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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes Human Relations Commission - 06/03/2004 S• 11 City of Corpus Christi Human Relations Commission Corpus Summary Minutes for June 3, 2004 Christi Page 1 of 6 1 . CALL MEETING TO ORDER: The meeting was called to order by the Chair, Oscar Hinojosa, Sr. with a quorum at approximately 5:13 PM. 2. ROLL CALL A. Present Commissioners: Oscar Hinojosa, Sr. Dr. Sylvester Peterson Linda Fallwell-Stover Dr. Stuart Elovitz Errol Summerlin Amy Rhoads Granberry Dr. Clifton Baldwin Albert Santoya B. Absent Commissioners: Betty Black Dr. Ledbetter Ruth Silva Theresa Holder Marissa Dowling C. Staff in attendance: Wanese Butler - Human Relations Department Joseph Harney- City Attorney's Office 3. EXCUSED ABSENCES (Discussion with Possible Action) - MOTIONS MADE Commissioner Reason Motion By Seconded Result A. Dr. Peterson Out of town Dr. Elovitz Mr. Summerlin Passed B. Mr. Summerlin Funeral Dr. Elovitz Dr. Peterson Passed • C. Ms. Holder Not yet in attendance- deferred D. Ms. Dowling Not yet in attendance- deferred 4. APPROVAL OF MINUTES (Discussion with Possible Action) - Regular Meeting on May 6, 2004. •The Chair asked if all Commissioners present had reviewed the minutes. Upon review, the Commission had .no changes/amendments to the _ minutes. MOTION to accept the minutes as written was made by Dr. Peterson, with a Second by Mr. Summerlin. There were no comments or further discussion. The Motion passed by Commission vote. SCANNED 1 f Corpus Christi Human Relations Commission Summary Minutes for June 3, 2004 Page 2 of 6 5. ANNOUNCEMENTS/INTRODUCTIONS/PRESENTATIONS None at this time. 6. CHAIR'S REPORT None at this time. 7. COMMISSION SUBCOMMITTEE REPORTS: (Discussion with Possible Action) A. Housing Subcommittee The subcommittee chair, Ms. Black, was not in attendance to provide the monthly report. 1 . Fair Housing Brochure: In Ms. Black's absence, Mr. Summerlin offered an update regarding the status of the fair housing brochure. He first apologized to the Commission for the delay in editing the brochure. After receiving the brochure document electronically from the Human Relations Department, Mr. Summerlin explained that he had several out-of-town trips. In the interest of this project, Mr. Summerlin yielded the final editing phase to fellow Subcommittee Member, Ms. Granberry, who willingly accepted. Mr. Summerlin would remain available for technical assistance. B. Committee for Persons with Disabilities — Report by Ms. Fallwell-Stover, Chair of the CFPWD: Ms. Fallwell-Stover reported on the following issues: 1 . In anticipation of the City's new arena, the CFPWD has concerns regarding accessibility. As new construction,.the building should be accessible, but there are other areas of concern such as access to programs and the handling of seating and policies. As an example, Ms. Fallwell-Stover mentioned the need for captioning for persons with hearing impairments and the CFPWD's desire to explore the potential of such recommendations to the City/SMG; 2. CFPWD's concerns were also address through another presentation at their monthly meeting. This presentation was by Kevin Stowers, of the City's Engineering Services Department, to address the CFPWD's concerns of accessibility at the McGee Beach area, which should be complete in 2006. Ms. Fallwell-Stover commented that the Committee looks forward to working with the City on a more immediate solution for accessibility, 3. Ms. Fallwell-Stover informed the Commission that the CFPWD is moving forward with "Very Special Arts" training, which provides technical training on the ADA and accessibility to arts and cultural organizations and employees; Corpus Christi Human Relations Commission Summary Minutes for June 3, 2004 Page 3 of 6 4. Another item that the CFPWD is working on is a Position Statement on recreation inclusion. This statement is being developed through a new subcommittee on accessible recreation and would be shared with the Commission; and 5. Ms. Fallwell-Stover also talked about the "Access for All" decal, given by the State and Governor's Committee to fully accessible facilities. Mr. Hinojosa asked about any grant funding for these types of projects. Ms. Fallwell- Stover indicated none yet. C. Education Subcommittee The subcommittee chair, Dr. Ledbetter, was not in attendance to provide the monthly report. However, subcommittee member, Mr. Santoya, mentioned that the subcommittee was unable to meet this month [May] due to scheduling conflicts. 8. OLD BUSINESS (Discussion with Possible Action) A. Reminder of Meetings Dr. Peterson had previously requested upgraded email addresses and suggested that an address group of all Commissioners be set-up and to be used for reminder notices of the monthly Commission meetings. Ms. Butler indicated that a group could be set-up, but that approximately half of the Commissioners are currently using or are providing an email address to the department for communications. Additionally, Dr. Peterson encouraged all to acknowledge emails upon receiving them as. a courtesy so that the sender is aware whether or not it was received. B. Business Cards The Commissioners had previously provided updated contact information for another batch of business cards. Ms. Butler reported that the department would utilize a new color printer to generate the business cards and forward to the Commissioners by mail. Ms. Butler reminded the Commission that the format of the existing has the City's Sesquicentennial logo (from the 150th anniversary celebration. She offered that if the Commission wanted to change the logo, this could be done before printing this next batch. There was brief discussion in which the Commission decided that their business cards would replace the Sesquicentennial logo with the standard City of Corpus Christi logo. • NEW BUSINESS (Discussion with Possible Action) Mr. Summerlin asked about the next major conference. Ms. Butler spoke about this would be the Annual Human Relations Conference, which will be on Friday, Corpus Christi Human Relations Commission Summary Minutes for June 3, 2004 Page4of6 July 16, 2004 at the Holiday Inn Airport. This conference will include equal employment and accessibility issues. The EEOC speaker is pending confirmation from Washington, DC. The Commissioners were asked to let the department know if they would like to be a moderator during the annual conference. 