the open meeting law requires that I notify the public that this meeting is being recorded therefore please be aware that an audio and visual recording of this meeting is being made by Boston City TV a part of the City of Boston Office of Cable Communications and it is
being broadcast on Xfinity channel 26 RCN channel 13 FiOS channel 962 as well as live streamed on YouTube where the recording will continue to exist and with that I will hand it over
to our board chair Jerry Boyd thank you very much Andrea and welcome uh everyone to the uh April um disability commission advisory board meeting u I'm calling this meeting to
order which is our first item on the agenda and next we'll move on to um introductions um if you could please when when uh introducing yourself if you could please
uh give yourself u just a a brief description uh of yourself to to kind of help the interpreters um that would be great um I'll start my name is Jerry Boyd i am a
white male with salt and pepper hair more more salt and pepper i've been hopeful at this point um and I live in uh West Roxbury and let's kick it off uh
I heard uh uh the Tulsa tones the laughter of Carl um so if you could introduce yourself Carl so my name is Carl Richardson i am a Caucasian male uh middle-aged with uh salt and pepper hair
and I am wearing a marine a maroon excuse me polo shirt and I can I identify as a deaf blind individual and I live in Brighton Massachusetts olivia if you could go next please sure my name's Olivia Richard i'm the
vice chair of the advisory board and I am a middle-aged white woman wearing glasses a black hoodie and headphones uh Paul if you could go next please hi my name is Paul Karen i'm also a
middle-aged white male with salt and pepper hair wearing a white polo shirt i live in the west end of Boston serve on the executive committee of the advisory board which is an honor and a privilege and I serve as a mental health
advocate uh Pette if you could go next please good evening everyone my name is Pette Det i live in the Madan section of Boston i'm a older black woman with gray hair and black glasses and a gray
um police and Elizabeth Dean Clower if you could go next please elizabeth are you are you able to unmute doesn't appear oh wait a minute i think
she she is unmuted now yes go ahead Elizabeth if you can the floor is yours yes great thank you um well I'm Elizabeth Dean Clower i live in Dorchester i'm an advisory board member
and in keeping with a theme you're often hearing "I too have salt and pepper hair i'm a white woman and I'm a power wheelchair user."
And um Wesley could you go next please yes hello my name is Wes Ireland i'm a board member i live in the North End i use American Sign Language i have
two female interpreters who will be interpreting for me and the visual description I am a white man red reddish brown beard and a green polo
shirt thank you and Tara could you go next please hi everyone my name is Tara Lynn Sard i am the secretary of the executive board um I am a middle-aged white woman who's a
little person using a parro wheelchair and I am wearing glasses and a white t-shirt and I'm in a rockberry area and um Juan Carlos could you go next please
[Music] one Carlos see the Yes hi i I couldn't unmute thank you hello everyone uh my name is Juan Carlos i live in Boston South End and I'm a Hispanic male member of the
community i use a power wheelchair because of a spinal cord injury great um let's see i'm not seeing any other um member of the advisory board that I may have
missed did I um do you see any any person Andrea maybe that I'm missing this is Andrea i don't see other any other appointed members of the board i don't know if you want Commissioner Macos to introduce herself but no other appointed members that I see sure uh why
don't we have uh commissioner uh if you're available why don't we have you introduce yourself please thanks Jerry hi everyone my name is Kristen Mccos and I'm the disability commissioner for the city of Austin i am a woman with blonde hair and glasses and city hall is in my
background on the screen and I also use a power wheelchair great um thanks for that thanks for those introductions everyone um next on the agenda is the approval of the March
minutes has an has everyone had a chance to review those and if so do I have anyone that would uh like to make a motion to approve the minutes m Carl I make a motion to approve the minute as as um given to us any seconds
this is Paul i second great um any discussion hearing none we'll move to a vote all in favor say I or raise your hands i I I any nays the motion passes unanimously
um next we'll have a a presentation from the Office of Language and Communications Access uh with Jennifer um I'm not sure how to pronounce your middle name uh your last name is listed as Wong though so if you
could introduce yourself again Jennifer that would be great thank you so much um hi everyone uh my name is Jennifer Vivar Wong and I am a Hispanic woman with dark hair um almost
30 and I am wearing a black sweater and my background is uh just a white um uh wall thank you for having me here today i will go ahead and start presenting my screen um and give me just a second i
know i want to just put for the record I'm not very techsavvy although I should be so bear with me and I apologize for my puppy that might bark in the background um he
is a tiny little dog um so my apologies um so thank you for the introduction i am the director of language and communications access here for the city i have met um some of you in passing um at different events or we have worked
closely together but it's great to formally uh be in this space uh with you all so an introduction about our office we are uh kind of like the baby that came out of the creation of immigrant
advancement and the disability commission so combined we work to ensure that all constituents of Boston regardless of language or communication ability receive the full spectrum of services offered by the city and that
they're able to participate in all that the city has to offer i want to give a little bit of history um just so that you know how we got here um in 2016 there was a
communications access ordinance that passed to create our programs so we were a little program under the Office of Neighborhood Services as the years went by specifically during the pandemic we were
able to um partner with uh great allies in the city council who advocated for the ordinance to be revamped um and so in 2020 that work started in 2021 the ordinance was amended and signed um and
we became an actual standing office uh which was uh incredibly great specifically during that time during COVID where there was a lot of need um for language and communications access uh to be intertwined in everything that
was coming out of that city during that time and then as you see here um on the screen there is a slide that will show that in 2021 we had three FTEEs and then in 2022 we grew to five full-time
employees and currently we have around 12 full-time employees within our office the accommodations that we provide uh are focused mainly on interpretation translation assisted listening devices assisted assisted technology and now
audio and video um accessibility which can include things like uh subtitles captioning audio description voiceovers audio files and much more so who we serve we serve folks who identify as speaking a language other
than English um and persons with disabilities and we work very closely with uh the disability commission uh to put together data which tells us um the amount of residents within Boston who
either self-identify as having a disability or selfidentify as speaking another language other than English at home and we use that to inform the way that we are um providing accessibility throughout the
city i want to put on the screen just an overview of our ORC chart um and so on the screen right now it shows that our we are a full team of uh 12 folks um and the different kind of groups within our
office focus around um administration and finance we hold a lot of the funds related to providing accessibility um for the city we also have what is called a compliance team which is uh the team that works handinhand with departments
to guide their uh accessibility plans when it comes to events or documents or programs and services and then we have our research and data team which also houses our in-house translators um and they work
really on kind of forward thinking being in the know of new um advances within the field uh and helping us move in the right direction there for example things like AI um uh or other kind of
initiatives that happen in the language and communication activate and then we have our training and development team which their main uh mission is to basically take everything that we want to um uh change implement
etc and train the entire city on the new direction or how to acquire accommodations how to provide interpreters um how to use our ondemand services that is their main task um and who is involved so it's our
staff we have liaison which I will get into in the next slide uh of course the departments and their own staff um and that is who we work very closely with to create systemic change within the city uh but most importantly we work with uh Boston community
individuals agencies uh ethnic media as uh strategic partners in this work in addition to that we also have other external partners such as um quasi agencies like the Boston Public Health Commission um the Boston Housing
Authority and other folks that we meet on a monthly basis to align access uh language and communications access across the city we work very closely with our state partners specifically MBTA and the R&B as well as the city
council and then um I also listed here our vendors which are the folks who provide the city with the accommodations um that we need on a day-to-day basis and that includes our vendors that provide interpretation services
translation services ASL and CART services um and other organizations that help us provide cultural um sensitive translation reviews so going back to the liaison piece um we're very special in the sense where
there is a member of every department who's designated as kind of like the point person for language and communications access they are usually uh deputy directors chiefs of staff or managers and they help guide um the
department inform them on updates for from our office but we function a little similar to uh hospitals where we set the vision that everyone in the city is responsible for providing accommodations um and that we would train the entire
city to do so um so that it's something that is a univers a systemic change throughout the city and then within our own department we have what are called specialists and that is for um a full-time member within our office who
has been assigned buckets of departments and they meet with the department's liaison and other team members um with the ultimate goal of creating what we call departmental language and communications access plans which I will
get to later on um so that is them and Jerry I apologize if I am taking too too long don't be afraid to ping me uh but departmental plans um so what is a departmental plan uh that is
