City of Santa Fe Mayor's Committee on Disability met Oct. 20.
Here are the minutes provided by the committee:
1. CALL TO ORDER 2. ROLL CALL
Members Present:
Member Aurore Bleck
Member Kendra Garcia
Member Kathlyne Gish
Member Meriam Jawhar
Member Jose "Eli" Fresquez
Members Excused:
Member Hope Reed
Member Victor Hughes
Member Pam Parfitt
Member Angelique Montoya-Chavez
Others Attending:
Lee Gagnon, Committee Liaison
3. APPROVAL OF AGENDA
Member Gish requests during Presentations for L. Gagnon to introduce his role to MCD
MOTION: Member Garcia moved, seconded by Member Bleck, to approve the agenda as amended to include presentation of L. Gagnon intro and his role in MCD.
VOTE: The motion was approved on the following Roll Call vote: For: Member Bleck, Member Garcia, Member Gish, Member Fresquez Against: None
Abstain: None
4. APPROVAL OF MINUTES
a. Minutes from the June 16, 2022 Meeting.
MOTION: Member Bleck moved, seconded by Member Garcia, to approve the minutes as amended.
VOTE: The motion was approved on the following Roll Call vote:
For: Member Bleck, Member Garcia, Member Gish, Member Fresquez
Against: None
Abstain: None
Page 2 – 3rd paragraph from bottom – Councilor Romero-Wirth – working on – the word “it” is missing
“Mus” should be changed to “must”
Page 4 – Public Comment – 3rd line Chair Gish – “sin” the booths are not manned should say “since”
5. PUBLIC COMMENTS (15 MINUTES TOTAL)
a. Public Comments from website
Attendee Jeminie Shell – wheelchair user who did not have accessibility after being dropped off from Zozobra – had to navigate Parks, Trails on their own based on the shuttle dropoff. May be worth City inspection of entire Fort Marcy Park for ADA accessibility.
Attendee Anne Marsh seconds this, and this is why she does not go to Zozobra. There is also not ADA seating so that Attendee Marsh could enjoy Zozobra.
Attendee Anne Marsh brought up concerns for accessible voting. Chair Gish invited the Secretary of State (SoS) member to address this at a previous meeting. This was predominantly for absentee voting and discussing accessibility voting. Chair Gish recommends we invite the SoS member again.
Governor’s Commission on Disability (GCD) helps handle accessibility for voting.
Attendee Jeminie Shell is happy to assist with providing technical assistance to support this.
Member Garcia believes a team of people with Disability’s Rights are going around to voting sites to analyze accessibility.
6. ACTION ITEMS: DISCUSSION
a. Discussion on status of ADA Compliance in the City of Santa Fe (Kathlyne Gish and Eli Fresquez).
Member Fresquez shared this in chat:
U.S. Department of Justice settlement where the city agreed to appoint an ADA coordinator https://www.ada.gov/santafe.htm
Member Garcia shared this in chat:
https://www.ada.gov/santafe.htm
Chair Gish spoke of the City’s history with ADA Coordinator position and the advisory committee. Segue into the next discussion of appropriate placement of ADA Coordinator and the MCD.
Member Fresquez started to discuss CART captioning in a future discussion.
Attendee Chris Pommier asked in chat:
Has there been any [news] coverage regarding the lack of an ADA coordinator at the City? Chair Gish said no.
Member Jawhar in chat:
But they are not responding back, except to assign Lee Gagnon.
Chair Gish spoke of more accessibility issues from minutes, captions within meetings, and the transition plan.
b. Discussion of Appropriate City Placement for ADA Coordinator and Mayor’s Committee on Disability (Aurore Bleck and Kathlyne Gish)
Chair Gish questions placement in Public Works as the appropriate assignment as this limits their efforts to sidewalks and ramps which does not encompass the ADA needs (this came up during 7a but continued here). Placement with Streets and Drainage Maintenance back in August 2017.
Chair Gish gave a history of the position via historical minutes; feels the position is not appropriately represented as a civil right.
Member Bleck and Chair Gish – stated MCD should either be independent or under something like Community Services or Health and Safety. Spoke of what other municipalities do, or creation of an Equity and Inclusion Office to be housed under.
Member Fresquez discussed salary of position as well as the role of the MCD as a resource to the City to support the ADA Coordinator. Please share all of this with Regina Wheeler.
Chair Gish read job postings and compared them to City postings. History of ADA Coordinator posting as well as the hiring process with Bernadette Salazar in HR.
Anne Marsh commented on the existing job posting, to which Chair Gish confirmed the posting is noncompliant to ADA Coordinator position reuirements.
c. Discussion of Updates on New City Website; The City Never Obtained Advising from the Mayor’s Committee on Disability on Website Features and Accessibility; Continued Lack of ADA Compliant Information to Request Accommodations and More (Kathlyne Gish and Eli Fresquez)
Chair Gish addressed concern that ADA compliance is no longer on the home page menu, and there are flaws in the ADA compliance reporting system.
Member Fresquez spoke of this and the accessibility information. It does have some accessibility like contrasting colours, as well as some compliance information. The City should be complying with Title II with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) via WCAG 2.1aa.
Chair Gish compares old and new website main menu entries. New menu list is missing ADA. All ADA links are missing unless you know what to search for. These should be on the home page links. City website does not print to PDF; links are disorienting.
Member Fresquez in chat:
Also a person with a disability would be preferred for both the interim and full time employee ADA Coordinator [role]. Able to perform the job with [or] without an accommodation.
Attendee Anne Marsh spoke of complaints systems on the website and the shortcomings of trying to file ADA complaints versus work orders. Chair Gish seconded this, and said she will follow up on the process.
d. Discussion of Disability Employment Awareness Month and the City Employment Application and Portal (Kathlyne Gish and Eli Fresquez)
Member Fresquez spoke of best practices with hiring and how we can accommodate those – it is more than just awareness at this point.
Chair Gish mentioned the shortcomings on ADA accessibility to apply, lack of contact information if you needed assistance. When you go through the portal, half of what is typed disappears when you click Save, attachments disappear, no list of items needed, no ability to skip forward to the next section, website timeouts/data loss. It took Chair Gish 2 hours in one sitting to apply for 1 job. This portal needs to be updated.
7. OLD BUSINESS
a. Discussion re: Letter on Accommodations for a Stenographer/CART (Eli Fresquez)
Chair Gish reiterated it was submitted three times to the person that this should be sent to based on the Mayor’s instruction of the City Clerk.
Member Fresquez says Title II entities have to reasonably accommodate CART services requests. In the event of financial or administrative burdens, a reasonable alternative should be offered.
Chair Gish reinforced the needs for detailed minutes for matters of inclusion and to capture the information all discussed in the meeting.
b. Updates on Request to Appoint New MCD Member (Kathlyne Gish)
Chair Gish requested to appoint Chris Pommier (present today), but there is no process to appoint. It requires a City liaison (ADA Coordinator) to appoint to fill this committee member vacancy. During this ADA Coordinator vacancy, the Mayor said he would handle the th appointment but there was no response since September 13 .
c. MCD Sub-Committee Reports
8. MATTERS FROM STAFF
a. A link to the video recording of this meeting will be added to the Meeting Minutes for this meeting.
9. MATTERS FROM THE COMMITTEE
10. NEXT MEETING: November 17 2022
11. ADJOURN
https://santafe.primegov.com/public/portal
