Steering minutes: 2020-04-18

Agenda:

Great Oak Cohousing
Steering Committee Meeting
4/18/2020

Facilitators: Amy & Patti (sharing Facilitation & Tech duties)
Minutes: Catherine


Present: Sharon (Chief Scientist), Annie (Membership), Marta (Common
House), Debbi (Steering Convenor), Mac (Grounds), Amy (Finance and Legal),
Mary (Buildings), Patti (Process), Eric (Meals), Suzette (Work), Gail G.,
Catherine, Debbi, Gayle T., Tammy, Bennie, Pam, Willie, Syndallas, Dan,
Tevah, Kelly, Glenn, Emily, Elph, Fatima, Polly,

We’ll be sharing minutes/meeting recording with Sunward and Touchstone.

AGENDA
Welcome & Agenda Review
List GO Accomplishments
Covid-19 Update
Announcements
GO Risk Survey Week #3
Do we need a COVID Protocol ad hoc team?
Labor to Support GO Shopper Program (Decision)
Reports from Buildings & Grounds
Next Meeting
Evaluation and Thanks

Minutes:

DECISIONS & TASKS FROM TODAY’S MEETING

DECISION: Approval of proposal to add labor for Grocery jobs to May Special
Work Season

DECISION: Continue the GO Risks Survey

DECISION: Point people for our new jobs/ad hoc committees:
Laundry: Kelly
Mail: Marta
Groceries: Tammy

DECISION: Create Covid-19 response plan ad hoc committee to prepare for
responding to cases of Covid-19 in the community. Kelly, Polly, Mary,
Syndallas volunteered.

TASK: Syndallas will convene the first meeting of the Covid-19 response
plan ad hoc committee with Kelly, Polly and Mary.

TASK: Work Committee and Ad Hoc Grocery Committee to coordinate around
including Touchstone labor in the Grocery system.


WELCOME AND AGENDA REVIEW


LIST GO ACCOMPLISHMENTS --Annie will be participating in and briefly
presenting at a cohousing panel in Ontario focused on communities’
responses to covid -19. She would like to share a list of what we have done
to take care of each other here.
Go round to share something meaningful for you that GO has put in place
during this time (or something that’s not been named already - noted in
this document) and below:
Shopping for each other
Printing faceshields from TS 3 D printer
Becky coordinating making cloth masks for health systems
Dale making 3D masks at Makerworks
Seniors able to stay home
CH sanitizing
Closing of CH rooms
CH available for laundry with sanitizing protocol--”could do minor surgery
there”
Being part of laundry room planning group--thought about how to be
inclusive and safe at the same time
Weekly Steering Team meetings (right hand always talking to left
hand--community coordination is happening)
Coordination of grocery shopping
Updates from resident epidemiologist
Used our policies to enable us to pull our steering committee together and
move into high gear together
Having a garden workday, seeing shoots coming out of the ground is so
hopeful
Early on, some folks knew that they had to do something. The community was
gracious with those people even if we weren’t all ready yet. We worked well
together.
All along, understanding that being isolated there is support that we can
provide each other as a community. We keep leaning toward that even though
it’s not perfect.
Distributing 5 gallons of hand sanitizer
Mail delivery so people don’t have to go into ch
Kids being able to play outside, with an understanding of distancing
Capacity to turn around on a dime. A ton of support, awesome
responsiveness for starting group Instacart delivery
Art, music, poetry, emotional support plus we also have data to rely on.
Our first informal meeting to respond to Covid-19 was on March 7. The
common house closed down shortly after that.
People send out emails before they go to the store, asking if anyone needs
anything.
Looking at financial needs and making an effort to meet those needs
Tiny porch concert series
The crisis has brought out the best of GO. Everyone is functioning at the
highest level to support each other
Speed of coordination of everyone. All of the community is putting their
mind to ways to help. Also every day there are neighbors who are really
attentive to others’ emotional needs and well being.
Meditation for the community
Shopping especially helpful to me, but I appreciate all of the
organization.

COVID-19 UPDATE (Sharon)

Sharon shared Bridge MI data. Look at daily cases, the number is coming
down. There have been some changes in the definitions of who gets to
“count” as a case. This is affecting the death counts in particular. Now
the CDC allows states to count deaths when testing wasn’t available.