and they're up on our website and I'll go to that after but department of plans uh is basically a commitment from the city um to offer accessible services um and that will include vital documents reoccurring programs um essential things like ensuring complaint forms are
accessible uh and uh one of the big things that we did at the beginning of this work is that we did partner with our partners um for example at work inc um to help us with ensuring that all of the departmental plans are screen reader
accessible as well um throughout the process so when we posted them they would be accessible um in that sense i'm going to go ahead and open up this link and hopefully let me know if you can see it
oh it might not load um let me just Andrea do you still see my presentation or is it not showing at all still see it okay I'm going to skip that for now but this is basically what um the uh slides
um go back this is what um on the screen you will see a picture of our website and it just says multilingual departmental plans and then it has these drop downs um that show all the different languages so if you click on
those dropdowns it'll show you all the departmental plans for each department and it would say Boston Police Boston Fire um in each language and you'll be able to read those departmental plans in those designated languages i apologize
that I can't um get the website open that is one of our biggest accomplishments and we're hoping to post another round of departmental plans in the new fiscal year so after July the other uh incredible partnership
work that we do on a regular basis is work with the disability commission as I was mentioning to post uh disability uh demographic data reports which gives the city um uh information that comes from uh the ACA uh the census um it gives uh
it's not the most perfect data there is a lot of room for improvement um but it does give uh uh information around the neighborhoods and the population within that neighborhood that have
selfidentified as having a disability um and we help um use this tool with departments to create plans for accessible events another kind of big um highlight that I
wanted to share here as well um oh sh Andrea can you see my screen okay yeah this is Andrea yeah I see the highlights um general slide that talks about emergency alerts thank you um so
this uh so as I was mentioning one of the biggest kind of highlights that other highlights that we have and I'm sharing some of the snippets from the departmental plans that are posted uh but within those departmental plans you'll see some of the big strides that
we've made for example for emergency uh alerts uh we have those that go out in um 11 languages they're sent in multiple platforms so they can be sent via text and via email there are also periods of time where we partner with H strong
where they are sent as audio recordings directly to um landline phones um and that depends on the emergency we also partner with the Boston Fire Department uh to ensure that when they're doing bedshaker
installations that they are done with ASL interpretation that is done via handheld devices boston Fire has gone ahead and purchased these iPads themselves so they can make sure that everybody who does this uh work within the fire department is able to uh carry
this out with interpretation as needed and then I'll mention one more and then I'll continue uh we also work to ensure that um the city hall on the go trucks that move around uh the city helping folks uh for example signing uh um
signing up for uh parking sticker or anything else that they have iPads as well that have on demand interpretation services that can pull up both spoken languages and ASL interpreters moving forward I wanted to also continue kind of zoning into some
of the other big projects that we have one of the biggest um projects that we have currently active is our welcoming city project and what we did is that on the city hall uh first second and third floor that is mainly where a lot of the
teller windows are that provide um services so we went ahead and partnered with all the departments there we came in we ensured that and I apologize the picture that's up on the screen is a little bit um uh hard to uh decipher but
it basically shows a teller window and it shows two pieces of paper that are against the window and that has a notice of rights that are translated in different languages and a a card a standup card that um lists the languages
um in language and in English for folks to be able to um point to as needed or refer to as needed to identify the language that they need interpretation on and so basically every teller window downstairs has an iPad that is equipped
with um our on demand interpretation service and is set up in this sense so that they have posted uh rights and the ability to have a language card next to them i'm going to start moving a little quicker apologies i think I'm going over
time um the other um device uh that we're going to be switching into in the next few months is what we call our translate live equipment um so this translate live um is something that is used at the Boston public schools so we're kind of switching over from our
iPads to this equipment to ensure alignment so when parents go to the Boston public schools and they see these devices that are meant for on demand interpretation they can do speech to text in any language um they can do um
even much more functionality such as background color changes Texas text sizes and fonts other accessibility uh features are included we want to make sure that they whatever is experienced at the schools is experienced at the city but this is um the picture on the
screen shows very much like an iPad and next to it you'll see also our notice of rights um for um all languages and our language identification cards as well so that is
what we'll be transitioning to for the teller windows another exciting thing that we have the iPads will not go away though they will be repurposed and often what we do is we share these iPads with a lot of departments throughout the city so we
let departments um do either long-term rentals or short-term rentals and they'll often take these two events um that are things like resource fairs or the picture that is up on the slideshow right now is for one of the vaccine
clinics that BPHC was hosting at the city and we were able to give them an iPad or walk-ins that they did not know if we need uh either spoken language or sign language interpretations and then for this uh
last one but I I think we'll wrap up here the state of the city um just wanted to give some highlights from this year uh we had uh both communications access and language access uh this was one of the most um uh the third year
that we've done this so we increased accessibility we had a certified deaf interpreter on stage we had ASL interpreters um on the ground as well supporting constituents with wayfinding uh we had invitations that included
requests for accommodations in different languages we had a cart provider on screen and we also had our iPads uh as well um and we had printed copies of the program language access we have 28 interpreters um that did both the speech
interpretation live and also supported uh wayfinding for our um multilingual constituents andrew sent out multilingual invitations um as well there are pictures on the screen that just show um different pieces of
the state of the city it shows the invites shows um our interpreters with paddles blue paddles and vests on as well as uh the picture of our CDI on the screen with some of our faith
leaders i'm going to um Sherry do I have one more minute sure sure i mean this is your likely your last slide correct so yes thank you okay okay so this is the com uh so the last thing I want to focus on is our
complaint process um so on our website there is a section called compliance process and you will find a link to our language access complaint form as well as our departmental plan and this is very different from the ADA uh grievance
process that has uh that is under the disability commission but we uh filter any complaints regarding um uh you know requests of uh communications or spoken language uh accommodation that were
requested um filter any feedback around um the quality of that interpretation or translation um and be able to take that in work with our vendors and improve the system we also work very closely with the disability commission so if anything
does kind of fall within both of our spaces we work together to tackle those complaints together um I know that there is a lot that I just mentioned um and I know that there's a lot that we can still improve on so I'll end with you know um thank you for having me here and
I'm looking forward to hearing your uh your thoughts um and understanding what more we can be doing um and thank you so much Jennifer thank you so much for your um presentation and you did you did a great
job you know in terms of your your time and everything i I I really appreciate that and I appreciate you trying to trying to streamline as much as possible uh I do see that we have um you know several members uh that want to ask
questions uh I guess I'll kick things off jerry can I could I jump in for a minute just to add one before we get to questions sure go ahead go ahead Commissioner hi everybody it's Commissioner Rashos um I just wanted to thank Jennifer and her team um Jennifer works very closely with Kai our um
accessibility inclusion training specialist and Colleen who is our liaison to the um office of language access and communications as well as Andrea who really is the tech person and the go-to person for all these accommodations um they work incredibly hard to ensure accessible meetings
whether they're public or you know throughout the city um things like that but I do want to also um give a shout out to Mayor Woo who was uh the original author of the ordinance when she was a city counselor and I worked on that way back in like 2012 2013 and finally I
want to give a shout out to our former chief of staff Jessica Dunan who was an incredible partner in this work she is fluent in ASL a lot of you remember Jessica I'm sure and um she really did a lot to advance this program as well so thanks to Jennifer and her staff and to
my staff for all their work in this area thanks Sherry great and and let me also thank uh thank Jennifer and her staff and the commissioner and her staff on on advancer advancing this this work uh
very very much um and again I really we really appreciate your presentation uh correct me if I'm wrong but I I think I saw on your org chart you um you listed a lot of different you know what the
specific FT FTEES do uh do you not have a full-time ASL interpreter have you ever had funding uh for that or or correct me if I'm wrong on that or is that something that you would consider u
consider advertising for or maybe trying to solicit some some funds for thank you for the question um hi this is Jennifer um so yes and um I'll also defer to commissioner and Andrea if they
would like to add anything as well uh but we did explore this i know that the disability commission um we had a position that was open um I think for a year uh or plus um and I what we kind of struggled with was filling that position
