Lots of assumptions being made here...wonder if anyone has been
collecting data, someone at the COA, or maybe even those that help
manage town meetings where we have a good turnout of those technically
approaching senior status perhaps? Does anyone on LincolnTalk know how
many use some of the shuttles provided by The Commons, etc.?
1) how many drive themselves to town meeting (daytime) and to other
(daytime) events
2) how many would prefer to take a bus if a shuttle existed instead of
driving themselves or carpooling, certain stops along certain routes
3) how many do not attend because transportation issues prohibit them
from attending DAYTIME events
4) how many no longer drive at night (or avoid it) and might use a
shuttle or door to door service?
5) how many would ONLY consider a door to door service, regardless of
whether at night or during the day?
If this data exists specific to Lincoln (and it really MIGHT?), it would
be great to have access to it here.
Lisa
Trapelo Road
------ Original Message ------
From "Joanna Owen Schmergel via Lincoln" <[email protected]>
To "Sara Mattes" <[email protected]>
Cc "Lincoln Talk" <[email protected]>
Date 10/27/2022 8:07:28 AM
Subject Re: [LincolnTalk] community center
Those with that level of restricted mobility would get their own
household stop.
I imagine that that is a smaller percentage and that the majority of
our seniors ambulatory enough to walk to a bus stop.
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On Thursday, October 27, 2022, 8:03 AM, Sara Mattes
<[email protected]> wrote:
That might be quite hard for some seniors and those with mobility
issues.
Imagine an 80 year old, using a walker, walking to and waiting at a
collection point/ bus stop, in rain, sleet or snow.
Such a system might keep many housebound.
Sent from my iPhone
On Oct 27, 2022, at 1:54 PM, Joanna Owen Schmergel
<[email protected]> wrote:
Not go to each individual household- shuttle stops similar to
school bus stops
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On Thursday, October 27, 2022, 2:36 AM, Sara Mattes
<[email protected]> wrote:
Can we first understand the needs of seniors.
What activities exist, what can/should be added?
I would urge all to spend at least 1/2 day at Bemis to better
understand what is currently going on.
Activities and appointments are happening there the entire day that
the front door is open.
Look at the COA newsletter.
It appears in EVERY Lincoln mailbox, monthly.
Many of these ideas are very interesting and deserve further
exploration.
I am not sure that we can have a private tai service/shuttle bus to
go to each individual household that needs transport.
But, maybe that’s feasible.
But, before we explore further, , let us understand what are our
needs and where do places exist that might serve them.
Sara Mattes
71 Conant
(Per Lynne Smith’s request that we attach name and address to each
post)
------
Sara Mattes
On Oct 26, 2022, at 7:49 PM, Joanna Owen Schmergel via Lincoln
<[email protected]> wrote:
$200k sounds roughly accurate.
I personally like the idea of a town shuttle that would perhaps
make the “rounds” 3-4 times a day on a schedule to Donelean’s,
Bemis, Town Hall, the School/pods, the library, etc…
Then activities for seniors would start being planned around the
shuttle schedule..
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On Wednesday, October 26, 2022, 7:30 PM, Lynne Smith
<[email protected]> wrote:
Can someone estimate the cost of a full time driver (9-5) and an
all- electric car or shuttle bus? eg., Salary plus benefits:
$100k; ev shuttle: $100k. So $200K total? Or we could use Uber
vouchers as some senior living facilities do.
Just another way of solving parking and driving problems.
Lynne Smith
5 Tabor Hill Road
Lincoln, MA 01773
781-258-1175
Sent from my iPhone
On 26 Oct 2022, at 7:02 p.m., Joanna Owen Schmergel via Lincoln
<[email protected]> wrote:
Well said!
And for significantly less money we can invest in a contract for
a shuttle bus to provide transportation to all of these
locations:)
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On Wednesday, October 26, 2022, 6:53 PM, Karla Gravis
<[email protected]> wrote:
Thanks everyone for the thoughtful discussion.
Andy, I think Seth's post is only talking about the cost of
renovating one pod, the pod allocated to LEAP in the new CC
designs. There is simply no need to renovate all three pods.
Right now they are in fact underutilized. My understanding is
that they are used for the following activities:
LEAP.
Summer Camp.
Parks and Rec activities taking place after school (the vast
majority).
A few Parks and Rec activities happening during school hours.
As and office for all three (3) PRD employees.
#1,2 and 3 could be hosted in the school as they do not overlap
with school hours. It would be duplicative to renovate the Pods
when we have a perfectly fine school right next to it. #5
requires very little space and could be done either at the
school or Town Offices, which only leaves #4 uncovered. An
entire pod is probably much more space than we actually need for
#4, so the $1.6MM figure is probably an overstatement.
