Meeting Minutes 10/8/2026

In person at Bath Housing Office

Attendance: Michele, Deirdra, Ruth, Jess, Phyllis, Joel, Melissa Fochesato, Allison, Polly,

Marla, Janet, Jim, Karin, Barbara

Strategic Plan for 2026-27

Michele and Deirdra started the meeting by recapping that the group had been scheduled to have a Visioning session in May with a facilitator from AARP in May to chart our course. He was ill so that did not happen, and several calls to him over the summer to reschedule were not returned. Michele and Deirdra met over the summer to discuss where AFCLK is going. They also met with Karin. The Volunteer Transportation Program (VTP) is very successful. Yet there are still towns and one city to establish, which will be a big lift. Given the group’s capacity, they believe it makes sense to shift away from general meetings and focus our energies on the VTP, along with a need we could fill for the Director of Community Health for Mid Coast Hospital, Melissa Fochesato.

Melissa explained that every three years the hospital conducts a Community Needs Health

Assessment (CHNA), in which they look at health-related data for our area and bring in

community members to discuss them. Several members of our group have participated in the past in this exercise, which asks questions such as “Why? What numbers are concerning us most, and what should we do about it?” For example, some of the priorities they’ve established out of this process are mental health, substance use, and access to health care. They are moving away from having one big meeting toward going out to groups with specialized knowledge. One population of concern is older adults. When they reach that stage in the process, probably in 2027, they would love to come to AFCLK and ask what members see as concerns bubbling up for older adults. In addition to CHNA, Melissa is hoping we could act as something of an Advisory Council for their community health work. She wants our input and has staff to do the work. Down the road it’s possible there may be ways to gain community or health system support or even money for the issues we care about. She distributed some information on the work her department is doing and would reach out to us when there is a project or issue on which she hopes we could provide input.

There seemed to be a positive reaction to us serving in this role. Some thoughts about input for Melissa included Jess talking about the health survey of residents Bath Housing is doing and sharing the results (not identified by person) with her. The surveys AFCLK did a few years ago can also continue to be useful (and Melissa has used). There was a question if we collected stories from our VTP riders. While conversations with drivers are personal and drivers don’t serve as community navigators, they may happen to be able to know of a resource that could behelpful to a rider. If Melissa’s group did have a very simple questionnaire, VTP might be willing to share with riders with it being completely their decision whether to participate. Melissa said that more than the quantity of responses or having names, the trends or stories we know anecdotally are very valuable.

Deirdra said that with Melissa’s needs for our input coming at different times, and focused work specifically on transportation and the VTP, the plan is to move away from monthly meetings.

There was some discussion from attendees about if there is additional work we might want to do. Barbara asked if it would be alright to convene the group that had been working on Social Connections (Janet, Ruth, Police Chief Andy Booth, and Marla, who needs to resign given her work on VTP), and heard that it was fine as long as she was the one taking the responsibility of convening. Ruth mentioned that there were a lot of projects in the Plan we had all worked on previously, that she or others might want to work on if they were brought up and people knew what they were. Michele and Deirdra stressed the need to focus our limited capacity on an area where there’s some energy and momentum, which the VTP has. Jess pointed out that whatever we want to do, we know we will need transportation.

Volunteer Transportation Program

Karin reported on very successful increases in VTP participation over the last year. Within the last 12 months in Woolwich, Arrowsic, and Georgetown, 25 volunteer drivers provided 944 rides, equal to 472 round trips. They covered 11,103 miles during 661 volunteer driver hours. Around 85% of the activity was in Woolwich. There was an excellent article in Lifelong Maine about our VTP in August which can be read at: www.lifelongmaine.org/news/. Karin said that unfortunately Woolwich’s coordinator, Jennifer O’Grady, has given notice and will end her position no later than February 1, or as soon as a replacement is found. Georgetown and Arrowsic all have drivers ready to go but do not have as many riders. Over the summer we applied for a grant of just under $5,000 to purchase assistive devices that could make some riders more comfortable in cars.

Deirdra reported on exciting news from West Bath. As was done in Arrowsic, a survey was sent out in West Bath tax bills. There were 71 responses. They showed there is a need. Many people said they need more than one ride a week and some have delayed a health appointment because they didn’t have transportation. Deirdre plans to do a follow-up email to the online respondents inviting them to be on our email list if interested. The town has been very supportive and she can use her Local Health officer town email to make her message official.

Karin has talked with leaders in Phippsburg, where they have an extremely active “Phippsburg Cares” group. They have not found a person to coordinate rides. Karin stressed that we should not try to institute VTP in Phippsburg, or Bath, unless the people there really want it, since it takes so much for the program to be sustainable. Michele said that we are still working behind the scenes in Bath. Jess mentioned that a Transportation Plan is being developed now and she and others are working hard to make sure that the needs of older residents are being discussed. Our group has discussed the possibility of

participating in the City’s Bike, Pedestrian, and Transportation Committee. Jess said she will

email Councilor and committee member Julie Ambrosino about that and if there is an

opportunity the Bath members of our group will discuss who could join the committee.

Joel asked if we had some information from our riders about why they needed the service, for example was it for medical appointments? That could be good information to share with

policymakers to demonstrate the need. Karin said they could run a report. Her sense is that

probably 90% of the rides are for health-related appointments, whether a doctor’s visit, physical therapy, or picking up a prescription. Allison mentioned that the Green Acres rental community in West Bath might be an area of need for rides (whose renters would not have received the property tax bill information).

Following up on this meeting’s business, Jess expects to have some survey information by the end of November, Melissa may reach out to us on input needed, and the social connections group expects to reconvene.

The next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, December 10, 3:30 – 4:30 p.m., at the Bath Housing office.