Senior Citizens Commission

CITY OF SHAWANO SENIOR CITIZENS COMMISSION AGENDA WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2024 9:00 AM SHAWANO CITY HALL, 127 S. SAWYER STREET, SHAWANO 1) CALL TO ORDER 2) PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE 3) ROLL CALL 4) COMPLIANCE WITH OPEN MEETING LAW 5) APPROVAL OF AGENDA AND/OR OTHER MATTERS AUTHORIZED BY LAW 6) APPROVAL OF SENIOR CITIZEN COMMISSION MINUTES OF OCTOBER 16, 2024 7) PUBLIC COMMENTS PLEASE KEEP COMMENTS TO 3 MINUTES 8) REPORTS: a) Civic Center Report b) Gift Shop Report c) Commission on Aging Report 9) BILLS 10) OLD BUSINESS a) Rental Conflicts 11) NEW BUSINESS a) Review 2024 Garden Agreement b) Garden Update c) Round table discussion Page 1 of 7 12) SET NEXT MEETING DATE 13) ADJOURN DISABLED ACCESSIBLE (Contact City Clerk prior to meeting if require additional services.) It is possible that members of and possibly a quorum of members of other governmental bodies of the municipality may be in attendance at the above-stated meeting to gather information; no action will be taken by any governmental body at the above-stated meeting other than the governmental body specifically referred to above in this notice. Page 2 of 7  October 16, 2024 Shawano, Wisconsin CALL TO ORDER • Chairperson Jack Young called the Senior. Citizens Commission meeting to order on Wednesday October 16,2024 at 9:00AM at Shawano City Hall. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE ROLL CALL • Members present: Alderman Jack Young, Lynnae Zahringer, Joan Porter-Priem, Lois Flaig, Bonnie Wolf, Roger Olson and Dennis Zdiarstek. • Absent: Mayor Bruce Milavitz. • Also present: Matt Hendricks Rec Director, Janet Zander, and Paula Landau Civic Center Coordinator. COMPLIANCE WITH OPEN MEETING LAW • Chairperson Young stated that we were in compliance with the open meeting law. APPROVAL OF AGENDA AND/OR OTHER MATTERS AUTHORIZED BY LAW • Motion by Zahringer to approve the proposed agenda, seconded by Wolf. Motion carried by voice vote. APPROVAL OF SENIOR CITIZEN COMMISSION MINUTES SEPTEMBER 18, 2024 • Motion by Zahringer to approve the proposed minutes, seconded by Flaig. Motion carried by voice vote. PUBLIC COMMENTS PLEASE KEEP COMMENTS TO 3 MINUTES • None. PRESENTATION FROM JANET ZANDER ADVOCACY & PUBLIC POLICY COORDINATOR • Janet handed out some flyers and explained her position at GWAAR, the Greater Wisconsin Agency on Aging Resources. Janet has been the Advocacy and Public Policy Coordinator for 11 Years. Prior to that Janet was the Aging and Disability Resource Director for Portage County for 20 years. The Greater Wisconsin Agency on Aging Resources is called the Area Agency on Aging. Under the Older Americans Act it provides the outline in funding for many of the programs that are served in the county and tribal level, nutrition, benefit specialist, counseling, and Transportation. Also, it forms Area Agency on Aging. There are three of them in Wisconsin. Milwaukee, Dane County is one and we cover the rest of the 70 counties and 11 tribes. We work very close to Shawano County and the 69 counties in our area to provide any technical assistance in operating the programs and distribute their federal and state funding to them. We also run the statewide elder abuse hotline and the guardian support hotline out of our agency. We run the senior Medicare patrol program. Many staff and volunteers work with individuals to identify fraud to the Medicare program and then report it to the state. What are the challenges that older adults and their communities are facing? Funding for those programs is very high priority. For the first year in a very long time, we are having to help counties create a waiting list for services, like meals, caregiver support, who are restricting on how often someone can utilize transportation or how many meals they get because they simply Page 1 of 5 Page 3 of 7  don’t have the funds. During the pandemic they received a lot of additional federal funding to meet the needs of the programs. Now they are cutting back. There is a shortage of caregiver workers, because of a reduction of income. On the flyers are a list of State Budget and Legislative Priorities. There hasn’t been a fund increase for 20 years. For Transportation Support; the volunteer escort service; the drivers are volunteers and only get .14 for mileage, where a paid position receives .65 for mileage. For the volunteer drivers their insurance is going up, because the insurance companies put them in the category of Ubers drivers etc. So many of those people can’t afford to be volunteer drivers. There is a shortage of workers. We need to work with the legislature on how to connect them to their counties on a local level. Discussion followed. REPORTS: • Civic Center Report: Paula Landau submitted a report for October to the committee members on the issues and/or happenings at the center. • Gift Shop Report: Bonnie submitted a report for October. October 5,2024 they were at the Octoberfest, and they had their biggest sale. November 2,2024 they will be at Craft show at St. James. On November 30th they will be open for the Tree Lighting. The gift shop will be open every Saturday in November. • Commission on Aging Report: None. BILLS • None. OLD BUSINESS • Rental Conflicts: None. NEW BUSINESS • Review 2024 Garden Agreement: Porter-Priem replied we should table this subject until the next meeting on November 20,2024. Motion by Olson to table this subject till November 20,2024 meeting, seconded by Porter- Priem. Motion carried by voice vote. • Garden Update: Roger commented that the garden season is winding down. Roger will prepare a thank you letter for the gardeners. Garden plots everything is cleaned out. The water pipe has been pulled. Once the garden plots are empty, the gardens will be disced, not plowed. Jacob Benishek will disc this fall and till the garden in the spring. Porter-Priem requested for more stakes for measuring in the spring of the year. • Round Table Discussion: Paula commented that Bob Kurkiewitz asked why we don’t have a turnaround going through the title companies parking lot. Paula told him that it was a privately owned parking lot. Bob will talk to Eddie Sheppard. Discussion followed. SET NEXT MEETING DATE • The next Senior Citizens Commission meeting will be on Wednesday, November 20, 2024 at 9:00am at City Hall. ADJOURN • Motion to adjourn at 10:06 am made by Olson, seconded by Wolf. Motion carried by voice vote. Respectfully submitted, Paula Landau, Civic Center Coordinator Page 2 of 5 Page 4 of 7 Page 3 of 5 Page 5 of 7 Page 4 of 5 Page 6 of 7 Page 5 of 5 Page 7 of 7