State-Local Advisory Council

State-Local Advisory Council

February 25th, 2008

11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.

MEETING Minutes

Attendees:

Gina McNeely MAPCHO

Mary Kersell Hampshire Co.

Sandra B. Martin Berkshire County Coalition

Bettye Anderson Frederic Hamden Public Health Coalition

Karen Rose Mystic Valley Coalition

Nancy Allen Shrewsbury H.D.

Jeanne Spalding Plymouth County Coalition

Marcia Benes MAHB/CLPH

John Coulon Region 3A and 3D

Terry Hayes Cape and Islands Coalition

Rich Day 3C and MHOA/CLPH

Brian LaGrasse 3B Greater Lawrence Coalition

Jennifer Sullivan Region 4B

John Jacob BPHC

Frank Singleton MPHA/CLPH

Sandy Collins MAPHN/CLPH

Cheryl Sbarra MAHB/CLPH

Mary Clark MDPH

Alissa Scharf MDPH

Diane Brown-Couture MDPH

Donald Snyder MDPH

Archana Joshi MDPH

Meeting Notes

·  Members were provided with a copy of January’s meeting minutes; theminutes were accepted.

Updates from Coalitions

·  MAPCHO – Gina McNeeley replaced Lisa Ebert as rep on council

·  Hampshire – Planning a communications drill for June 2008; 101 towns, 12 hospitals and the MRC will be involved. They will be testing communications hardware and have been in touch with MEMA to request that WebEOC be activated for this drill.

o  Hampshire will be working with the 5 college’s emergency planning committee; they just held a pandemic influenza preparedness conference which was well attended. As a result, the Cooley Dickinson Hospital is planning for an additional ISCU site across the river.

o  Hampshire is also doing facility surveys to collect information on shelters, EDS sites, ISCUs, and other service sites.

o  Produced an EDS just in time training video for MRCs, currently developing a 72-hour kit video as a companion to the EDS video – which will be available on their website

·  Berkshire – progressing on the special populations project which is funded through pandemic influenza funding

·  Hamden – hired a staff person for the coalition.. They are deciding on how to use the MRC NACCHO funding they received. Started work on the project to address the needs of people requiring special assistance in an emergency.

·  3E – Medford is working with Elder Services to send an emergency preparedness packet to seniors. The packet contains information on preparedness from an all-hazards perspective.

o  They are deciding on how best to cover the 5 cities using the MRC NACCHO funding.

o  Developed a spring training schedule, working with Betsy Land, MDPH Health Educator, to conduct the EDS trainings.

·  Worcester – continues to work to organize and prepare the MRC. Also, working on mutual aid issues.

·  Plymouth County Coalition– addressing contract issues, reviewing liability associated with hourly versus performance based contracts

o  Sue Merrifield is conducting an exercise with the surrounding towns in April

o  Animal emergency preparedness course for large and small animals to be held at the end of March, working with MEMA’s SMART program

o  All MRCs have received their funding and moving forward on planning

·  3A and 3D – Region 3A is in transition to a coalition wide MRC like 3D. Region 3D has worked well with the level of staffing in the Region.

·  Cape and Islands – Hired a MRC coordinator. Would like to restructure the MRC by March or April to a Regional MRC or to individual MRC chapters within a Regional MRC. Stated there are many MRC liability issues.

·  Upper Merrimack Valley – Drills in 3C. Applied for NERAC funding to work on and improve sheltering projects and issues

·  3B– Also applied for NERAC funds for specialty care equipment. They are in search of an MRC coordinator and also, will be holding ICS 300 training in March in Andover.

·  4B – Hopes to have a new regional coordinator soon.

·  BPHC – Community awareness for emergency dispensing/mass dispensing sites. BPHC has funded 20 community centers and groups to develop and conduct ‘train the trainer’ courses to reach out to specific populations to teach them the details of EDS planning

o  The 20 community centers and groups can come up with the most effective way to present EDS information to the different populations that will be served

o  Next EDS drill is this June; will build on last year’s drill and planning for special populations will be a focus

·  Frank Singleton/MPHA – Lowell conducted a presentation on the Mary Immaculate evacuation

MDPH Staff and Organizational Chart

·  Mary Clark provided an updated MDPH staff and organizational chart for the department as well as the Emergency Preparedness Bureau. There were questions on the role of the Exercise and Training Coordinator, Roberta Clarke, with local health. Mary stated that Roberta keeps track of state and local health exercises happening across the state and offers technical assistance to local health in exercise planning and evaluation. She also coordinates required, internal MDPH exercises. Roberta is working closely with MEMA to coordinate and instruct the HSEEP courses as well. Candidates for the open exercise planning position have been interviewed.