10. ADMINISTRATOR'S REPORT Mr. Ramos was unable to attend due to an out-of-town business conference. Ms. Butler provided an overview of the department for the month and presented the monthly statistics for April 2004 and May 2004. In reference to the cumulative totals, she noted that the department has met the annual case production requirements of the EEOC contract on equal employment cases of discrimination. Regarding housing discrimination, Ms. Butler informed the Commission that the department is coming out of capacity building with HUD and anticipates a HUD agreement in August/September 2004. Through the anticipated contract, HUD would pay the department for case closures of housing discrimination complaints received. Ms. Butler also mentioned the department is partnering with a new Fair Housing Initiative Program (FHIP) locally through Accessible Communities Inc. (ACI). This FHIP agency received a HUD grant to conduct fair housing outreach and refer complaints of discrimination to the department. There was other general discussion about stafftraining, expected number of HUD cases, fair housing intake process, and a question to check on whether the FHIP grant allows for testing. 11 . PUBLIC COMMENTS/CONCERNS/ITEMS FOR NEXT AGENDA Dr. Peterson- Concern on quality of life data: Dr. Peterson asked Ms. Butler if the City of Corpus Christi or another group, even nationally, monitors and can show the quality of life for "All American" Cities and others communities,for a sense that the quality of life in Corpus is improving from 10 years ago with measures and benchmarks. This included data with respect to organizations that have indicated their use of grants/funding to serve certain populations to improve the quality of life. Ms. Butler indicated that she was unaware of one group that takes all of the initiatives made, by the City and the other organizations serving the community,to measure or weigh the effectiveness of their collective efforts toward the overall quality of life in the community. Dr. Peterson commented that he would hope that the various efforts, including those receiving grants, are effective in meeting their goals, toward the larger goal of improving the quality of life, with a hopeful movement toward reducing the issues affecting the quality of life of victims and those suffering. Ms. Butler mentioned that possibly thoseagencies serving certain populations to improve their quality of Corpus Christi Human Relations Commission Summary Minutes for June 3, 2004 Page 5 of 6 life could be a resource in gathering some perspective and local measurement of the community-wide efforts to improve quality of life issues. [Mr. Harney had to leave the meeting] General discussion ensued, including examples of other cities and former years. Regarding housing, Dr. Peterson commented that hopefully the barriers that exist are being addressed and through a group effort, i.e.: to reduce problems in housing and problems of discrimination. Back on the issue of the quality of life in cities, Ms. Butler mentioned that before Mr. Harney had to leave, he suggested the Texas Municipal League as a possible resource to assist in collecting quality of life data. There was more general discussion on possible resources or possible contact persons in an attempt to obtain information and measures for some type of overall assessment of the quality of life in this community. During these discussions, some Commissioners shared individual perspectives on factors impacting the quality of life. Regarding the question of"...Is Corpus Christi better off today..." Mr. Summerlin commented that some responses may be subjective, and sometimes there is a lack of input, for various reasons, from those persons who are suffering. However,.Mr. Summerlin agreed that there are objective factors to measure, but that this data/input may be provided or collected by individual organizations. He mentioned that he would be interested in learning about what information or criteria that TML and others (like chambers of commerce) may have available regarding measuring quality of life issues. Ms. Rhoads Granberry suggested that some of this type of information for historical perspective and projections should be available in the Consolidated Plans that Neighborhood Services Departments have to update every five years. Mr. Hinojosa commented that work is underway to provide low-income housing on the city's south side on Holly/Weber roads, but interested individuals would have to qualify. He also spoke about what keeps people from "getting ahead", in that improving an individual's quality of life out of low-income housing depends on that individual's desire to"get ahead", which may be lacking for some people, and that certain individual attitudes of being a minority sometimes hold people back. Corpus Christi Human Relations Commission Summary Minutes for June 3, 2004 Page 6 of 6 Ms. Fallwell-Stover commented on one other criteria for measuring how well a community is doing. From the perspective of people with disabilities, one of the issues regarding their quality of life is that of having more affordable and accessible housing. 12. ADJOURNMENT This meeting adjourned at approximately 6:01 PM: Motion by: Errol Summerlin S Second by: Albert Santoya Result: Passed