah.

The article has in there that, well, not the article so much as the RSA has in there what the money can be used for. So in addition to public transportation, we could be looking at some sidewalk improvements, some bus covers, some rail trail help. It's kind of nice to know that we can get into some other things if we want to. But for right now, our major concern is the cart increase. So on June 2nd, Marianne, John and I met at the Manchester Transportation Authority with Sean, our town manager. with Art Rugg from the, from our Art Rugg here, but also he's on the Southern New Hampshire, am I going to get this one?

The Car Advisory Board.

Southern New Hampshire, he's on the Planning Committee. Southern New Hampshire Planning Committee. At least it is on the website. But he is on, so he attended as well. There was Mike Whitten, who was the general manager, or the manager of MTA, and CART, and he had three other members of his team there. One of the nice things was one of the people was a data collector. So Sean had a conversation with her about what data would be good for us to have. He's still waiting for it, but he's on top of it as soon as they can get us that data. But we'll know some destinations. We'll know how many riders are denied rides. We'll know the hours that they're busiest. So some of this data is going to be good for us moving forward. So right now, we're not really focusing on changing any of the route. Right now, Londonderry is on demand. So they call into the dispatch for the route. But this might help us to know if there's different hours. So for instance, if we decide we want to do an 8.30 start, maybe we want to get an 8 o'clock start based on the data. So we hope to get that data soon. Do, do, do, do. One of our other goals, well, first of all, we got through the meeting. There were a few things that were thrown around the table. They thought we might want to get creative, but we kind of said, you know what? We have the money. We have the plan. We have the desire from the seniors. This is our best option. We want to go through with expanding our hours and mimicking what dairy is doing. So we're going to move forward with that. The data will tell us if we have to make the hours different. So for instance, how long do we need them on a Saturday? We don't know. How early can somebody get a medical appointment in the morning? We don't know. So that data is going to help us. So one of our goals is to get data or get input from the residents of Londonderry. So Marianne has worked with the senior center to get together a, I know she's been in touch with you Sherry, she's getting together to get videos done of the seniors and we will, the folks that use CART so that we can get right from the horse's mouth some information about what they like about it, what they might change about it, what would make it better for them to use it. So that will kind of help us. One of our goals is to interview them, but I also put in here that discussion needs to take place about other ways to gain some of this data. So for instance, we could look at getting in touch with houses of worship, library posting, Facebook posting, electronic and paper surveys, newspapers, postings in medical offices, Meals on Wheels drivers, and the cart bus drivers. So as much information as we can all put our heads together and say where can we find out how much of a need this is, we need all of you to put your thinking caps on.

I go to the senior center typically four days a week. And especially for walking club because we walk the rail trail and we talk. And when I said something about the possibility of expanding hours, I was questioned. Why hasn't it happened? We voted for the Warren article. Why isn't it now?

So we should almost videotape you saying just that, you know, because that's important and that's what we need to remind the council of. How long ago was that, November? When was the?

Well, we started, we voted in March, and we started collecting in April. I put down here the current bus schedule and the future, hopefully, the goal bus schedule in here. Again, that will be confirmed by resident interviews and resident data. We might find we don't need a whole day on Saturday. We might find we don't need a half day. We don't know. We can't decide what people need.

I don't know if you saw the email I sent out this morning.

I saw the list of possibilities.

Yes, the list of all the events that take place on a Saturday that the people that are relying on CART can't go to. Can't even attend.

Right. And the list was exceptional and we have a few copies floating around too.

If anybody has any additions to that,

Just let me know all the data needed, please. Please.

So we've collected, you said, approximately $52,000 or so for the first quarter. When do the federal funds come into mesh?

That I can't answer.

A federal money that comes in to match it. You said it's matched one to one.

I don't think they give it to us. I think I give it to CARP, right?

The way it works is we, the town, does not get any federal money. We are effectively, the simplest way to look at it is we contract with CARP, Supply Services for Lennon Dairy, okay? So, what happened, and it only happened, it's actually back in April 22nd, 23rd, CART started receiving money. The way it works is that every town that's involved in CART, that would be us, Derry, all those towns have committed to put in what I would describe as a flat fee they're chicks share of the cost for the year so that turned out to be when you put all that together around numbers that comes to 375 thousand dollars Okay. In addition to that, okay, the state this year put in, or is going to put in an additional $75,000. Okay, we can put that together, it's $450,000, so on. After the May 20, yeah. Back in April, actually, after the budget for CART was approved, CART applied to the state. It's federal money, but in order to get it, it flows from the state, or the federal government down into the state and then branching out. New Hampshire Department of Transportation has control of the money that comes in from Amazon. So the day after the budget was approved, he applied for it, and he card-brought in $450,000 of federal funding. The problem that we have, which we're trying to straighten out now, is what we're doing has never been done before. We are trying to, we have the money, and we're trying to go to Caritas and especially purchase some more services from them, okay? And the addition, our share of the pot at the beginning was $67,000, okay? Our share of, or 50% of...