um so we're happy to relook at it um together i know there was a time period where we also thought about um putting that type of position under our office um and you know I just want to say that I am happy to take everything that you
all think would be helpful and uh run with it and advocate for it um and I know that this is an important thing for us as well andrea and Commission I don't know if you want to add anything hi this is Andrea um yeah I will just
add that we've moved away from that after having tried for two budget cycles um to to hire someone directly um part of the challenge is building a enough work because interpreters don't
want to um you know work part-time for the city and and part-time sort of twiddling their thumbs when they know there's interpretation needs going unfilled so trying to find the right balance of you know enough work um that's predictable a lot of the
mayor's press conferences end up being last minute you know when a truck rolls over in Chinatown um so if we do like a part-time that person might not be available when the mayor needs them but we didn't really have you know 40 hours a week of interpretation needs that we had come up with at the time um so still
open to it um but I think we've we've cobbled together a system that you know let me know if if there are needs going unfilled at city events for sure um but my understanding is we've been able to fill mo pretty much every request every
press conference for a while so we've kind of backed off the idea of an interpreter uh full-time and I see Wes added in the chat that um uh the cost of living in Boston um the uh requirement that someone live in the city to work for the city does create a lot of
challenges when recruiting um and we never did uh come to a solution for whether we could get a waiver for the ASL interpreter role so Okay great thank you for you know I I I
think this is Jerry uh speaking uh I think it's still a good thing to try to explore i guess my um a follow-up question is um so uh like the interpreters at the mayor's uh may
mayor's event events or press conferences those are contracted uh employees those are people that they just find through through the partners part partners that Jennifer mentioned or or or other city partnerships
hi this is Jennifer that is correct so it's a combination of our partners interpreting um contract we also have another uh vendor under that contract named Karash uh but we also if that is not cannot be fulfilled by those two
vendors we also have worked very closely in the past with MCDHH when we were implementing contracts uh we did try to work with MCDHH directly um but they were um uh because of uh other factors we were
unable to solidify a contract with them directly to provide ASL interpretation for the city so what we did do together is we got together and uh you know explored especially also with the disability commission you know the interpreters that were trusted within
our Boston community and we were able to pull a list together which we actually share with our current vendors partners and garage so that they can kind of see um what are the interpreters that are often being worked with in Boston and making sure that we can continue those
partnerships with those people can I just add a note on that as well um Jennifer talked about a lot of work on systemic accessibility and we've really pushed that uh ASL as um a requirement for major press conferences andrea has a
meeting with the press team every other week to go over what um press conferences are coming up and which ones really they need to get ASL for so it's really that systemic push that we've managed to um accomplish really well i believe then it doesn't put the work on
us to get ASL for every department or on Jennifer's team but really it lies with the individual um offices that are hosting meetings to get um to get the ASL so great work uh systemically on that great thank you both and thanks for
the clarification it was it's great to um it's great when we see the uh interpretation especially you know at events like the state of the city and whatnot and how it's really kind of embedded in in everything the city does
um now and and that's a reflection of the of of the great work from Jennifer's team and the commissioner and her team as well so that thank you for that i see we have several questions uh Carl
you've had your hand raised go ahead please first of all Jennifer I want to commend you and your staff for your language access i think overall you guys do a great job secondly I wanted to ask you about you mentioned audio description
earlier and that is something you do i'm wondering if you could elaborate on how and when you use audio description and I also wanted to mention to you as a potential resource that I am the chair of the audio description project for the American Council for the Blind and
consult with Netflix and Amazon and Prime Video so I have quite a bit of background and work quite often in the field of audio description if you ever need a resource to reach out to but if you could just elaborate on what you're doing for audio description for the
blind I would appreciate it thank you so much Carl um and I don't know if you remember we met briefly um last year um so it's wonderful to be reconnected here again um and thank you so much i will definitely be reaching
out to you regarding you know this area of work um and thank you for asking to be very transparent this is something new that is going to be uh that is in our contracts um uh this year and so
this is something that we are still working on to expand and explore i would need to check so the way that our office functions is that we get a lot of requests from different departments so I would need to track down within our records how many departments have been
providing certain different accommodations specifically in this space and I can get that back to you i apologize that I don't have that in front of me um but um I do believe most likely it would be very very limited i think this is an area that we can
frankly explore how to expand i think right now the focus over the past few years has been very language justice i think where we want to get to is oh sorry let me correct myself is language access communication access and what
we're trying to get to is this place of language justice um and that I think is where we could definitely use more support great um thanks for your question Carl um and Wes I saw that you had a question go
ahead hi yes Jennifer thank you for your presentation it was great it's great to see Boston doing such tremendous work and doing such a great job with access for language diversity within the
city to bring everybody up to par with accessibility in Boston i have a question for you for the service provision of interpreters and translators who tends to pay for that is that your department or the individual
departments that ask and request the services hi Wes Wesley this is Jennifer and I am also glad that we're reconnecting in this space i know that we interact a lot with yourself um and your wife uh via email and work for interpretations on
the requests that you all have so it's great to connect here in this space to answer your question technically the majority of it all falls under our budget um so roughly around
um I I I know this figure so roughly around last year we had around 880 requests for accommodations from our office that includes uh communications access and language access um and I
think we roughly have spent um around 9 maybe 800 something maybe I'm not the best figures person um on accommodation to date um uh last year my apologies last fiscal year uh our so yes it is a
centralized budget but to be very honest we also have ARPA funds which are used to fund accommodations for ARPA funded projects this is the interpreter are you saying arba a rba
thank you arpa a r as in um he Thank you and it stands for um the American Rescue Wand i don't know what the other is plan act um
yes and then some departments often might have a little additional funding either through grants or through other federal uh um or other miscellaneous funds that they have and oftent times um
if for any reason we cannot cover the accommodation they will use their own funding as well okay thank you i do have an additional question go ahead your office of language and
communication access does it have any involvement with the Boston Public Library for their ESOL programs for English for non-English speakers and other languages that is a great question um I guess it
depends on um how you define involvement so we are involved in the sense of if they need um translated will translate them or if they um that is most likely the majority in
terms of the actual planning implementing executing that is all under the BPL we don't both we actually don't right now do any work related to um English as a second language learning um
that often sits within the libraries the schools um or the office of uh workforce empowerment okay thank you the reason I ask I know that other public libraries such as
Cambridge Brooklyn offer free ASL classes to the community and that's sponsored by the disability commissions and the libraries and the office of language and communication access i am hoping to see
that type of program offered within the city of Boston to the community members for free ASL courses and it would work for other languages as well for example if individuals within the community
wanted to learn Cverian or Vietnamese it would be wonderful if we could offer those languages on a free basis to the community thank you so much i will um take that idea and circle back there was a period
in time where we worked with um uh Deaf Inc um where we were kind of tossing around the idea of having ASL classes within the city um and I think it was
mainly due to their and and we have had some in the past too uh for like particular folks who wanted to learn but we haven't really expanded on that um and I think what we'll do is we'll connect the disability commission and see how we can maybe move this idea
forward because I think that is a great idea so thank you so much thank you Jennifer for your time yes Jennifer and and uh thank you for your time and your resources and your and your good work again this is Jerry
um speaking uh and thank you uh to the board members for such thoughtful um questions and and comments and ideas uh we just heard you know a great idea hopefully hopefully that can uh that can bear bear fruit thank you uh Westford
for bringing that that forward um we are going to move on uh in the agenda now before uh before I just take a few minutes to give a a brief report I did notice um uh during uh Jennifer's
presentation that that we had a couple of more advisory board members um join us and I wanted to give them an opportunity to to introduce themselves uh um if you could when called upon if
you could just uh give a brief visual description and also just uh say what neighborhood you're from and and and uh and and whatnot that would be great why don't we start with uh Charlie it's good to see you
