Community Services - Regular Meeting

Museum somewhere in New York having a really good time. So welcome to the February 2025 board meeting. I think just quickly, if we can go around and do a check to see who's all here, just do a roll call moment.

So Jilda Haven. Celeste Chapman. Joyce. Joyce, is your microphone working? It says you're still connecting to audio.

Or Giselle? See, you're on. You need to give a thumbs up?

Baby.

K. Well,

we might come back to both that. Alright. That's all the We can see you're here, so we'll we'll count you count you as as present and accounted for. As you saw last month, those of you that were here, we have a new community liaison. And so we're gonna go ahead and just do a real quick roundtable of who's here, including anybody from the public, but I don't really see anybody. Jeremy. And the community foundation. Yeah. And the I'm just not seeing people at all. That's because I have my glasses on.

So just a quick counselor. If you wanna start and just give a quick you're a new person. So so everybody knows who you are, and you're actually on camera.

So That's awesome. Yeah. I'd look this way. Alright. That way.

Yeah. Yeah. It's be

So very pleased to be the council liaison for the year Great. To the the county health council. I had been had a co liaison with counselor Sheedy back in 2019 when I was still the community health council. So I think and and so and we're historically, the board you know, before your board and thought closely activities as a board and Great. Just just excited to to be involved and Awesome. Have whatever I can do to help. Yeah. Make sure you get what you need from council and just move forward.

Awesome. Awesome.

We are thrilled to have you. So Alright.

Anyone else like to take just a second? You're a quiet group today.

Jeremy or the Community Foundation, either of

you online wanna say hi?

Hello. Good now afternoon. I am here. I'm very excited to listen to this month's meeting. Sorry I missed last month. I was on vacation.

No worries. It's a

good reason.

Yeah. And this

is gonna

it was nice. And this is gonna be great because I Jessica, I saw you. I was at the the statewide health council meeting the other day. So I'm really excited to hear some extra stuff that we're planning for Los Alamos Health Council. Awesome.

Welcome, Brandy.

Thank you.

And Jeremy? Anything.

Oh, hello, everyone. This is Jeremy with the New Mexico DOH health promotion team for the Northeast Region. I'm the Northeast Region community happy. Glad to be on today. Everyone has a good afternoon.

Pretty.

Good morning,

everybody. I don't know if oh, here I am. I'll wait till the owl a minute.

That's alright.

We're all getting used to it this morning. My name is Karen Brown. I am the coordinator for BabyNet, which is our area's early childhood collaboration, and that includes many of the organizations in town. And we're working on getting more childcare facilities involved, the daycares, the Montessori schools, and all that so you can get that voice in a

piece. Awesome. Yep.

And I'm just here to And you guys also have

you interact with the hospital and the maternity board and Yes. OBGYNs there too when it's helped? When it's been

big part of what we've been doing in the past since 2019. Right? Just continually encouraging them and asking them to continue with the program and is in a place where it can get more stable, and that is exciting. Yeah.

Great. Thank you. Any

other folks that wanna make a comment or before we get on with the getting on?

Is at the hospital

room. She's still trying to

connect. Technical difficulties. Oh.

That's somebody from my office. Okay.

I was gonna get the give me just a second. Sure. Let me send I always send the Zoom link, but let me get the phone number, and maybe Joyce needs the number. Okay. I was just talking to somebody at the state earlier today whose Zoom wasn't working. And I was saying how my emails seem to keep pointing to people's spam inboxes, and we're just like, you know, is it a full moon? Like, what is happening? People's technologies.

It was last week.

Yeah. It's just kind of all over the place.

It is.

Let me just send this to Joyce. Alright. Real quick.

Well, all the boards should have received minutes from last month and reviewed. And so if I'd like a call for an approval of the minutes or changes. Yes.

I just have a question. Sure. Of course. On the minutes on nineteen five eighty one dash twenty five, it says possible change to the health council daytime. And then it says I'm so I guess we postponed it till now, but then it says I moved that the daytime be changed as presented. So guess that gives us Yeah. Maybe that's because it's We

Yeah. I thought we tabled it. Yeah. We did

tabled But we decided Oh, so decide. Yeah.

That's We need to correct that in minutes. Yeah.

Because we had quite a few board openings, and I think we've decided to wait until we kinda had a bigger board. But so yeah. So let's change that. My favorite. No. No. I love that. Table with no action. Yeah. I love that. Thank you for bringing

that for me. I apologize for not catching that. Thank you.

It's alright. We're moving. That's super zombie these days. So alright.

So So now I move that we Okay. Approve the the amendments as amended. Great.

Any second? Thank you, Celeste.

Can I say a since we're having technical difficulties?

I think you can. Okay.

I'm gonna go get the second.

Leticia is here.

She just got her microphone. But has her microphone off. Alright. Alright. So approval of last month's meeting minutes with changes that we just discussed. All those in favor, just raise your hand. Leticia, did you wanna do something different? Oh, okay. Just raise your hand if you

approve. Thumbs up

for the minutes approval? Yeah.

Ah, thank you. Thank you. Alright.

That's all the homework we have to do. So we've already kinda done an introduction, I think, of everybody, unless we have somebody off so we can kinda move through that a little bit. If there's any public comments or whatever, we'll get through that. You're a quiet group, so everybody needs to pick up a little bit of having things. We've discussed so much last month. You may have some questions more so than comments, so feel free to bring those over. Okay. How about you wanna go ahead

and take You wanna do the member roundtable? Let everyone you share their programs. And We can

certainly do that.

Let's do that.

Yeah. Okay. Why don't we start here?

Okay. The new me. I've been here before, but not since it's been an official council.

So well done, everybody. Well, welcome back.

That was exciting. I for baby net, I just wanted to share that we have a speaker series. It's about monthly, and I have some flyers for people in the room. And I'm happy to share a digital one with this group to send out if you'd like. Awesome. It's next Tuesday at February eleventh at 6PM at Family Strengths Network, and this is let's talk risky play in nature. So we're talking about risk rich environments that help build coordination and confidence in decision making skills, and then learn to tackle challenges that hinder adventure's play, and discover how to embrace those risks while reducing real real dangers. So Denise Matthews is leading this discussion presentation, and she used to be the early childhood educator at Peak, and now

she runs she's the director of her own school,

which is Worms and Wildflowers Nature School. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we're excited about that. And then some of these will have this one doesn't. But in the future, we wanna be adding more talks that have professional development hours for our child licensed childcare professionals so they can get there twenty four hours towards their licensure. So that's one of the projects we're working on. Awesome. And I've got a flyer here about baby nut in general if anyone wants. We are looking for I

was just gonna say, do you guys work with Parks and Rec

on some of this? We haven't yet. Okay. But I will put that on

my notes. Yeah. Invite them to be It just makes fun

to do something. We've been trying

to get together regularly. So if I can help those connections to parks. Oh, yeah. That's a great idea.

That's nice. I think we would. And I can if

you send me this digitally after the meetings, I will send out all the information that is shared as attachments. So Awesome. Okay. And then the other

thing we're trying to do is bring in family representation. So we have space on the collaboration for family leaders is what we're calling it, and that comes with a really nice stipend. After they attend two meetings consecutively, you start getting paid from your second meeting going forward. And it's just an hour a month so far. Nice. And then they can choose to do more, and it helps us really tap in and see what is on the ground for needs and what they'd like to see our projects be. So I've got a flyer for that that is requesting family leaders to help them. Have they just shared That'd

be great. Stuff. Thank you.

