Re: Discussion of Recent Needs Assessment Studies

Review of Commission Mission and Duties
Sarah handed out copies of the City of Rockville Human Services Policy so that Commission members could consider the framework in which human services are provided to Rockville residents.  Sarah then handed out copies of the Resolution that established the Human Services Advisory Commission.  She reviewed the roles of the Commission, which are delineated in the Resolution.

Sarah then identified two issues related to the Commission’s roles that could possibly be discussed in the upcoming year.  These include meeting with the new Human Resources Director and considering diversity in staff hiring.

November 2006 Community Services Division Study and January 2006 Metis Associates Needs Assessment
In setting priorities for the coming year, Sarah said she had made a list of needs based on her reading of the two recent needs assessments.  She wrote the list on a flip chart and asked other members to add to the list as they wished.  The completed list follows.  Those items with an asterisk had the greatest appeal to Commission members.

• Needs associated with single heads of household*
• Youth issues* (these include gang prevention, reducing the dropout rate, teenage pregnancy, students’ ability to read/write, educational attainment)
• Adult immigration*, e.g., ESOL, issues related to the legal system, how to buy a house, etc.
• Needs related to people with disabilities
• Access to services/information dissemination*
• Crisis needs
• Employment services/lack of well-paying jobs*
• Health care (for example, needs of the baby boomers turning sixty)
• Affordable housing
• Substance abuse
• Mental health needs
• Reentry needs of people who are incarcerated

Mary Lou said that traditionally the Senior Commission has concentrated on issues related to aging, e.g., the health care issue identified above.  Agnes said that relative to reentry needs, six months before their release, prisoners are moved to a prerelease center on Nebel Street.  There are different programs for reentry.

Michelle Beadle proposed that the Commission should continue its work on the issue of gangs in Rockville.  Sarah asked Commission members what the Commission could accomplish in this area.  Kim Dawkins responded that first those children at risk of becoming gang members should be identified.  Michelle suggested pulling together the faith communities to ask what they thought could be done.  Agnes said the Commission could see that information regarding gangs is put in places where both kids and parents go.  Mary Lou said that early on in their study of the gang issue, the Commission should be briefed on what the City is already doing in this area.

Each of the identified areas of need was briefly discussed.  Sarah said that Commission members would vote on their priorities at the next meeting and would then be assigned to individual “task forces.”

Re:  New Business

There was no new business.
  
Re:  Plan Agenda for Next Meeting (June 12, 2007)

• Continue discussion of Commission priorities for the upcoming year.
• Performance measures:  Mary Lou suggested that the Commission wait until September to incorporate performance measures updates from the outside agencies
• Sarah suggested the Commission discuss Mary Lou’s monthly status report to Burt Hall, which has been regularly included in the mailing to Commission member.

Re:  Adjourn

Michelle moved that the meeting be adjourned to Executive Session.  Agnes seconded the motion.  The meeting was adjourned at 9:25 p.m.  The next meeting of the Human Services Advisory Commission will be held Tuesday, June 12, 2007 at 7:30 p.m. in the Glenview Mansion Dining Room.