September 2023

Holyoke Safe Neighborhood Initiative
Meeting Notes


Date: September 14, 2023
Time: 1:00pm to 2:30pm
Place: Zoom Meeting


Mission Statement: The Holyoke Safe Neighborhood Initiative is a partnership between local, state & federal law enforcement; city & state government; civic & human service organizations; faith based organizations; the business community; education providers; property managers; and residents coming together with a goal to create safe, healthy & economically viable neighborhoods through information sharing, identifying at-risk youth, referrals and community efforts in specific Holyoke neighborhoods.

Welcome & Introduction 1:00pm - 1:05pm

Agency Presentation: Lani Ortiz DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps 1:05pm - 1:20pm
Hi, everyone my name is Lani, and she/her pronouns. I'm the community coordinator over at the DIAL/SELF Program. If you don't know what that is, I'm about to tell you what that is. We serve Western Mass community, even though our office is in Greenfield. We serve Greenfield all the way down to Springfield. So just keep that in mind while I go through this I'm going to share my screen. Give you guys some info about our program. I encourage questions definitely ask me questions. Maybe throw them in the chat, and then we'll go over them. As we have time or save them for the end. I'm really down for whatever.

Is national service right for me with the DIAL/SELF of AmeriCorps Program? So first, it doesn't have to be obviously directed right to you. But it might be a community member that you know. Somebody that you maybe see and interact with one day, and you're like this might be perfect for you. So here I am offering it. So DIAL/SELF of AmeriCorps Program, the DIAL/SELF of AmeriCorps program has been serving youth and communities in the valley since 1996. Here's a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr. “Life's most persistent and urgent question is, what are you doing for others?” Everyone can be great because everyone can serve. And that's what we do here. We serve our community.

What is National Service? National Service refers to programs like AmeriCorps, Senior Corps and other programs and initiatives. There are many different National Service programs out there. Ours is specifically it's a local program within western mass. Some types of AmeriCorps programs. There is AmeriCorps State, there is AmeriCorps National, there's Vista, there's AmeriCorps NCC, lots of C's. And then there's DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps, which is us here.

Five reasons to serve. Why might someone want to serve their community or another community? I can first say that I actually did this program for 2 years. So I served the Western Mass community. And then I was asked to join the program as a coordinator, which is pretty cool, and I'm happy to be here. So some things to consider for reasons to serve is time for reflection, time to reflect, learn, grow, and explore without committing to a career.

DIAL/SELF of America Program gives people the opportunity to explore and kind of see what they are interested in, or may not be interested in and challenge themselves, and just have a very supportive system while they're kind of going through this program. You learn new skills. New skills are gained, learned and you gain new competencies and certifications. So we will dive more into it later. But we actually hold weekly development trainings for our members where they can learn various topics as a group. Grow your networking connect and network with local professionals, organizations, and opportunities. Being a DIAL/SELF member, you are collaborating and you are connecting. You are becoming part of the community that you serve. That can be really helpful for career opportunities moving forward in life after serving as a DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps member.

The fourth reason to serve is career coaching. You get to explore career options and try on new roles and aspects to discover what suits you professionally. So, being in this program, you can try on different hats. You can see if maybe something works for you, maybe something doesn't. But you have that flexibility to be able to try something. Possibly doesn't work out, and you can try it again, or you can move on to something else. We really encourage people giving effort and being in that growth zone while they're with us.

The fifth one is more than volunteering. There are things like you receive compensation. You receive healthcare public assistance on the job training and an education award which I'll talk a bit about in a moment.

Who can apply? Individuals who are 18 plus, who have received their high school diploma or GED equivalence, and who are US Citizens. I think that when I first say 18 plus, people are like, oh, it's only people that are like young adults. That is not the case; we have members of all ages that serve the community. I think that it really creates this wonderful circle of individuals who are growing together and learning off of each other, and I think that the older members have some wisdom to offer to the younger folks. So it's actually really nice, so don't count those people out because they can be part of our program as well.