Yeah. We're glad you're here. And I appreciate it. I I think this is a good collaboration and, like, what you're working on full time versus this. Yeah. Yes. I don't have it at work. Yeah. That's great. That is great. Doing this. That is great.

How about you, my dear? I don't really I have a bunch of ideas. I'm not sure if this is the right place to bring a habitat. I did go, however, to the.

Wasn't it so good?

It was great. And I

Do you wanna talk a little like, share a little bit about what it was?

Yeah. Well, it it's just funny because the big topic is scamming. And it's just funny. I don't know why, but I'm all of a sudden been the target personally of all these different scams. And they're really good, the scan. And and I feel like I'm fairly savvy, and I feel like I'm not someone who gets taken in in easily. And yet, I've had a couple of close calls now. One was with Medicare. Mhmm. And a very nice woman with no accent, which is one of my first clues as a feminine accent, but called me and said, hey.

Medicare is putting out a brand new plastic version of the Medicare card. And anybody that's on Medicare knows that you get this cheesy little Paper thing. Paper thing that when it sits in your wallet for more than a year, it starts kinda crumbling and the numbers fall off. And and, know, so I was immediately like, oh, this is a great idea. Yeah. I'm all for this. Then she kept talking, and they had enough of your personal information. They know your name. They know where you live. Yep.

And they'd say, well, let me confirm this to your Celestra. I mean, blah blah blah blah. But then so, like, you you're, like, walking down the path, and then then they say, oh, we just need to confirm your date when you entered Medicare because it's not it's different for everybody, and that's one of the things that's on your card. And then the other thing is then they say we would like and then I'm like, uh-uh. You should have this. Why don't you tell me what it is? But I was walking down the pathway. You know? And if I looked in if I wasn't thinking and they always catch me on my cell phone when I'm not at home and I'm doing something. Yep. This way, I never answered my cell phone. But so that was the first one. And then the second one was from Chase. Mhmm. And I got a notice.

I got a text. You know? Was up skiing. You So they always get me when I'm doing something. And I get this text. You know? Somebody just tried to do a charge for 2,000 something dollars. Is this a good you know, should we put this through? And without thinking, I immediately pushed their

the bank. Yeah.

I started talking to this person. Again, they knew a bunch of my information, and that's what's so frightening. And then she started telling me, oh, well, you know, this is from your debit card. Well, I don't have a debit card. I'm like, hey. I I don't have a debit card. And then she starts arguing with me. I'm like, darn. And then I'm like, oh, I think I better call you back. Click. Yeah. So the movie was super cool. It was a movie about an elderly woman who'd been scammed. And by the way, my neighbor fell for that scam Yep. Where somebody calls you and says they're your nephew.

And we figured out that they probably got a lot of the information about his nephew off of Facebook. Yep. And let's say Tim, as he went to the bank and the bank manager said, you know, before we give you this money, let's just call your nephew. Yep. And he called and ensured that there was a scam. And so in this one, the the scammy, the woman who gets scammed wins. And, you know, which I think

She engages in some Yeah. I don't know if anyone else was at the so Larso, the the senior center hosted this movie at SALA. And my understanding is the older adult network is has a small work group to help educate more people about the prevalence of scams. So they showed this movie, and then they had somebody from the Albuquerque FBI field office talking through what some of the most common scams are and kinda scam prevention questions to ask. You know, what sets off those those red flags. But in the movie, this woman does get scammed, and then she kind of engages in, like, some vigilante justice and tracks them down, like, on a little scooter.

She's smart.

My village. And and it's just it's it's a delightful movie. I mean, it sounds like it would be so, like, sad. Like, you know, this older woman gets scammed, blah blah blah. But it it was so delightful, and and Sala was packed. And they're gonna be doing a book club and some more events. And I know it's not quite social services, but I've had several conversations with our police. The number of calls they get about scams is so high. And I I think that should And those are just the ones that are reported. Yeah.

Should be about his admission is

people being scammed because my father was scammed by a local Los Alamos resident. Yeah. He lost $50,000.

Oh my god. And so My father is

a very well, he's not running one of those. Very But it might be worth

when Lisa comes back, because I know she sits on the older adult network kind of, like, as the health council liaison. So maybe we just kinda connect some dots and see Yeah. How the health council can support that. But

Yeah. Or at least bring it to people's attention.

Yeah. Yeah. So Thanks a lot. But, anyway, so, yeah, I was You learned something. I learned something. And then I also again, there's so many cool little things going on, but they're all under the radar. And I would never have heard of this unless I got I didn't hear email. Somebody's email, and I clicked into it. So how do we get all this stuff that we have in the front? Yeah. How do we so people know that it's there.

And I think that's part of what the health council's taken on with our proof that the council The outreach and that. Yeah. Was to do more of a one door moment, and then you can figure out what the doors are. Yeah. But, also, you

know, my my big thing that I started out with at the very beginning is this idea of a central published resource. Yes. And I think if I had to put a priority on anything, that would be priority number for me is getting a central published resource where it's like a one called, it's a place where people can look and, you know, not online because it's so frustrating to look stuff up online. You go to this page and that page and then you have that in this page. And when you have a book in front of you, you just look. Oh, yeah. And you flip back. I'm sorry. I'm a dinosaur, but

That's alright. Dinosaurs were out. They lasted a long time. They did.

And you can still find that box.

100%. Yeah.

They've left their remains. By the way, our dinosaurs, It's true.

Awkward. Do we wanna check-in with our members online? Leticia, can I call on you? Do you have any updates, programs we should know about, activities, things to share?

Not really. Just still I'm getting a lot of new patients here. So if you guys wanna refer, I'll see them. Fantastic. Great. The scams, yeah, my mom gets those all day long, those calls. She's 86, and they tried to scam her through Dish Network this week. And she kinda fell for it and then had to put a stop to it. It's a mess. These people are horrible.

Leticia, I'm totally jumping ahead of my note, but have you guys been impacted by the federal freeze at all or getting any calls about that?

As of yet, no. We've just been you know, they're gonna advise us hopefully next week on Okay.

Any

further, like, what we need to do and how what we should do to protect our patients and that kind of stuff.

Cool. Thank you.

Giselle? Looks like maybe she's on. Giselle, are you on?

That's her that's her note taking on her phone. Oh. Yeah. Or Joyce, do you wanna jump in if you have access to a microphone?

Yes. Sorry about that, you guys.

Hi, Joyce. I'm

glad. Don't know if I can get but yes. Hey, Karen. Good to see you.

Hi,

Joyce. So so I'm Joyce, and I'm nurse at the Las Palmas Medical Center. I did labor and delivery here for quite a while. Before now, I've been doing infection prevention and employee health here. And I think just, you know, we've got some new things going.

One of the things I wanted to pop in and just kind of check with somebody asked me they were trying to work with our women's health here, and they were saying, you know, they wanted to have something to look at this year as far as what they could measure and see how we could do things, dealing with our social determinants, basically, of health in the community. And one of the things that came up was, well, how about follow-up visits? Well, that's not a real problem in Los Alamos with this group with this group here at that they're they're they're patients. So they were saying, like, gosh, is there anything else? I'm like, well, we've done a lot of stuff here at the community health council.