thanks thanks Jerry appreciate it um hopefully sorry if there's background noise in um the general area but my name is Charlie Kim i'm a um a resident of the north end i'm wearing black glasses
have black hair and wearing a gray hoodie and I am on the advisory board representing parents and caregivers of disabled um with disabilities pleasure to be here thank you and Richard we saw we I saw that you
joined us uh during the last presentation if you could uh just take a few moments to introduce yourself please sure thanks Jerry richard Blowski i live in Back Bay i'm hearing impair um I am
wearing a brown jacket blue shirt and uh I guess I have to confess somewhat gray hair great that was a that was a trend that we noticed uh you know uh earlier in our descriptions most of us uh had to talk
about our our salt and pepper uh hair so some of us more salt than than pepper at this point Richard definitely uh thank you um next on the agenda we'll move just uh briefly to to
the chair's report my report uh what I'm just going to really highlight and and echo is is what's come what came out on Friday um the disability commission uh uh electronic newsletter um highlighted
that that April is is fair housing month uh which and and I know that we all realize that that housing and access to accessible housing is a key issue for um all residents of of the Commonwealth
that u and Boston but particularly uh folks with disabilities we we all know that the housing stock uh needs improvement and um there isn't enough accessible housing
out there so So it's very very important and I'm I'm glad that that um that the uh newsletter highlighted uh several um offices in the city um that work on uh on accessible housing
and I'm glad that the commissioner I wasn't aware that that the commissioner and her staff put together a video on how to access how to access um uh accessible housing and some resources available maybe Andre maybe you could
put that put that access to that video in the um in the chat so that folks who who don't uh get the the e newsletter yet can uh you know can avail themselves of some of those uh some of those
resources um I quite recently um over the you know last fall or so I availed myself of of the Boston Home Center and and um was
part of a lottery process to get an uh get an accessible um wheelchair accessible condo unit uh in the city so I went through I went through the whole process in terms of taking a first-time
home buyer class and and um you know just really you know um um went step by step through the process just to educate myself on on on what it would be like and I gathered all my all my financial
paperwork and and you know uh saw whether I would be income eligible it's an opportunity that I didn't end up go going you know fully forward with with you know I decided that renting uh was still the best uh best option for me but
it really opened my eyes in terms of uh the resources available to to residents of the city and I know that that uh it's been a really really big uh push of the current administration to increase
housing stock increase uh affordability um and and increase accessible housing so uh so it was good to go through that process you know even though again I decided not to go fully
forward with it but just to just to see what the process what the process would be like and I would encourage any and all uh you know folks here and and listening at home and watching at home
to to um to go to um the Boston Home Center website um available um available through boston.gov gov uh and avail themselves of of um you know the resources
uh resources available to uh folks to to see about oh hey you know maybe maybe u maybe purchasing my own home uh you know you know can be a reality for me before I decided to go through with the process
I didn't think you know I thought of at my age or or a particular situation i didn't think that that was a real possibility but lo and behold there are so many programs available uh um there are so many programs available through
the city that that you know it really was possible uh you know to for me to pursue and I'm glad I'm glad that I I did that uh just another resource I wanted to uh I wanted to share with
folks um um and I know on the city website they have a a metro list uh that lists um you know a lot of uh accessible housing both in the city and and in other towns in the Commonwealth but
another resource is the Mass Access Housing Registry uh I don't know if people were aware of that but I just thought I would share that um that for folks they have both home home ownership opportunities as well as rental uh
opportunities so So just some resources again you know maybe uh Andrea could pop some in in the chat um but um again this highlights uh this highlights really the good good resource that the that the
Disability Commission's uh e newswsletter is uh it's got a lot of uh very useful information every month so if people aren't on there um you know again maybe Andrea you could share either in the chat or in person uh just
now how folks could sign up for that because I you know you know I found out about that home ownership opportunity through the through the newsletter actually so um anyway so uh so that that's my report and we'll move on to the um
commissioner's report thanks Jerry and uh just so you know Andrea did put a link to the webinar on housing and also to Metro list and a link to sign up for our e newswsletter um I want to give a shout out to our um constituent service specialist Chris Morowski who does a newsletter every
week he does a great job so I do hope everybody signed up for it and just two points on Jerry's report before I get into my slides um first of all we um we did the webinar on housing as part of our work last year on National
Disability Employment Awareness Month in October we held four live webinars that we recorded and we know that employment involves a lot of things and one of the things is housing so we did a webinar on gaining housing um and it has a lot of good resources so I would um encourage
you to click on the link that Andrew posted and I would also encourage everybody to go to our YouTube channel we have all our advisory board meetings posted there but we also have a whole slate of trainings that our um disability access and inclusion training specialist Kai Kennedy has recorded on a
number of topics and we have our disability um national disability employment awareness month trainings there as well so really valuable resources and I actually clicked on it a few weeks ago and I was very impressed with the amount of trainings we had on it so um please use that as a resource and one of the main things that you can
do to help us is spread these resources to the community so just like Jerry said the housing one is very helpful i hope that you all um push that out to friends relatives and you know your different um email groups um so that they get the information as well a final note on
housing is that um a few years ago we established a disability housing task force um Olivia served on that with us for many years and we made a lot of u good strides and then it kind of concluded the work that it was doing so we wrapped it up but we're going to be launching another uh disability housing
task force in July so stay tuned for more information on that and now we can go to my slides all righty so um to begin my report I just wanted to talk a little bit about the city of Boston budget you may have read recently that um Mayor Woo
submitted her budget to the city council so the next few weeks will be all about the city council reviewing the budget asking questions of different departments our department will be presenting our budget to the city council later in April and we did find we had um a slight decrease but it won't
imp impact our programming and the mayor's budget overall has a slight increase but we know that there are uncertain times um federally so we're all trying to pay attention to that luckily our department does not receive any federal funding so we won't be impacted at all by things that happen in
Washington although some of our colleagues may u may be impacted especially a few in the equity and inclusion cabinet but we will be fine for now um I wanted to let you know that the Boston City Council has called for a hearing on sidewalk accessibility no date has been scheduled yet but we will
keep you uh updated once a date is scheduled and this would be a an example of a great meeting that board members could attend and give input on um just to emphasize the importance of accessible sidewalks in the city so watch for uh a date on that and Chris also posts um relevant city council
meetings in our email newsletter so if you uh do get the newsletter make sure you watch for relevant city council hearings and if you don't please sign up after this meeting um Andrea brought this um issue to my attention it seems that court reporters right now are
seeking a raise there was an article that came out um this week because court reporters haven't gotten a raise since the 1980s and as many of you may know cart reporters are classified as court reporters and we know they play a vital role in providing access at meetings so
there is currently legislation proposed to support this raise um it's H1649 and S1168 it was filed for the eighth term and it's getting a lot of advocate support on Beacon Hill so I wanted to throw this out to the council to see if this might
be something you would want to write a letter on letter of support and also share with your colleagues to see if they may want to um to support it as well so I will hand that off to Jerry as chair um to discuss after my report next slide
okay some department updates just a brief overview of events that we have coming up our disability community forum is Thursday May 8th from 2 to 3:30 um it's at Suffach Law School and it will also be on Zoom we really want to encourage people with disabilities to come out in person we know um things
changed a lot after CO but it would be great to see each other live again and really um connect with people and you know share our stories and our concerns and our power as a disability community so please spread that invitation as well we will get a flyer out to you uh soon
about that and then also um I had mentioned before that advisory board members um may be able to participate this year when I present my annual report and I usually um report out about different categories so I was hoping that in the categories that you've
selected as your area of interest you might be able to talk about a certain meeting that you've attended or a meeting that happens on a regular basis or something that you know about in that area for example if it's housing and Olivia wants to talk about uh something that the BHA is doing that would be a great time to give an example of
something that the board works on so please think about that and we will ask for RSVPs for people who are able to attend in person and those who can attend on Zoom we also mentioned that the ADA35 is going to be a group event it's going to be a march and rally on Wednesday July
23rd at 12:00 noon we're going to do a flag raising at Boston City Hall Plaza then a march to the Boston Common and a rally at the Embrace Statue Memorial and the City Hall Plaza piece will be led by by my office but we're not going to do the information tables this year it's
