Community Services and Youth Committee - Regular Meeting

Play the recording.

Pursuant to the city council rules of procedure in order of business resolution, the members of all boards and commissions and the public are reminded that they must preserve order and decorum throughout the meeting. In that regard, members of the boards and commissions and the public are advised that any delay or disruption in the proceedings or a refusal to obey the orders of the board or commission where the presiding officer constitutes a violation of these rules. The City of Riverside is committed to fostering a workplace that provides dignity, respect, and civility to our employees, customers, and the public they serve.

Good evening. We'd like to welcome you to the Commission on Disabilities meeting. Please stand if you are able for the pledge of allegiance. We will now take attendance.

Commissioner Trim? Present. Commissioner Stewart? Commissioner Dunston?

Here.

Commissioner Dryan Segala? Commissioner Tarmo? Here. Commissioner Lee? Here. Commissioner Crick?

Oh, he's out.

Commissioner Cleary?

Present.

Commissioner Peregrino? Here. Commissioner Rand? Here. And commissioner Beltran? Present. We have quorum. We

will now move on to item number one, election of officers.

Just as a reminder, this item is open to anyone. This is our annual reelection for the officer chairs.

So I'll volunteer to be the chair.

I'll volunteer to be vice chair.

And Leah also said she was willing to be chair, I wanted to

say that on her behalf.

I would also put my hat in the ring for vice chair.

I'm sorry, commissioner. Your last name?

Beltran. Okay.

Are those the only nominations so far, or do you guys wanna continue? Okay. We'll start with a chair first.

Alright. We're gonna do a hand vote. So how we're gonna do this is we're gonna have everyone vote once for each position. So you all each have one vote for vice chair and the one vote for chair since we have two candidates for each chair. Okay. So could I please have a vote for commissioner Tarmo for chair?

I see one, two, three, four, five, six. I have six votes for Tarmo and then could I see a vote for commissioner Stewart for chair?

I see two. Okay. So the commissioner, You are the chair. Alright. Now for our vice chair, if I could please see hands for commissioner for vice chair. I see 12345678. Okay. I see eight. And then if I could see raise of hands for commissioner Beltran, also for vice chair. I see one. Okay. Congratulations. Commissioner Clear, you are now the vice chair.

And

then if I could have you guys switch seats. So commissioner, you'll be sitting right here in the chair seat and then commissioner, you'll be sitting right there.

Yes.

I can manage to flub that up. Will now whoops, am I on? Yeah, it's on. We will now proceed with public comment. Staff, please play the recording.

Public comment is now open for this item. Call (951) 826-8688 and follow the prompts to access the meeting. To request to speak, press 9. When called to speak, press 6 to unmute. You can also join via Zoom. The meeting ID can be found on the agenda.

Do we have any comments from members of the public?

We do have one member of the public, yes. May start when you're ready.

Can you hear me okay? Because

it would

be additional ADA time for my speech. So instead of the typical three minutes, may I be permitted to have six minutes? Thank you. Okay. Yes, thank you.

Okay. All

right, thank you. Well, good evening chairs And also vice chair, congratulations to you as well. My name is Kevin. I am deaf and disabled. I live in Riverside.

I am in Section 6. I moved here from Washington DC, and I was in San Diego. And I went to a local university. I studied in business, and I've been serving in public service for twenty eight years. And I'm here to propose to all of you a formal request for the city to set up an office of deaf and disabled support.

There's a letter that's been given, a draft, and you can modify that however you see fit. And that letter would be sent to the mayor, and that it would be a specific request that could be added into the into the, the next year's budget. So I'd like to have that. I'd like to set up an office for deaf and disabled support. I know that that we might be discussing later today and you might be more expanding on why that office is needed, and you might make those points already.

But if you look at number two of strategic priorities, if you look at number two, it discup it discusses about that. I know that'll be later in our meeting tonight. But if you'll please consider looking at that draft and make a decision if you could accept that letter, vote on it to then be sent to the mayor and to the city manager. And, again, that is up up to you. So I propose that, and there's some reasons why.