So, you know, I kind of thought, like, gosh, if there's anything that pops up here, we could kind of see if they're interested in, you know, looking at that piece for their patients. You know? So it could be yeah. Anything. And I, you know, would be happy to share it with them. And maybe, Karen, you've done some of that. I'm not sure. Jessica, doctor Ransom was in this meeting. I wasn't in the meeting, but I had people come to me and ask me or talk about, you know, some of these women's health ideas for what we could do to track. So

Are they from, like, UNM or where

No. It's it's our hospital. It's a hospital. Okay. Sorry. Yeah. Our women's health department, basically. Yeah. And then our quality department. And so, you know If

just in the interest of brainstorming, but also maybe we a group of us kinda chat about this afterwards. But

back when

we did the back when we did like, all of six months ago, when we did the community health survey Time is a construct, everybody. Back in 2024, in the olden days, the the woman who did the community health survey for us, Rochelle, had offered to do further deep dives into the data if we had specific things to look at. So I wonder even if just, like, a first glance separating out women from men or women between the ages of 18 and 55 or I don't know. But maybe there's some way of looking at that data and seeing what their individual answers were, like, handwritten answers, any particular issues, and see if maybe we tie it into something along these

lines. Yeah.

We have the data. And and I had never gotten, I mean, I just told Rochelle, like, yeah. We should deep dive, but we didn't have any specifics to, you know, parse the data. I'm making, a cutting motion of a spreadsheet. So maybe we a couple of us chat and see then if we can loop Rochelle in to at least start there.

That would be great. Yes.

I'll make a note for some follow-up after today's meeting.

It's one of those things where you talk about, like, oh, you know, the right hand's doing something. The left hand doesn't know we're doing it, and then somebody else is doing something else. It's like, there is something out there that we can at least get a little insight on that can help us.

Great. And but I know you guys have also done some stuff with, like, heart health or, like, women's heart attacks or maybe there's just some kind of, you know, a couple of us over coffee brainstorming what that and what we'd be able to get the data for. Right? I mean

Yes. Definitely.

To to

see if there's any measurable thing. So alright. That's really cool, Joyce. I'm excited to hear that. That's great.

And the other thing is I'm trying to keep up on what because I depend on the CDC a lot for for information, and I'm a little personal personally connected. My son works at the CDC, so there's just so much anxiety right now there and, you know, uncertainty and some misinformation. So, you know, I think being aware of that, but we you know, a lot of the emails that I usually depend on what's going on out there are really not coming anymore. So I'm not sure how we're gonna get that coverage.

Are are you not receiving, like, regular updates? Or I know that some things have been paused. Or is that impacting, I guess, as infectious diseases? Are you Yeah. Have to dig a what's happening in our in our county?

Some things like yes. Like, in Department of Health, we have not received as much that we, you know, as we usually do on what's going on, like the Hans Health Alert Network. Some of those, I just saw one this morning, but I have not seen them in a long time, and I'm not sure if they're being filtered. And then there's you just have to dig a little bit further, like, through resources that I'm not used to looking at. You know? I mean Yeah. Yeah. New York Times is not necessarily, you know, a resource that I like to depend on. But if I get a little information on what's going on out there, then, you know, it might give me some help with that. But but, yeah, it's definitely a challenge right now and a little concerning.

So hoping we can get some of that information back, you know, or find out where we can at least get, you know, some reliable information.

Thanks for that update.

Thanks. Yeah.

Anyone else? Alright.

Do you need

to do

a staff update, please?

Alright. I have quite a

few things social services is working on. First, as it relates to health council, we are getting interviews scheduled for new members. We've received three applications in the past couple of weeks, so that is exciting. Two of those have confirmed the scheduling, waiting on one more. And Joyce's term has been up, but she is interested in renewing and staying on, and so hers has also been scheduled.

So more to come. We'll get through the process with counselor Reidy and Lisa going through the the interview process for Lisa on this side of the Right. The interview since previously, you know, she was interviewed by Lori and counselor Lepch and myself. So that's more to come. Hopefully, by the March meeting, we might have some new faces, which would be good.

In January, Denny fell from the social services office. She and I attended a full day training, like, to five down in Santa Fe, and we are now trained as trainers in a kind of evidence based practice suicide prevention training. It goes by its acronym QPR, which stands for question, persuade, refer. It's a really targeted intervention. The training itself can be done in an hour, hour and a half, like, you imagine over somebody's lunch break.

Jen Bartram, who just rotated off the health council, she and I and the community foundation and Christine Koblins from the schools. There's, like, a kind of a little universe of us. This aligns with one of our department of health deliverables, suicide prevention trainings, and putting that out into the community. So we the the group of us have been brainstorming, you know, what it would look like to get this out in the community. What if we set a big goal?

What would it take to get 500 people trained in suicide prevention? What would it take to get a thousand people, 5,000 people? Like, I always think about the we're the healthiest county based on US News and World Report because we have a lot of people with health insurance. And but but what does it mean if we aren't able to reach out to somebody and say, hey, Jill. I'm worried about you. I've noticed things. How can I help you? Right? Like, building those those community connections. And so I we are targeting a July rollout for this mostly because my plate is full with upcoming budget stuff.

And then internally at the county in May, we do performance reviews. Just spring is busy. But we're getting all of the pieces together. There are about 10 or 15 people trained as trainers in the county from different places, including faith based organizations and the schools. So we've been brainstorming stuff like, what would it look like to get all of the PTA representatives trained, right, at all of the elementary schools?

Or my little soapbox is, could we say all of the board members and parents that work on the youth sports leagues? Right? And if you are a youth hockey, I'm a a baseball mom. I'm a Little League I have connections with Little League. If you're on the Little League board, you have to send a representative every year. Right? Because we're working with youth and teens and and where we can have this impact. I talked this week. I know Bernadette Laritzen is also one of the trained trainers. And so, like, kinda, you know, how would we build for the the the faith based organizations?

So many people anyways, there's, like, lots of bubbles to this. And then kind of building on that, then expanding mental health first aid is an eight hour curriculum. So it's much more in-depth that goes across lots more mental health, substance use, in-depth on depression, anxiety, substance use, things like bipolar and schizophrenia. And so then building on off of suicide prevention, mental health first aid, youth mental health first aid, and really creating a bunch of opportunities in our county for people to learn about these things and get connected. Yes.

So I have a question. So is the the purpose of this training, like, strictly layperson? Mhmm.

He is my neighbor's child, and I'm nervous about That's a great question. Yep. Yep. Strictly layperson, not clinical training. How do we help in the training people to know that what the crisis hotline number or the 988 resource? Or

It's kinda like first responder CPR.

Yep. It is exactly like CPR. Yeah. That's why they called it QPR to, like, play on CPR. Like, very much that's that's how it started in our training. Like, just like we taught everyone CPR, save a life, learn QPR, you could also save a life.

Yeah. So community help community. I mean, one of the things Yeah. I heard when I we were visiting about this is, you know, this county takes pride in,

you

know, its closeness. We're all here to take care of each other kind of moment. And we've had some gross things, and so we have to go back and backfill a little bit. Yeah. But this is not just saving lives, which hopefully it will. It's also just adding to why people would wanna live here. Yep. Because they have a sense of a layer of safety that maybe they aren't gonna have in Santa Fe or whatever. Also.

It's very Exactly. So a priority for the Ah. Insurance. I will just share a a very quick story. We received I received a call two weeks ago from a community member that I know that knows of social services. He had been driving the night before across Omega Bridge, saw somebody on the bridge, kept driving, and started to think, like, you know, it's late. You know, it's 7PM. Probably not somebody just walking on the bridge. Like, know, kinda like that little thought of maybe there's something More. Something more.