Sorry, in terms of 67,000 of the 450? Yeah.

Okay. So, what he didn't do, in fairness, I have to give him a little slack because we've never done this before. He should have asked, added to that pile, the $35,000 that we are putting in for new services. And no one has really ever done that before. So before 50 comes in, now we're running into problems about the 35. And they can be straightened out because, first of all, It's not a one-time deal when you go out for the money. If you ask for that money, and normally that would cover them for the year, but if projects come up during the year and so on, they can go back via New Hampshire Department of Transportation and get more money. So what we're wrangling with now is getting that to happen.

The second payment, if you will.

So that's kind of where we are on the money. So that's how the money works. And there's a lot of... There's a lot of federal money for this particular kind of thing out there. So it's not like the federal government just run out or, you know. Good question, Tim.

Did that answer your question, Tim? Mm-hmm. Good. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Continue.

Go ahead.

Oh. Sorry. So we want to get the input from our residents. We want to, that's our first goal. We want to then go before the town council with a presentation Sean is suggesting a PowerPoint presentation, and so Mary Ann's working on a video to ask for us to access this money. It is in this fund as it's being collected through the registration fees. It's going into this fund, but we need their permission to access it. And... Good blessing. Yes, they're a blessing. They're a blessing. So that's the second part, is in addition to getting the data from the seniors to help us with what are the hours going to be, we then need to get our presentation ready. And that is on for 7-20, as he had said earlier. The rest of the paper that I gave you is just my thoughts to throw down. We don't have to go over these tonight, but if you could look at them, the last two pages are information that I've just kind of gone through, our master plan, our strategic plan, any place I could think of that I could just grab stuff that says we could put this in. Like, for instance, if you all just be looking at some of these, if you look three-quarters of the way down the page, in 2023, southern new hampshire uh planning commission had the numbers of manchester having 116 400 residents dairy having 34 530 london dairy was third at 27 5 30. so we are right now in the southern new hampshire region not over the state we are third And we need to be there with our services. We need to be there. Another thing I had written, I think it came from the master plan, was one of the goals is to keeping our rural community feel, but they can't help the fact that we've changed more into a, a new suburban area and we need to start to match that. So it's interesting. Another note on here that I love is the single person household with seniors has doubled over the past decade from 430 to 837. Now one of the things we talk about is people who are aware of CART and who have the need for CART wherever they're going, But how many people out there don't know about it yet? So we have to find out a way. That's why I said maybe houses of worship, doctor's offices, a way that we can reach folks who may not know this service is there. They may be right on the cusp of thinking, my kids are going to take my license away any day now, and what am I going to do? Well, we're going to be there for you. But we don't know who these folks are. So we just got to get out there. We got to let folks know. that we're going to help them. Old Home Day is a perfect place. If they can get there.

And at the Expo as well. I invited over I invited 13 local churches to the expo, which we've never done before. And I only stayed with Londonderry. I could have gone. I wanted to see how the response was. But we can also have them participate in that during the expo.

Exactly. What I might work with you on, if you wouldn't mind, remember last year we had an easel in the front lobby? If we had an easel that said, the Senior Resource Committee, and I think we discussed this at our last meeting, is working on blah, blah, blah. Please talk to us if you need transportation assistance. Which lobby are you talking about? When we're doing the resource deal. The resource deal.

Oh, okay.

Might want to have a lobby here. You were like asking what people thought of the lobby.

Yeah, that's right. I'll speak personally. In my neighborhood, there is a gentleman. I see him walking three times a week. He lives somewhere up on Old Mammoth Road. He shops at the mobile station at the corner because he can't get anywhere else. And he walks really slow to get there, and he walks really slow to get back, all weather. I applaud him. Maybe he isn't aware that we can take him to Market Basket, but he shops at mobile. The prices he must be paying.

I think I see that guy.

Do you see that? He lives somewhere up by the sea.

I see someone on Hall Road.

And he has a walking stick. If I had the guts, I'd stop and say, dude. And he wears layers. He wears layers. And shorts. If I had the guts, I'd say, dude, what's up? Why are you shopping there? Let us help you. But I don't have the guts. I hide behind a shirt.

You just stop and say, I don't mean to be rude, but I was wondering, do you know about CARD?

He wouldn't be insulted. I hope.

No, we don't.