Preparedness. The distribution of deaths in the cities that didn’t have a
chance to get a leg up on things. Big outbreak that flooded into hospital
systems that didn’t have the PPEs, the ability to get in front of it.
The more we can continue what we’ve been doing and not let up, the better.

Working with the state with attention to economic life. Some of what Sharon
knows is not for public consumption.

Sharon has pulled faculty together to lay out a framework for our
state--are we urgent, stabilizing or in recovery. Also trying to
understand businesses and where they are to think about how to mitigate
risk.

What are the low-risk jobs that can operate even within an urgent
framework? The idea is to keep opening up different segments.

We are looking at a slow re-engagement to economic life where people are
still social distancing. For example, go to work but then come home and
continue to socially isolate.

We need to be able to test, we need the health care system to be ready--ICU
beds, PPE, etc.
The opening of businesses will have to be staggered.

Most of us just want to jump from “urgent” to “recovery”

Best guesses regarding timing:
Possibly we will have the necessary testing capability by the end of
May--to be able to test enough if faced with another outbreak.
End of July, hopefully, able to test asymptomatic people. We still don’t
know the frequency of asymptomatic carriers.
August--may be a test for antibodies. Current tests are not adequate.
We just don’t know about immunity. This virus does not act like others.
Vaccines are many months out.
Health systems are in pretty good shape.
6000+ people have volunteered to do contact tracing, people with some
knowledge and skill.

Questions:
What is the status of treatments/therapies?
Therapies are in mid-development. Pharma companies are taking thousands of
already-known drugs to screen them for usefulness.
Hard to test--people in hospitals are very sick; it’s hard to test on very
ill people, and it is also hard to test when the system is overwhelmed.

What is your take on medications that have chatter but also indications
that they might be harmful?
Depends on the community, it depends on the kind of testing.

What is the status of the coordination among the states?
The info must be boiled down so everyone understands it. There will be a
batting order for getting back to work at varying levels. It’s a hard
concept for everyone to wrap their minds around. It might still be a month
away.

We see a low rise of Washtenaw County cases and deaths. How realistic are
these numbers?
The testing we are seeing is for the people who were sick enough to be
tested. I think the testing capacity is enough that we do accurately see
the tip of the iceberg. But we won’t know the numbers of the lower part of
the iceberg for a while, when we expand the testing.


ANNOUNCEMENTS
Garden workday this afternoon.

Today is one year that Suzette and Bob have lived here! They want to order
bagels for us to celebrate. There is a code to use now. Order from Barry
Bagels by 3pm today.

Polly introduced Oberon on-screen (new cat)

A while back, Syndallas and Rowena (from Sunward) worked together on a
nature school. Now they are collaborating on a community-building activity
around nature and neighborhoods. Over the next couple of weeks, Syndallas
will be asking for volunteers for fun things, and feedback too. Watch for
more info.


GO RISK SURVEY WEEK #3
People are starting to think that they might be heading back to work in May.
We’ll have more questions about how community risk is shifting as people go
back to work.

About half of respondents shared that they are having difficult
feelings--stress, depression, etc. The survey team doesn’t have a plan for
how to respond--perhaps will pass info to other committees.

Captured some concerns about social distancing, particularly for teens and
children. Also, concern from parents about their kids’ needs for social
interaction.

Some are commenting on judgments about social distancing

Questions about how we will handle cases of Covid-19 in the community

Lots of appreciation for the ways we are supporting each other.

We also captured lots of info regarding shopping, laundry and shared that
info with the ad hoc committees.

54 surveys completed. Catherine and Pam did outreach to people who had not
responded.

Ongoing question: is this survey useful, do we need it? Is there feedback
that people have regarding the survey?

Questions/Comments
Without baseline data of how people felt before the pandemic, the data
about how people are feeling is less useful.

True, although from a community care perspective, if 50 % of people are
feeling depressed or sad, it is something to respond to.

What was the actual wording? Anxious, lonely, depressed. We asked people
how they were feeling and they filled out their own responses.