Turned around, parked the car, went and talked to the person. It was a young kid, a high schooler. It turns out the kid didn't really wanna talk a whole lot, didn't want the police called, didn't want, you know, a bunch of sirens and everything, but they did engage in conversation. This person doesn't have QPR training, but, like, knew enough to engage in a conversation and at least got the kid to walk off the bridge. Right? Did not know what resources, you know, was wanting to know more. So called me the next morning and was like, I'm really worried. Is there anything else I can do? Or, you know, he was saying anything he could do, anything I could do. I called the school.

We did not know we only had the kid's first name. The kid did not divulge his last name. Don't know if he's in the public schools. Don't know if he's homeschooled, but, like, let me start with the school. So many of you know Christine Koblenz is the prevention specialist at the high school, former social services manager as well. We have a really good relationship. And so I just called and was like, I have a first name and kind of a description and, like, what else can we do? The school has emergency protocols. They noticed oh, this is our Medicare ship specialist, Stephanie. Let me let her in.

They noticed that the the purse the kid had was present in first period, like, know, marked as present for first period. This was in the middle of second period, but he hadn't been marked present for second period. And so the school immediately engaged their emergency protocol, checked the cameras, saw he was leaving campus, got very worried, called his parents, got his parents to agree to immediately go home and check on him. He is alive. They got him some emergency mental health resources, and it it just, like, illustrated connecting these dots, but how we need so many more people to know to call the crisis line in the emergency or to call a behavioral health specialist or, you know, whatever the next step is.

And so it, like, it worked because we have those connections, but, like, we we can do this, you know, probably across the whole county.

So It worked because the person knew who to call. But the

next day Yeah. Hopefully, ma'am.

Can you imagine the parent? Because Yeah. My understanding, the parents had no clue how bad it was. Yeah. So that said, this community helped educate the parent that kinda But so the caring community member stopped in the first place. Right? So It's a huge moment that very few communities can actually say they do, and we have an opportunity to do this. Amazing to hear.

Oh, I was just I mean, I took that QPR, and I was just so there's a you hear about occasional stories. There was a segment, like, PBS a few nights ago about veterinarians. I don't know. People saw that that you know, so that we don't realize so youth means it's the focus on youth is great because I know that's one of things you're trying to work on, but it's all kinds of people that All living things. That people are struggling, and and sometimes people it's like it was the spouse that was still surviving this.

Yep. She was also veterinarian. So they have the same profession, but sometimes you don't recognize, like, when somebody is struggling, and they just left. One morning, they jumped off the bridge. Yeah. And after that, one of the mitigations was putting in, like, a higher fence, so it's more difficult. Right? But it's hard to you know, it's hard to do it's hard to remove all that.

Yep. Yep.

And and it's the the QPR, I think, is really good to have people more aware of, you

know What to do or how to do to notice this notice changes. Yeah.

Because, you know, it's it's going full circle with, you know, the scamming thing is that can cause Distress. Feel like Yeah. Of

course. Can.

So it it is yeah. It yeah. It it's all kinds of things.

It's Absolutely.

And nowadays, it's more it could be that you don't know it because they're communicating online with people or whatever. But it's just to get people more connected.

And Brandi Statistically excuse me. People who attempt suicide versus people who successfully commit suicide, one of the biggest risk factors is the elderly. Yep. And I was just gonna say before I

called on Brandy, I don't mean to focus on youth because we absolutely have want to focus on older adults. We have a large number living alone, that social isolation piece.

And professional men between the ages of, like, 30 and 50. Yep.

So Women too. And then Brandy, go ahead.

Men's we're gonna attempt men connect. Oh.

Brady, you're still you're muted. There we go. I was like, thank you.

I was like, if I could chime in because I know I'm going to be playing a part of this. I just wanted to elaborate and let everybody else in the room know that part of the reason why we've also started to move forward with doing these with hopefully starting in July with the suicide prevention trainings, is part of the job that I'm currently doing at the Community Foundation is I've been meeting with some of the executive directors, including Jessica Gott to participate, and I've been discussing with them what they think is a huge health priority in Los Alamos. And so far out of the eight people I have talked to, every single person has identified more mental health resources as something we need in town. And I'm predicting that based off of these interactions, and I will continue to do more of them, that we will have even more executive directors and more community members in Los Alamos seeing these suicide prevention trainings and extra mental health resources as one of the top priorities in town. Cause even though we are extremely healthy community as we've mentioned, there is still a stigma around wanting to talk about mental health in Los Alamos, as well as making sure that people do have these resources if they are struggling and knowing that somebody across the street that lives near you maybe has some sort of suicide prevention training is something that will make Los Alamos an even more close knit community, but also a safer place for people to feel comfortable.

Absolutely. Thanks, Brandy.

Just a couple more tiny tiny things. We're working on a couple of initiatives at social services, having the department of workforce solutions come to our office once a month to help people with resume reviews, interview skills, interviewing skills for both in person and via Zoom. We've had a number of clients express interest in either finding work or returning to work, but we aren't really trained job coaches. And so we've had a very successful partnership with Santa Fe Civic Housing, kind of air quote, section eight, coming to our office twice a month. And so we reached out to Department of Workforce Solutions, and they were like, yeah.

This is exactly what we do. We'd be happy to come up. So they will start coming up February 20 to meet one on one with clients. So that is huge for us.

Put on your list if you haven't already. RBC, I mean, that's their goal is regional job.

I think it is through them because it's through the per it's the connection that Sarah Holtzclaw made for for all of told you. Yep. And so they they have trade training programs.

They have

all these things. So she's Yeah. Just gonna start coming up at least once a month, hopefully twice. So that feels really big. On Tuesday, Lisa and I attended the state health council alliance gathering. It's not quite a conference, but a gathering of all representatives from health councils all across the state. Lisa was there in person. I was there via Zoom, and it was great. It's, like, a great opportunity for all the health councils to share. There are health councils that are stand alone nonprofits.

There are health councils like ours that are kind of under the county board and commission. There are tribal health councils. Councils. There's all these different ways in which people get the work done. And I will send along I think they sent it to me.

I will double check. But the the state the Department of Health has this really great pyramid of how the state's priorities kind of start at the state and filter down to the health council. So the idea of how do we make New Mexico Mexico the the healthiest healthiest state state in in the the country country within within the next ten years, and then, you know, what are the next steps and the next steps, and then how do the health council, you know, take on chunks of that regarding prevention, like having gun locks that relate to suicide prevention, relate to the QPR trainings. Right? Like, all these things kind of build on each other.

So I thought it was a great presentation. I will send that along to everybody. And then the last thing I have is just other connections being made Angelica Gurule in the sustainability office has been pulling people together. We are meeting after this meeting to start planning climate change how how to respond in a world of climate change to people who are the most vulnerable. So emergency management will be there.

I will be there, a representative from the police. We attended a really great training led by Phoenix, by Maricopa County. Over the past number of years, they've seen an increasing number of deaths from people who are homeless, people who are low income without air conditioning units, a whole spectrum people who are elderly dying during kind of those unrelenting heat waves. And we don't quite see those heat waves here yet, but just as we were talking, we're not seeing quite the rain, but we had snow and ice in November. Like, we had a really early ice storm that for our folks who are homeless or living in cars, you know, they maybe weren't indoors yet because we don't normally get ice storms in November.

Right? So just kind of in a world where weather patterns are changing, what do we as a county need to start thinking about? Do we need to have cooling stations or misting stations or whatever that looks like? So there's a a kind of a collaborative happening there. And then separately, also meeting with police and EMTs to kind of broaden our opioid overdose response trainings and kind of crisis response and kind of what that would look like. So good collaborations happening at social services. I am sorry to have taken What? That much time, but lots and lots of good information. Everyone kinda hit the ground running in 2025. So any questions that I can help answer from anyone?