So there are people out there. We see them. Another example that we should bring up.

London Dairy's population is higher than Salem.

Oh, Salem? What's Salem? Salem. That's shocking to me. Darius 34, Salem.

These were 2023 population figures.

Yeah, I always think Salem is a city, but it's not. It's a town, and I think they should be.

I should check this side of New Hampshire, and I can't believe.

How much is it?

Huh? What is it, the population of Salem?

I don't know. These are the figures I picked from the thing on 2023. I could have made a mistake. Or they could have.

We're not perfect.

No, no, I think.

According to Google Quick Search, it's 31,000. There you go. 31,000, according to the Google Quick Search. But that's current.

What year? That's now.

It doesn't say that information.

So right now, then, they're between us and Derry. Okay.

I couldn't imagine they'd be smaller than us.

No, no.

Especially with, well, you know, since that 2023 thing was done, they've boomed with all the .

Tuscan, the villages, all those apartments. Because I remember the clerk saying that, that so many apartments have gone in there now. So we were really very close on that general, you know, when you compare. And then the goal of where all this has to go is that by the 20th, the subcommittee is working on a presentation that will be to the point, but appealing enough so that the councilors will understand and vote to release this money.

And we really want to... One and done. We want to get them the information they require without it having to be, you haven't told us enough. That's wasting their time. So that's why I'm thinking we really, if we're going to take a piece of their time, let's make it worth it. And then the last thing in here which was interesting is the disability status. The percentage of Londonderry residents living with disabilities has risen from 7% in 2012 to 12% in 2023. So again, that's a population that we're interested in helping. Okay.

Is that an extra one of those in the center of the table?

I don't. I'll email you one. I ran out of ink on my friendship.

Maridel, thank you for doing this because this is a great summary of the meetings that have been taking place and where we need to head.

Well, as I mentioned last month, we need all our thinking hats on. We need to know how this presentation can go forward and have it be a positive experience for us and our seniors and the town council.

I THINK WE NEED TO KEEP IT UNDER. I KNOW THEY'LL GIVE US 20 MINUTES OR WHATEVER, BUT I REALLY THINK 10 MINUTES, LIKE, LESS IS MORE IN THIS SITUATION. THAT WAS LONG. WHAT DID THEY SAY, PEOPLE'S ATTENTION

John always says eight minutes.

You know, if you can say it in eight minutes, you've got them. Well, then they start, you give them time to think about it. Right. They don't want to do that. Exactly. And our goal here really is that we need them to approve this so we can move forward.

Marianne and John, did I forget anything?

No, I just wanted to say, you know, we're working to fulfill the will of the people. Yeah. So that's our goal. And I think that should be a slide, like something that's right to the point like that.

You know, this is what your residents voted on. Would it be helpful to have other committee members there to support you guys? Absolutely. Yes. So anyone who can plan to attend that meeting on the 20th.

I did notice the agenda. It's not on there yet. I'll keep my eyes on the agenda and when it, There's no agenda on the posting. When I see it, I'll confirm with everybody who's on it.

Well, Marianne and I were talking about this before the meeting, and I'll reach out and request that we are right after public comment. And if the chairman, you know, doesn't have something that would prevent that, I'm sure that he'll do his best to make that happen. We don't want to be... You know, talking at midnight. Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, they'll have to wake us up. Take a nap in the middle of the afternoon. So I guess our next question is, is that this is phenomenal. We have the information, but now it needs to go back to the subcommittee to create Do we have any ideas that we need to share here to give to the subcommittee so that they can build on what's here? Yes, please. The idea of interviewing people that are using it, we've talked about Cindy from... We have at least three people from the center who are more than willing. Which will be powerful.

Have you heard from Drew?

No. So Drew from the cable center will be the person to come over and videotape. And we know he's been on vacation, and so you're going to work with him.

I left about 3.30 today, so I haven't looked at email since.

One of the other things I wanted to ask John, you could confirm this, I'm not sure where I got this data, that the CART service that we have now, does not give our residents assistance getting on and off the buses if they're disabled. But the new one will. So that's a really important factor because there could be people out there not taking it. So now we will have that service with our .

To be clear, it's still from the curb to the bus. there's no service that will come to the front door or in. Right. But they'll help them get up the stairs and into a seat. Which is more.

So even with that one, it won't help them from their house. No. to the end of the driveway. I know, Lois. That's a big issue.

Well, the buses are hard to maneuver in certain driveways, too. Right, sure. But so are Ubers. Yeah. Right?