We clarified who current point people are for some of our new jobs/systems:
Laundry: Kelly
Mail: Marta
Groceries: Tammy

Support expressed to continue the survey.

PLAN FOR WHAT TO DO WHEN SOMEONE IN OUR COMMUNITY IS SICK:
Do we need to set up a small group to work on plans? People immediately
volunteered: Kelly, Polly, Mary and Syndallas. Syndallas will convene the
first meeting.

LABOR TO SUPPORT GO SHOPPER PROGRAM
An ad hoc grocery group worked on a plan to formalize our group shopping
systems.
Bringing groceries has a high value for many people here. This proposal is
for the May Special Work Season. This is proposed to go under our Meals
Committee.

We have been sending in shoppers to shop for community members.
Coordinated Instacart order.
Curbside pickup.
Coordinating with TS. They do not currently have a parallel program.

Neighbors who have shopped for each other may not all continue doing so.

Link to the full proposal (numbers are based on preliminary results of the
Risk Survey, week 3--numbers may be updated before presenting proposal at
our plenary meeting.)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/18FsYU0DiBIS1x-4r_TULW_j815COZ2iV/view?usp=sharing


Can the Steering Committee decide on this proposal today?

Clarifying questions:
TS people are using the system. Could someone contact TS and formally
request some hours from TS?

Can we spread out the load a little bit more? Can the Work Committee come
up with ideas for this?

Have we considered a TS ambassador to communicate with them?
Marta has talked with them. They have some work hours in their budget they
may be able to contribute to this.

Susan Ayers has been running an instacart that is open to GO.

Discussion:
I appreciate that there is a more realistic number of hours assigned to
this. It was lacking before.

I appreciate the work that went into this proposal and getting a realistic
number of hours.

I am always concerned about adding to the work hours. But right now there
is a sense that some cannot do more work now, others will step up and
volunteer, independent of the number of hours people are assigned.

Most of this work has already been happening. By formally counting it in
the system, it acknowledges the work that is happening, and also allows
spreading the work around a bit more.

Do we have any concerns?

I support the plan but also think it would be a good idea to discuss at a
plenary.

What is the schedule for the Work Committee?
The Work Committee wanted to hear from the community before we added 100
hours per month. Looking at the May 1 deadline, we realized it’s tight but
also artificial. We don’t want it to drag out but as soon as we have the
info to execute, we will. We are also still waiting to hear from the ad
hoc laundry committee about their labor plans.

Hearing support for the proposal. Marta can let the plenary know that
Steering supports the proposal, and ask for additional input.

As a facilitator for Monday’s meeting--is this a decision by Steering, or
are we asking the community for formal approval?

We will present this as a decision for May. There currently isn’t a
requirement for community approval for work jobs.

What we hear back from the work survey impacts the ability to fill jobs. We
can try doing this, but how much does Work really need to “wrangle and pull
teeth” to fill these hours, or just try our best?


REPORTS FROM COMMITTEES RE: DISCUSSIONS OF CDC GUIDELINES VIS-A-VIS THEIR
WORK

BUILDINGS
Met Thursday night. Based on their review of the Governor’s executive
order, they put together a checklist for workers to complete prior to
entering a unit to do repairs.
1 Is this a repair that can wait?
2 If a worker needs to enter a unit (Olas, Ted, Eric or a hired
contractor), they are asked to complete a checklist asking questions like:
are you wearing a face mask, gloves, will you sanitize the door knobs
before and after using? And more.

Wilie is working on the draft checklist.

If anyone has work that they need to have done in their unit (for which
Buildings is not involved, for example, a faucet leak or other) they can
communicate with Buildings to get the checklist to use for everyone’s
safety.


NEXT WEEK’S MEETING IS ON 4/25/20
Email your agenda items to the facilitators, Mary and Susan as early in the
week as possible.
Minutes: Catherine

AGENDA STACK FOR NEXT WEEK:
Report on Financial Needs survey results (Caring)
Ad Hoc Laundry Team report?


EVALUATION AND THANKS
We’ve been twinkling forever and it translates so well to Zoom!
Dynamic facilitation
The intro and reviewing all of the things that we’ve done collectively to
respond to Covid-19
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