How to apply; how do you apply for the DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps program? You complete an application form. So you visit our website. Then we ask that you to submit two reference forms. So you contact your references and there's a form that we ask those references to fill out. It’s really just too kind of get a sense of this candidate's interest because we're not really looking for your past experiences. We really take people as they are and want to grow together with them.

Then we have an informal conversation with the candidate. We take time to allow them to ask us questions. Reflect on possible site placements that we have and we give members full agency or candidates, full agency to kind of choose where they would like to serve within the community. So then, we view site, specific position, descriptions and you choose a site that calls to you. Then you visit their website, learn a little bit about them, and decide where you want to go further.

You have an interview with the DSAP team as well as the site that you will be placed at. This is giving possibly time for the site to introduce themselves as well as you introduce yourself to the site and get to know one another and then you accept the position. If this is something that you want to dive into and be involved in we give candidates some time to consider all things, and then, if you accept the position, you are part of the team.

What does the team look like? What do AmeriCorps members do? So there are three core components of DSAP which stands for DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps Program for short. That inform one another and support the development and of active, critical and engaging community members. So there is one piece that's the site service. This is where members spend most of their time.

Our focus is supporting youth and kind of figuring out their self-efficacy, their autonomy belonging and being real creative. So members serve Monday through Thursday at a service site, some service sites that we partner with currently within Hampden County are places like Community Music School, we do Hope for Youth and Family Foundation, we do House of Colors. So we have many site partners and we encourage more sites that support youth to jump aboard and have an AmeriCorps member at their site. So that's one component of it so site service.

Then we have corps workshops down below. During this time on Fridays, every Friday we hold development training for our members. So all members are serving at different sites Monday through Thursday but then we all come together on Friday, and we learn about different things like trauma informed care, disability, justice, resume building. So a bunch of different things that help members to develop themselves professionally and personally and just kind of create a community, a new community where everyone is starting a new journey together, which is pretty cool. Then we have Team Service Project team Service Project focuses on creating some kind of interaction with the community that focuses on the community assets.

So thinking of, where? What are the strengths and how can we kind of build off of those? Members work together and it's fully member led, so I'm kind of just the back person supporting but they take it, however they'd like to. So those are the three components. And then the middle part is ultimately where the learning happens. So all of these three components help members grow as an individual, learn, challenge themselves, and contribute to different community spaces that we are part of.

DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps goals: Some short term goals that you can see is use a collaborative youth centered approach to support autonomy belonging and personal learning and aspirations. Create spaces where young people can develop meaningful goals, drive their own solutions, make decisions, learn, fail, and grow and use arts, creativity and experiential learning. The long-term goals is helping young people develop the tools they need to thrive and contribute to the communities in which they live. Inspiring lifelong learning, improve youth, self-concepts and practice of self-love and increase education, attainment and economic self-sufficiency in under resourced communities.

Time of service; service is ten months. Our program is the ten month commitment and it goes from August to June. It is during the academic year. So our members have begun their service term this year, but we still have a rolling application. So people are more than welcome to apply now and jump aboard and join the team. Also we ask that members complete 1,700 hours of service that includes onsite, the weekly training and the team service project. It’s a full-time position. So it's Monday through Friday, Friday being that it is the development training.

We also have the weekly workshop with the cohort kind of what is that? What are some certain pieces that are positive towards this member? So you have peer support and boundaries. These are some workshops that we offer; peer support and boundaries, coaching to re-regulate and mental health, feedback skills and strengthening identify strength identifying, diversity and social identities, nonviolent communication and positive youth development. So I mentioned a few other workshop topics before, but these are also some of the other ones, and we definitely encourage members to offer some of their interest to us. We take that into account and we apply it on Fridays. So if someone really wants to learn about professional settings, we'll throw that into our schedule and offer that to our members, so that they have that opportunity to kind of gain that skill.

What is a day in the life of a DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps member? So behind the scenes, there's a lot of researching, planning, preparation and putting together the resources and programs your site provides to youth. There's a lot of professional development; growing your personal and professional goals, using the resources, tools and networks available. Supporting the mission, helping your site to be the best it can be, and to meet the objectives of the organization's programming and staying in touch. The name of the game is outreach. We love outreach here.