I still have not heard any CC proponent respond to Joanna and
Yonca's eloquent pleas. What will it accomplish that cannot be
done with the existing resources?
As the initial post explained, towns our size simply do not
build Community Centers. There are many ways to foster
intergenerational commingling, which to be clear is a worthwhile
goal, but building very expensive empty rooms is not one of
them. Intergenerational commingling happens when there is a
common purpose that brings everyone together, not as a result of
a new building. We already have facilities where those
activities can be done if people are willing to organize them.
If people want to host a book club, they can use the library
with the help of our amazing librarians, if they want to play
sports, they can use Reed Gym, if they want to put on a play or
have a town debate they can use the Donaldson Auditorium.
Our town already has the most onerous property taxes in the
region. Elevated property taxes are causing financial hardship,
which is why the town approved the senior circuit breaker. Let
us try to keep that in mind when we are talking about a project
that would increase property taxes thousands of dollars a year.
From: Andy Wang<[email protected]>
Date: Wed, Oct 26, 2022 at 2:18 PM
Subject: Re: [LincolnTalk] community center
To: Seth Rosen <[email protected]>
Cc: Lincoln Talk <[email protected]>
Seth,
Just to be fair in the comparison, according to the
presentation in the Spring (reference here
<http://lincolntown.org/DocumentCenter/View/72451/Community-Center-2022-Town-Meeting-Article-12>),
the cost of renovation of the 3 pods from the CCPPDC report was
originally estimated at $3-3.9 Million. Updated in 2021 to
$3.8 - $5.3M and projected to 2025 Projected Construction
Mid-Point at $4.5-6.1 M. Which is more like 20-26% on the low
end.
Also, several people have made this sound like it's just for
CoA. As proposed, this is supposed to be a 'Community Center'
not just a 'Senior Center'. So while you might consider the
discussion of PRD with this as a conflation, others may not.
It may be an opportunity to use what I think are two
under-utilized resources (the pods and Bemis) into one with
more use. At the same time, co-mingling diverse generational
residents has shown to have a positive effect on all involved.
There may be other intangible benefits for a Community Center,
you can't look at everything from a financial side only
(though, you can't ignore it either).
In terms of renovation, I think Bemis and Pierce House, while
lovely, are not ideal sites for either the CoA or a Community
Center due to access, parking, physical layout of the spaces.
Pierce House is historic and I doubt a large renovation would
fly there. Bemis lacks parking and it doesn't appear like
there is much room for expansion. The pods really do need a
renovation, if you've been in them, that should be pretty
obvious.
I did go to a bunch of the Community Center discussions years
ago and put my little blue dot on choices, but those were all
about features and things you would love to have in a building.
There is a financial reality that wasn't really discussed at
the time (to my recollection, and at least not concretely).
So, in general, I am in support of a combined community center
to house CoA and PNR on the school campus, but at the current
scale, I'm undecided.
I'll air my issue with where we are in the movie though. The
vote at the end of Nov to allocate $325k for professional
services is really looking to provide detailed breakdown of two
very similar proposals. The 'Infill of Pods' and the
"Secondary Central Green' are estimated at $23-$24M and $24.3 -
$25.4M (2025 Midpoint Construction #'s) respectively. I'm sure
lots of folks may prefer one or the other for a variety of
design reasons, but from a financial standpoint, they are about
the same cost. Both are lovely buildings, but my concern is
that neither may pass the larger town vote. I would have
rather seen two separate proposals for a community center, one
at the $12M range and one at the $24M range. Actual cost just
as an example.
It's clear the next steps that happen if the vote passes. What
happens if the vote fails to pass? Does that remove the
possibility of having a community center or does that just put
things back to the committee to come back again? From my
perspective, I'd much prefer a community center on a smaller
scale, but also, I'd rather have one at the current proposal
and be forced to pay, than not have one. I'm just not sure
which way to vote in that case.
Andy
On Wed, Oct 26, 2022 at 11:47 AM Seth Rosen
<[email protected]> wrote:
Since some posters have mentioned it, we thought it would be
helpful to zero into how the Pods factor into the Community
Center project and what we think is the most rational path for
the activities there.
Neither of the existing currently proposed designs
contemplates a new home for LEAP, although I do agree with
Diana that there are definitely capital needs there.
There are three pods. In both designs POD B would be LIGHTLY
renovated and stay as a standalone facility to host LEAP. In
one of the designs the two other pods would be torn down and
in the other design they would be incorporated into the
Community Center.
The cost of renovating the LEAP pod was estimated at $1.125MM
in 2018, using the same cost inflator used for the overall
project, the updated cost would be approximately $1.6MM, which
corresponds to 6% of the total Community Center project cost.
