Title
April 14, 2021 Meeting Minutes
Body
Roll Call: 6 Commissioners present
Vice Chair Linton, Commissioner Roloff, Commissioner Kenny, Commissioner Brillinger, Commissioner Hall, Commissioner Mullins
Minutes from the December 16, 2020 Commission on Persons with Disabilities Meeting Approved
Minutes from the February 10, 2021 Commission on Persons with Disabilities Meeting Approved (Commissioner Brillinger abstained)
4A: Presentation from Crisis Support Services of Alameda County
• Presentation by Narges Dillon, Executive Director, provided an overview of services and she was available to answer questions, they are a contractor of Alameda County Behavioral Health
• Website: <https://www.crisissupport.org/>
• Movement of peer support in crisis and suicide prevention - stayed true to community based model - they have 150 volunteers to support callers, and they also have 50 staff, so a hybrid model of community volunteers supported by staff
• 3 prongs
o Crisis and text line
o Clinical program
o Community education
• Resources:
o 24 hour crisis line: 800-309-2131 - local, national suicide prevention lifeline: 800-273-8255 (TALK), they answer 40,000 calls per year
o Crisis text line: Text HOME to 741-741, text SAFE to 20121
o A lot of more intense calls come between 10pm and 3am
o 10% of callers are in crisis and suicidal, other callers are having a bad day, argument, range of issues
o They take calls from all ages, they have multiple languages available and access to a translation line
o COVID-19 support line at 510-420-3222 -- geared to people in a healthcare setting
o Follow-up support for people who are high risk or without access
o Grief program
o Clinical programs: 800-260-0094
o Services are free or people pay what they can
• Volunteer opportunities!
• Different options depending on time of day, none are 24/7, if someone has a serious crisis there is no option other than law enforcement in Alameda County at this time
• Every call to law enforcement is reviewed by a clinical committee to ensure it was the appropriate intervention
• BK: Timing is interesting because most of Alameda’s 5150s were not at night time in the last few years. Can you provide suicide statistics and trends for Alameda? Suicide statistics can be delayed by 2 years because of the nature they are produced. We see on the crisis lines stress - and that is similar to the financial crisis, fear of job loss and loss of housing is top of mind. Economic crisis and suicide are correlated. COVID also brings grief and is a 2nd major risk factor.
• BK: Since April 2020 the number of ER visits for children that are mental health related has skyrocketed. 1 in 3 people who get COVID have a mental health issue after. Have you seen an increase in demand for clinical services? We have heard about how much more very young hospitalizations there are. We see an increase in acuity -- calls are higher risk because of these compounding factors.
• BK: Can we access the free trainings? YES!
• JL: Do you work with the east bay regional center - see a gap in services provided? They cover their phone line after hours and meet regularly with the director of programs. They might also be asked to contact client outreach.
• JR: How often do you have to renew your contract, are your services at risk? Funding comes from Prop 63 funding and is not at risk. There is no other provider in this space.
• AM: Are you willing to share data and are there any restrictions? We would be interested to see the trends. She will send a report with Alameda data. Do you track demographic data? It is by disclosure so the data is spotty.
4B: Update on the Homelessness Strategic Plan
• Presentation by Amanda Gehrke and Ana Bagtas
• Prior to 2018 - programs to assist homeless were minimal
• In 2018 the City Council adopted the 2018 homelessness strategic plan, SB 850 was signed into law which provided HEAP funds to respond to these needs, and Ana Bagtas came on board to manage services. At the end of 2018, there was a plan, a person to manage the plan, and funding for the plan.
• Over the last 3 years the City Council has continued to fund programs in addition to the HEAP funds. Today there are 20 programs that provide services to prevent homelessness and provide assistance to people who are homeless, including temporary shelter, food assistance, emergency assistance, health and hygiene, outreach, case management, and support groups.
• Homeless hotline: 510-522-HOME (4663), Mon-Fri 9am-5pm, evenings and weekends call 211
• From 2017-2019 the number of people unsheltered in Alameda increased by 13% and we believe COVID has increased this even more
• Homelessness is a priority to the City Council
• January - launched process to update the homelessness strategic plan
• Hired Homebase consulting firm
• Main focus of last few months has been on gap analysis and community engagement, survey received more than 1000 responses.