going to be more of like a call to action to protect disability rights and protect the ADA so we'll just do the flag raising and hopefully the mayor will speak on city hall plaza and then Bill Henning from BCIL will lead the march to the common and really rally folks to um you know to do a call to
action whether it's to reach out to the legislators or write letters or um whatever is the hot issue at the moment so stay tuned for flyers on that and we hope we get a big turnout for that rally in March there will be um a meeting of organizations who would like to
participate next Tuesday two a week from Tuesday April 22nd at 10 a.m on Zoom and if you um are part of an organization watch out for an invitation and if you know of any invitation any organizations you'd like to be sure are included please email me and Andrea and then I also mentioned last
month uh the PD Blue Project which is the pedestrian bike lane user experience um you may remember that Mayor Woo put a temporary pause on curbside infrastructure changes bike lanes and bus lanes um she did that in March and we were able to give input on the accessibility issues related to the
changes in curb use so that was wrapped up and a report was issued to u the mayor um from what input um the public works um team found was um was residents were feeling about these changes so we will continue to provide input from our
collaboration with IHCD on the pit loop program um so we are working with Valerie Fletcher to go out and look at bike lanes to look at what is working what's not working to help the city create best practices in design and that will be happening over the next few weeks and we're also going out with RAG
who is doing um a shared space um project to also look at bike lane access and recommend best practices next slide and um just some advisory board updates briefly um I know I heard from a lot of you about your area of focus um
and if any of you have um have thought thought about it and want to add to yours or if you have something identified i know Jerry is interested in transportation and PCA's Olivia housing tara food justice and Tara we did reach out to the food justice department and
they're going to come to a meeting soon paul is a big mental health advocate charlie Boston public schools and you also mentioned being a parent and caretaker so I can add that to your description um Carl has a lot of input on legislation we thank Carl for that um Wes I know you're interested in emerging
technology and communication access uh Zary healthcare access and accommodations and I'm not sure I've heard from Juan Carlos Richard Pette and Elizabeth um I if I missed an email I'm sorry because I was away for 10 days so I may have missed uh an email but if you
haven't gotten back to me yet or you do know what you'd like to concentrate on please let me know and all this really means is that we would love it if each of you could be sort of a liaison to the communities that you've involved in the issues you've chosen so things like attending a meeting like if there's a a
fair housing meeting in April maybe Olivia would go and report out to the board we'd like you to propose presenters on your topic um think about actions the board could take on an issue like if it's something like writing a letter maybe you could draft the letter if it's in your focus area um invite
people to attend that meetings not only present but actually to attend to talk about the issues and then share information out at our monthly meetings which is a new agenda item that we've implemented for 2025 and then as we've also mentioned um some of our board members are
transitioning off the board and we do have some people who are interested in coming on the board we've submitted some names to Mayor Woo and we're anxiously anticipating some new appointments coming very soon and we'll go to the next slide um so this is um some
opportunities for advisory board members to participate in as well as to spread the information to community members and I'm going to turn it over to Colleen to talk about this she did go over them last month but I want to uh have her reiterate them because they're really great opportunities and they are still
timely people can still participate and uh spread the word to neighbors and colleagues and friends colleen are you on um yep thanks Commissioner i'm just going to talk quickly about some engagement opportunities that we would love your help with uh the disability outreach tour at BPL Neighborhood
Branches is going to be going on all year you can go to our website boston.gov/ /isability and see this under our initiatives tab you'll see all the upcoming dates which are mainly going to be in the summer and fall months but if
you see a tour date that you'd like to come and attend or share information please let me know we'd love to have you at every single event also happening right now this month in April is the ebike incentive program we would love your help
spreading the word um if you are a Boston resident who can use a standard bike um applications are open right now and they're going to close on April 30th you can go to boston.gov/ebikes to learn all the
eligibility criteria but I'm going to summarize it residents who are either a senior people with disabilities or chronic illnesses or are lowincome are eligible to apply for a standard ebike from April 1st to April
30th if you do apply for this standard traditional ebike you're going to be entered into a lottery and vouchers will range between $800 and $1,500 if you are a Boston resident with a disability or chronic illness that requires an adaptive bike it is a
rolling application process and you do apply separately and your vouchers will cover either $2,000 or 50% of the actual bike all month long they're going to be ebike tryyout events there'll be one on
April 24th in Madapan April 25th and 26th on City Hall Plaza April 27th in Roxberry and May 8th on City Hall Plaza no matter what type of bike you want to apply for really encourage you to come to these try and ebike events to learn more and um see if this would be
something that either you and your family would benefit from or someone you know in your neighborhood thanks Kish thanks Colleen and um I know the the board is always looking for action steps they can take so again this is a huge action step if you could spread the word um a lot of people with disabilities
love adaptive adaptive wreck so this is a chance to get a good bit of money towards an electric bike and I think I read a statistic um that 20% of all the applicants last year were for um people with disabilities so it's a huge population whether you have an ambulatory disability a visual
disability um any type of disability and you want to try out a bike we encourage you to go to the um one of the events to try out an adaptive bike so we'll go to the next slide and I want to turn um my uh
presentation over to Kai Kennedy our disability access and inclusion training specialist um Kai has put together a lot of great trainings for different city departments on disability 101 disability 102 and as part of their training they
included um this link to a video that they found online and when I was watching the video I noticed something very special in the video so Kai is going to play it and then we'll talk about it afterwards kai thanks Kamish um yeah I just wanted to give a little bit more background and
then um I think Andrea is sharing screen it'll start the video um at the agreed uh time slot but this video um I found on YouTube and gives an amazing kind of history um of disability rights the things that um disabled folks kind of
both endured um and you know persevered through as well as rights that were um you know earned and and by protests and things like that the capital crawl and the 504 sit in um and so uh we're gonna play the video um and Andrea has a time
to stop it at so that we can uh show our our little secret secret um shout out uh to someone very special um for the board so Andrea uh go right ahead did we hear sound did the sound come through this is Kai i did not hear sound
no I don't hear any of this still no no sound no one second sometimes when you click on screen share you have to click uh do a check box for share my sound you're exactly right and that is what I hadn't done which is why
I stopped sharing acting section 5 Francisco and across the United States gathered to push rally and protest to make sure that regulations enacting section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act be
put into law let's set the stage the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibits discrimination due to disability in any programs agencies or by contractors receiving federal financial support going on three years later the
regulations in order to enforce that law still have not been signed by Jimmy Carter people with disabilities said "We want access to the things that other people are taking for granted federal buildings education employment
initiatives demonstrations took place all across the nation [Music] in San Francisco about 150 people led by Judy Hume occupied the Health Education and Welfare Building
archival footage of protesters occupying the Hugh headquarters people came together in the community there was intersectionality before the word existed we had support from churches unions civil rights organizations gay groups elected
politicians we had the gray panthers offering support we had the black panthers providing food 28 days later 504 was finally signed kitty cone giving 504 victory speech we
show strength and courage and power and commitment that we the shut in or the shut out we the hers supposedly the frail and the weak that we struggle at the highest level of
government ever [Applause] here we are over four decades later and that's still the longest sitting the longest occupation of any federal
building recorded in the United States of America why aren't we using that as an example to say this is what happens when communities come together these are the changes that can occur when we stand
together roll together sit together in solidarity 1990 nearly a decade after section 504 protests the stage was set to take it to the next level organizers such as Justin
Dart and Yoshiko Dart met with activists in every state rallying organizing protesting ready to create what would become our own landmark civil rights legislation the Americans with
Disabilities Act no no I did the pausing wrong it's okay well you have a time stamp so spring of 19 communities come to and mark civil rights legislation the
Americans with Disabilities Act over 30,000 activists across the nation perfect now um does anybody who can see the screen recognize um anyone in this
photo and I'll give a hint this oh I see a hand jerry go ahead is that Zaryi holding up the flag it sure is it go yeah um Commissioner Macosh pointed that
out to me um the first time that she saw the video in one of my trainings and I had no idea um I know Zaryi how I know her now um and so yeah Commissioner Ro pointed this out i thought it would be a great um you know little cameo to show
