Steering Committee Meeting – September 20, 2011
In Attendance: Father Stan Aksamit, Our Lady of Peace Parish, Jane Banks, CHD, Sylvia deHaas-Phillips, United Way of Pioneer Valley, Peg Keller, Three County CoC, Andrea Miller, CHD, Pamela Schwartz, Network coordinator, Liz Sullivan, Mental Health Association, Lynne Wallace, chair, Dietz&co. Architects
Governance: 9/16 meeting of Governance committee. Established priorities. Will continue to review composition of committees; will focus on communication and need for website. Will look at final version of policies and by-laws. Must finalize. Will get minutes out for review.
Clarified that Peg Keller will participate in developing methodology for evaluating coordinator but not actual evaluation right now b/c of overlap between coordinator role and city councilor.
Family Services: Jane Banks gave update on HomeBASE implementation. Collaboration going great; challenge is vast. Peg would like to get more clear on chain of referrals for Hampshire County; Jane will assist with that.
Individual Services: Pamela updated on recent discharge planning meeting. Productive meeting with over 30 people from four counties. Good collaborative discussion. Sought steering committee representation and several people expressed interest.
Community Engagement: Last community engagement meeting evolved into discussion of Northampton’s effort to relocate drop-in center to larger location (due to lease being up in May, 2012). Decision made to focus community engagement efforts on Northampton and ensuring “housing first” focus. Brought this focus – and Gerry – to Northampton’s next meeting (the following day). Reviewed follow-up with Peg (who facilitated that meeting): people in attendance not feeling duly understood around their current housing first focus.
Steering Committee agreed we need to attend to this and ensure communication flow continues in all directions. Will continue discussion.
Budget Update
Reviewed budget. Added $10,000 Fireman Foundation funding. Added Berkshire United Way $2,250 (cash assistance for families) and $750 (provider admin).
Will follow-up with PVPC re: audit. Need accounting on cost.
Issue of consumer stipends – how to pay out since UWPV only pays organizations. Must address.
Update on UWPV $30K to assist families:
Decision by family providers to allocate $30K UWPV funds to Hampden County DV shelters (YWCA, WomanShelter) to assist families in obtaining housing out of DV shelter (since not eligible under EA programs). Agreed this assistance is part of larger effort to close the gap between DV and EA families.
Fireman Foundation Jobs Grant
Network awarded $10,000. Discussed hiring of consultant. Andrea and Pamela will work on job posting; will get it posted by the end of this week. Agreed on a very short turnaround time (1 week) and then interviews and decision the week after. On hiring committee: agreed on Andrea and Pamela. Will ask David Gadaire (Career Point), Nancy Stoll (Berkshire United Way) and Joanne Glier (DTA). Agreed to empower Andrea and Pamela with final decisionmaking on hire if necessary.
Agreed Management Team meeting (9/22) will take up issue of PVPC rollover dollars ($16K) and discuss network priorities.
Next meeting: Tuesday, October 18, 3-5 pm, DMH Haskell Building