Now for my public comment, I wanted to ask you again to please consider this as an opportunity. We can read the work plan, and we can have an opportunity to review the budget. We already have line items for the office of stability and the office, there's a system, and then you can also see that that that our city government can well, we can be represented in our city government. So we were asking you to tell the mayor what we're wanting instead of the department just always putting in what they want, but to have one center for the whole city services, for all city services, for whatever is needed. You're to and to help every person that has disabilities.

We are professional people who make things happen, and you can also make things happen with us. So let's make it happen together. It's very simple. So I know there'll be discussion of ideas, and there will be strategies about that. And so we'll be discussing a work plan.

Thank you for the opportunity to hear my public comment, and I'll see you later during the strategic planning section.

Thank you very much.

I'm looking at number five. Yeah. When we're looking at number five. Yes. Thank you.

Do we have any other comments from the audience, from the public? Okay are we going on to number three now?

No callers online, no participants in chambers.

Callers? Are we going on to number three? Okay. Receive a presentation from Riverside pickleball.

Unfortunately they weren't able come out today so we'll probably see them at our next meeting.

We will now move on to the consent calendar. Do we have a motion to approve?

I second it.

Okay. I'm gonna take the voting. Commissioner Trim? Commissioner Dunston?

Yes.

Commissioner Rand? Yes. Commissioner Dryan Sagala? Yes. Commissioner Tarmel?

Yes. Commissioner Lee?

Yes.

Commissioner Cleary?

Yes.

Commissioner Beltran? Yes. Commissioner Pellegrino? Yes. Motion passes.

No callers online. No participants in chambers.

I'd like to ask our audience member if he was interested in doing a public comment for item number five, the annual work plan.

Hey. Looking at number five, there's a I do have a public comment for number five. So, again, thank you chair. Thank you vice chair. And, again, congratulations, and thank all of you for your service and for people who are disabled. Again, my name is Kevin. I'm in Ward 6. I am deaf and disabled living in Ward 6, and I'm advocating for their needs for public health and services. I've been in that services for twenty eight years for the federal government. I've worked for the state.

I've worked for the county in many, many different capacities. I graduated with a, I graduated from a, you know, local university, and I've been serving people here. So looking at number five, a work plan. And there's let's see here. So we have five points that are listed here, and I wanna look specifically at number two.

So if we could pull up number two on the work plan, I wanna make sure that you have a copy of that in front of you. So the the point of number two is inviting various city departments to come present on the topics of interest to the committee the commission to have conversations to promote city programs and to serve disabled people, and it would be by Riverside Connect. So I'm I'm reading number two to you. I wanna be sure you have that in front of you. Now realize I'm mentioning that Riverside already has an office of sustainability, and we already have that for the city.

But I'm wondering how many of you have ever heard of the office of stability. Are you guys even aware that we have that office? There's a lot of big changes that they've been doing to improve the city when it comes to accessibility and encouraging, looking at green energy. I mean, there's such a variety of things that they're doing, health conferences, networking, mobilization, etcetera. They hire staff.

There's different programs that that that they that they've put off that are very, very successful and very powerful. So I asked them how was that office set up? There's so many cities in need who don't have it. And he said simple. We asked the city commission who asked the city manager for money to put a line item in their annual budget.

And I thought, that's it? I was actually very surprised to see how successful they are and to think that that's all that it took. So we're looking search at number two. So I'm making a formal request to the commission that you would send this draft letter that I've written for you, sending it if I want once it's voted and passed as part of your work plan to send it to the mayor of the city and then the city manager to put a line item in the budget to set up an office of deaf and disabled support. Chicago has it and it's been very it's been a very successful office.

They have an incredible model there. For example, there are a lot of conflicts happening between the citizens with disability who are deaf and the police department. If a police comes and they're trying to resolve conflict with a deaf individual, they want to try and keep peace but how do they know how to get an interpreter? Sometimes they have to wait three hours for the interpreter to finally get there to really have one in person. So thinking so what Chicago did was they automatically had all the police realizing they have a person who's disabled or a person who is deaf.