the disability uh advisory board here um and I I agree this is an incredible kind of just testament to how far back the advocacy of our advisory board goes even uh before it existed so Kamish is there anything that you'd like to add thanks
Kai um just that yeah I've known Zary for over 30 years we went we were uh together when I was a student at UMass and Zary worked in the disability student services center and I recognized her right away i was like that's the Zary I knew back in the day and I don't know if Zary's online is she at the
meeting today unfortunately not okay so anyway um this link is in my slide deck so um feel free to share with others it's about a 10 15 minute video 11 minute video so um feel free to um take a look at it in your own
time and share it with um your colleagues and groups thanks Kai and that wraps up my report i will um close it out and send it back to Jerry great thank you so much uh
Commissioner make sure I'm not muted yet yep I'm not muted good uh sometimes I have problems with that as we've known in the past but I'm not muted now uh and so next up on the agenda is
um the architectural access report with Patricia Mendes take it away hi everyone good evening can can you hear me you're a touch quiet Patricia if you could speak up a touch you'll be good okay can you hear me
now hello yep okay great um Andrea would you be able to share my slides or do you want me to share them i can do them just give me one second if I can't find them quickly I will kick it to you got
them great my name is uh Patricia Mendes i'm the director of architectural access for the disabilities commission and this is my architectural access report um I would like to share that um
the construction season um started for utilities company so what we do every year is the public works invites us to have this big meeting all of the contractors for the utility company um are required to
attend and we talk about the expectations regarding accessibility so it's um very well attended and we pretty much hit the five or six takeaways so um people
are hearing directly um from us uh some of the departments attendings are are the public works department who's hosting this big event and transportation department Boston water and sewer and also other departments um next
slides please um so the main point of uh our of my speech this time um is that during the construction the accessible route must be maintained
so I break down to the the pieces of that maintenance of the accessible route and I remind all the construction companies that when they are building
something or underground on the sidewalk they have to create a temporary accessible route around the work and they have to keep that accessible route uh at night when they go home for the evening and at all times it's not
something that comes um in and out they have to maintain it the entire time um part of the accessible route is to keep uh compliant ramps so when they're creating the accessible routes maybe
they don't have the usual um curb ramp curb ramps but they need to either uh build mounds with asphalt or uh put a piece of metal or a piece of wood and create a temporary ramp that gives
access from the sidewalk to the street and then back to the sidewalk um also the barricades that the contractors must have need to be cane detectable in order um to be useful and
safe for our constituents who are blind and low vision um the other reminder that is important that I share is that when they need to close um the entire block to put
appropriate signage visible signage especially at the beginning of the block so if somebody comes um walking or rolling down the street they see the signage and they know to go to
the other side across the street instead of going halfway and then having to turn around and go back um the the next big takeaway is that the curb ramps and crosslocks need
to be clear and and usable know when they have to do work around the corrupt or the crosswalks um they need to um be mindful and maintain the the accessible
route and also when they're having work near the curb ramps and the crosswalk they need to keep those clear from the work uh so people can continue to use them um next we talked about the temporary uh patches and plates and our
ask is always to to be mindful and when they use the patches or the plates to make sure that the edges are smooth and they're level uh so everybody can use those safely and they don't become uh tripping
hazards um okay so before we go to the next slide oh we can go to the next slide um so the reason that we're sharing this with you is so you are a way aware of the requirements for the utilities
company so if you see something like this happens happening and I'm going to share some photos with examples um if you see that there's construction and that the sidewalk is blocked and there's no ramp and there's no accessible road
um that is not okay so you can contact our office and let us know and what we do is to contact um transport transportation department so they can pass on the the report so it can be fixed um quickly okay so the other thing that we
talk about with the contractors is that the AC the on street accessible parking spaces need to be maintained uh and this is state the state law so contractors are required to contact our office uh
with uh some time um we ask them for two weeks so we can help them uh find another spot so the spots can be relocated instead of just you know blocked or taken away
um and we shared the our our email and we shared our form that we use for for to make that communication um easy um the last point that we remind the
contractors is to be mindful of the MBTA bus stops when the work uh affects the location of a bus stop and the maybe the bus stop needs to be relocated to the next block before or after it's
important to communicate with the MBTA so the MBTA can send out notices to um the users especially our blind and low vision population that rely um very much on on their memory to where the
locations are so when there's changes it's a big deal for our constituent um okay next slide please and I'm going to go really quickly with the with the photos so these are the
best practices uh I have two pictures on this slide one of the photos uh has a temporary ramp made out of asphalt and that that is um temp a
compliant temporary ramp and then in the other photo it shows um a blind constituent using a white cane and uh he's able to detect construction barricades that have a lower rail and
also a top rail so it is really important that these barricades have the bottom rail for for the cane detectors the other useful barricades are the the ones that are called jersey barriers um that are you know more more massive but
these with the lower rail are also helpful all right these are best practices so let's go to the next slide these are things not to do and here on the left we have an example of
uh what not to do which are to just use the small orange cone so the orange cones are not useful because they're flimsy they blow with the wind and they're not significant barriers for for
constituents that um may be transversing a work area um and then the picture on the right is what not to do because the whole sidewalk is blocked with a big
barricades in the shape of barrels and they're also blocking the curb cut so that is an example of what not to do next okay these are also examples of what things not to do the one on the
left uh is a sidewalk next to the street and on the sidewalk there is a construction fence that takes um all the accessible route it blocks the entire sidewalk and it doesn't have a ramp
going down from the sidewalk to the street or it doesn't have the other ramp too that belongs to the other side from the street to the sidewalk and there's no signage saying that there's a
detour um okay and the last photo is um a picture of an accessible parking spot and there is a construction dumpster right on top of the parking spot so that
is something not to do all right and I think that is the last line um so thank you much for your attention and as I said before uh I'm sharing this information so when you see
construction around and you realize that there's no accessible route uh please let us know so we can report it and have it fixed and I'm happy to answer questions i see thank you for your report Patricia
this is Jerry speaking and I see um Pette has a question or a comment go ahead Pette well I'm assuming that the same applies for snow dumped into handicap parking
spaces that we should contact disability at um you know the email that you had listed there when we see that um this presentation was particularly
for uh construction yes worse i know that I was saying that I assumed that the same process would be in place for if we saw snow in a handicap spot that we would contact your office the same way
i can jump in Patricia thanks Colette um yeah unfortunately the city doesn't have the resources to shovel out any parking spaces they concentrate on clearing streets and they're able to do some sidewalks and curb ramps and priority
areas they do all the sidewalks on city of Roster property but they just don't have the resources to do parking spaces that being said you can always um send it to 311 and our office and if there's any way we could get it done but um it's
definitely not something I would expect to be done we do get those complaints every winter but it's just not something that the city does they don't shovel out any parking spaces they just don't have the capacity to do that and Andrea do you want to add anything yeah this is Andrea i'll just add that you can't
clear snow from your property into the street no matter what the use of the street is at that curb so if you see someone like digging a bunch of snow off the front sidewalk and dumping it all in the street that you can report to 311 and can be ticketed um but that would be
the same for any amount of the public street not just for accessible parking unfortunately and even if they get fined it doesn't mean that the city's going to remove the snow unfortunately okay do we see any other questions i don't um so thank you very much for your
report uh Patricia and uh now we'll move on to uh our new agenda item the community shoutouts this is an opportunity for for members of the advisory board to really um highlight
something that they've been working on or a meeting they've attended or or uh an issue they've been working on for the past month so I I don't know if anyone has anything they'd like to share
um but now would be a great time to do so um if you uh if I'm and I'm sure as I said in my uh uh my report that was read last month uh I'm sure all of us you
know have worked on things over the past month or so that that deserve to be shared and and the community should should be should be aware of um so don't feel like this is a I'm putting you on the spot but I definitely want I just
want to highlight the the great work that we all all do so I don't know if if anyone has something they'd like to share but now would be a great time great time to do so uh and I'll I'll uh
I'll give it a minute here um I'm not seeing any takers uh we've all gotten a little shy i I will share myself there's three hands up hands up there there there is okay i'm
