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Minutes 05-12-04 MINUTES OF THE COMHUNITY RELATIONS BOARD HEETING HELD I~N COHHISSION CHAMBERS, CITY HALL, BOYNTON BEACH, FLOR/DA, ON WEDNESDAY, HAY 12, 2004 at 7:00 P.M. Present Blanche Girtman Dan DeCarlo, Board Liaison .layne Kupperman Brian Miller Eddie Mitchell .loyce Mura Phyllis Stern Brenda Lee Williams Joseph Bartley, Alternate Absent Robert Harper, Alternate Prior to having an election of officers, Mr. Dan DeCarlo called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. Election of Officers Mr. DeCarlo called for nominations for Board Chair. Mr. Mitchell nominated Mr. Miller for Chair. Ms. Stern seconded the nomination. Hotion Ms. Williams moved that the nomination of Brian Miller for Chair be approved. Ms. Kupperman seconded the motion that carried unanimously. Chair Miller thanked everyone for his election. Chair Miller asked for nominations for Vice Chair. Mr. Mitchell and Ms. Williams expressed their disinclination to accept nomination. Meeting Minutes Community Relations Board Boynton Beach, Florida May 12, 2004 NS. Williams nominated Ns. Kupperman as Vice Chair. Ms. Stern seconded the nomination. The Board voted unanimously to elect Hs..layne Kupperman as Vice Chair. Chair Hiller introduced the Board members and each Board member gave some historical information about themselves for the benefit of the new Board members and the audience. Recognition of Visitors Chair Hiller recognized the presence in the audience of former Board Chair Ron Washam, Brian Edwards, Sister Lorraine Ryan of the Community Caring Center and PATCH, and Susan Beidler, R.N. and Assistant Professor of Nursing at Florida Atlantic University, a member of the PATCH Board of Directors. Chair Hiller welcomed the visitors to the meeting. Pledge of Allegiance At the request of Chair Hiller, former Board Chair Ron Washam led the Board in the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. Remarks of Ron Washam Hr. Washam reflected on his service on the Community Relations Board (CRB) where he was Chair for 14 years. He recalled his first year as Board Chair and was honored and humbled by the confidence the Board accorded him in 13 successive re-elections as Board Chair. Over the years, Hr. Washam was urged to serve on higher-profile Boards, but continued to choose the CRB. He recalled that this Board had instituted the Youth in Government Day back in 1972 and it had been successfully presented annually since that time. Hr. Washam credited his attitude towards public service to the principles and inspiration instilled in him by Hr. Hitchell, his junior high school teacher. Hr. Washam impressed upon the Board that the CRB was "the conscience of the community" and as such, performed a valuable service, acting as a bridge between the residents and the City Commission. Over the years, when trouble and strife appeared, the Commission had called on the CRB for assistance. Hr. Washam was proud to have been a part of the Board and its projects and expressed his willingness to serve as a resource for the Board on a continuing basis. He spoke of many ongoing projects and expressed his individual thanks to each member of the Board. 2 Meeting Minutes Community Relations Board Boynton Beach, Florida May 12, 2004 Various Board members expressed dismay and regret over the loss of Mr. Washam on the CRB, as well as best wishes for his happiness and success in the future. The Board was glad to hear that Mr. Washam was willing to serve as a resource to the Board. The Board also expressed gratitude to the exiting Vice Chair Anna Noe, who expressed appreciation for the opportunity to serve on the Board. Chair Miller expressed the belief that the energy and ideas of past leaders would not be lost, but would add to the strength of the Board as it continued to build on the foundation past leaders had supplied. III. Roll Call The Recording Secretary called the roll and declared that a quorum was present. IV. March 10, 2004 Minutes Approval Motion Vice Chair Kupperman moved to approve the minutes of the March :[0, 2004 meeting. Mr. Mitchell seconded the motion that carried unanimously. V. Agenda Approval Chair Miller asked to add under New Business a discussion of a possible co-venture with the Recreation & Park Department to take the area youth to some Marlin and Dolphin games. Ms. Girtman asked to add a discussion of the multiple problems of the Haitian people in the north end. Chair Miller suggested that this be included in the Literacy discussion. Motion Vice Chair Kupperman moved to approve the agenda as amended. Ms. Williams seconded the motion that carried unanimously. VI. Correspondence and Announcements Mr. DeCarlo announced that the recent Youth in Government Day had been a big success. The turnout was good