They automatically know the accommodation that's needed. The department has done intense training with them so they know what to do when they're ready. The office is making it happen and this office has been very successful. Imagine if the police is trying to speak with a deaf individual and they're trying like this tablet. We have this interpreter up here on this TV screen.

Imagine a police having a tablet there with a screen that has an interpreter to make sure that the dispute can be resolved. So maybe they won't even have to go to jail or have to be arrested at that point and do the whole runaround, but the accommodation is right there immediately. It's been very successful, and we've seen it done well in Chicago. So the person who runs it is a deaf lawyer. So he is very, very brilliant in his field, he's made it all work.

When there are people who have been sued or just different things that have happened, as we've seen that there has been peacekeeping in the city services, and I know Riverside could do the same. So imagine you have an office and and you vote for this and we have if you if you were to vote for this office and that ADA would be available every time there was something that was needed that the city was provided, immediately, there would be an ADA accommodation right there for them. Imagine that. The city people people who work in the city would already know what to do, almost like in house services. So in this letter that I wrote, how to provide access and opportunities to receive funding because there are resources out there that at the state and federal level for funding to help pay for some of these accommodations that are necessary.

And it is imagine that the oh, the interpreter cannot see him any longer, and so I'm not sure what he's saying. My screen has been moved to his seeing him from the back of the room. So if we wanna hold, I can't see him any longer.

Unfortunately, that okay. Unfortunately, that is time. So thank you very much, Kevin.

The interpreter cannot see him.

Oh. So

I'm letting him know that I cannot see him. I can only see from the back.

Oh, I'm sorry, Kevin. Unfortunately, that that that is time, but thank you very much.

Is there any discussion on item number five? Yeah. But does anybody have any comment? No. Yours is not working.

No. I'll go over here. Alright. Thank you. Sorry about that.

It's on. It's on. Okay.

It's on. So is this a draft or is this a final version?

I think it's a draft.

Okay. So are we open to offering ideas of just some of the wording in this draft? Yeah.

So, this is an opportunity for everyone else on the commission to provide input. So, this draft was put together by the ad hoc committee. So, if you guys choose to move forward with this, then this would be the finalized version if you guys were to vote and approve it as is.

There are some words or ways I would like to maybe clarify and tighten it up a little bit. Going this way. Alright. In the opening statement, the mission of the Commission on Disabilities is to promote greater and I would insert the word safety and awareness and no need for the word of, and total and rather than the word total put full participation of individuals with disabilities in all aspects of life including employment, housing, socialization, education and I like the idea of being a little more specific.

I'd like to clarify that the mission statement technically can't be changed since it is part of the bylaws, but we can look into that.

Okay. Okay. Then the rest of I can't?

Yes. Yes. So one to five is what we're focusing on for today.

Starting with number one.

Okay. So number one, I didn't have any notes. Number two, invite various city departments to present on topics of interest to the commission on disabilities to facilitate conversations and promote city programs that serve and protect people with disabilities in our community.

To serve and

serve and protect.

Lisa. Hey, excuse me. Where were you at in the pamphlet?

Said they

I no longer

have that. Oh.

I think I got my Five

pages from the back.

Okay.

It's yeah.

I don't think I have that packet any longer. I think it got oh.

I don't know.

This it?

Yeah. That's

it. Thank

you. For the annual work plan?

Yeah. It says 2026 annual work plan. Does everybody have that?

No, I found it. Thank you.

Okay. And she her comment was, number one, to leave it as is. Number two, she added the words to serve and protect. Right?

Mhmm. People within the disabled community.

Number two it's

after

the word serve

people within the disability community.

We can't leave it as the disabled community such as Riverside Connect. Programs that serve and protect the disabled, can we leave that?

Serve. For me the big issue is the word protect being added in there. Why

are the words Riverside Connect in there? I'm sorry.

I missed that in the past. I don't remember why we put that

in I don't know why it's there. I

think it makes more sense to just say community.

Community. Community. Period. Yeah. Yeah. That

could have been from another article.

You guys are okay with it saying programs that serve and protect the disabled community?

Pardon me?

Yeah. Programs that serve and protect the disabled community.

Period. Got it.