I think the biggest point is direct service collaborating with youth and the site you serve to give back directly. So this can include tutoring, mentoring, coaching, and supporting the dreams of youth and communities.

There are challenges of national service and volunteering. So there's burnout, there's some high demand, as most of us know, there's high demand for support in under resourced communities, meaning it's an important and sometimes busy place to be.

Finances; adjusting to and maximizing the AmeriCorps stipend, learning how to budget and make responsible choices. That being that it's a national service network; Members are paid a modest income, so they really have to kind of figure out how they're going to go about their living styles while in the program. There are some limitations. Being that AmeriCorps is a bipartisan funded government program, which means there are some things that are prohibited to take part in while counting service hours. So there are certain things that members cannot be a part of while serving. But personally, they can do whatever they'd like.

DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps support. So some supports as a DSAP supervisor. I supervise the Franklin and Hampshire members. Some of the supports that I offer are week long orientation in the beginning, supporting members in achieving their personal and professional goals while serving, DSAP member and site check-ins happen pretty often throughout the year or throughout the ten months, to ensure that things are going smoothly. And if they're not, how can we kind of make an active plan to support that.

Providing and encouraging peer support, and connecting to local resources and opportunities to offset financial challenges and burnout. So there are other resources that we can connect members to and youth, just community members overall that can offset that financial challenge. And then they have a site supervisor. So how I mentioned, like community music school of Springfield, there is an individual there that would be the AmeriCorps members Site Supervisor. Some ways that they support their member is they have weekly one on one meetings, they have on-site trainings and connections with local resources, they provide feedback regularly, and they do informal support. So they're always someone that you can kind of directly go to if there's a concern, or if you have questions or anything really like that. There's a good support system.

AmeriCorps stipend. So AmeriCorps members earn $17,800 throughout the ten months.
They do receive free healthcare and childcare and fuel assistance. Some members are eligible for food stamps as well. There is loan forbearance. So being that this is National Service network, individuals who have student loans are able to put them on forbearance, meaning that you can pause paying back your student loans while serving and anything that accrues during your time of service actually gets paid for by the Government, which is really nice.

Members receive a Segal Education Award at the end of their ten months of service, so that being a $6,895 education award that can be put towards student loans or future education costs. It can be put towards college. It can be put towards certifications. It can be put towards like tech so different things like that. Some other benefits like I mentioned; there's snap benefits, childcare and fuel assistance as well. Benefits after service; during service there's a lot of connections that are made. There's a lot of networking. There's a lot of kind of showing what you can offer and kind of learning through that, you know.

Where do I excel in? And how can that help me as a person who's growing? It can lead to future education and job opportunities. Different things to think of, AmeriCorps by the numbers; AmeriCorps alum are more likely to attain a bachelor's degree or higher than the average American adult. 9 out of 10 alum reported that their experience improved their ability to solve problems. 8 out of 10 alum feel confident they can create a plan to address a community issue and get others to care about it. 79% of alum are or planned to become, actively involved in their community post-service compared to 47% prior.
8 out of 10 alums say AmeriCorps benefited their career path. And 94% of alum registered to vote in 2016 Presidential election, well above the national average.

There are two different corps that we have. We have the positive youth development corps, and then we have the restorative relationships corps. So the positive youth development core, the members within there support youth, development connection, confidence and skills. They are trained to use a conversational skill that is called motivational interviewing, to support young people in setting goals and activating the resources they have for making progress on them. RRC, so restorative relationship corps members in that program support, student leadership, social-emotional learning and restorative cultural advocacy. Members are trained to use restorative practices to support young people in improving their social and emotional skills.

For site descriptions you can ask me and to email you some flyers. So we do have some sites that are still currently open for candidates to join. So like I said, that 18 plus high school diploma or GED and US Citizen. We have Community Music School, Springfield, that is open currently, and we have Easthampton High School, and then we have Musica of Franklin. So three different locations, one position in each location. So if you know of someone that might benefit from this program, or really cares about youth, development and just being part of community this is definitely a good opportunity. And like I said, it's a ten month commitment, and there are many benefits to being part of this community.