and the students did a great job during the mock City Commission meeting in the evening. The Great American Cleanup drew some 200 volunteers this year. 3 Meeting Minutes Community Relations Board Boynton Beach, Florida IVlay 12, 2004 VII. Old Business A) PATCH Update .Sr. Lorraine Ryan of the Women's Circle and Vice President of the Boynton Beach PATCH organization gave an update on the PATCH project. She distributed a list of the PATCH Board of Directors with their credentials, a PATCH Monthly Report dated May 3, 2004, a May 11, 2004 letter to the Community Relations Board, and a letter from Brian Edwards containing Historical Information and Activity Sheets pertaining to PATCH. All of these documents are on file with the minutes in the City Clerk's office. Sr. Ryan commented that many of the people on the Board and in the audience had been working towards a common goal for the last twenty to thirty years: the establishment of a community health center~ preferably in the Heart of Boynton area. Sr. Ryan pointed to the high immigrant population in Boynton Beach, estimating that approximately 1/5 of the population in Boynton Beach was without health insurance. The affected people cannot afford to go to the Emergency Room at Bethesda Hospital or to private physicians when they are ill. The primary area to be served is on the north side of Boynton Beach Boulevard. This area, zip code 33435, has citizens at high risk for hypertension, diabetes, and HIV/AIDS. It was to serve the pressing needs of these uninsured citizens that the PATCH organization was formed. Sr. Ryan gave Mr. DeCarlo a petition in favor of the community health center that was now being circulated in the community. PATCH has been 43 months in the making and is currently awaiting its 501.1(c)(3) classification. In support of the free services being offered by PATCH, $10,000 has been received from the Medical Mission Sisters, Sr. Ryan's home religious order. When the 501 (C)(3) status is achieved, PATCH will apply to The Blue Foundation for a Health Florida (Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida) for a total over two years of $100K, for the purpose of establishing a free-standing wellness center in the city limits to promote full-time health care services to the residents of Boynton Beach. The next PATCH meeting will be held at the Treasure Chest Learning Center on Seacrest Boulevard on May 19 at 7:00 p.m. and Sr. Ryan invited the Board to attend. She stressed the importance of arranging a workshop between the City Commission, the CRA, the CRB, and PATCH to discuss a temporary site for use of the donated doublewide trailer (from Bethesda Memorial Hospital), and eventually a community health center in the Heart of Boynton. 4 Meeting Minutes Community Relations Board Boynton Beach, Florida May 12, 2004 PATCH would like to be able to provide the services for longer than the two hours now occurring on Saturdays. Also, they would like to be able to use the donated services of doctors and nurses that stand ready to do so, including health assessments and prescriptions. The sense of the Board was that if Bethesda Hospital recognized the need and was willing to donate the trailer to support it, that the City and PATCH should work together to make this happen. Susan Beidler, R.N. Family Practitioner, Nurse Ethicist, Assistant Professor of Nursing at Florida Atlantic University and on the PATCH Board of Directors, addressed the Board. Ms. Beidler became involved in PATCH in October of 2003 and was new to Florida, having come from the area of Reading, Pennsylvania. Her most recent clinical experience was in a public housing based, federally qualified health center, staffed entirely by Nurse Practitioners. These health centers receive special funding from the federal government because services are being provided that go beyond what is provided by traditional health care services. This is the type of effort that she envisioned the PATCH program supporting. She felt that this was a necessary step in the development of a community health center that was all-inclusive. Ms. Beidler has spent every Saturday since January of this year at the Wellness Center, on a volunteer basis. She pointed out that Sr. Ryan had extensive experience as a medical missionary in India and that she was familiar with the notion of training people to go out into the community to promote health. She had adapted the model from India to Boynton Beach, and Ms. Beidler thought that this was a wonderful model of community health, and unique in this area. People come in on a Saturday and learn about a particular disease and go out and help to educate their friends and neighbors about it. Brian Edwards, 629 N.E. 9th Avenue, Boynton Beach, spoke in support of the PATCH organization's efforts to