Disability Advisory Committee - Regular Meeting

Good evening. Welcome to the Disability Advisory Committee meeting for the City of Charlestown. Today is Monday, July 13th. We are at 5 o'clock p.m. Let's begin with the Pledge of Allegiance. We are being live streamed by Under Production Multimedia. Alright, now let's do it.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you. Let the record show that all committee members are present with the exception of Cindy Perkins. We have an agenda that's been provided by our secretary, Andrea Frazier. Let's get a motion to approve. I'll motion to approve. And second?

I'll second.

All right, all in favor say aye. Aye. Any nays? Okay, motion approved. All right, let's see. Standing business, let's get an approval for the prior meeting minutes for May the 18th, 2026. Can I get a motion to approve? I'll approve. And can I get a second?

I'll second.

All right. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Motion approved.

And I need to abstain.

Yes, you do. Yep. Yep. Sorry about that.

That's okay.

I should have said that because I have that in my notes that you were not here last time.

Alright, does anybody have a copy of the signature page ready?

Alright, well we'll pass that around afterwards and get that taken care of. Okay, O Business, are there any updates that we need to talk about?

Anybody have anything that they want to discuss? Well, I'll just mention that Okay, I'm sorry. I forgot that name. Brian, Trayva contacted Brian. Brian contacted me. He needed my list of resources by July 2nd or 3rd, so I had to go ahead and put something together, and he's put it on our landing page on the city. Okay. On the Disability Committee's landing page.

Okay.

on the city website, I'm sorry. All right, that would sound good. And it's also gonna be on the September's city, I'm sorry, I'm not doing good today, newsletter.

Newsletter, it goes out with the sewer? Yes, yes.

Okay. So I just wanted to say that.

All right, thank you. Okay, anybody else? All right. Any upcoming events that we have that we need to talk about? You may know of anything that we are? Do you need to give any opinions more on that? No, nothing? Well, that was very simple. Okay, well then let's move on over to the new business. Mayor Treva is going to talk to us a little bit about the Little League facility. Do you want to come on up?

Hello, thank you all for being here. I will say that on upcoming events, we do, I don't think you, you won't have a meeting before this, but the commons grand opening is scheduled for the 28th of August. That coincides with the food truck challenge. So there may still be some small pieces that we're waiting on a delay of some of the equipment. There may not be all of the benches and stuff in place yet, because there have been some shipping delays, but we did not want to delay the opening of the space any longer. So that will be happening on the 28th. And with that in mind, of course, we expect a larger crowd. So we will talk to ICE, figuring about using their parking lot for additional handicapping. We will have a block up here on the square for that as well, for accessible parking. The thing that I wanted to talk to you about tonight is the Little League renovation. Those of you who have used the Little League are familiar, are aware that we've been trying to do this for a few years. We've done everything from get concepts for a complete renovation, as in scrap everything and realign the fields and do everything. Unfortunately, that falls outside of our city's bonding ability and the amount to be able to do that scale of a project. We've chased multiple grants throughout the years and have not been successful in either identifying qualifying ones or landing the grants. And so I asked the Redevelopment Commission a while back if they would consider moving forward because it falls just outside the TIF, but would benefit the TIF district. We have numbers for Little League now that show that anywhere from 450 to 500 kids sign up every year for that. They found it was within the scope of their ability to do that. So what they're going to do is do a simple, just a basic renovation. They're not going to realign the fields. They're going to redo the fields where they are and add another large field. But a part of that will also be tearing down the existing, the existing sorry the word wouldn't come, and redoing the bathrooms. Because if you've been to that facility, you know that the bathrooms in particular are horrible. They're not ADA compliant, they're a mess, they're a nightmare. So that all will be part of this renovation. The process for this is going through a build, operate, transfer agreement. And the city has issued, the Renewal Make Commission has issued the request for qualifications on that project. And so we're waiting for those responses. When those responses come in, the committee that's been identified to rank those responses includes myself, Chuck Deaton for the Redevelopment Commission, and our council president, Brian Hester. The three of us will review the responses to the request for proposal. We have a scoring metric that we use to rank features of it based on what they respond. My request for you tonight is that you identify no more than two members of this group that would also be willing to work with us on that stage, but more importantly, to work with the committee once that, whoever is awarded that scoping period, to work with them a little more closely on the design to ensure that we are thinking through accessibility features as well. not only for children but for adults who may also use the facility. I do not know if it will be within the budget to have a completely accessible field. You know, the, what do they call the, there's a name for that league and I can't think of it right now.

The Miracle League?

Yes, the Miracle League. I don't know if it will be within the scope of the project to be able to afford a field like that. However, there are certainly ways that we can improve the overall accessibility of that park. So that's my request for you tonight is that you guys nominate, volunteer, whatever, pick at least two of you who would be willing to engage with us in that process. It shouldn't require too much extra work. It'll be a simple matter of meeting with myself and the council members that are assigned to the committee to go over things. And then when we get to the design to have at least kind of like we did with the commons where I send it to you and you can provide feedback, but it may require a couple more weeks. I didn't want to have to stress it for the whole board, but to have two members that can participate in that would be very helpful. So that's my ask of you tonight.

Okay, sounds good. Thank you. If anybody wants to volunteer for that, if you want to just let me know at the end of the meeting and then we'll go from there on if we have more than two people that are interested and then we'll See how that works. Everybody good with that?

Is there a timeline for this?

I don't remember the exact date that the request for proposals are due, but it will be within the next couple of months. They usually give 45 to 60 days on others. So when they come in, I would be touching out. I would be reaching out to someone or whoever and saying, hey, we have these who would like to meet with us. to look at what's been submitted to get feedback there. But specifically for the design, that would be happening over the fall and winter. Their goal is to have this project funded and ready to go and design by the time that the Little League season ends in 2027, and that is usually the 1st of June, because the goal would be for them to break ground immediately as soon as it's over and get it done before the next season begins in February of 28. Thank you.

Did anybody else have any other questions regarding that or regarding the two members that they're requesting? Any additional items that we need to talk about for new business? I think that the next meeting is scheduled for September the 14th. Has everybody got that on their calendars at this time, 5 p.m.? Yes. Okay. If we do not have any additional items that we need to discuss, we can call for a motion to adjourn. I'll motion. Okay. Second motion? I'll second. Second. All right. All in favor say aye. Aye. All right. Motion is approved. Meeting is adjourned at 5.11 p.m.