And then number three, engage with community members. You don't need the word the. Engage with community members, and then being a little more specific, of all ages, comma abilities and socioeconomic status to identify barriers that are faced and formulated.

Okay wait I need to write a stock. Okay

Could you repeat that please? Engage with, scratch the, community members of all ages, comma, abilities and socioeconomic status to identify barriers that are faced and formulate possible resolutions.

Formulate possible resolutions? Read the whole thing back to me so I can make sure I've got all the words.

Engage with community members of all ages, comma, abilities, and socioeconomic status to identify barriers that are faced and formulate possible resolutions. Or you could use the word action plan.

Did everybody get that? Do we have any comments? Are we okay on number three?

I think we're okay.

And then on number four, this is just my idea, and I'm stealing a bit. But I said create an office of disability with staff within the city of Riverside to coordinate services for people with disabilities.

Okay.

Don't think that

Daisy, what? We would have to look into that

process of an office and we'll come back with an answer.

Okay.

Can we get back to it at the next meeting? Okay.

Okay.

And number five, what do we think?

No changes.

No changes on number five. And number four, she'll get back to us at the next meeting.

Yeah. I would

Well.

If this is an action plan able to have another item that's just specifically focused on ensuring working within the business community to ensure employment of people with disabilities. And I didn't see that on there, but I don't know what people thought about that.

Any comments?

Do you mean like an outreach to the business community? Because I don't know how else we would work with the business community in Greater Riverside without first coming out with an outreach plan to do so.

You may very well be right that it needs, there is the mission statement and then there's the objectives and how to do it. But I would love to see the business community invited in to our meetings so we could hear what they might have planned or what's working or what we could do to ensure more than I think I think it's like 20% or less is not fully employed.

Mhmm.

I mean, I know that I've told a couple of local businesses about how they can work with regional I do have my mic on. I've told a couple of local businesses about, like, coffee court over here, which I know is now shut down, but a a couple of different businesses about how they can work with Regional Center about bringing staff in that is supported. And Regional Center will bring staff and support to and it's a whole program. And yet, they had no idea. I had only found out and it's literally what I do.

And I only found out from Girl Scouts. I found out from Yucaipa. But Yeah. Yeah. Regional center does it. So that

Fred can call Mhmm. Set it up?

Yeah. We can probably find out who in regional center brings that out, they have whole programs that they will bring supportive staff and set it up with businesses. Businesses just have to be interested in able to bring the people in. In

that case, give Fred the information so he can call.

Yeah. Know. I know.

Okay. Any other comments? So

I

just wanted to make a comment about that. I think it's extremely important. It's something that I work on on a daily basis trying to bring the businesses in, right? Because of course we see just a lot of people being left unemployed. It definitely does mean I think a further action plan because just in the time that I've been doing it it is a bit of a struggle with the businesses and in the community. So I think it's something that definitely should be focused on but needs more time to develop.

I I very much appreciate it, and I don't claim to you know this better than I do, but if I'm looking at what we're going to work on, I go I think about what are unmet needs in our community that we might want to highlight so that they're developed. The other one is housing. And there wasn't a mention here on housing. Housing is not just mentally ill, it's people with disabilities who have difficulty obtaining appropriate Yeah, I wasn't there as part of it. So, you know, I I appreciate you guys. You did the legwork on this very, very much. But I just don't know what what is we could do and put in a work plan.

So Maybe we have to be a little more specific. Maybe we have to be a little bit more inclusive.

Anybody else have any thoughts? Yeah.

On that one, you know, I there's definitely the the piece of evaluate know, helping those programming in the city, but we can also look specifically at how the city of Riverside is doing its hiring and its inclusivity and maybe focus on that as a first step about how it's going at this level and then move on to some of the other levels.

So do we need someone in here from their personnel office to explain that to us?

Very quickly. Kevin, we are past public comment for this item. So, unfortunately, you can't provide any more input for this item. But, you're more welcome to provide a a public comment for the next item. Thank you. Could you please repeat your question?

Well, the question come up is, what is the city of Riverside doing for people with various disabilities? What are their hiring practices and training practices? So maybe we need to get someone in here from the personnel office or resource office, whatever they call it and explain that to us.