Right, because they've never taken a new one. Something else I think we need to figure out how to tie in is not just the seniors or people with disabilities, but it could be the 25-year-old that lost their license or can't afford to drive. And that's a population we have, too, people going back and forth to work. But I don't know how we get those numbers. From CART, we can. That would be the data. Because I think that's a big one because... Our goal, of course, is our senior community and people that are disabled, but that's another assistance, and CART utilizes that, because I've known people that have lost their license, can't afford a car, but that's what would get them back and forth, you know, someone in their 40s, someone in their 20s, so we need to highlight that in a slide, too.

Some people just don't drive. It would be nice if we could interview a veteran that's using a service.

And I wonder if through the American Legion, there might be, we could get a contact. And also, the service is extending back into Manchester. My understanding is they used to go to the River's Edge in Manchester. And a man, I think he's 95 now, down the street in our neighborhood, he came in because that service had been stopped. And then luckily, your wonderful husband, Laurie, who, you know, a hero behind the scenes,

offered to take him and you know so he said that he's all set now but that's a service that's needed because if you don't have a tom or a laurie you're kind of stuck you know so well tuesdays and thursdays currently they they take folks to manchester for medical appointments but if we no no um the cart yeah if we have i don't know any of you have had this problem i have it You can't get an employee. You can't say to your doctor's office, oh, I can only do Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9 to 11. And they laugh you off the phone. We have to give folks more opportunities.

So maybe that's what he meant. Or he might have been a bit. So what do you think? Is being mindful of the other things we need to accomplish? Does folks want to think and email us? What do you think we want to do?

Because I'm trying to think of something right here. Let it percolate for a little while, and then just send email.

Just a comment on the Uber. I have a friend, she doesn't drive anymore. She uses Uber. And it doesn't seem like they have a rule, because each Uber driver is different. One might help her, one might not help her.

The car drivers are like that too. I've seen them come into the building to help people, and I've seen them sit in the truck, in the vehicle. So the same thing.

They're all different.

okay thank you all for listening just trying to come up with specifically what the presentation will look like to the town council to get them to release the money exactly we can also say this is what we've decided to do with the money we hope you agree well this is not what we decided to do this is what the voters have said it doesn't seem like it should be too complicated in my eyes i mean if it was presented to us at the school board be like Here's the Warren article that passed, so do your job.

Tim, that's been my struggle. That's what I thought three years ago. Tim, I agree with you, and we've talked about this in the subcommittee meeting that I attended. That's the concern that I have, because in my mind, the voters voted. I think it's more what you said, Ilona, that this is what we plan to do, and it's a blessing. Could you give us some feedback? Yeah, or even, I think that's what you're saying, too, that if it would... The voters want this. We're informing you about this exciting project and how we're going to move it forward. But I don't know that we necessarily go in as an ask. Well, that's my point.

It's not really an ask. I think all you really need is... to show them that you followed the roadmap on how this money is going to be appropriately spent in accordance with the RSA. So we have that roadmap for you now, please.

I agree. Now that it's passed, it's taken a few months to work out the details. Here they are. Here's what we're going to do.

And then when you were saying, Marion, about being on the walk and someone saying, hey, what the heck's taking so long? We loaded on this. You know, but that's my point, and I just don't think this, why are we asking? This is what the voters wanted, you know, we're doing. But the subcommittee will put that back to you and think about what your approach is.

The original article was voted to go on the ballot three to two. So it was a close one even to put the Warren article on the ballot. And now the concern is... There might be some more issues come up. So one of them is actually something in our favor, which I forgot to mention in my presentation is, let's say it was $37,000 we've paid every year for this. That came off the budget. That was a line item on the budget. It's not anymore. That line item's going to disappear. These are the positives that we have to stick in there. And you're right. And I wrote down what you said. I loved how you said, follow the roadmap. Here you go. I love that. All right. Perfect.

I think I would add to that. Are my pens ready? Go. I think I would add to that. But the purpose of this is to help you. And if there's something we're not doing, please let us know and see if we can add. I would add something like that. So it won't come off as negative. We're really trying to help you. What is it you're concerned about? Thank you.

Another thing that I think we should be prepared for, If I was sitting up there, okay, and I was all for this, okay, and you asked for the money, okay, and they know, we're actually going to ask for the money, our base fee, right, and then we're going to ask for an additional piece. If they understand how much money is coming in, okay, then if I was up there, I would say, okay, it's $67,000 here and $34,000 here. That's $110,000 or whatever that is, and you're going to get $200,000. What are you going to do with the rest of the money? So we have to have the answer to that question. Now, one of the things we haven't talked about at all, but I think we have to have in that number, we have to carry out – That money is in reserve, but we have to carry a reserve. I think we should say that we always have to have three months worth of service in there that we're not using. So if bad things happen, we don't shut down and leave all these people stranded. So part of the big hunk of that money, I don't know what it is, but we need to come to an answer to that question. Because otherwise, everybody up there is going to say, well, I have a $25,000 project. I have, you know, there's a pothole on my street. So we've got to think it out.