I think that

That was a lot.

I think what's really coming forth pretty hard this year is we have got to learn to collaborate with everyone because Yeah. All of all the pieces that run a town, your health council is really what touches everything. And we've gotta figure out how to create that and not work you to death. That would be a good thing.

Well, I'm not duplicating work.

And not duplicate work. Yeah. No reinvention wheels, but really just make sure all the wheels are moving in in rhythm as opposed to against each other. So thank

you for all you do. You too. Alright. Lady?

Yeah. So the so I think one one one thing I was updated probably people did pay attention, that there was a question about the was council advocating for any changes to address the health professional shortage. Right? So I don't know. We discussed the session still happening, so something might happen.

It'll be really good. I think there's some good hope for some things, but think the malpractice reform, I think, is recognized as being the biggest maybe the middle pole in the tent, I guess. So And the licensing stuff. Yeah. There's the, yeah, the the cooperative agreements, I think, is what they're called. Right? So we're not a member of any in the state. So those are a couple things, and I think there's some good chance we'll see that. So I think this was the first time the council had actually put that on our objectives, our state priorities. So that's good news.

And, yeah, I mean, so I'm also liaising with the inclusivity task force. I had been, you know, liaising to the environmental sustainability board. So, obviously, sustainability, are all things that are all interrelated. Right? So it's the lack of housing is another thing locally that for instance, for me, I only recruit people. So we have those are things we're working on, but, obviously, not we don't see new housing at the moment.

It's coming.

It's coming. There's some housing that's open. It's not gonna be affordable. It's near the hospital. So that's taken an amazing amount of time just to get that Yeah. You know, finished. So I think there are some things that are happening, and I'm hopeful that we'll see some more. And I think it's just great to just work on what we can locally. You know, we need to focus on that, and it it's hard right now with all the federal changes that we're seeing. And

Just keeping up with all the

Yeah. So there have been Fair post. Yeah. The grant freeze that apparently got you know, it's not happening, but may happen later. So we'll see what happens with all that, but I think there's still things we can do. But, yeah, I I guess the only other question I I made a note of wastewater because that seems like that comes up with some frequency, and I know we're still doing the testing. And it's just kind of another tool that we might have.

You know, in the in all

of the federal stuff, I have not chatted with Linda Madison about where that stands. So I will reach out to her because I know she was kinda keeping an eye on that and getting that updated. I'll ask, and I'll send it to this group.

And you guys check with Angelica when you meet with her because I think the sustainability, in theory, we are also doing that

more from a pollution standpoint Okay. Opposed to health.

But Okay. But I'll check. Yeah.

I don't know where the wastewater monitoring stands and if it's run through the CDC, where that might be and all of this.

So Right. So that may not be as important. Who knows?

As coordinated. No. I'll I'll get an update for everybody and send it out. I neglected to ask that.

Well, we're happy to to have you, and feel free if there's you know, my guess is as you as you get more up to your eyeballs in this, there will start to be priorities that councils that we'll see because we certainly can't do all the things that, you know, we need 80 people on this board to do all that. But one of the things that we talked about last month was creating some working groups. And so we had started with a working group wrapped around what we're calling community health action center, which is really the brick and mortars piece of this. And we're gonna be doing I think I've got three people that have raised their hand, and I think a couple of people that will come on the board, I think, will have some interest. I also reached out to Kathy Keith this week with the Lantel Foundation to just send out a email to everybody.

Landell, Triad, I mean, just everybody. But these are some topics we're working on. If there's somebody that's really interested, come on board. Let's, you know, let's all work together with this. So we are gonna oh, go ahead.

Oh, I was gonna I was gonna offer some framework. Sure. We know we're a small health council, and we we got this report finalized in December with, like, 16 action items that we want to get done. But as far as when when Jill mentions that physical piece, when we had kinda talked about a a hub or some of us don't like the word hub. Yeah. The center. An action center. Like, a place where things get done. Right? And more of

a But that it one door reflection

of Right.

Single single entry. But that the the small health council, that's a large piece to break off for us to, like, think about how would an action center come to fruition. It is gonna involve so many more people

Right.

And just be a bigger project than we can reasonably do in the hour and a half that we have here.

Right.

So one of the ideas was we can have working groups that have a couple of members of the health council that can involve members of other county departments and community members. I know I've not been a part of the health council where we had working groups, but I know they've been used with par open spaces parks trails and open spaces. Transportation. And RV. Yeah. Okay. So kind of like an an kind of another way of getting more people involved in the process, which I we think definitely want for something that would be as big as an action center. Right? We'd wanna get input from a lot of folks.

So we're operating on the premise that it is a big alligator that we're trying to wrestle here to to become The

elephant to all. Yeah. We can put all kinds of metaphors.

And so the initial thing would be really just identifying who would need to be part of something like this. K. And what would their needs be? How many square feet? What kind of people do are they looking to bring?

In my own crazy brain, I'm I'm thinking it's probably gonna take three separate locations. It's gonna take a central thing and then some subsections around housing and transitional housing with training because those require more security than something that's just come in and will help you do whatever. It'll be tied to all sorts of things, but specifically the mental health needs and wants up here. And, again, it'll in in in my crazy brain, it's a public private nonprofit moment that everybody's gotta figure out how to do the lift around there. But the the working group is really just gonna start making the shopping list, creating, you know, how many people do we think is gonna be here, what are the different divisions of that, how many square feet, you know, just that kind of stuff.

So we have a starting place for all of that, and then we'll open it to public comment or whatever it is we move move forward. But it's a start. Jessica sent out the kind of the other proposals, and we'll address those with each month as we go through some other potential working groups. Because as I think we all got last month when we left this meeting, the list of what we we need to accomplish is gonna require some prioritization pretty quickly so that we don't just run everybody ragged because it's Like, everybody will leave me.

Yeah. And I good.

Yeah. It's like, okay. You think you need three people. We all think you need eight.

And so

this is a this is a I think it's I'm new to this board. I've not been here less than a year, I guess. But what I'm seeing is this board and the social services department touch everything. And so the more we can kind of break down some silos and actually get some collaboration going, the better we're gonna be. And that's really why I reached out to Kathy Keith with the Lantel Foundation is they're our biggest employer.

You know? We need a couple of people on this board and also working groups that can kinda take some of these messages back and come back forward and go, okay. So here's what we're seeing within our, you know, employee base and yada yada yada. So it's an exciting time. It's a little overwhelming at this moment, but I think it's it's an exciting time. Can I stay a bit longer? Absolutely, please.

I know in about 2019, the county went to Carrie Fanning, who was the previous executive director at Family Strands Network. And that that was what they talked about was a colocated Yeah. Family services kind of center. So I have a spreadsheet that I you might have it.

I was send it to me just in case. I probably have the same spreadsheet,

but we have lots of pages. Password. It feels like there

I do.

And and maybe you might have some insight into this too, Cemps, already. It feels like there was a lot of momentum for this in 2019. We have a lot of notes.

Yeah.

And then it felt like COVID hit and

Everything shut down.

Everything kind of changed to addressing that emergency. And so now Now we got back to Yeah.

Well, we also had

That feels like a very truncated

Yeah.

Version of events.

That's certainly a part of it. I mean, in COVID, we could blame for almost everything.

Let's I still doing positive. But I

think it was that transition from the the community to

the county.

Because that was in 2019 also.