Sure. We can look into getting a presentation from human resources specifically Okay. The recruiting

Yes. That would be great.

Okay. There was a second one I wanted to look at at the facility visits. I want to expand that a little bit to tour various city facilities, parks and outdoor attractions to ensure physical accessibility and evaluate the inclusivity of on-site programming, services and digital resources so that we're looking multiple disabilities in addition to physical disabilities.

I'm sorry, say that.

On number five. Yeah, on the end. And evaluate the inclusivity of on-site programming, programming, services, and and digital resources.

If I'm not mistaken, last month well, not last month, the month prior, you guys had Park and a bill discussion whether you guys were gonna go in person to the parks and all the other facilities. And then one of the other commissioners mentioned that she didn't have the time to go out there and she wanted presentations from the actual department. So it's still up in the air right now. So it's your decision to decide whether you guys want something in person or presentations here in the commission.

I I also think if we're talking about, you know, inclusive programming, that could be done through the the commission meetings.

Okay. Does

it have to be either or? I mean, could we not have a presentations but then also have some folks, you know, few times here.

Having both. It's just your decision is still drafted. So once it's finalized, then we can go ahead and move forward. Okay.

Instead of saying maybe tour, maybe audit various city facilities, parks, and outdoor attractions because that could be both in person or through meeting presentations.

I don't know if audit is a good word to put that because we're not auditors.

What's what's oh, that makes sense. I'm good with any synonym that gives it that general idea. About evaluate. Evaluate.

I would say tour and evaluate so that you ease them into that.

I do wanna bring up that if you guys are gonna tour these facilities, like, it won't be the entire commission because then you'll create quorum. So that's another thing you're gonna have to decide once we finalize this draft who will be attending. Maybe we can do an ad hoc on outreach.

May I suggest that we let there there might be different people on this panel. Does it have to be the same group every single time? Or could we let them know that this facility is open for a tour? Some of us have expertise in certain areas that might be a better fit for certain facilities or tours and we might want to let people choose individually based on the tour.

Yes and we can use that one form that you guys created for events so that way you guys can know who's going to be going where and what location and that way we can also memorialize it into our meeting minutes.

When we go out and do the evaluation, are we gonna have a form or something that's gonna have us look at the same items each time we go out as a comparison rather than just generalizing looking at the bathroom or whatever. Are we gonna be looking for specific areas to have to pay attention to?

That's a good idea. I'm not an expert on that. I would not know what to look for. So I would suggest you guys probably know more better than I do. Come up with some type of a list.

Perhaps that would be the ad hoc committee is coming up with that evaluation system? Correct.

Yes. So I had a parody where everything will be similar and one wouldn't get judged while others wouldn't get judged or not judge. Don't say judged but we're just gonna go out and access.

So we can move forward with the corrections and bring this back next meeting so we can finalize it maybe next meeting? You guys are okay with that? Okay. Then we'll go ahead and agendize it one more time for the next coming up meeting.

We will now move on to item six on the agenda, the resource guide. We will now move on to our communications items. Oh, well that's different. Okay.

Resource guide.

So resource disabilities resource Guide. Yeah, it's here somewhere. I saw it. We have to vote number okay. We're gonna go back to item number five because we have to vote on the changes that we've made.

I'd like to add you can either vote to accept the changes and once those changes are made finalize it. So that would be the final version or we can bring it back next month with the changes.

Okay. So all those in favor of voting to bring this back next meeting to make this a draft? Is that an accurate word?

A second draft?

It's like a second draft

with the changes

draft? With changes

I occurred today.

Okay.

All those in favor of make making the changes that we've made today, the second draft? What? Raise your hands?

Okay.

Making this the final. Okay. We'll bring it back. Okay.

Okay. Can we go on to number six?

Yes.

Okay. We will now move on to item six on the agenda, the resource guide. Any callers or any public comments?

No callers online. No participants in chambers.

So item Okay. Number six, the resource guide, which should be The resource guide I have. Yeah. In my packet it's the last two pages. Right?

