2005-Annual Town Report - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

This includes assisting in insuring equal opportunity ciently evaluate and enforce ADA requirements. for individuals with disabilities in employment, town Additionally, we have established contact with offs- services, and in the goods and services provided by cials in some other towns to benefit from their experi- businesses. The committee meets on the second ences with ADA issues. Of particular importance was Thursday of each month to discuss issues of concern a briefing on some of Barnstable's programs from the to residents and develop programs intended to provide Chairman of their Disabilities Commission. equal access to all. l Improving access to Town Hall for the mobility- After being inactive for many years,the commit- impaired was one of the first problems addressed. tee was reconstituted and members appointed by the Thanks to the support of the Town Manager,the assis- { Board of Selectmen in the summer of 2004. The new tance of Building Foreman, Ray Martini, and the committee met for the first time in August 2004 and efforts of Catherine Laurent of the DPW an automatic elected co-chairmen and secretary and adopted the door has been installed at the front entrance. ; above mission statement. The introduction of large-print warrants and In addition to appointing disabled residents and Communications Access Realtime Translation caregivers to the committee, the Selectmen wisely (CART) service at the October Town Meeting enabled appointed the Superintendent of Schools, the Building attendees with impaired vision or hearing to partici- Inspector, the Local inspector(as an alternate) and the pate equally in the Town Meeting. The CART service, Personnel Administrator to the committee. (Jim Marr, providing a realtime typed transcript of the proceed- the former Assistant Town Manager was a member ings projected onto a screen visible to all attendees, until his departure in December 2004.)This ensures was extremely well received. Selectmen commented town officials responsible for overseeing implementa- that about two-thirds of the attendees appeared to rely tion of key provisions of the ADA are directly on the screen to follow the proceedings. We hope pub- involved in the process of identifying access problems licizing the availability of these services will encour- and developing workable solutions. age more residents to attend the meetings. A continuing priority requirement has been to Committee members have worked with the Town establish and maintain contact with town and civic Planner and Town Clerk to review and update perti- officials to increase awareness of ADA requirements nent bylaws to more accurately reflect current Federal and work with them to identify programs and policies and State ADA requirements. One recent example is to provide equal access for the disabled. Toward this the amendment of the handicapped parking bylaw to end, the Town Manager, Town Planner, Chief of significantly increase the fine for unauthorized parking Police, Fire Chief, Assistant Director of DPW, in handicapped spaces which was approved at the Director of Leisure Services, Director of the Council October Town Meeting. Members have also attended on Aging, the Library Director, Vice President of meetings of the Conservation Commission, the Mashpee TRIAD and the Construction Coordinator Planning Board, the Design Review and Plan Review for Mashpee Commons Limited Partnership have Committees and the Planning and Construction attended one or more committee meetings and have all Committee to help increase awareness of the ADA expressed willingness to work with the committee on Committee's interests. ADA issues. At the request of the committee, the Information We also maintain contact with the Cape Systems Department has established a voicemail drop Organization for the Rights of the Disabled (CORD) through the Town Hall switchboard and an email link and the Massachusetts Office on Disabilities (MOD) on the ADA Committee page on the town website. to keep informed of new laws relating to the ADA as This provides a convenient means by which residents well as programs and materials relating to our efforts. can contact the committee with their ADA concerns. We also rely on guidance from these agencies to ensure proper interpretation of current ADA require- The committee also has worked with Mashpee ments. Committee members attended a two-day Commons officials to improve access for the disabled CORD-sponsored MOD training session designed to within the Commons. As a result of the willing sup- provide local officials the expertise necessary to effi- port of Douglas Storrs, Jim Vaccaro and Tom Feronti a 182