Why serve? You can jump, start a career, try on social work, community work and youth service to see if they're right for you. Last year was my first year as the community coordinator after serving, and we had a member who joined the program and she's like “I'm going to go to law school. That is what I want to do. Blah blah blah.” She was committed and then she served in about like maybe five, six months in, she came to me like “Lani, I actually want to be a social worker. I don't want to do law school. I don't want to follow my parent’s kind of expectations. I want to do what I want to do. This is where I want to be.” So she went for her masters in social work after she left our program. So it really gives individuals the opportunity to drive their own interests. So that's pretty cool building skills, learn how to connect, adapt network and develop programming and relationships for your future and then giving back and connecting, supporting a community you're connected to, or may not be connected to, but can be connected to in a tangible and practical way and stay connected as an alum after service as well, we have many events that we hold for the DSAP alum which I run those events.

Organizations or anybody who kind of supports youth within their organization this is for you. You can potentially host a DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps member. So some things to consider are you can have full time support. So for ten months during the school year, members serve up to 35 hours a week on site. You can address sites’ needs and members’ roles. The members’ role is adaptable to the site's needs and also sites have discretion over who they match with and then you can expand capacity and deepen quality. So members inspire young people to establish youth-centered relationships. It allows opportunity for maybe some projects that you have in the back of your mind. Maybe some individuals in the organization can't get to right now. Having that extra body to kind of work on those projects and start them up is pretty cool, or keep them going through those ten months.

Site partners contribute $10,000 to host, one full time member for ten months. This money largely goes to the members living stipend, and is less than half the total cost of a member's placement. Thank you. And if you have any questions you can reach out to my colleague, or you can reach out to me as well. And I can drop my information in this chat.
But that is all I have, and I'm happy to take questions. If there are any.

Agency Overview and Updates

Yamaris Rivera: Families First
Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Yamaris Rivera. I'm the program coordinator for the parenting program, for Family First Organization. And we are going to launch other programs over at E. N. White School. This is a two weeks program for families that have children between the ages three to eight. I'm going to share other information in the chat. Thank you so much.

Yahaira Diaz: ROCA
Hi, everybody. My name is Yahaira Diaz I work for ROCA. I'm the system director for Holyoke ROCA. We work with young men and young women from the ages 17 to 24. They're high risk, young men and young women. We help them when they come out, get their ID, social, birth certificate. If they need their high school diploma or GED, we try to get them back to school. We work to change behavior. Young moms, they do have an inside daycare while they come into the building. They will take care of their kids. If you have any other further questions, just let me know.




Stephen Fay: Holyoke Mayor Garcia’s Office
Hi I'm Steven Fay, and I work for Mayor Garcia in Holyoke. I joined the Hub at the outset, and have been following the progress and activities and reports such as the one you're making now and then. I share this information with Mayor Garcia, and it's always a pleasure to be here.

Sicry Garcia: Nuestra Raices
Hi! Everybody! And Sicry Garcia from Nuestra Raices. I just want to highlight in the flyer that I put in the chat. I just want to invite you all to the harvest and cultural festival. September 30th, from 12 pm. To 4 pm. So we going to have live music, vendors, farmers market, and I’ll see all of you guys over there.

Shannon Burke: Holyoke Pediatrics
I'm Shannon with Holyoke Pediatrics. I just want to say, thanks, everybody, for all your updates. Usually I don't have anything to share. But I appreciate all the resources for all our patients here at Holyoke Pediatrics. Thank you.

Shandrika Knight-Torres: Gandara
Hi! I'm part of Gandara in Ludlow. I work with recovery and mental illness.

Sandy Ward: Funeral Consumers Alliance of Western Mass
I'm a volunteer with the Funeral Consumers Alliance of Western Massachusetts. I'm available to give presentations. Our group is all volunteer run nonprofit, and we answer questions people might have. We're not connected with the funeral industry. We're knowledgeable about how you can deal with the funeral homes and what's possible in Massachusetts. So I've put the information in the chat of our website, which has lots and lots of information to answer questions. But we're also available through email and to answer individual questions.