Wasn't it that the ad hoc committee was going to change the picture?

Yes. We were looking for a different picture.

We were looking for a different picture. Okay. And don't we've found

wanted to see something different.

Leah wanted to see something different if I'm not mistaken.

Yeah.

Yeah. So the reason I brought this item for discussion just so you guys can kind of talk about or even form an ad hoc committee if you would be interested in reviewing the entire brochure. So this is more for like input on what you guys want to see as far as the pictures go.

Alright. For especially for Nicole, Jennifer, we wrote up this wonderful brochure. And for all of the rest of you, if you would take a look at it and see if there's any comments you 'd like to make, any revisions, any anything that you'd like to add. Okay? It's up for feel free.

I'd like us to add information regarding the Rape Crisis Center as well as alternatives to domestic violence.

Rape Crisis Center?

Yeah. I have a question. Where would we get the pictures that we are gonna think of using?

So, the pictures that we were provided for this brochure were provided by our marketing department. So, they're preapproved. But, we would have to look into using other pictures and check with them if that's okay.

Okay. Because I have a lot of great pictures. If there's somewhere I could submit those of, you know, actual disabled adults in Riverside.

Okay. If you could send those to us and then we could follow-up with marketing and see if they're okay with them. Okay. Another alternative to posting them, we could also probably put it on our webpage.

Also, there is a movement to not use the words mental health as much as behavioral health, so we changed the title to behavioral health.

I'd also like to suggest we add a QR code or an easy way of navigating to a more comprehensive site for resources.

What site would you suggest? Would you suggest the commission website or something like two eleven?

For the commission website, we'd have to build that up at this point. Yes. So currently it'd be something like two eleven, something somebody could access easily that would get them to those resources they might need.

Okay.

The other thing that I think needs to be under behavioral health is the phone number for IEHP's behavioral health systems. Like eighty percent of people in our city have IHP for their health insurance plan.

We had mentioned before that the city services for disabilities were under the department of aging. Do they have a resource area?

I

don't believe we have a department of Aging. That would be with the county. Yeah. That's county.

We used to have a commission on aging.

There's no

commission, but there's not an audit.

That's it. Commission. I'm referring to when we heard from two one one, and they said many of the resources for disability were under the other department. That was the county department they were referring to?

That was the county.

I understand. Thank you.

Under housing, I would clarify with ARC if they want to have their information under housing because I don't think they provide housing.

We were also looking at adding Easterseals under disability resources.

There are some great nonprofits that I just I can tell you what I think should be in here, but it's going to start to get huge. How much information do you wanna That shove in was a

problem that we had when we were building this up.

Emergency sheet and it just has some stuff. I'm happy to share that with you if you wanna take from what's on there. But I worry that it's gonna get big.

I do have a suggestion for that. So we do have a list of resources on the commission web page. So what we could do is we could make an ad hoc for the next meeting to look into maybe updating the web page. We could make an ad hoc just for general outreach material creation.

And then that could be that QR code that we were talking about. Right. QR code to be updated on

that webpage. You

do need to have somebody who's going to update that webpage, though, because funding cuts and what program was there once is not there anymore.

So the web updates would be done by our marketing department and the request would be put in by us.

Fabulous. It's not us.

So we might want to just think of doing a card with essential services with a QR code that leads them to some of the other more comprehensive services That that we're talking would be if that's what we're going to do, that the commission would help add things to. But maybe that is what the committee would talk about is how to do that and perhaps a small QR code.

Right. This pamphlet is lovely, but the more information that we have available is all useful to you.

And unless I'm missing something, I think the big glaring one that really needs to be in here is adult protective services and child protective services. CPS. CPS and adult protective services.

This is gonna be 20 pages. That's the

We have done a comprehensive guide several times, and it it it is book. It is Yeah. It is the size of a book. Yeah. And it is very unwieldy to maintain. It changes quite often.

That's why I asked who was going to keep updating it.

Well a good thing would be since the marketing department handles that if you send them a request, take this one out, add this to it, so on and so forth, it should be fairly easy.

Should be. Yeah.