Part of the future, perhaps, is this is door-to-door, on-demand service. If we find that there are areas, say Woodmont Commons, say the President neighborhood, the King neighborhood, sorry. Am I wrong? I should be in America and not Britain. We could turn this into a route someday. And a route would require bus stops for somebody to stay in out of the rain. So there is a future for it. But right now, we can use it for a rail trail. We can use it for other things.

The idea of having a fixed route is probably the place to go. I think we're close there.

We might go there, yeah.

And if we can get that accomplished between now and, say, the end of this year or maybe the middle of the next year, I think we had that going, it was working. I think we've cemented that we're going to have a transportation system in Londonderry because once you get to that point, if you think about it, we have a small car and we have a scalable system because what does all transportation systems do they started out right maybe like we're doing they added a fixed route that goes here and then somebody says well you know this opens up this building the factory down here we better run over there you know amusement parks down here but so we better open this up for Sundays because everybody .

But the point is, that's how you start. $120,000 with a two-year wait. Maybe we should order one now.

That'll be ours.

And then we can, you know the name that plow contest? We could have a name that bus.

I think that's a great idea. And it's really not that far in the reach. I think though what we need to do now is, Maribel, you suggested that submit an email to our subcommittee if you have another idea. I think what Tim brought up is that we have to keep that in mind. This is what the voters wanted. I think we need to keep the eight minutes in mind, ten at the most. And I think we're bringing it back to the subcommittee now. And we don't have another meeting before the 20th. That's the issue. That's the issue. That is the issue. And we are a little bit on time, so we have to be a little mindful.

As of last night, I asked the town manager. He has still not received the data. Tracy's data. Okay. So I have enough data to put some stuff together. Okay, but I think putting data together in some respects is easy. It's the human touch to all this, what you've done. Okay, those are the things that, you know, organizing the and all the things we've done. And then putting that into a package is the difficult and time-consuming part of what we're going to do. So that's where I think we need help.

I guess I'm just confused as to what... I'm wondering if you even need to go back to doing that, because I feel like that's what you needed to do to sell the town on passing it.

See, Tim, I agree with you on that.

So I think you're at the stage now where really you just need to have it laid out, okay, here are the line items on where this money is going to be spent in accordance with the law, so we're ready to receive the funds that we're approved for.

And I think the personal videos are incredible. Yeah, at least one of these. Yep.

And 110%, and there's a world that that will work in. But right now, Londonderry is in a different world, with all the chaos and so on.

Right, but I guess what I'm saying is, what's the alternative if you went to them and they rejected it? They're not going to reject it.

They're going to be grateful that the work was done.

That's what I'm saying. Just play up the scenario, OK? and say they vote no against your request?

They're going to return all that money?

What's going to happen to the funds that we've already got $52,000 that the voters approved and have taken in?

I think it's important that we list the benefits of all this. What's it going towards? Because if they did not work to deny the benefits in some alternate universe, then... You know, they would have to answer to the public. That's exactly how I feel. One of the major complaints in this town is the traffic. This could help reduce the traffic.

It absolutely would, that's right.

I just don't see how they can, but I guess I'll be curious enough to go.

And the idea of the presentation came about from the meeting with our town manager. He felt very strongly that we needed to present this to get the vote. I tend to agree more with what Tim's saying, is that we already have it because the voters voted on it.

You just need to see where the money, how the money is going to get it.

Exactly. And I think that they'll be excited, honestly, that now this is a positive, where things have been more on the negative side. This is a win for everybody.

Yeah, because the only scenario I could see where they would deny it is if you just went in there and said, Oh, we know what we're going to spend it on, so just give us the money. You've got to show them what is going to be spent. I agree. And that is in accordance with these rules.

Yeah, I think so, too. I think we could put hours into this, but I don't know that it's going to change the outcome. I think it's, you know, that we just... I think we just do, I love the idea of the personal touch and the Cindy's and the good people, the why, more of a courtesy than anything else, you know, and a little excitement for the people that are watching.

We like to see what good they're doing.

Yes, exactly. So, but I'm going to again toss it back to our subcommittee. If you decide that you feel that we need to call a meeting to talk about this more, even if only six people, whoever can make it. We could also do it during the day. I mean, I know that can be tricky for people, but that's another possibility. But we'll leave that back to our committee. And you've already done an exceptional job. You've got us this far. You got us a meeting with our town manager, a great discussion that was over an hour of his time, which was greatly appreciated. So we'll wait for you to reach back to us. But would everyone agree you have our complete support?