Because I was also coincidentally in 2019, and then there was interest, I think, in, pardon my language, a hub. Right? Right. But it's just, yeah, someplace where you would have the one stop Yeah. For people and whether or not it actually it can't functionally be that way because you have to have some things someplace else. Right. But, conceptually and it was before we were, like, the health of this county, I think, officially. Yeah. Right? We wanted to be looking at this and then also and it was the the same thing with the the mental health resources, right, had been had any debt.

Yeah. Right.

I heard about it in 2018 Yep. And since. So I think, yeah, so I think having that working group because you have I think you you can have 12 members. Right?

The health council? Or in the health council.

We are allowed up to 15.

Oh, 15 is what we did. Yeah. Okay. Made it a non member. 15 isn't crazy. And I think that dates back to how many

people used to

be on it. But, right, I think the problem is trying to get Enough interest. Because they have to be Residents. County residents.

They have

to be resident and beholden to the And it's a party affiliation. Party affiliation. To the Yep.

That's the charter. So we're we're not changing that. Yeah. So we have the constraints we have. It would be great to have more people, and I guess it's the more I think the only thing to look at is maybe we could make, like, ex officio members. Right? If you want to get certain

Like, the

medical center Yeah. Always representative, then maybe they can always

Well, and that's Joyce. Yeah. Right? But if we had, like

If you wanted to make that you know? So it's a question of that connection, which was the old community version was quite different in that regard. Right. I don't I only have that small window of experience with it, but I I so I think it would be worth like, in terms of your wanting to do what you wanna do, make sure that we don't just say, well, we're stuck with the way it is. I mean, we can Oh, I see.

Change things. I think the first start is your working group to have that and then to because then you can involve the other members, and you can if if people have the time that are on the health council and they could be involved in working group, then they can bring the results back. That way you know? And I think you wanna get my understanding of the reason for changing the time was maybe to have people come to the meeting.

Right. But now I think we're back to we took that off the agenda to maybe keep it to lunch for at least the new members who are interested in joining can all make it at the lunch period. Yeah.

Trying to figure out. So I I think that's part of it is just figuring out logistics of the right time.

And So I have a question that I think probably you can answer. Because I went through this whole subcommittee working group thing last spring. Because I was on the open space Okay. Subcommittee. Yeah. And now we're done. I don't know. But it's very not clear to me, and I just reread last night the county publication. And working groups are only defined for the county council. They're not defined for subcouncils. And if you look at the county council working group definition Mhmm. It can only have three members of the county council, and then everybody else has to be noncouncil people.

Right.

So is that the same That was my understanding. It was the same for boards and commissions. So so boards and commissions are That was my understanding. Not said. Because otherwise, it becomes a quorum issue Right. Which so the idea of a working group, if I'm correct, is saying. It doesn't have to the the public notice doesn't have to be you can meet without the public notice.

You don't have to have minutes.

And you don't have to have minutes.

To have we're supposed to the working group that I am on, I am not a member of the Parks and Recreation Board. Jerry Cohen and Brian Watkins come in. And and so we we have really known what we get to make up our own rules. Yes. Which And I think that's true.

I think it's

And we report, but somehow or there's this weird sunset clause. And so once a year,

and that's Once the project is done. No. It's not done.

Oh. Once a year, we we're supposed to report, and this is just rules that Parks and Recreation made. It's not written anywhere. Once a year, we're supposed to go and report or no. Excuse me. We we report every couple months to Parks and Recreation on what we've been doing. Mhmm. And then once a year, they have to vote whether or not they wanna keep us or not. And none of this is written down anywhere.

Good. Well, that's mostly, I think, right.

Yes. It is.

It's there's just, I think, just Yeah. Just a couple of clarifications. So there is a new so it was the the problem was the board and commission manual was out of date with some things, including it didn't have working groups in it. So they've been added now to the board and commission manual.

Well, I just read it, and they're not.

Well, they should find the

most recent version because I

I read the one that's published. Okay. On the website.

And also

I don't think that the board of commit unfortunately, I don't think board of commission manual is one of the things that's out on the county website. I think it's been given to so you probably might have gotten one

I have.

As being a member of this.

Not up to date. Right. And then they sent me the Yeah. The stuff that's quote up to date, and it's still it's great. And let

me check because, also, internally, Jackie Salazar is now kinda specific to boards and commissions. So maybe she has kind of a repository. So I'll I'll look and

and see. We did go through that. And so I think council is responsible for approving that. And then we did we had a discussion about it, and it was like, oh, I think a lot of times you have discussion, and then it actually it's revised after the meeting. Right? Mhmm. There's the the chair is often delegated. Well, you finish this up because we can't spend another three hours here going over

the changes. So but but my only question was is so we just follow the county council's working group?

Well, no. There should be a there should be there should be a working group.

Boards and commissions working group.

Yeah. Because they didn't we didn't used

to have on there. So I'll look, because I have it printed out. Okay. See what I can find.

Let me give you the the the two kind of end members examples. So there was a a working group that was, like, the working group. Don't if you heard about that one. So that's the one that's given this. Like, well, this is, the the example, like, all working groups should exactly be like this.

So it's a very defined task. You know, it has members from different boards and community members, and then they had to kind of report at the end. Now other working groups like OpenSpace are not like that because they're kind of replacing an activity that was advising parks and rec for certain aspects of their scope because their scope's too big, which is think it's so but your working group here that you're talking about is like, well, that would be kinda finite. It's more like. We'll have more than one working group. You'll have more than one, but the one that's talking about the center is like, well, that's a working group that's gonna meet. You know, you'll report back. And it's not like it has a sunset date. It's like you'll you expect to be done with recommendations. Right.

Maybe it comes back, but it's that's one that's more finite. Right. Other ones are more ongoing, and there's nothing stopping them from being ongoing. And, technically, it's only the so the chairs delegate the authority of, and they would probably discuss it. I think I guess what happens in parks and rec board. Because the chair says, well, we've had these working groups in the past, and I I we wanna continue having them. They're in the work plan. So the the work plan for each board would indicate, well, here's the working groups we have, and you would just list them. And and you can list the members from the board that are on them. It's not necessary to mention the members of the public, but it's really it's to help the board do their work.

Right? So in the case this case, whatever whatever working groups you want to have, based on the chair, you could say, yeah. We wanna do this. And, like, inclusivity set up, I think, like, a dozen.

Yeah. They

figured, well, this is too many. That's over. We only have we only have seven members, and then, like, if we're doing all this, we won't be able to we can't have that many. Again, but they're just trying to identify everything that was important. And so that's good, but then you can't so they have to kind of prioritize, which they what they just talked about yesterday. But as you're just getting going with them, I think it's good to have this one sounds great. Whatever else you need to have, you know, you can have. And it's like the parks and rec board example. So it's it's so it's kinda like the chair has this delegated discretion, but they get the input from the board and the public, and they say, yeah. This is something we've had and we wanna continue doing.

Okay. So, hopefully, the and it and eliminates the the additional requirements. So if you make it a subcommittee, then that process is Yeah. More complicated because that has to come back will have to go to the the staff first. Say, we wanna create a subcommittee. The subcommittee basically is like replicating this. It's like we have all the same stuff we have for this. Now with the subcommittee, maybe there are cases where I know. I I have a There are cases where you wanna do that. We will say that.

But it but it's but it's it's probably most cases, it's a working group where people Yeah. You it's like we wanna get more input, we don't wanna create more Admin burden. Requirements Yeah. That aren't necessary. But but the working groups are on the agenda as much as they want. You know? And then, yeah, the whole thing of sunsetting, everything there's there's a lack of permanence to everything at some level. Right? Right. So it's not like you can say it's in perpetuity, and that's why it's like, functionally, when you approve the work plan, you're approving, you know, what the board's doing, including the work groups.