Penny Dugan: Center for Human Development
Hi, I'm Penny Dugan I’m from CHD. I am a supervisor of a new program, it's a new program. A lot of our same services, but we are adding on more pediatric clinicians at our Holyoke outpatient office. We're also trying to get into Holyoke public schools to get community based services, so therapy and intake for kids in schools. The real goal is, we all know the wait list is brutal, and we all know a lot of kids are ending up in crisis for preventative therapy. So this is a way to kind of pipeline kids who are coming in through referrals straight into this pediatric unit, and I can help hook kids up with services faster and families as well. So yeah, we're excited to reach out. And if you're in a position to be referring kids, please reach out to me.

Officer Colon: Holyoke Police Department (HPD)
Hello everybody, I'm Officer Colon, from the Holyoke Police Department. I'm working out of 208 Race Street. Nothing to report at this time. Thank you.

Nayroby Rosa: OneHolyoke CDC
Hi, everyone. I'm Nayroby Rosa, Director of Community Engagement and Resident Services for One Holyoke. Our biggest thing happening at the end of the month, September 23rd is our final citywide cleanup. We're looking for volunteers that want to come help us clean up the city. If anybody's interested we'll be kicking off out of 43 North Canal Street. I'll put my contact information and email in the chat. But we're always looking for volunteers to take care of a particular area in the city, so we'll be in the flats. But you can pick whatever area you'd like, even if it's your street and just “hashtag keep it clean 2023.” It's the end of our campaign, and we'll be restarting up again in the spring. I also wanted to share that we received some Grant funds for tree planting services both within the planting zone in wards, one through four, and also some outside of the planting zone. So if anybody's interested in getting trees planted please reach out.

Finally, as always, we have continued our COVID outreach. There will be another vaccine that will be rolled out at the end of next week, and it will be for that variant that's been around and one shot, and we will have vaccine clinics and all of that. We continue our space at Key Foods, and if anybody's interested, I always open it up to organizations. We are more than happy to share that space with you at Key Foods Marketplace, and I open it to any business that would like to bring their information there to share with the community. Thank you.

Megan Gross and Nancy Garcia: University of Massachusetts
Hi, everyone. I'm going to hop in for a moment and let Nancy introduce herself. My name is Megan from the Bilingual Language Development class at UMass. And it's been a little while since I've been at these meetings. It's great to be back, and I have a new PHD student who will be joining us for these networking opportunities.

Hi, everyone my name is Nancy Garcia. I'm a first year PHD student in the Bilingual Language Development lab here at UMass.

We're continuing to collaborate with Nayroby on supporting Bilingual Families Group and we have a meeting coming up on Saturday, September 23rd at Enlace at one o'clock. This is for Spanish speaking families, raising children. With a particular emphasis on those who have special education needs and we also have an ongoing study on zoom for children ages four to six, who speak Spanish and English, who have autism, spectrum, disorder, language impairment, or typical development. So Nancy and I will put information about that in chat.

Miguel Arce: Springfield College
Thank you, Mr. Caisse for allowing us to get together. I am always so inspired by all the wonderful work that's been undertaken, and as the result of your forum that you provide, I am inspired. So thank you very much. No reports, but I will be presenting in January about a conference on March the 13th. Anyone that's interested, there's going to be a mass blast that goes out from Mr. Caisse's office and will probably be a series. But you might want to mark March the 13th on your calendars now.

Melany Mendoza: Mass Mentoring Partnership
Hello, everyone! It is Melany from Mass Mentoring Partnership. Mass Mentoring Partnership is a state wide organization. We support mentoring programs throughout the State, whether it is with professional development funding this year. We were really fortunate to increase the line item for mentoring programs from 1.5 million to 1.8 million dollars. So programs throughout the state, including lots of domain Western Mass will benefit from that funding. So thank you for the advocacy you had done, and for the work you do for young people.

One thing that I want to mention is that Mass Mentoring Partnership has a regional network that is called MMP Connects that meets quarterly and invites all youth development organizations in Western Mass, including the Berkshires, Franklin, and then in Hampshire. So we will have our next meeting on a, I'm actually going to post it in the in the in the chat. End of this month it's going to be in Holyoke at the Holy Public Library, so we hope to see many of you there and get to meet you.

