2011-02-17 Veteran Advisory Committee Minutes

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Veterans Advisory Committee Page 4 February 17, 2011 Director Fitzgerald thanked the members for their understanding. He said with the furloughs, time is really valuable. Today is a great example since tomorrow is a furlough and Nathalie's time here won't allow her to get anything else done prior to the long weekend. He said we really appreciate your help with cutting the number of meetings. If something does come up, we will call an emergency meeting. Mr. Wery asked what are these meetings costing the County. Chairperson Fox said this is costing the County, Nathalie's time. Mr. Wery responded that she would be working anyway and getting paid. Chairperson Fox said she would be working on other Parks and Recreation stuff. She shared that Director Fitzgerald, Deputy Director Honma and Deputy Corporation Counsel Renee Schoen could all be working on other P &R and Counsel stuff. They are all here on the County's time dealing with this meeting. If meetings were held every other month, during this hour or so they could be working on other items. She stated that we can't give a dollar amount in savings, but when you add up everybody's time (not the members time because they are volunteers), that is a lot of money. If we can save them an hour every other month, that's our small part to help the County. Again, if there is something that comes up, we can call an emergency meeting. Chairperson Fox asked Mr. Wery if that answered his question. Mr. Wery responded that answered his question, but he doesn't agree with it. They are all sitting around doing what they do normally. Chairperson Fox said that isn't so, she would be in her office doing other P &R things. I'm sure Renee Schoen would rather be doing other work then having to sit here and listen to us in order to make sure we're not breaking the rules. She said they have other things that they could be doing that would be more productive for the County then sitting here in a meeting. It takes a lot of time in someone's day. It messes up the now and is very difficult. She said let's see how this works and go from there. She asked if there are any other questions about the new meeting schedule. EX- OFFICIO MEMBERS YUKIO OKUTSU STATE VETERANS HOME Juan Babiak of the (Yukio Okutsu State Veterans Home) shared that for calendar year 2010 the average daily census for YOKSVH was 86.1 and their goal was 85.5, so they were slightly over that. Current number of patients as of this morning is 91 and actual goal for 2011 is 91. One of the goals is to make a big push for marketing trying to get veterans in the communities to enroll for care with VA, apply for benefits through the VA or pre - enroll with them for admission. Trying to get veterans to get in the system, so