Yeah. So it's not meant to be like they're they end. They sunset. Some of them are intentionally like like, the bailing twine one was like, well, we want to have we wanna have a report back in three months kind of thing, which is the other. Like so but that's not what that isn't the level that isn't all that public engagement is.

Right? So you can't say that it's like that. And there was a lot of confusion about the but there should be there should be a manual that has it in it. And then the idea was, well you know, because it was put out. It's like, we wanna get if there are still problems with the way it's set up in there, you should let, well, let me know because I'm gonna be your liaisons. Like, if this isn't working Yeah. For us, this is why it's not working. Yeah. Or this is clear now. That'd be good input too. We don't need to revise it. Okay.

So My impression on reading it when we went through this whole thing with Parks of Recreation was it's left intentionally big so that it's pretty much a working group can define what it wants to be. And then we we have some guardrails on this. You know? But What's fine with that?

Let's find and see what it says on there because it was it was the the chair, basically. Yeah. So this service means, like, well, any group of people could, like, get together that, like, you know, sugar and cream Right. And say, we wanna provide some input to the health council. Mhmm. We're really concerned about this. So anybody could do that and then show up at the meeting or send you a letter and say they want it. So there there's there's that. Anybody could do that. This is just what we're recognizing is that the board says, well, we want Mhmm. Input on this topic, and we wanna make sure you're on our agenda as opposed to anybody can come in and say Anything. Anything we would want. It's a cost. It's free speech. You know?

It's like you can come in, and you can associate it wherever you want versus then the board has to be appointed by the council when you report the council. And then if you create a subcommittee, the interpretation is that the subcommittee then is basically exactly like the board in terms of, like no. It's no longer it's it's a it it's an input. You know, it's a formalized input. It's still input, but it's not Right. It's not people just getting together and free associating and doing whatever they want.

I I think that's why we stay with the working group because it it's gonna touch other entities besides just social services or just social services slash health council. But we certainly are in a place that we we just need the shopping list. You know? We just need the input of where are we trying to go, what are where we're trying to get to. With the health council having, I think, a monthly reality that virtually that it touches so many things that we have to all collaborate, not siloed out.

Because we're too small, first of all. I think the other thing the work group will do, I know, is we'll start to look at best practices in other communities, similar size, greater, whatever. What has worked? How did this you know, how did you get started with this? Because it's, again, no no need to reinvent the wheel. There are people out there, communities out there that have done really good jobs of this. And so we just need to figure out what's best practices, how do we work it to fit Los Alamos, and then now how do we you know, who's missing at the table. Yeah. And we plan to put this on a pretty fast timeline. I think everybody's pretty committed to come back with at least something by the summer, you know, even if it's work in progress or here it is.

Let's go. Because everybody in this room knows that things are going to change. I mean, budgets are changing. CDC moments are changing. Feds are know, everything's changing. So the quicker we can kinda get our debts in a row, think the better off, it's gonna be the service community.

So alright. Thank you for

all that clarification. That was great and

great questions. That's where the the idea for action center came up when I first started looking at what other communities have. It was either Brooklyn or Queens, but one of them, they call it, like, the Brooklyn Action Center. And I was like, I like that. It's like where you go. You get things done in your community action center. So It's

a positive moment.

Yeah. I love it. So last thing on the agenda. But before I get to it, Stephanie, do you wanna just say hi and give a quick shout out? I I saw you joined.

Oh, we can't hear you.

There we go. Drop the mic.

Afternoon. Good to see you.

Apologies. I missed the introductions. I was hearing about the mental health scenario that you put out about the youth and absolutely wouldn't mind going out once a month for those hours that you're talking about where you have other agencies going out, sharing the Medicare preventative services, and just being there to meet with folks would be great. So I'll get with you on that. I did miss some of the introductions.

I caught Brandy and and who she's connected with. I sent Leticia a chat message asking what program she's with. But, yeah, I'm a Northeast Region ship. I've been with aging and disability for a year now, and I've gone out to your county, to your senior centers, two open enrollment times already to meet with folks one on one for Medicare navigation, and look forward to building some more participation in your community. I did put my cell number on the chat.

So if anybody has someone with an issue in reference to Medicare and Medicaid, please share the number and have them call me. Los Alamos falls in my region, and I'm here to help folks in my region. Thank you.

Fantastic. And I just wanna say Stephanie gave our office a great training for Jordan, our new older adult case coordinator. But Stephanie's the one who shared the information about the Medicare card scam that we got into the daily post and out on social media maybe a week or two ago. I would a couple of weeks ago, whenever that was. So, again, with good partnership building.

Thank you.

Going. So thank you, Stephanie. Likewise.

Thank you for that.

Last thing on the agenda, I just wanted to maybe have a discussion or brainstorming, trying to plan the next couple of meetings and what everyone can expect. Hoping to have more new members here for the March meeting if we can get those interviews done and get them on the consent agenda for council. But hoping to put at the March meeting, I've done this around this time last year, but me giving a presentation on what social services covers and what the health council covers. There's obviously some overlap there. What the different funding streams look like, what the Department of Health deliverables look like for health councils.

But I I think it's a good presentation to kinda have everybody have the same framework for particularly what what social services does. I literally we literally today right right before I came over here, got a call from somebody who thought I was the right person to talk to. She had some questions about Medicaid, and I was like, we are the right people for you to talk to. And she's coming in tomorrow for her first appointment as a new client, but she was like, I don't even know where you're located. I And was like, we get that all the time. So if

that's okay with everyone,

you know, we'll still do the member roundtable, but then I'll give that presentation. We'll get everyone on the same page. And then there's been an initiative to get all of the boards and commissions to meet annually with the county legal staff. They have a presentation on kind of code of conduct for boards and commissions, what's I was gonna say what's kosher, what's allowed, what's, you know, permissible? How all the boards and commissions work? I know some is in that manual, but if you're like me, you read a you know, you get a manual and you're like, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But that you know, how did are you allowed to talk to the press? How do you represent yourself? Were you gonna jump in with that? No. Okay. I was like, oh, anticipating the hand raise. No.

And so Katie Twates is one of the county legal. I work closely with her on a couple of other things. She offered to come to the April meeting and give an overview for that, again, kinda getting everyone on the same page. And then we had received a message from Rachel Light, a community member who has done a lot of work with youth and mental health and bullying in particular. She had offered to do a presentation.

I know we've talked a lot about youth mental health, so I was gonna slot her in for the May meeting to, you know, give back to kind of our standard, like, learning presentation, thirty or forty five minutes with time for q and a, to see if she would be interested in coming in May for that. Any other ideas, suggestions? We'd have kind of our regular agenda and time for

I think January to be added onto the agenda starting in March is these working groups. Working group. But this have to give some time to that because, for sure, we're doing the one. I think there's one or two others that other board members have measured that they would like to see us address. And we really I think we all wanna try to keep this to the hour and a half. You know? So we have to be careful with.

I've suggested giving the staff update via a written report that when I send out all the other materials that I mean, I do not need to take fifteen minutes in every meeting, but to give that written report to kinda help save you.

When we invite speakers, I think it's fair to ask them to keep it, you know, under thirty. Yeah. Because I I get it. And we all wanna broaden our horizons a little bit. But as somebody that's sitting on this thing as the, quote, unquote, vice chair, the list is just pretty severe. I mean All

the stuff to address. Yes.