The topic for that particular meeting is going to be the importance of self-care, which is really important for everyone, and we will have an opportunity to have networking time with everybody. So I will also bring food, so you will have you nice breakfast and coffee, so I hope to see many of you there. Thank you so much.

Megan Williams: Atlas Farm Mobile Market
Hi! My name's Megan Williams. I'm here with Atlas Farm Mobile Market. We have been running a mobile market called Blue Bus. We've been going to seven stops in Holyoke since June, but mid-August our bus broke down and we are trying to get back on the road. We are seeking some outside funding as well as new partners to kind of help spread the word. We are a hip vendor, which means we accept snap and all of our items on the bus are hip eligible, which means they're free to snap users. We're hoping to get the bus back on the road, but we need help. So I put my info in the chat if you have any ideas. Thanks.




Mark Gaudet: MassHire Holyoke and Springfield
Hi everybody. My name is Mark Gaudet. I work at MassHire Holyoke and MassHire Springfield. I work for the Department of Education, I'm a counselor for adult education for English, for speakers of other languages, ESOL. Also for adult basic education, meaning literacy. Through GED, or high set preparation classes, I help people navigate the local agencies, apply to programs. I always recommend that they apply to two or more programs because there are currently always waiting lists.

There has been a recent effort to reach out and help people get into English class. Certainly the refugees that are housed in the Clarion Hotel in West Springfield, and the Quality Inn in Chicopee. This population is Haitian some Venezuelans. There are folks from Africa and other Latino countries there as well. It's difficult to know where the agencies are that they have to contact several. It takes time because people need an intake appointment. They need a level assessment. So if anybody has contact with that population, there will be bigger efforts. Pesha Black from HCC, recently announced that there will be kind of a group forming to help this community in particular.

The MassHires’ recently had an ESOL job fair, and some of these people came to that fair. There were 130 people present, and the UMass language services. I want to shout out to them, they were there and helping out as well. So my cell phone number is in the shared. And I think I left my email. If not, I'll repeat it again. Thank you so much.

Linda Manning: Easterseals
Good afternoon. Thanks Ed, for hosting today. My name is Linda Manning. I'm the Pre-Employment Transition Coordinator with Easterseals. I work with about a dozen different high schools between Hampden, Hampshire, and Franklin counties, working with youth that are between the ages of 14 and 22 with some sort of a disability. Wide variety of disabilities, helping them learn about the world of work. We have work based internships. We explore postsecondary options. Easterseals also offers job development services for adults as well as assistive technology and other services. So thank you, everyone.

John McCarthy: United States Citizenship and Immigration Services
Good afternoon, everyone. My name is John McCarthy. I'm the Community Relations Officer for USCIS. That's citizenship and immigration services. And my function is to provide information services to anyone who desires those services. In particular, I'm interested in reaching out to adult educators who may want an overview of immigration to have an understanding of people that they're dealing with or people who are teaching a naturalization course to give information to them.

Now, I've put my contact information into the chat, and I've also put one piece of information about an upcoming event that's going to be held on the 27th of September. It's going to be hosted by the Boston Public Library. It's going be on at six o'clock in the evening, and you need to go to the Boston Public Library.org website, go to the calendar events site, put in the date 9/27, and it'll allow you to register to attend this meeting virtually. Now I need to caution you, the posting will not be on the Boston Public Library website until likely about the middle of next week. But after that period of time you'll be able to register for it.

Now, the program that's going to be put on is a program that is, on family reunification. It is the reintroduction of family reunification for Cuba and Haiti. And it's a new program that's being offered for Columbia, Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. So I'm going to be covering the rollout of those programs. People who are interested, please go to the Boston public website and Boston Public Library website and register. Thank you.

Julia Popkin: Community Legal Aid
Hi my name's Julia Popkin. I'm a staff attorney at Community Legal Aid in Springfield. I'm in the education law unit, but Community Legal Aid has a variety of civil legal services. We serve Central and Western Mass. So Worcester County, West, and we have offices in Worcester, Springfield, North Hampton, Pittsfield, and Fitchburg.