And again, we might want to just send them to two eleven or the agencies that are keeping that up on a regular basis even though those are county agencies. Maybe something that we're handing out more explains the Commission on Disabilities and what we're doing and then refers them to agencies as far as our materials that we provide to people while we're out.

I have a suggestion. You know how you guys have this brochure and it talks about all the disability programs, all the ones that you have already here? How about including something where it takes them to the QR code for more information like how you requested more facilities or more departments that have all those sources that people might need.

Yes, that's the idea.

So do we want to put together an ad hoc committee to do this right now?

We'd have to make an ad hoc committee specifically for the brochure right now. But if we want to have additional materials created, then we can bring that back for next month.

Alright. So I need some volunteers for the ad hoc committee to revise, add, figure out what we wanna put in the brochure. So I need three volunteers.

I'll volunteer. I've done this before. So

I I will do it as well. But are we locked into a trifold brochure?

Lisa, I'll give you my

We can suggest other options to our marketing department and see what they can work with.

I'll I'll go on the ad hoc committee also.

So it gives us three.

Could I have a raise of hands for everyone that's gonna be on the ad hoc please? Okay perfect. So

you only want three? Can't be four?

Well it can be four.

We can do up to four.

I like to be on.

Okay.

Shelley and Tedra.

Okay so I will need a motion and then a second to approve the ad hoc committee.

I need a motion for the ad hoc committee.

I'll make a motion that we form an ad hoc committee to revise and update our brochure. Second?

I second the motion.

One more thing, we will also need a chair specifically for the ad hoc committee.

Which one of the four of you would like to be the chair?

I think it's

you. Don't all raise your hands

at Yeah. I can do it.

Okay. Lisa, that's it.

My special skill.

Alright. We're gonna go ahead and do a roll call vote. Commissioner Trim? Chair Trim? Oh, sorry. Tarma.

Cheese.

Commissioner Rand?

Yes.

Commissioner Pellegrino?

Yes.

Commissioner Lee? Yes. Commissioner Dunston? Yes. Commissioner Diane Zagala?

Yes.

Vice Chair Cleary? Yes. Commissioner Beltran?

Yes.

Okay, motion passes.

Yeah. You're just gonna have to get them all together.

Yeah. So Yeah.

Okay. And then you have to

can move on to the next item.

Alright. We are now up to item seven, updates of conferences, seminars, and regional meetings. Anybody have any information on any of that?

The

anybody going

conference CBU this week? CBU.

Veterans? I went last year but I wasn't gonna go this year but I went last year. Are you going? Alright. I have class.

What is this specifically?

It's it's a type of therapy?

No. No. It's not therapy. It's a outreach program. They they invited us back this year for just to present about our commission to veterans so this one is about veterans this year and it's also gonna be to students. Last year, it was about teachers of special needs, but this year, it's about veterans.

Gilbert, didn't you come last year? I did. Didn't we go? You and I went.

Yes. I did.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anybody else have any information on any meetings, conferences, seminars coming up?

I wanted to bring up that the Abilities Expo is gonna be in Long Beach here, the March 27 through the twenty ninth, and it coincides with the Abilities Conference. So if anybody's interested in that, they have exhibits, a number of vendors selling items. It is we've been to the conference. It is a good it's going on. Okay.

08:29, I you said, or twenty seven. That one.

It's at the Long Beach Convention Center. It's called the it is a very it's it's big one. It's Abilities Expo.

Oh

yeah, I've been to that. I go to that every year.

Yeah, that's a great one.

Twenty seventh.

Three day event.

Would we get tickets for that?

Have an online registration. I can forward that information to Frederick that he can send to

the group.

That would be great.

But I think the admission is actually free.

Okay. Any updates from the ad hoc from the event ad hoc committee? Yeah. A couple of months ago, I brought up the idea of having some kind of a miniature Special Olympics here in the city of Riverside. And in the process, I found out that the last time this was done was in 1965.

So I I made some phone calls. I called doctor Sorter from the County. I've talked to Fred. I've talked to other people around the city in and around the city, and I have a meeting set up April 8 with Christiana Jamie from Parks and Rec, Tedra and her assistant Laura, Fred, and doctor Sorter, and the city of Temecula. Now why the city of Temecula?