establish a community health center. He distributed letters and reports to the Board and solicited the Board's support to help draw the decision makers together so that the dream of a community health center in Boynton Beach could move forward. Mr. Edwards spoke of the work of the volunteers to bring the organization to the point it was today and the need of the support and partnership of the City. Board members discussed various locations for the trailer donated by Bethesda Hospital, but no conclusion was reached. The Board realized that there were some in the City who did not believe a community health center was necessary and that it duplicated services provided now by the Senior Center. The problem was that most of the citizens in need are black and the citizens who use the Senior Center are 99% white. 5 Meeting Minutes Community Relations Board Boynton Beach, Florida May 12, 2004 Chair Miller suggested contacting major pharmaceutical companies, who had money and would be interested in this program. Ms. Girtman, a long-time member and former Chair of the CRB and life-long resident of Boynton Beach, expressed her feelings on the matter. :in 1972, she stood at the podium and begged for a health center for the citizens of Bo~ynton Beach, for the older people who were confined to the vicinity of N.E. and N.W. 9L'' Avenue to the canal and over to the Florida East Coast railroad. They did not have cars and did not have taxi service. They still do not have taxi service in that area. She felt that it had been very hard to get the City of Boynton Beach to go beyond Boynton Beach Boulevard to come over to the area to help anybody. She was still asking for the health center, more than thirty years later, and was very concerned about its future. She said that many of the residents of that area were uninsured, without financial assistance, but that they had pride. Ms. Girtman felt that it was time for the City to step up and help. She expressed love for the Boynton Beach that she had lived in since 1946 and taught in for so many years. She had worked with the City in every way that a citizen could. Now, she felt it was time for the City to support PATCH. When Sr. Ryan asked if PATCH could use her building, she gladly agreed, l~f she could install the trailer in the parking lot of her day care building, she would do so gladly, but she knew that the Code would not allow it. Ms. Girtman's remarks met with considerable agreement and sympathy on the part of the Board. Chair Miller stated that health care was a number one priority locally and nationally and that people were living longer. For many, finances had all but disappeared. He felt it would behoove everyone to realize the importance of this issue. Motion Vice Chair Kupperman moved that the CRB takes a strong interest in the PATCH program and believes it is important to the community. :in its advisory capacity, the CRB recommends to the City Commission that the City do what it can to support PATCH. The Board believes that PATCH addresses a group of City residents that really needs this kind of help. Ms. Girtman seconded the motion that carried unanimously. After further discussion, the Board passed an additional motion. Motion Ms. Girtman moved to recommend that the City Commission, the Community Redevelopment Agency, and the Community Relations Board meet with PATCH in a workshop as soon as possible, possibly in 3une, to find ways the various entities can work together to make PATCH into what it needs to be in order to best serve the needs of the community. Ms. Stern seconded the motion that carried unanimously. 6 Meeting Minutes Community Relations Board Boynton Beach, Florida May 12, 2004 The PATCH organization will work with Mr. DeCarlo to arrange an appropriate date for a joint workshop. VIII. New Business A) Marlins and Dolphin Game Trips Chair Hiller suggested that the CRB consider becoming co-sponsors with the Recreation Department to offer trips for area youth to the Marlins and Dolphin games. The tickets are inexpensive and the youth would pay for the ticket and the City would provide the transportation. The CRB could participate as chaperones on the bus, for example. Ns. Stern suggested that the Advisory Board on Children and Youth might wish to participate in this as well, and Mr. DeCarlo will contact them. The Board thought this was a good idea. B) Literacy With the consent of the Board, this item will be postponed until the next meeting. IX. Next Meeting Chair Miller asked that the .lune 9 CRB meeting be changed to June 16. ( The Chambers is not ava//ab/e and Mr. DeCar/o's office w/// find a room and not/fy the Board members.) X, Adjournment The meeting was duly adjourned at 9:00 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Susan Collins Recording Secretary (os~3o4) 7