Thread by @FranklinMatters

Ready for live reporting of the #coa0111 Council on Aging meeting about to begin

Town administrator Jamie Hellen arrives and meeting commences. Introduces new Senior Center director Danielle Hopkins. Deputy director Christina LaRoche also introduced. They provide their background #coa0111

Correction LaRose not LaRoche #coa0111

Round of intros of attendees, only folks on Zoom had appeared to be nefarious folks and removed. #coa0111

Deputy director added to senior center to bring alignment with other town Dept. Had been gradually building budget with part-time resources #coa0111

Christina to primarily handle day to day, Danielle to focus on personnel, long term planning, etc #coa0111
Yesterday was first day on job, so getting a feel for it

Job posted yesterday for chef and kitchen manager. Will take time to fulfill role. #coa0111 cleaning was done, broken furniture taken care of, additional inspection of equipment while 'down time' is here.

Desire for better accounting on the ins/outs. Likely not reopening until later Feb/Mar. Kitchen folks had not been part of the tax work off program, looking for better volunteer structure. #coa0111 pandemic is major factor for cafe operations

Tri-county maybe more formally helping to support the food service, how about the public schools? They already serve the students with 10 kitchens, this could be "1" more. At leverage where possible the ops program they have with weekend backpack for students ...

Seniors have food needs on the weekend also. #coa0111 had been only 'rubber stamping' ops, would like to be more involved in programming, and then communications, and plans for execution. COA is rather loose.

Some things work, some things not so well, there are a lot of opinions; need to survey and assess to plan accordingly. Statement on COA read, motion to redefine at next meeting, second, passes (not sure of #) #coa0111

New office will work with COA to determine agenda, gets posted to Town page, and then shared via all channels. GATRA is only one of many topics that can use help in getting the word out. Some use phone, internet, computer, others don't #coa0111

Printed copies made available at stores, etc. Where possible and made aware of. #coa0111 Friends needs feedback on gifts to Senior Center, provided gift cards at Christmas for distribution. Who got them? Tri-county did print work for COA, newsletter etc.

Friends have more than $49k to help support operations. Annual fund raising generally gets $25k (+/-). Need to do labels for this year's mailing. #coa0111 "best meeting since I've been on the board"

Need all members engaged in the scope discussion at the next meeting #coa0111 reinforce the sign in process to ensure better counts

Motion to adjourn, second, passes
#coa0111

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