It turns out that they've had a similar event to this for the past fifteen years and we never knew about it. So I'm gonna find out about it and see how we can work that into the city of Riverside. Okay? I never knew about it. I don't think anybody else knew about it either. No. But we're gonna find out about it. How's that?

I did know that the city of Temecula is far more advanced than we are regarding services, particularly for autism. They had a city council person who had a child with autism and a lot of services and things developed out there that we've just never seen yet.

So their event is literally one day and it was a couple of weeks ago. Mhmm. Okay? So and I wasn't able to attend. But I've talked to their special event person, and she's gonna be at the meeting, and it'll all that'll happen on April 16 too. Okay? So just to kind of let you know, we're moving forward.

Mhmm.

How's that? We're moving forward. And, hopefully, this is gonna happen maybe next year.

Oh,

April our next meeting sixteenth at 05:30 in the evening. Oh, good. Well, I'll have a few meetings that day. It's fine. Oh, well.

As long as you're aware.

Okay. Thank god somebody knows. Okay. I'm turning the page. Items for future Commission on Disabilities consideration as requested by the members. Do any of you have any requests that you would like to voice? I do. Yes, you do. Okay.

I would love to have back to Riverside Community College and their programming for people with disabilities. We've talked about that in the past. Any luck with them, Fredrik?

We have a bit of a backlog with presenters. How we're trying to do it moving forward is have one city department and then one outside organization per month. So right now I'm booked until May.

Is it because we can't have two in an evening?

We can have two. So we can have one city department, one outside organization just not to, like, prolong the meeting because each presenter has about anywhere from twenty to thirty minutes.

I got a suggestion I wanna bring up. I recently met a met a new organization called Champions Coffee. It's out in Ward 4. I talked to the guy Adrian to see if he can come and present for us.

What is this organization?

It's a startup business for people with disabilities selling coffee.

K. It's a coffee house or

Just a coffee cart.

Oh, coffee cart. Okay.

Anybody else with any suggestions?

I would really like to have, in my perfect world, a evening devoted to housing issues and people with disabilities. That would be like housing navigators from IEHP to HUD to the city has a housing program.

Do you have someone specific in IHP that can come and present with that? So we can ask the director here for the city, but we don't have I someone for

can find them. I've referred people to them. They contract it seems like they contract out to different nonprofits. But if we can get somebody from IHB who knows all the nonprofits, that makes more sense to me. Okay. If you have that contact I can find it. Over a problem. And then we'll ask

the director for the housing.

Then the other one is the biggest housing organization is HUD.

Anybody else?

I will say that this past month, we I had the opportunity to go to Gable Farms with Gabe. And I gotta say, you wanna see something really great, and it'd be wonderful to have Eric come in here and speak to us about what they're doing there. They're getting ready to open up their farm stand, which is absolutely beautiful location on Victoria. And the gardens are great. They have a good handful of people working there.

And they're keeping people busy. And they're putting out a heck of a product too. And most of the food there goes to food banks. But they are going to open up commercial stand for the public. So if you have a chance to go over and see the place, please do it.

Can you say that again? Is it Gable Farms?

Gable Farms, yes, on Victoria.

And are they hiring people with disabilities to

Mostly volunteers.

No, they're not. It's mostly for volunteers. I take my group there every Wednesday.

We take our students there

too. It's wonderful place.

It is. And

probably the best tasting strawberries I've ever had.

Yeah, it is a nice place. We toured that place last year with I can't think of the name there, commissioner.

Commissioner Cleary, do you have a name for that location? Not not the name of the farm, but, like, a a contact person?

I have his information.

It it's Eric I can send you Okay.

Yeah. U n g e r.

They have a website too.

Okay. Thank you.

Anybody else? If there are no further updates are there any items for future Commission on Disabilities consideration? In that case the next Commission on Disabilities meeting is scheduled for Thursday April 16 and that's at 05:30 and this time Fred's bringing margaritas. And Thank the meeting is adjourned.