sorry olivia Charlie and Paul yeah I must have uh I lost that i apologize go ahead Olivia so I attended the office of housing one-year plan meeting on March
13th and a good amount of the community input was centered around disability issues in housing uh there were two people interested in
ADU or accessory dwelling unit um there was someone who was looking for information on how to retrofit uh stair lift into their into their
their home um so they heard they heard from the community on that great great anything we should follow up on Olivia
um I gave them I put in the chat the disability commission information because a few of the constituents would benefit from contact with with the disability commission
particularly the stairlift issue because she was looking for like where do I go sure sure great thanks for that it's a great example of of some you know why why we the executive committee thought
that that this uh this agenda item would be would be useful so thank you go ahead the second thing I had Oh sorry yeah two things i'm sorry Elizabeth sorry uh is that the elevators in my building we
have three elevators it's a Boston Housing Authority complex two of the elevators went down cutting off access to the sixth seventh and eighth floors oh no they went down on a Friday evening they were fixed by Sunday morning so I
have to say the housing authority is getting better with these issues that's great that's great um awesome anything else before we move on
that's it okay um thank you go ahead Carl so yeah as many of you know I'm a service animal user and lately I've had a number of um trip denials with Uber and Lift and frankly I'm getting rather annoyed at
that and unfortunately the way the shared transportation services work they won't share with you the information and then after the driver cancels the trip the trip gets deleted from the app so there's no way to um get local enforcement involved
because that's not the way the state laws work there's no way to track down the driver and file a complaint with MCAD even if you wanted to so um I'm working with Representative Christine Barber who just filed a bill
20 house bill 2066 on the filing of Lyft and Uber and I'm also it should be also submitted any day now working with Senator Joan Lovely who will be submitting a bill given
local hopefully giving local police uh authority the ability to enforce uh service animal laws so um I will keep this commission updated as the bills uh get assigned hearing dates
right now the first bill I mentioned A2066 it with the labor and work for committee um and as soon as that gets assigned today I will let you know and as soon as Joe Mly does a Senator Lovely does a late file for the other one giving police the authority to find
bills find um violators of that I will let you know so um just stay tuned for more information but I just wanted to let you know that's one of the things I'm working on can I um just follow all up on that comment Carl um hi Commissioner McCo um so we had a meeting
with um Uber um about some other things we're working on with Uber Wave program and they did let us know that recently they put um on the app that you can check off if you have a service animal right so the driver will know to expect it i don't know if everybody knows about that um and we do have contacts at Uber
that we're going to be meeting with moving forward so we can always raise this issue more specifically we were concentrating on wave wheelchair accessible vehicles in the meeting but we can certainly um circle back to this issue are you working with Britney um I don't know that that was the name
no I don't think so the head of accessibility at Uber um where I work meeting with the head of global accessibility no that's what's her name she's got an Irish name maybe I have the wrong person but I Yeah I out of San Francisco i just sent her an email so
thank you but yes there is an the ability to self-identify um depending on who you talk to in the blind and low vision community some are okay with that some not so much cuz they feel like we shouldn't have to identify in order to
get a ride in the civil rights so it it um it's kind of controversial depending on who you talk to um the what I would like as a blind and low vision consumer is when a driver cancels a ride the
ability to get their name and uh license plate number so that I could then file a complaint with MCD MCAD or somebody or DOJ or somebody but right now the way they set it up is when you're denied a
ride there's nothing you can do because they purposely delete the name of the driver and so how can we take legal action they say they have a zero tolerance policy and they will not accept that and they'll investigate and punish the drivers but you don't know
what the repercussions of that is because they won't share the results of their investigation to Uber or Lift will not share the results of their investigation with the individual that they happened to and B they won't get you the name of the driver so I feel like there's a lack of both transparency
and accountability carl this is Jerry have you um would you be willing to speak with um with Cat from BCIL i have spoken to Cat we're working on this together great great because I know our tag has has um been
doing a lot of work with Uber and Lyft on on this very issue so right and and we're looking at how because when I booked a ride I did it under the Uber Flex program i'm also considering it a violation of section 504 cuz they were
driving on behalf of Lyft right so so um I'm hoping that they rewrite the contract in such a way when it's up in a year or two to have stricter stricter enforcement great thanks for sharing um Charlie you
you had an issue that you wanted to share oh um not an issue just an update can you hear me okay yeah great oh great um just wanted to talk about a tour that we took the the commissioner and I have been serving on a I think a working
group or an advisory group for Boston public schools uh transition program um for students with disabilities that that also age through the age of 22 called stride program and it's an acronym that stands for
supporting transitions to reach independence through vocational experiences and we took a tour of um facility we're building that they're actually going to be dedicated to the students and I know that the commissioner and the the uh the
disabilities commission I think Andrew you've also been in the background working um closely to foster home screens to kind of make it happen and the building that we toured it's the old Edward M Kennedy um facility so it's really nice fully accessible we had a tour of it but I think the bigger story
is that we're actually dedicating um uh the facility but then also focusing on transition services and also working with the students um for become independent of work job work towards training and I think in relation to this
uh group um my goal is to work closer with the director Marshia Fitzpatrick at Boston Public Schools to have them introduce the the students and also the parents and the caregivers to start paying attention to the disability commission meetings they can start
learning more about the services and offerings um that that are available as as they transition to adults i think um when the children are younger and the students are younger there's a lot of different groups like the parent advisory councils and and a lot of uh
parent support groups but I think one of the areas that that I was uh focusing on and and finding you know what is that transition period where um where the students then move towards independence and trying to find independence for some
new job training so um wanted to thank the the commissioner i know that he had worked closely with them but um that touring is really really cool facility so I'm glad to see that that's actually happening it's been in the works for um several years um that I know of but I'm
sure it's been longer than just several years great thanks for updating us uh Charlie and and thanks for your work on that and commissioner and her staff work on that please uh keep us updated and let us know how we can support uh support you
uh you know in that you know making that connection to the Thrive program and and and how we can um uh illustrate it and and get it out to our communities as well so thank thank you um Paul I know
you've had your hand up but you also it looks like you need help unmuting so Andrea can we help Paul with that it's all set now thank you great i just want to say how strong and positive the W administration and councelor Sharon
Durkin have been with mental health advocacy and that coming up in May is mental health awareness month so in preparation for that for April I know it's a tough season for a lot of people with anxieties depression bipolar any
kind of mental health so what I've been reading up on and talking to constituents is you know a lot of sunlight a lot of activity a lot of positivity it's easy it's easy to get down and whether it be a power of prayer reading or keeping motivated setting
routines it's a big help i want to also have a little more to say next month in May it being mental health um advocacy month and like I said the W administration and councelor Sharon Durkin in particular have been very helpful and strong in mental health
advocacy and it's been a it's made made my my job easier as an advocate to to help others thank you great and thanks Paul for your continued uh work on on this issue i really really appreciate it uh very much and Wesley says in the chat
about Jiren Durant the Red Sox a player who uh Yes you know has been so outr about his own mental health struggles um you know and I you know anything we can do to highlight the issue I think it
it's great i think personally I feel everything everyone's breathes the same air and everybody's human whether it be Kevin Love in the NBA Jared Durant you know high ranking politicians and business leaders we all breathe the same air everyone's human and comes across
the same problems and sometimes it's people are more apt to get more professional help and have have that that at their fingertips more than others so I mean my line's always open for any kind of assistance by email or my cell phone which the commissioner has
great thank you um and let us know how we can continue to support Paul um and we look forward to to working with you on the on the those issues and championing mental health issues in all
the work we do um Richard you you had a something you wanted to share yeah thanks Jerry um among other things um I'm on a list that the US District Court falls upon from time to time to represent individuals in civil rights
cases including um cases involving ADA issues i think I've done nine of them uh for indigent defendants or individ indigent plaintiffs um also I think it's worth mentioning for those who are unfamiliar with it the
bigger center for children at Mission Hill which is very focused on kids mental health it's really it's the smallest of all the Harvard institutions but it's the one I think that probably doll does the most for society because