Yes, can I just make one other suggestion for data collection? Maybe contact community caregivers and find out who calls in there for rides to get to the market or rides to go here and there because my husband used to do that too and he used to give rides to people to go to dialysis and things like that. They might also get other requests for rides that maybe they can't accommodate.

They have a shortage of drivers.

I saw the ad on Facebook.

And they only allow, I think, so it can't be a continuously ongoing thing to it, my understanding is it's like a period of time. So, Lori, that's an exceptional idea, and I'm sure Cindy would be more than happy to give us some kind of quick information on it. But all right, subcommittee will wait to hear from you then. Thank you. Exceptional job, the three of you have run with this, so thank you. We'll go on to the, and we're going to move a little quickly through here. Jim Green Award, thanks to Kelly. It's now up on the website. And there's a nice, yeah, very impressive. I did a test run, so I didn't intend for everyone to get my test run in their email. Yes, so I was happy to see that it did work. You never know with websites and all. So the summary is good. Tanya worked with Tristan on that, and that's great. It's not too much. The form is there. Now what we have to do, and it might be on that extra meeting that we'll have, that we have to have some kind of a display for Old Home Day. with the forms and all there so that people, and we gotta get a little bit of more information out. Tonya said she can do a blast for us, you know, an email blast to make people aware of it, and maybe the local newspapers, but we have to think. Can I put it on my Senior Center Facebook page with a link? Perfect, thank you, yes. So yeah, wonderful, but Kelly, you ran with that. So it's ready to go. It is, yeah. And the form is very, I love that the form is It's quick, it's simple.

I'm having my volunteer celebration on Thursday and maybe we can give them all a copy.

I love that idea. That's right. And I believe, did I put this on here too? I wanted to bring that up to Ilona because I know some people on the committee said they could help and sign up to help with Ilona on that. So I think on the Jim Green Award, That's rolling along and we just have to think more toward old home day with it and getting the word out there. And then jumping to number six, discussion of the old home day booths. Saturday the 15th, Kelly created a sign-up sheet for us. Valerie did say that she'll take that morning slot as we were talking about. If we could kind of pass this around. We do have another meeting and you can always reach out to me too. But to kind of, if there's a time you know that you want, Kelly has it. Go ahead, Kelly.

I had a hard time with this visually. So if you want to do like two or three hours, just write your name for the three hours in a row. I will be at a wedding that day. Rocking in August.

I'm really sorry.

So we'll pass that around if anyone does want to sign up today.

Last year, was there a cooling station there?

That old home day?

What?

That old home day? Yeah. I don't think so. Not that I'm aware of.

Maybe we should do that.

What kind of cool institution are you talking about?

Well, I mean, they have a beer. I was using spreaders during the heat wave, and out on the deck they had this hose. I don't know what it was. But it was a mist thing, and it could be time. And it was set out, at least where I was sitting, it seems like this one is getting unbearable. The spray came down. Actually, the kids would get a huge kick out of that. What?

The kids would get a huge kick out of that. Well, I got a kick out of it. I mean I have a bubble machine that we can use.

Well, they have one on the common. They do every Wednesday night. They do every Wednesday night.

And it has like 18 holes. I think we would need to reach out to Chirsten about that. I have pictures of those bubbles. It's pretty cool.

I think it's a neat idea, Charlie. That's where I am with my . Bubble machine.

I think it'd be something creative and different, too, you know? And people can choose to let their little ones go through, or those big ones of us that want to go through it. It's like it was last week, right?

We all need to go through it. Somebody got a video of that? Yeah, you're right, you're right. Bring some joy and laughter to it all, you're right.

Yes, so on that, the tent is still a bit of a mystery, but our town manager, I did call you back. I did call you back, but it was after you had left, so I can't remember the text. Yes, I bet you were. So back in the tent, yes, so everyone hang it back for just a second. Guys, everyone? Oh, I really caused a stir with the tent. There's good news with the tent. So, Ilona and I have been questing for it. We know it's somewhere. It might be in the mix. By a tent, what I mean is it's actually thanks to our Deb DeRocher. She found a good deal on one. It's a 10 by 10 tent to protect us all from the heat and to store everything. But we know it is here. Things don't get lost like that. And we have the sign, those kinds of things. But if for some reason our town manager offered, there's many of those available. So he is more than willing to make sure that we have a tent. He even offered a larger tent if we wanted to. But then that gets into our spot, which can be tricky too. So as far as the other things go, at our next meeting, we kind of have this down to a science as far as waters and treats and things like the things, the little things that we need to have in there. But I think it's more having our supplies. But on old home day, keep it forefront in your mind. Think about if you want to sign up, you can do that now, or you can reach out to me. And then we'll jump. Do you have anything else, Ilona, on the old home day?

