Rockford Sun

City of Rockford Community Action Agency Board met March 26.

Here are the minutes provided by the board:

I. CALL TO ORDER

A. Roll Call

Attendee Name	Organization	Title	Status	Arrived
Karen Hoffman	City of Rockford	Alderman	Late	12:08 PM
Gina Meeks	City of Rockford	Alderman	Absent
Michael Chamberlain	City of Rockford		Absent
Gina Delrose	City of Rockford		Present
Dorothy Redd	City of Rockford		Present
Jeremiah Griffin	City of Rockford		Present
Laura Snyder	City of Rockford		Present
Tiana McCall	City of Rockford		Excused
Mary Yoho	City of Rockford		Present
Markayla Herbert	City of Rockford		Absent
Mary Cacioppi	City of Rockford		Present
Ken Oliver	City of Rockford		Present

Other Attendees:

a. Quorum Established 12:04 PM

2. Board Member Attendance

RESULT: DISCUSSED

II. ACTION ON MINUTES

1. Approval of Minutes November and January

RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS] AYES: Hoffman, Delrose, Redd, Griffin, Snyder, Yoho, Cacioppi, Oliver ABSENT: Gina Meeks, Michael Chamberlain, Markayla Herbert EXCUSED: Tiana McCall

III. PROGRAMMATIC REPORT COMMUNITY SERVICES

1. Programmatic Report Community Services

I. Community Services Programmatic Report

a. CSBG:

i. Te’Airia Robinson has been appointed to the role of the CSBG Programs Coordinator.

ii. Interviewing candidates for the CSBG Advocate role.

1. Ebron Tyson has been promoted to this role.

iii. The 2024 Scholarship applications were made available to the public on March 4, 2024. Applications must be returned to our office no later than Friday, April 5, 2024. We will be asking the CAA Board to review applications and make recommendations.

iv. We have received 13 Garden applications, including 7 returning participants and 6 new applicants. Currently, we are in the review process of selecting the approved participants for the upcoming program year.

v. Funds for the Homeless Prevention Program are decreasing. We are in discussion with IDHS to secure additional funding to support the program.

1. Down to about $20k. Seeking assistance from Hope Heaven from Dekalb Co.

b. Homelessness:

i. WCCMHB program: Joe Sculuca started on 3/18 as a Housing advocate for our mental health program. He is doing some internal training this week. 2 more positions are open (and now posted) ii. SPOE-intake/data position is now posted.

iii. Medical Respite-program planning moving forward, looking to partner with the Rescue Mission to provide space for 4 beds (2 men, 2 women) to start by June 2024. State of IL (funders) are going to pay for 2 people to go to the National Healthcare for the Homeless Conference in Phoenix in May. They have asked Angie to be a panelist (along with Christine Haley & Rachel Thomas from the state of IL and another IL respite provider). UW has agreed that Shannon Kopp from Rockford Fire should be the second representative-she will seek approval from her leadership.

iv. 100-day unsheltered challenge-will have midpoint check-in on April 2nd. The goal is to house 30 unsheltered people in 100 days. The team is off to a good start. As of today, 8 housed and 8 more are in progress.

v. HUD 2023 awards announced-we received all renewal funding but no new funding. HUD is supposed to release a new Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) soon that will fund new permanent housing.

vi. State of IL-The Home IL program has put out an application for FY2025 funding which looks like it will remain the same amounts as FY2024. They have scheduled their Home Illinois Summit for June. We may be part of a panel for that conference, as well, but it has not been decided yet.

vii. Built for Zero-The data coach is helping us get data up to date since we lost our SPOE/data person. They are also helping us with some resource mapping and gap analysis.

viii. Landlord Engagement-has met multiple times with the “Get you Housed” Stakeholders committee, resent landlord survey (currently have 24 responses), has met with multiple landlords, has a unit list of over 100 properties that have been shared with staff, working on information packet to go to landlords to explain CoC wide programs.

ix. Comments:

1. Karen Hoffman: A person running for city council, on the premise of Homelessness, it might be good for them to speak to CAA to get a better sense of the issues being faced.

c. LIHEAP:

i. Communications with COMED are still off - DCEO says they are having weekly meetings - It has been a month now. LIHEAP customers are guaranteed LICA protections with the utilities - but if the utility does not know they are LIHEAP customers (communications are turned off) they are not getting those protections (no late fees, better payment arrangements, disconnection moratorium, etc.). It seems to me that pressure should come from LAA (because DCEO is not doing it) for COMED to compensate these customers. Because of COMED’s technical inabilities, these customers have been harmed.

1. Comed lifted this and now we are able to communicate. There are more than 1500 applications to process for Comed.

ii. The LAA should be compensated by COMED for the extra time devoted to re-processing endlessly applications that normally are processed only once.

iii. The Outreach Wednesday events continue, but attendance is diminishing - therefore we have recaptured some phone appointments on Wednesdays so that we do not under-serve our customers. The technology for these events is almost figured out - but it has been a challenge to get all the pieces working.