it it helps families and children deal with significant mental health challenges they have a school and all that um uh so to the extent we're unaware of that or folks aren't aware of that and um you know are looking to make an
impact on kids mental health um uh I would recommend that they consider that at some point as a place to um perhaps work great thank you uh thank you Richard um
and thanks for everybody for sharing is there anybody else that I'm I'm missing that hasn't had the opportunity to share that would like to share again not to put anybody on the spot um but thank you for for those of us who who did share
this month and we look forward to um to folks continued work in and and sharing in in future months so uh next on the agenda is old old business and the old business that we
have I believe is the um the letter to the uh new owners of the Abilities Expo asking uh asking them to uh consider coming uh to Boston do I have that right Andrea
yes it is great um so so everybody should have a draft of that uh of that letter uh you know gotten a draft of that letter with their packets um I'm looking for someone
to make a motion to approve that letter this is call i I I would like to make a motion to approve and send the letter out any second we need a second Charlie is that a second
charlie okay thanks Charlie um and uh so uh we'll take a vote all in favor say I i i great any vote i
Great any naysay i should have asked any discussion um first but anyway uh a little out of order there but it appears that the um the uh letter uh passes the motion
passes unanimously so Andrea I know you'll work on getting that letter out as quickly as you can thank you uh and thanks for everybody who gave input uh input on it um next on the agenda is new business uh
does anybody have new business that they'd like to [Music] share or an item possibly for new business this is Carl yes Carl so earlier in the meeting I believe Andrea mentioned that or maybe it was
Commissioner Macos mentioned something about court reporters not getting a raise and then she said that also extended to cartrid i I question that a maybe the court reporters that work in the court systems haven't gotten a raise
but I know that the contract that I used to hire cartriders here in Massachusetts MCHH has raised their rate at least once if not twice in the last 17 years that I've been involved so I I don't [Music]
know if the rate that they the court reported get the same rate as the car so I'm a little I I while I want to support them and potentially do a letter I just want to make sure we have all the facts yeah this is Andrea um good question so
this would be a raise for people producing transcripts in a court which right now are um usually court uh cartright cart providers one thing I do want to note is a cart provider uh
watching from home did send me a message that there are some concerns about the bill allowing for noncart providers human cart captioners to be court transcribers um so while the raise is certainly something that is
supported cart human cart captioners right now work as court reporters and in their work as court reporters yes they would like a raise from I believe $3 a page to $4.50 a page um but this person is is
happy to provide some additional information on behalf of the Mass Court Reporters Association uh at your next meeting if you'd like i think it I mean I I would support a race based on what I know but I I would still love to have the person come to the next meeting and
perhaps educate us if that would be helpful yep we can definitely reach out to the association and have someone come um I guess previous versions of the bill have explicitly included language to allow for basically AI generated captions
instead of a human um the current version is not as explicit but could be made since that version has existed in the past and they they want to make sure that change doesn't get made um so yeah I can invite them to come or or send a member is it federal
legislation or state legislation cuz forgive me I'm not aware yeah it's state legislation so if there is a transcript being made in a court it is subject to a rate in law that does not have any
sort of interest um you know as as the cost of living goes up this rate goes up with it there's so it's just a flat rate that was set in 1988 thank you so u from what I'm hearing is that um
Andrea will reach out to um this person watching from home or the association uh that they're a part of and see if um see if we can get them to come either to the next meeting or or or
um one uh you know in the near future and or get some more information so that we can we can clarify and decide decide and uh whether whether to write a letter in support of the current uh legislation
uh or not do did I hear that do did I capture that correctly yes I think so that sounds correct to me this is Andrea one thing I will note is with new state um legislature
attempts to move bills more quickly they do have to report on this bill by June 7th so we do have one more meeting um if I could suggest the board could have a motion to consider a bill or a letter at the next meeting and you all can
finalize it and vote on a final letter at the next meeting if you would like to get it to the legislature before that committee deadline actually Andrea the rule is the bill has to be reported 50 days out of committee after the bill already has been heard
has the bill already been heard yes it was heard this week oh that changes things a little bit okay all right so we have 60 days then okay so um just so I'm clear are
you suggesting Andrea that that um maybe we want to uh you know start drafting a letter and then vote on it for next meeting or I'm just I just want to be a little clearer this is West can I contribute to this conversation please
this is um I think it might be better for the board to review the bill prior to drafting a letter because um we don't have as much information about what's in the bill yet um so that we could review those materials and then we could make a decision based on what the content
actually says explicitly or implicitly whether and how we want to respond thank you for that um Wes maybe this is something that we we should have um we should take up at the at the next uh executive committee meeting andrea
sounds good okay so we'll do that which which you know we meet uh two weeks prior to the next meeting so um we'll take this up during that meeting and then then uh if
you know based on that maybe I'll send out an email uh to folks and that way we'll have as much information as we can to to maybe make a little bit more of a informed decision uh at the May meeting uh if that sounds okay to folks
saying it okay um I know we're running really short on time um but um West uh under new business uh I didn't know if anybody had anything um under new business that they wanted to
uh wanted to share and maybe have us consider this is Wes i do actually have new business um but Jerry I think you also wanted to speak about the same issue um was it about the the mayoral uh the
mayoral questionnaire yes exactly yeah um yes um thank you for for bringing up that issue um issue Wes and we did discuss it at the executive committee meeting and what um what came out of
that that meeting was that I outreached to to VCIL because they've done some work um work in the past on putting together uh questionnaires for the mayoral candidates in past elections as well as um for state folks from state
office running for state office as well i did reach out to Bill Henning um he's he's willing to consider um doing that work again um but he would want it to be more he would want it to be really targeted the questions uh that be asked
be really targeted so that so that we don't just get a pro-form response from both candidates or from any any and all candidates so I didn't know whether uh Wes you'd feel comfortable can I put you
in contact with him uh and maybe you can take the lead on this issue or are you comfortable with that Wes yep I'm comfortable with that but I also wanted to add if I remember correct that the last time this was a discussion the last election um things sort of fell apart
and um I would like to make sure that that doesn't happen again this time around right right totally understood and uh last mayoral race the last mayoral race I believe we tried this and it fell apart so I would be hopeful that in addition to being careful about the language that we're making sure it goes
through sure yeah um sure uh so I mean again I think it's an important issue and I'd like to see us I'd like to see us uh you know follow through on it as well uh hopefully we have some time and let me get you in connection with Bill
and and we'll go from there and I'll support you in whatever way we can and the executive committee will support you in whatever way we can great um and uh is there any other uh new business that folks would like to
share or propose hearing none we do have just a couple of minutes for public input any member of the public with an issue this is Andrea of the Disabilities Commission members of the public uh you
may have noticed you are not unable to unmute yourself uh automatically uh please use the raise hand function in Zoom raise your hand on camera or note in the chat that you would like to ask a question or make a comment once you are
recognized by the chair uh I will send you a request to unmute and you will have two minutes to make your comment or ask your question if you need pinning ability to uh connect with the ASL interpreters to sign your question uh
please also let us know that in the chat andrea I'm not seeing anyone uh from the public at least um uh you know at least online um you know raise their hand or or whatnot i didn't see anybody in the
chat either did I miss Did I miss anyone if you missed it I did too because I'm not seeing any virtual Zoom hands hands or chats and this is Rachel we didn't hear your last comment
oh no i muted it we're good okay can you hear me now great sorry about that we got muted in the room um I am not seeing any hands or chats either Jerry so no one is indicating a public comment that I can see great um you know I would
encourage members of the public um to take advantage of this opportunity and we'll try to um we'll try to leave a a few more minutes uh you know at future meetings to make sure that that folks have have have their two minutes uh to
to uh to make a comment so but please uh please feel free to and I would encourage everyone to of the public to use use this opportunity going forward so but hearing none I would request that someone make a motion to
Jerry this is Carl yes Carl i'd like to make a motion to adjourn second and Paul seconds yes I second i all in favor
i I I Great that that motion also passes unanimously i feel good the first meeting that I've chaired in quite a while all the motions passed unanimously i don't know what that says but anyway uh thank you everyone for the uh for the
great uh great input tonight i'm sorry um you know that I missed uh missed some folks uh with raised hands i will try to do better with that going forward um but have a great great uh rest of your
evening and thank you for all you do um and and look forward to uh working with you and hearing about all the good work uh we do uh next month as well take care