No. Well, I just wrote to Ricky to see if he has a key to the building. I know Dave's office.

Yes, that's where I got it. They're on vacation. Oh, thank you. That's good. AND JUMPING TO THE SENIOR EXPO, PATRICK'S BEEN ON IT. ELONA HAS A GREAT UPDATE FOR US. SO WE'RE GOING TO TURN TO ELONA FOR A SUMMARY OF WHERE WE'RE AT WITH THE SENIOR EXPO.

OKAY. I'M GOING TO TRY TO BE QUICK WHEN YOU'RE READY.

And if anyone wants to leave a little early for the very special event that is happening, we will completely understand. That's a perfect example.

But the Lynch Library is putting this on, and you didn't even know about it. Oh, I've had it advertised at the center. Yeah, no, I wasn't aware.

Is it going to happen tonight? It's raining. It started at 6. It's going to be in the cafeteria.

High school. Yeah, at 6. So if you decide you want to, we more than understand.

Okay, I was going to send out 200 notices this week, but I did it two weeks ago. so i already have 26 applications for the expo i have 300 and 200 more promised um for the special fund we have yeah um here's an example of the letters i sent out you all can take one and this is the spreadsheet of the 200 plus places i have contacted if you would each take two or three sheets And contact everybody who's not green in the next few weeks and say, hey, did you get the information? Blah, blah, blah. This is what's happening. And I can send you a copy of the packet that's in there, which I think I already have done, but I don't know if we still have it, to forward to them. But I don't know if you want to forward it from your town email or let me know that they need to know more about it. But we're on our way. We're good. That's phenomenal. We've got almost more than we did our very first year, which I guess is good since we started early. But the green people, the green handwriting is all taken care of. So if these disappear by the time I'm gone, that would be great.

Have you gotten any feedback from anyone that has said no because of the registration fee? Nope.

They said it's cheap. They said they paid more. And that's what Kelly was saying about the prices in Massachusetts. So Kelly next year would do the $400,000. But it's pretty simple. I mean, we've done it so many times. It's just I'm hoping Patrick will work out the floor plan because apparently his worked out really well. Yeah, they trade stuff.

I think this might be the easiest one because we've done it so many times. And this is year five, which is crazy. It's hard to believe five years. And really it just came about because Chief Bernard was sitting here as our liaison and, hey, you know, and that's how great things happen. So what do you think of this? But, Ilona, thank you. Exceptional job. They're doing all that because if people don't, if these groups don't show up, we don't have an expo. So thank you, Ilona.

That's wonderful. Is that what this is? I don't know why I struggled with this so much.

So like all the empty spots. The idea is to have at least, or to have four people. I love that a lot.

What's happening with these? That's what I actually mailed to people or handed to people so you can see what the packet looks like.

Oh, so this is an address to send out to somebody. No, I've already contacted everybody. Oh, and I sent to the 13 churches, too.

The 13 churches.

I've contacted almost everybody on the list.

Don't contact the green people. Those are, they've already responded. You're talking about the green font.

The green font, right?

The green font. The green font is good. That means they've already. That's wonderful.

It's really, really good.

An email or call. I would call them. Call them. And sometimes my contact information is incorrect, so maybe you'll get a new person. I have people who've left. I have a new director. So I've tried to correct it as I go. Whatever way you're comfortable with. But I've already sent them either... If I don't have an email address, I've sent them a formal letter. And there's some I skipped. There's a lot of housing ones I skipped. Because I'm not going to send to the apartment complexes.

Because they already have a waiting list. And I don't think they're going to want to present because they're already full.

So... You know, Ilona, while we still have you, let's just jump on to do you need more volunteers? I know a few people here had said they were going to volunteer for the volunteer lunch.

Yeah, I'm picking up the food at 10. Yoga's over at 10, and that's when the tables need to be set up from 10 to 12. I've already done a sample table in my office with all the goodies, and the food will start being served at noon. People can come in and sit down and eat and chit-chat. Do you have a layout of how you want the tables, or will you be back by then? No, I already have a layout. I have a layout.

Is anyone already planning to help you to draw the table moving and all?

No, because I'm not letting the volunteers, or my main volunteers, he's standing, sitting right there. I'm not letting them help, but I know they're going to come in and help, because that's how they are. That's their attitude. I'll be there at 10, so as long as I know where to put the tables.

And I'll be there at 10.