• Preliminary goals and strategies:
o Mobilize the Citywide response to homelessness
o Increase access to homeless emergency response services
o Secure a housing future for all Alamedans
• Next steps: input, data analysis, develop measurable goals and outcomes, draft strategic plan
• JR: How many homeless people are there in Alameda? 2 years ago this was 231 but because of COVID there was not an updated count done. How much of your time is focused on this program? 1 FTE, other staff provide support.
• BK: Count is misleading under the best circumstances because it is only who is on the street that night, not on a couch or somewhere else but still homeless. What are the waitlists like for housing? The County has a coordinated entry system (CES) for housing - depending on your assessment, you get a score and that determines your placement on the list. Project roomkey helped to provide housing for 24 people in Alameda. This has turned into homekey which is more permanent housing. We still have a big deficit in housing for folks. Opportunity for more low income housing at Alameda Point? A draft action step is to evaluate citywide available public and private land that could be used for temporary and permanent housing. How do you access emergency assistance and is this a loan or a grant? There is a SF program RADCO where you can get a loan and if you pay it back, you are eligible for a loan if you need it again. No penalty for not paying it back except you can’t apply for another loan. A lot of programs were HEAP funded and that money expired at the end of March. This one time assistance expired a few weeks ago, strategy is to go back to the County for new funding to be allocated. No pay back is required and max amount is $700. So impressed with what has happened since 2018 - it’s amazing.
• LH: The City has stepped up for our homeless, often times, the City misses the boat on those people that are on the borderline, the people that are struggling all the time, AHA does not help with more than the basics and waiting lists are forever. In the CIP money for improvements can get passed through to the renters.
• There is a new regional approach we are looking at: 1-2-4 methodology. For every one person who becomes homeless, two should be placed in temporary housing, and 4 are prevented -- this strategy should reduce the homeless population by 75% in 5 years.
4C: Presentation on the Vision Zero Action Plan
• Presentation by Lisa Foster
• Vision Zero - reduce traffic deaths and life changing injuries to 0, growing movement that started in Sweden
• Deaths are preventable with changes to the system
• Heart of Vision Zero is the need to reduce speed, some streets were designed to encourage speeds faster than 25 mph
• Safety is the highest priority in transportation efforts in Alameda
• We need this because every year in Alameda 2 people die, 10 suffer severe injuries, and 221 have injuries
• Younger and older people are overrepresented in severe and fatal crashes, as are pedestrians and bicyclists
• 40% of severe crashes are in socially vulnerable areas while only 30% of roads are in a socially vulnerable area
• We also developed high injury corridor maps, including intersections -- 70% of injuries happen here even though they cover 20% of streets
• Top 2 most dangerous behaviors are failure to yield to pedestrian and unsafe speeds
• Now developing a Vision Zero action plan for the next 5 years - actions to increase street safety
• July - releasing a draft plan and will come back to the Commission in August
• Meantime - working to improve street safety
• Have a Vision Zero implementation team, prioritize street safety improvements
• Central Avenue is headed to the City Council after 8 years of work on April 20
• Proposal for 4 roundabouts as part of this project
• Roundabouts can reduce vehicle conflicts and pedestrian conflicts by 78-82 percent
• Made tactile maps in Braille and large fonts that are available at the Library and in some community members homes
• In 2021 we installed 29 new high visibility crosswalks, increases safety
• We daylighted on high injury corridor areas, red paint to increase visibility
• Completed Otis safety project, this was a major speeding corridor
• Will have a new slow street on Alameda Point on Orion Street, requested by the Alameda Point Collaborative
• More information:
o <https://www.alamedaca.gov/VisionZero>
o VisionZero@alamedaca.gov
• LH: Community member died at Otis and Westline, was hit by a bus, thank you for this work
• JL: Oldest son was hit in a crosswalk at Santa Clara and Willow, very interested in this. There is a bucket of flags at Central and Caroline for people to make themselves more visible. Want to have a more permanent and structural but will look into more solutions like this in the meantime.
