Minutes of the
CONSUMERS COMMITTEE
Chairs: Charmaine Graham, Marcelo Maia
Consumer-At-Large: Raffi Babakhanian
Monday, July 22, 2024, 1:00PM – 3:00PM
Minutes
Committee Members Present: Charmaine Graham (Co-chair), Marcelo Maia Soares (Co-chair), Raffi Babakhanian (Consumer-at-Large), Lisa Best, Asia Betancourt, Paul Carr, Billy Fields, Lawrence Francis, Yves Gebhardt, David Klotz, David Martin, John Schoepp
Staff and Guests Present: Jeff Klein, Kimbirly Mack, Doienne Saab (Planning Council); Amanda “Mandi” Alvarado-Frantz (NYC Health Dept)
Agenda Item 1: Welcome/Introductions/Moment of Silence/Minutes
Charmaine G. opened the meeting, followed by introductions and a moment of silence. The minutes of the June 17, 2024 meeting were approved with no changes.
Jeff K. displayed a poster with words of gratitude for and recognition of Charmaine, whose second term as appointed Planning Council member and term as co-chair is coming to an end. David K., Marcelo M., Billy F., Paul C., Lawrence F., and Lisa B. also added words of appreciation for Charmaine’s contributions. David M. expressed appreciation for Charmaine for her work while serving as Consumer-at-Large, especially her collaboration with him as co-chairs of the lapel pin subcommittee to bring to fruition her vision for the first-ever lapel pin for the Planning Council.
Agenda Item 2: Disability Pride Month Presentation
Mandi A. gave a presentation entitled, “Disability Access and Healthcare” in recognition of Disability Pride Month. The presentation included the following:
- NYC Statistics
- 985,824 NYC residents have one or more disabilities (11.3% of total population)
- 29.1% of NYC residents with disabilities live at or below the federal poverty level as compared with 19% of non-disabled NYC residents
- 61.7% of NYC residents with disabilities age 16 and over are not in the labor force
- Of the 985,824 People with Disabilities in NYC: hearing difficulty (178,722), vision difficulty (197,667), cognitive difficulty (378,279), ambulatory difficulty (599,151), self-care difficulty (276,266), independent living difficulty (443,470)
- Common Barriers to Healthcare
- Attitudinal (stereotyping, stigma, prejudice, and discrimination)
- Communication (written material, audio/visual, technical language)
- Physical (structural obstacles: natural, human-made)
- Policy (lack of awareness, failure to enforce laws and regulations, not adopting the spirit of laws and regulations)
- Programmatic (scheduling, equipment, short appointments, lack of training)
- Transportation (lack of accessible subway station, long travel times, inconvenient, cost)
- Resources
- NYC Health Department
- Initiative for Women with Disabilities – NYU Langone Health
- KEEN New York
- Achilles International
Mandi A. left her contact information for further questions/discussion (emails: Aalvaradofrantz@health.nyc.gov, Access@health.nyc.gov)
Agenda Item 3: Debrief of July 16th Provider CAB Breakout Session
Raffi B., Marcelo M., and Charmaine G. described the CAB breakout session as having been well attended with a high-level of engagement. Initial feedback from the provider community and the QMPI team were positive. Raffi described his conversation with Gina from QMPI team about mandating CABs again, which they cannot agree to at this time. They also discussed technical assistance for CABs coming from outside the agencies and the QMPI team. They are willing to talk with us and brainstorm solutions, although they are working within funding and timing constraints and may not be able to accommodate all that is asked for. Overall, the prospect for furthering collaboration with the recipient around CABs is positive.
Agenda Item 4: Planning Council Outreach Strategies
Raffi B. led a brainstorming session around outreach strategies to determine goals/objectives (what we want to accomplish), methods (how we will accomplish our goals), and performance indicators (how we will measure success). The ensuing discussion included the following, which were captured on a whiteboard which was saved and shared for further collaboration:
Goals/Objectives
- Educate/inform what the planning council is/does
- Get people involved in consumers committee
- Encourage people to apply for the council
- Find commonalities and connections with consumers, their needs, make PC relevant to them and why they should be involved
- Broaden outreach to nurses or non-clinical staff who have relationships with consumers
- Increase focus on involving underrepresented pops inc. youth (13-29) and creating a welcoming / comfortable environment for their involvement
Methods
- For every outreach activity/event, consumers committee member should be present
- Online resources explaining how RWPA resources can affect them
- Recruitment to the consumers committee and a buddy system to integrate new consumers to PC (since full PC may be intimidating)
- Broad service categories can be broken down to be made more clear/relevant to consumers
- Develop talking points or “elevator pitch” so that message is consistent
- Train the trainers (community coordinator can train existing consumers, trained consumers train others) for outreach activities
- Consumers committee create a video for consumer involvement
- Providers receiving RW funds, and their staff, could make Planning Council and committees info available to all their patients/ consumers. this could be done verbally, or via pamphlets or video in their waiting room
- Use social media in outreach (e.g., YouTube channel, TikTok, Instagram)
- Consider: How would that outreach look to various groups? when designing the method
- Create CABs or spaces for young people to be with other young people who communicate like them, identify like them, etc.
- Make effort to ensure all who enter this space are included and have sense of belonging.
Performance Indicators
- Check in with paired buddies to assess how well it’s working to integrate new people, whether involvement is less intimidating
Agenda Item 5: Public Comment / Other Business
The next meeting of the Consumers Committee will be on Monday, September 23.
There being no further business, the meeting was adjourned.