Hopefully, this will pave the way for 2025 Outreach events to proceed quite smoothly!

iv. PIPP-Communications with COMED are mostly still off. Some are getting through - however, missed payment notices are not getting resolved even though the customer made a payment - this means the customer is getting dropped from PIPP, and with Communications off - we cannot do Appeals and reinstate the customer. --- This can mean that they will become disconnected. We have been told to notify certain people at COMED about emergency situations, however, we do not know what is an emergency situation in many cases, because we cannot see the client’s current bill. We have contacted DCEO about these issues and requested that they turn off the “auto-drop” feature for missed payments.

v. The implementation plan is mostly completed with fiscal meetings scheduled for next week to finalize.

vi. Emergency Furnace has restored heat to 55 homes.

d. Weatherization

i. We hired a new Weatherization Specialist. He has begun The Certification Program to become a State Certified Assessor.

ii. Assessments and closeouts continue.

iii. We are using more WX+ funds to assist clients in basement waterproofing, vermiculite removal, and mold treatment, among other items that traditional weather dollars cannot fund. We are learning that the community has a great need for these unique services.

iv. We continue to have bi-weekly calls with DCEO.

v. Since Oct 2023 we have worked on the Programmatic Monitoring Tool as DCEO will not release us and another response is due for the third time on 4/1/24.

vi. Wx Implementation Plan has been assigned in STARS and is due 4/5/24.

vii. 3 Weatherization vehicles were deemed unsafe to drive by yards and have been approved for disposition by OCA.

RESULT: DISCUSSED

IV. PROGRAMMATIC REPORT HEADSTART

1. Programmatic Report Headstart

a. We still have several positions available:

i. 5-Family Support Specialists - 49 weeks

ii. 1-Family Support Specialist - 37 weeks

iii. 1-Bilingual Family Support Specialist-37 weeks

iv. 4-PACE Teachers

v. 1-Head Start Teacher

vi. 1-Early Head Start Home Visitor Teacher

vii. 1-Community Partner Coordinator

viii. 1-Family Services Team Leader

ix. 1-Maintenance Technician

x. 1-Coach

b. As of the end of February 2024, we are at 91% of enrollment, 647 of 714 slots are filled in both Head Start and Early Head Start. In the Early Head Start option, we currently have 32 openings. In Head Start, we have 35 openings.

c. Working with the National Head Start Office on a Change of Scope of Work.

i. If we can get the change it could go from 91% compacity to 97% compacity. National Head Start Office might give more funding, to be able to service more clients.

d. Comments:

i. Jeremiah Griffin: Went down to Illinois Headstart Association. Got to meet with other LAAs who agree that they are struggling with attendance. Most others are using general funding in addition to their grants.

1. Karen Hoffman: Director Parham should position the Mayor’s office and council to seek general funds.

ii. Dorothy Redd: The school district is going to get rid of after-school programs.

1. Owen Carter: Not sure about that, but different organizations such as YMCA, and Park districts are in charge of those, so not likely.

2. Karen Hoffman: Alderwoman Prunty is working with churches in her district to have after-school programs.

RESULT: DISCUSSED

V. PROGRAMMATIC REPORT FISCAL

1. Programmatic Report Fiscal

a. Fiscal Reports

i. Health and Human Services Award Dashboard

b. Monitoring/Auditing

i. HUD monitoring is scheduled for May 6th through May 10th.

ii. DCEO monitoring is scheduled for May 20th through May 23rd.

1. DECO has hired, an accounting firm to help keep them more on track.

RESULT: DISCUSSED

VI. EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS REPORT

a. Please review the By-laws and bring any issues to the board. Two big things are that we only need a 1/3 of the members to establish a quorum and that we need to remove the clause regarding meeting virtually. Virtual meetings can only occur under the Governor's decree.

b. DECO is looking at the minimum number of CAA Board Members. Reducing from 15 to 9. The measure passed the Illinois House and is in the Illinois Senate.

VII. BOARD MEMBER REPORTS

a. Karen Hoffman

i. The Immigration Community Event hosted by AAUW had about 100 participants and lasted more than 90 minutes.

ii. AAUW to have candidate representatives come to High-rises and Blackhawk, to speak to residents.

VIII. GUEST REPORT/ PRESENTATIONS

a. Barb Chidley

i. White Head Elementary working on better support for student's mental and emotional support.

1. Karen Hoffman: White Head Elementary is also looking at a separate building that can host events while also providing Laundry services.

2. Mary Yoho: Officer Turner of District One had a laundry program that she is trying to bring back.

ii. Looking at ways the community can serve Seniors better. Need better access for Seniors.

1. Gina DelRose: Can the library look at getting the mobile library to Senior high-rises, or provide Kindles, like the IDA Public Library?

IX. APPOINTMENTS AND RESIGNATIONS

1. Appointments and Resignations

1) Executive Committee Appointments

2) Board Member Removal

a. Appointments to the Executive Committee for one year

i. Chair: Karen Hoffman

1. All Approve, Motion Carries.

ii. Vice Chair: Jeremiah Griffin

1. All Approve, Motion Carries.

iii. Secretary: Dorothy Redd

1. All Approve, Motion Carries.

b. Member removal

i. Owen Carter: If the minimal amount of Board Members is reduced, we will look at the removal of members who have multiple absentees.

RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS] AYES: Hoffman, Delrose, Redd, Griffin, Snyder, Yoho, Cacioppi, Oliver ABSENT: Gina Meeks, Michael Chamberlain, Markayla Herbert EXCUSED: Tiana McCall

X. NEW BUISNESS

a. Gina DelRose: Due to issues surrounding the recent incident at Walmart, are there concerns for our services?

i. Owen Carter: We are working with the powers that be to make sure that resources are being utilized. We know there is a gap in mental health funding, and our agency will continue to cooperate and provide any assistance within our ability.

b. Laura Snyder: We need to have all agencies sit down at the table with strategic Communication to make sure that work is being directed towards the collective mission.

i. Mary Cacioppi: A lot, of people, are over-committed and we need to ask the right people to be at the table.

c. Karen Hoffman: Serves as AAUW DEI Chair, and in having spoken to families the biggest need is to help the children.

XI. ADJOURNMENT

The meeting was closed at 1:18 PM

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