• AM: Do we know yet if the recent changes have had an impact? Too soon to tell? Shoreline did reduce speeds. Re: slow streets, there is still thru traffic, has this created any problems? We are watching, have not heard of incidents yet, looking at traffic circles at some of these locations. Will they last beyond the pandemic? A lot of locations are proposed for bike boulevards in the long term. This work should come together.
• AB: thankful for all three presentations, it has been more than a year since I have been out on the streets, as a wheelchair rider I am considered a pedestrian. Sometimes it is like taking your life in your own hands. I’m glad to see these things happening. I have been hit many times and had many near misses.
• BK: Can the tactile maps be at the crossings? Will look into that. Hate having to wait when I am the only car there. Changes taking place -- don’t know how to interact with some new work, when there is a bike lane and car lane specifically, traffic trivia would be fun to do. Question about roundabout at Sherman. Current suggestion has southern part of Sherman as a cul-de-sac. There has been a great effort to make sure there is a vision zero for everyone.
4D: Update from the City Attorney's Office Subcommittee
• Commissioners Roloff, Morrison, and Mullins and I met with Elizabeth Mackenzie in the City Attorney’s Office, Assistant City Attorney.
• Feedback from CAO:
o Regarding the suggestions made during the meeting:
o Commission receiving courtesy copies of public reports of settlements. We defer to you, as the Commission’s liaison on whether you’d like to pull such public reports forward to the Commission. These reports are public records but generally cursory.
o Commissioner receiving a regular report on lawsuits involving disability issues (ADA and otherwise). The CAO cannot take on this role, but I’m happy to advise you if you choose to compile this information. Indeed doing so would set an unwelcomed precedent of reporting to the many commissions that may have interactions with lawsuits.
o I have informed Yibin of the subcommittee’s suggestion that the CAO consider seeking input from commissions (including the Commission on Persons with Disabilities) in advising the City Council on addressing claims against the City. Obviously we cannot disclose the content of our legal advice provided to the Council, but he is aware of this suggestion.
o COA providing courtesy disclosure to the Commission when the City makes a disclosure to a reporter under the Public Records Act on a topic of significant concern to the disability rights community. There are practical limitations that preclude our office from being able to agree to this commitment. For instance, we are not necessarily aware of when a PRA requester is a journalist. In addition, a PRA requester may make a request for a voluminous number of documents, and then use some of the information therein to produce a story that may ultimately be of interest to the disability rights community. The CAO does not have the staffing to re-review PRA productions to deduce whether information in that production may be of interest to the Commission.
o I understand and appreciate the Commission’s desire to get as much advance notice on City issues that relate to the Commission’s work. I balance that understanding with the CAO’s need to maintain its attorney client relationship with the City Council. I hope that our suggestion that the Commission direct its focus toward working on Building Code enhancements with the Building Official is something they’ll consider.
o I also wanted to clarify a couple of issues raised yesterday. First, commissions that serve in a quasi-adjudicatory capacity are the commissions that are staffed by the CAO. In other words, commissions that hold hearings on contested issues and issue opinions (e.g. Personnel Board, OGC, Planning Board) are staffed by the CAO. The Commission on Persons with Disabilities, like many of the other City commissions, does not have a quasi-adjudicatory role which is why it isn’t staffed by the CAO. The ADA Coordinator is from Public Works, not the CAO.
• BK: We asked to be informed when there is an issue with someone who has disabilities.
• AM: Good discussion, part of the problem is that we don’t know what we don’t know
• JR: Would like to receive a report before every meeting
• AM: We would want to know if there is a claimed filed -- before there is a lawsuit
• BK: The CAO and CC is reviewing things before they are released -- if they notice one that involves people with disabilities, we would like that courtesy. City Clerk’s office is implementing a new software, we can pull a report and have that be attached to the Agenda each meeting once the software is implemented.
Staff Communications
1. Talking with City Clerk, will have a training on Brown Act and Sunshine Act -- communications among commissioners should be set to me not to the full commission
2. Vaccine clinic at Mastick this Saturday will use the Moderna vaccine
3. COVID by the numbers, community has done a great job getting their vaccines
Announcements
BK: Autism Acceptance Month, City is recognizing
Adjournment