We argue that the town has other public space to host the
activities hosted in the Pods today, if at some point in the
future they are not deemed further usable. LEAP as well as all
of the after-hours Parks and Rec school-age-activities, which
represent the vast majority of the program's indoor offerings,
could easily be hosted in what is otherwise a brand-new empty
school. There is already a precedent of a Parks & Recreation
activity, namely IMLEM, using the school, specifically the 8th
grade hub, to conduct its activities. We are sure other adult
activities could also find accomodation. Adult basketball for
example is already hosted at Reed Gym.
As it relates to Parks and Rec Department (PRD), there is no
urgency in finding the Department a new home. Once that
happens, as anyone who has stepped foot into that office can
attest, they only need a small fraction of their current space
to house three employees. We are certain either the school or
the 15,000 sqft Town offices could find space for them.
Let us not conflate a discussion about the future of PRD and
LEAP, which can be easily fixed at no incremental or a small
cost, with a $25MM project with no other apparent incremental
goal other than hosting COA.
On Oct 26, 2022, at 9:15 AM, DJCP <[email protected]> wrote:
My kids go to LEAP, the after school program, and we
frequently use the Pods for community events and rec dept
programs and generally hanging around after school and the
Pods are in tough shape. Much like the school building was
before the renovation. I am sensitive to costs, but
significant overhaul of the Pods is needed in the imminent
future. Costs are only going to go up if we put the project
off. And I like the idea of rolling the senior center into
the school campus as it would be nice to have the communities
intersect more. (The Girl Scouts in particular already do
service projects for the COA&HS and it would be great to
expand that.) Again, I am sensitive to cost, not just for me
but the community, but I hope everyone can keep an open mind.
Diana
Giles Rd
On Wed, Oct 26, 2022 at 8:27 AM Louis Zipes
<[email protected]> wrote:
Maybe I missed it and I could be very wrong it but I think
part of this project also takes into account the Hartwell
Pods/Bemis Hall and the cost to sustain those/replace them
going forward. That might or might not factor into the
overall cost and design we are seeing.
There have been community center meetings so I think I
personally need to go back and watch them to be better
educated.
https://www.lincolntown.org/1019/Community-Center-FAQs
On Wednesday, October 26, 2022, Joanna Owen Schmergel via
Lincoln <[email protected]> wrote:
What about the cost for ages 65 to 79?
I do think low cost access to indoor year-round swimming is
important for our older population.
Many might find $199 a year to be a lot.
If there is some kind of access to certain facilities at
Hanscom for seniors that would be very good information to
have. Hanscom has fantastic health & fitness facilities.
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On Wednesday, October 26, 2022, 7:55 AM, Maureen At Beede
<[email protected]> wrote:
Lots of Lincoln seniors use beede center in concord. Full
access for $199/year if over 80.
On Wed, Oct 26, 2022 at 7:52 AM Joanna Owen Schmergel via
Lincoln <[email protected]> wrote:
Just out of curiosity, I wonder if our Lincoln seniors
could ever be granted certain access to any of the
phenomenal health and fitness facilities at Hanscom?
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On Wednesday, October 26, 2022, 7:41 AM, Elaine Hawkes
<[email protected]> wrote:
Thank you Seth and others for bringing up the community
center. It’s something I have been discussing with other
youngish seniors (LSRHS class of 1971)and have a number
of concerns. Although I don’t yet use the senior
senior, and do think one with an elevator is important,
I’m not sure how many older adults in town use it
regularly. In my cohort, there is a greater worry about
high property taxes and whether we can afford to
continue to pay them if a community center is built.
“If you build it they will come”
(https://www.lincolntown.org/documentcenter/view/35385)
Is this true, particularly with ongoing concerns about
covid and availability of classes and meetings on Zoom?
There are few offerings for adults through the Rec
Department. Is that from lack of space or lack of
interest? Most people I know go out of town for
programs.
I’m not happy with the design which appears to have a
lot of wasted space in its “open concept”. With heating
prices going up, how much will it cost to heat this big
building?
I also think the world has changed since 2017 when this
community center was first discussed. I would rather
the town spend its money on mixed income housing, for
example, which it needs. And, Lincoln’s older homebound
adults could stay in their homes if they had more
services paid for by the town. This would be a good use
of money for seniors.
Lastly, if an expensive community center must be built,
can we at the same time look at allowing more Lincoln
homes to build accessory apartments and backyard
cottages? This would help seniors pay their higher
taxes, and stay in their large homes while benefiting
non-high income folks looking for Lincoln housing.
Elaine
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