Watertown Commission on Disability

Watertown Commission on Disability
December 16, 2009

Attendees: George Donahue, Chair; Kim Charlson; Marilyn Devaney. Anne Doughty; Fred Isaacs; Alex Liazos; Carol Menton, Gayle Shattuck.

Meeting called to order at 7:10 pm by Chair George Donahue.

Roll Call

Guests were Town Councillor Steve Corbett and Raymond Isaacs

Chair’s report – George Donahue
Alex, Kim, and George went to a meeting of The Disability Consortium in Medford. This group is trying to coordinate the various town disability commissions. They would like various town commissions to sponsor/host these meetings. We should do this in 2010.
George will write our Commission’s annual report for the Town Clerk.

Minutes.
It was moved, seconded, and passed unanimously [again] to accept the minutes of the October meeting as amended by removing Ann Doughty’s name since she wasn’t at the meeting.
It was moved, seconded, and passed unanimously to accept the revised minutes of the September meeting as amended.
We will table a vote on the November minutes to the January meeting.

Treasurers Report – Gayle Shattuck
There has been no activity in our account since Nov 20. We have a balance of $125,362.59
It was moved, seconded, and passed unanimously to accept the treasurer’s report.

Safety and Access – Kim Charlson
Things have been quiet. There have been no issues.

Closed Captioning—Carol Menton
We will do a test run next Friday at 5:00 PM in the Council Room. We hope to have the captioning up and running by the first January Council meeting. Tamarah Green and the Cable Board have really worked with us to make this happen. The captioning will be projected in the room. The data line was put in last Friday.

Special Ed Report—Fred Isaacs
Watertown is preparing its own Disability Awareness course. Ms. Bender, a retired Fourth Grade teacher from the Lowell School, is writing it. I will try to find out more about how the project is going.

Snow Removal
Carol Fox from the Council on Aging is running a system to match volunteer snow shovelers with those who need help dealing with snow.
The Police Chief would like to remind people that there’s a place on the Police Department web page to set up reverse 911.
Watertown’s snow ordinance requires businesses, but not homeowners, to clear their sidewalks.
Unfortunately, large piles of snow accumulate at the corners of properties and block sidewalks. Sometimes these are left by homeowners and sometimes they are left by the town’s plowing contractors.
Councilor Corbett would like to see the Town Council discuss snow removal again.
Kim Charlson mentioned that there have been issues with snow clearance around the poles that hold the buttons which work the pedestrian signals in Watertown Square. George will write a gentle reminder letter to Sue Tabor at the DPW about this.
She also asked if there are any plans to publish a reminder about the snow removal ordinance in the Tab.

New Regulation
Governor Patrick has signed a bill making some changes to the state conflict of interest law. We will get a copy of the revised law; we need to sign it and send it to the Town Clerk.

Elections.
Kim told us that she had filed a complaint with the Town Clerk’s office about the fact that the special voting machine for her precinct was not set up. She and Brian had to have a poll worker fill out their ballots.

Plaque
George presented Councillor Devaney with a plaque thanking her for her eighteen years of service on the Commission.

It was moved, seconded, and passed unanimously to adjourn at 8:10 PM

These minutes are respectfully submitted by Fred P. Isaacs.