And I just wanna always be sure we get at least a five minute brain dump that somebody goes, yeah. This is what I'm working on or whatever. So that's just my 2¢. It we're we're gonna start pushing these lines when we get these working group because it's important for them to present. Right. We know what's going on. Yeah. Otherwise, as a board, we might have a clue. I too sense. Yeah. So Lisa's been

pushing me to do a prevention working group. And, honestly, I I mean, I think it's a really good idea, but but I have to tell you my, again, hugest concern is giving out what's going on in this county. Giving and and I don't know if that's a possible job for a working group. I don't know what you'd have.

I would say an outreach and education working group.

No. Not so much that. I want my my directory. I want

a directory. That's what I Like, the directory would be an action. It would be a deliverable under that.

Yeah. Because I I don't know. And and and, you know, I always kinda feel like I'm in the field by myself. I I don't know what what you've been working on in terms of this. I I I don't know what's going on with our direct group. Nothing yet. Nothing yet. Okay. To me, that's more important right now than. To me, that's the number one thing on my list of what we Well,

the directory actually is a huge piece to the shopping list for the Yeah.

Because I think we have, I mean, a little bit of background, what we have and what we need. And I'm gonna tell you don't know what you have. Exactly. Do you want the early childhood one? I've got it. Yeah. Unless you know what you have, it's hard to know what you need. So how do you see that working? That's the I have never I have no idea how to set for this. So so we need to talk

about it in between the next March meeting and then present it me as a working group? Because I think the other deliverable from the comprehensive health plan that would fall under that, we've talked about at least two other, whether they're formal surveys or gathering information from providers Yeah. Regarding what insurance they take, their hours that might be part of the directory.

Yeah. And I I think you first have to start out just globally with what's here.

So I think, like, there's a series of deliverables that would meet our comprehensive health plan goals that, like, again, right, maybe there's a working group of other community members that will help us

accomplish that. Like you. Like, I didn't know you were here. Now I know you're here. But you know what I net. Yeah. Baby net and Yeah. J. J. And, you know, I mean, local necessities. It'd be really nice to

have a list. Some on that list. Yeah. This is for parents who are new to parenting or new to the community. Yeah. So it's for young families. And at the same time, there are a lot of resources on there that

But, you know, like, you're talking about overdo it, and you throw out your back. And you can't get up on when you're not, and you don't wanna go to Instacash.

I think that might be a really great working group to pull other folks in to help.

Yeah. And I think as much as I'm into prevention, I totally am. I think this is more pressing, honestly. Well, I think it's the same thing. I mean, in

many ways, it's information is the most powerful thing we're gonna be able to do for anybody. Exactly. It's just help open doors to information.

The And and I think this helps all the, whatever you wanna call them, the providers because, you know, if there are tree in the forest and you fall down, nobody hears you. You make a sound. You know? So if you're here, it's bad illness, but I'm an imparent,

and I'm too busy. So maybe there's a is there a staff person at the county that actually collects all this information? I mean, it seems like there would be because So

can I say?

I have wanted a guy like that for the past decade at the community do a

Working group. Thank you.

I like to on the screen too.

Scheduled to do that, and I talked to lots of different people, and no one wanted to be responsible for it because they have liability concerns about offering a resource and people thinking it's a referral. And then

working is endorsed by the county.

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. And I and I look at it. That's thing. Just paid, but, you know, I don't know.

I is not

that practiced for thirty years and got sued several times. You know, you just have to learn a little And if you run your life going, I'm gonna do this so I won't get sued, guess what? You're not gonna do anything because you can sue anybody for anything. So I don't

So There's no county staff

person.

There are ways of getting this done. Right? I mean, social services can provide some admin at the community services department, you know, the department that social services is under. We have a great person, Mia Casados, who does a lot of the social media. She pulls together all the information for the The Activity guide. The quarterly activity. Yes. I was like, what? The book. Oh, the quarterly activity guide.

And that's across, like, parks and rec items. It's not a provider directory, but she could probably help us replicate the the forms we send out, people fill in when activities are coming up, how she puts it all together, how it gets printed, how it gets put online. Mean, I we don't have to, like, recreate the wheel. Yeah. Yeah. But you need consolidate. Bandwidth to gather all the information.

Well, community members submit to the activity guide too.

Yep. Like, all of our you know, Family Strengths submits the gingerbread house competition. You know, like, everybody submits all of their stuff.

So do service providers have to have a business license, or they're supposed to have a business license?

Oh, do need part of this directory?

It'd be on the county to operate it.

Yeah. See, that's something.

I don't know. So CDD would have they have listed, like, everybody, but you don't want forget how many thousands. There's more business licenses you imagine for her in the county.

Because there are

because there's some somebody just get one for, like Yeah. You know, you're doing in consulting or whatever reason they get

You just throw out c CBDs.

CBDs. Development department has who everybody that gets gets a business license. Yeah. In the county, that's even so people that aren't here, they get a business license to do business in the county.

So I'm not sure who that is currently. It was Janice Krish.

And she still may have some.

But she may still have some. So, like, right. As a as a working group, again, we could just

start figuring out who

the information, figure out how without having to be the referral issue. Right? Just here's what's available.

Right. And it

should be at some level

Filterable by by stoppage.

Just like the, you know, the parks and

The chamber may have something. Just Well, it's between the chamber and Okay.

Yeah. The county. But Yeah. Because everybody my people that work here may or may not have a business license.

Right? They don't know. Right.

There's nobody checking. Right? Right.

So it's an easy thing to not

I guess we have to develop rules for it.

You can. They didn't so Carrie involved in a lawyer who wrote a little thing at the top of the guide for everyone. You're using this at your own risk, essentially. Yeah. And use your best Judgement. Judgment.

I would

think the hospital is Because I

don't want any a busted car.

This isn't Not wearing gloves. She may not want to

use them. So midwife. The doula doesn't wear gloves. She would be at

the hospital. Would be at the hospital. Be the

just our availability. So Well

Well, let's talk about how we can get this into workers, and then Walter comes in and list of

what you're trying to get to. Let's figure out who probably already has at least some of that information. And it's a it's a reason really I mean, if the county doesn't have this, this is a valuable tool to them as well. You know? As to the chain as to the LACBC area. The Albany White House. Every yeah. Everybody asks for the same thing.

But, I

mean, we get calls from adult children whose parents are living here asking for resources that they're not here to

get their parents to a medical appointment. Like, who's and I

can't tell them to go to Manham or you know, we we can't direct that.

So What's we can send? Here's the doc Here's

the document. Talk talk with your loved one

and find what fits you best.

This is who you can call. And then it's a I mean, it's self fluid. You know, when a doctor has a full practice one day and then maybe six months later, they have Right. But that just We can't be responsible

for You would have to call to Yeah. And then

this is awesome. You guys

were getting started with the comprehensive health plan. Now I'll just lay it

on the agenda for next week just to help us understand where how

So maybe we could I'm so excited. Yeah. Because I think you guys schedule as much busier than my schedule.

As I've put in multiple, multiple emails, coffee is my love language. I will meet for coffee. Like Yes.

She does.

It it's true. $5.05 a gallon. So Yeah.

Awesome. I I think of of the three of us, I am. I thought when I was my schedule's the most I

made a note. I'll reach out.

We'll get some So anything else before we At

your other weekend. And I will try as hard as I can.

Let me check-in.

Patricia, anything from you or Joyce, anything before we leave?

I don't have anything at this time. Thank you.

Thank you. Well, thanks everyone

for joining. I hope you do. I'm sorry, Paul.

Thank you all.

Thanks. Thanks. Good to see everybody.