In reference to the EPB organizational chart, a question about the new Local Public Health Institute (LPHI) director and how he/she would interact with the EPB was asked; Mary said that once that person is hired, he/she will coordinate with Mary and Roberta.

Another question in reference to the EPB organizational chart and the hospital preparedness bureau was raised; Mary stated that eventually, the hospital bureau will be integrated within EPB.

Governance

There was discussion on the legal authority of the emergency preparedness regions and coalitions. Mary said that the regions and coalitions are not legal entities, and as such have no independent legal authority. MDPH has a contractual agreement with the host agencies to provide administrative and fiscal oversight, but ultimately, MDPH is responsible to CDC for the emergency preparedness grants. To fulfill our oversight responsibilities, Mary noted that it is important that regional coordinators be included in all regional coalition and governing body meetings whenever possible. As always, their role is to provide information on MDPH policies or procedures, and to relay information between the coalitions and the Emergency Preparedness Bureau.

In addition to this discussion, Berkshire County stated that it has 5013C status.

Regionalization

·  The statewide Regionalization meeting is happening on Friday, Feb. 29th at the Best Western in Marlborough. The Regionalization work group state report as of Feb. 19th is posted on the CLPH and BU websites.

Budget – Next Grant Year

·  Mary stated that several people from EPB traveled to Atlanta, GA to attend the NACHHO emergency preparedness conference and while there, they were able to meet with CDC. Mary relayed that CDC has not yet submitted this year’s guidance or budget to HHS for review or approval.

CDC did say that there would be a cut in funding and that the base, BT grant will be reduced from $711 million to $692 million. There is no pandemic influenza supplemental funding for this year. CDC was unable to provide the exact amounts of funding that would be available for each state, but did say that each state would be guaranteed $3 million. CDC will roll a few of the pan flu requirements in with the base grant. With less funding, states will need to reevaluate and revise their priority projects. The ASPR hospital funding is decreasing this year as well.

Like the last grant year, Tim McDonald, Suzanne Crowther, and Alissa will be working to organize the information on this year’s grant for the Advisory Council and will include information on various programs, positions, vendors, and equipment.

Tim will review the consensus document to have everything in place before CDC releases the guidance, a draft of the consensus document will be shared with the Advisory Council

The Advisory Council would like to request a formal discussion occur to fully understand how the funding cuts will affect the coalitions.

Budget – Current Grant Year

·  MDPH has not approved any rollover requests at this time; MDPH does not anticipate any problems with requests.

CDC BT funds cannot be used to pay for backfill or overtime pay for public safety. These funds can be used to pay for backfill and overtime pay for public health.

Host Agent

·  MDPH is in the process of drafting the RFR for host agencies. MDPH will be organizing a conference call with the host agencies to discuss the upcoming RFR. There is a small committee of the Advisory Council that is reviewing the regional/coalition shifting process however; this process probably won’t be fully developed in time for the RFR, so there will be no regional or coalition shifting this year.

Western Massachusetts would like to discuss the host agency issues that need to be resolved; there are many issues that need to be clarified with the RFR. Also, Western Massachusetts would like MDPH to consider reshuffling some epi surveillance staff to be based at the Western MDPH regional office.

Host agent issues that need to be resolved include working relationships with coalitions. If a host agent signs on to the RFR this year, the contract would be continued until 2010.

Pan Flu

·  DHHS is currently revising all of the state pandemic influenza operations plans (panops). MDPH does not have a definitive date as to when HHS will issue its guidance on the state panops plan. There is a sense that this guidance will be issued soon and we will have 90 days from that point to review and submit the plan to HHS.

General Comments

·  Local health would like MEMA, MDPH, EOPSS to sit down to discuss a variety of issues ranging from identification, sheltering, communications and equipment interoperability, etc.

·  Local health would like to discuss the concept of special populations’ registries

·  MDPH will participate in this year’s MEMA Hurricane Exercise

·  Is there any clarification/ information forthcoming on MEMA’s evacuation signage?

Agenda items for future meetings

o  General budget discussion – request from Sandra Martin

o  Regionalization discussion – follow up from the Feb. 29th meeting

o  MEMA director – Don Boyce – to discuss sheltering, collaboration with MEMA, interoperability, and exercises

o  Health Educator discussion – need Allison Hackbarth to attend

o  ASPR and CDC grants – explain how they work together – Mary Clark

o  BPHC – presentations on mass prophy and dispensing – April 2008 Meeting

o  CDC Guidance – April 2008 meeting

NEXT MEETING

Shrewsbury Town Hall

March 24, 2008

11:30-2:30

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