Okay. Um, I should, I'll be, I'm leaving at 9.30 to pick up the food so that it's ready by 10. So, I told them to be ready by 10. I didn't want it sitting for two hours. Yeah, that's why I asked. Like, if we get there at 10, are we going to know where to set these tables up? I will leave you on that.

Thank you. Okay.

You know, would it be helpful to see if anyone, like, from the fire department who's available or the police department to just go over, like,

I usually have more than enough volunteers. You do, so you're not concerned. Really, Tom? He's across the street. Okay, all right, if you're not worried. Actually, people have already asked, you know, when can I come and help? You're a volunteer, it's for you. We're having other people. Well, that's what's worrying me. Dan's supposed to come, too. And then at noon, when we start... It's going to be very loose. It's going to be, Sean's supposed to be there. I have somebody from the organization who does Bone Builders speaking. I'll be speaking a little bit, but I have entertainment. It's going to be real chill. It's going to be real easy. And it's going to be help yourself. We're not going to be like, here, you can only have this. Just get your own sandwich and sit down and eat.

I have a question for you. Bone Builders still exists? Oh, yeah. Because I was talking to someone this weekend, And they don't have bone builders anymore in Hillsborough County because the money has been taken away. And I said I would check with Rockingham.

Is it still this person? She'll be there on Thursday. Is it still her? She'll know. No, Rhonda doesn't see it anymore. All right, so you asked me about her. No.

Like, is she working without being paid? I don't know.

Well, what they've done in Washington... Addie Tarbell has covered a lot of gaps in Bone Builders.

I don't... Well, what they've done in Hillsborough County is people are just volunteering. They're still having it, but they're not getting paid. They're just volunteering.

They don't get paid for Bone Builders. They're all volunteers who teach. The woman who helps run the program is paid by RSVP. That has to be who they're talking about then, yeah. I know Addie's doing double duty now, the woman who does it, because some people have left. But you can ask her. If you're coming on Thursday, you can talk to her. I'll give you her phone number.

I've got another question for you. When we call these people, there's nothing here that tells us what you want us to tell them.

What I said last year was I'm following up on an email you may have received about our Senior Resource Fair. Yeah. And if you need any questions answered from me to help you with your decision.

Did you get our email or our letter regarding Our expo, it's this packet they got. That's the packet they got.

You know what, Lois, thank you. You've helped because I'm going to take one with me too. And I can make more. They might give us a definite no. Yes, you're right, which would be helpful too, though.

And if they say no, people in red, I'm sorry, red people don't get to be called because they said they are a definite no. Green people are good, red people don't know.

Good to know. It's like so logical. ALL RIGHT, SO, ELONA, EXCEPTIONAL. THANK YOU. THURSDAY WILL BE ANOTHER GREAT EVENT WITH MUCH APPRECIATION. AND, TIM, YOU'VE BEEN WONDERFUL TO SIT HERE WITH US AND TO ADD SOME EXTREMELY IMPORTANT POINTS, WHICH WE REALLY, IT'S FRESH, YOU KNOW, EYES ON IT TOO. a little summary of how our school department is doing.

Yes, so we have had very few meetings the last couple of months because we haven't had much going on since voting day, but we did obviously break ground the DO project here in collaboration with the town. We had a groundbreaking official ceremony on June 23rd and went off without a hitch, thankfully. We had all five school board members and four members of the town council, quite broke out. I saw you. No, all is good with that. As far as the part of the movement towards Old Lake Kindergarten was moving the modular buildings from Moose Hill up to Matt Thornton. That took place last week. It's not fully connected up, attached in the hallways and everything, but that should happen next week, so all that's underway on schedule.

I'm going to have two grandkids in that school next year, so take care of them.

We had a great season since the last meeting, getting through a successful baccalaureate, all the awards nights, graduation events. Exceptional. And the only other thing as far as the committee that we're on for the DO project, One thing that has come up in the recent meetings is discussing adding solar to this building. And we are looking through the different options for it as far as how we can make it affordable. And I think the numbers look great on it. It's just a matter of the initial outlay of the funds to get it installed. But some of the figures I saw showed turning a positive return on investment after just six or seven years.

That's for the new admin body?

That would be in combination of the admin building and the rest of this building and other buildings around town. So they're exploring that, but that would be funded on the town side, not the school side. I just know I'm privy to it because I'm part of that committee too.

Good having you with us, Tim. We appreciate it. And as far as our... Library and our other department, our liaisons, and we're all set then for this meeting, which is kind of a good thing, too. Make a motion to adjourn. Thank you very much. I second it. And all in favor? Aye. Our next meeting, please note, August 4th before October, but also there's a very good chance we're going to have to have some type of a brief meeting.

If you can't get it here, you can do it at mine. Yeah.