We specialize in a number of areas of law, including housing so eviction defense, access to affordable housing programs, fair housing, and we have a family law unit for survivors of domestic violence. We have the education law unit which I practice in, so we help students get special education services, language access. Making sure that meetings are interpreted and forms are sent home to parents in the correct language, and that students are getting bilingual evaluations when necessary or appropriate. We represent students and discipline proceedings and try to disrupt the school to prison pipeline in that way.

We do work around bullying and harassment in the school setting. We also have a CORI and re-entry unit. So helping folks with criminal records, access housing and employment and seal and expunge those records. We have an elder law unit for people 60 and over, and that helps them with their most pressing civil, legal needs. And we have a benefits and employment law unit.

And then our subsidiary has an immigration practice. So that's humanitarian based immigration and we primarily serve folks who are below a 125% of the Federal poverty level, or if people are 60 and older there are different income requirements. I don't think I have any updates.

Jodi Ripka: Holyoke Pediatrics
Hi, there! I'm Jodi Ripka. I am a former provider at Holyoke Pediatrics, and I've been at the teen clinic since February. I'm trying to revamp the clinic. It's been closed off and on over the last couple of years during the pandemic as well as lack of having a consistent provider. So I just wanted to say hello to everybody, if I forget your name, or reintroduce myself five times, I'm just meeting a lot of new people and just trying to get to know
people in the community. The kids are here.

Jessica Gilmore: Hampden Superior Court
Hi everyone, Jessica Gilmore, probation officer in Hampden Superior Court. I primarily cover Holyoke, but I do have an overflow with Chicopee and Springfield. My chief asked that I present to you guys and send out a flyer earlier. We're having our seventh annual cultural appreciation day on October 20th. It'll be at the Springfield complex, but it does involve Hampden Superior, Hampden Juvenile, and Hampden Probate and Family. So we do service all of Hamden County. It is a free event, providers, anyone that you work with they're more than welcome to come. We'll have food. There's a bunch of different activities and events planned for the day.

James Maloney: Hope for Holyoke Peer Recovery Support Center
Hello, good afternoon, everyone. My name is James Maloney. I'm the assistant director and program supervisor at Hope for Holyoke Peer Recovery Support Center. We help people get into recovery, maintain recovery, and celebrate their recovery and reconnect with community partners and start back in community engagement. We offer a bunch of services here.

I just put the event in the chat we have tomorrow, our Recovery Day event taking place at Veteran’s Park. We're going to have a march from Heritage Park to Veteran's Park, and then we'll have live music, food at Veterans Park tomorrow from 12:00 to 5:00. I put our calendar in the in the chat as well. If you were interested in seeing what we have going on throughout the rest of the month. We'll be going out to Boston to go celebrate with the rest of the state at Moore's Boston recovery day. So it's going to be great fun, and thank you all for letting me share. Take care.

Iris Sosa: Boy Scouts of America
Hello, everyone. My name is Iris Sosa, and from the Boy Scouts of America, Western Massachusetts Council outreach specialists for the program. Right now we are working in Holyoke and in Springfield, and especially I'm working in Holyoke in to bring back Ethnic Unit. We have programs for little kids from ages kindergarten to fifth grade for the Cub Scout. We have programs for regular scouting from eleven and up. We have a step program that is more career oriented program in is from ten to twenty-one.

Right now we have two programming aviation explorers and the new program is a STEM engineer in skill trade with Northeast Haven that is coming up. We also have activities for outdoors. Once a month in our scale reservation, I put the link in the chat so everybody can check it out is open for all the public. That event, if you want to go outside and have a nice day, enjoy activities outdoors, I think this coming Saturday they have boating, they are going to have, like geocaching and other activities. Feel free to go to the link and sign in and go with your family, bring your kids. I think it's a good safety space to enjoy the outdoors and have activities for the kids.

Everybody can participate in the program. We welcome boys and girls in the program, everyone is welcome. And if you don't have any people you want to help out we are always welcoming volunteers to help out to be leaders in the program. We've been talking with a few organizations now in Holyoke and hopefully in the next few months we finally can have something up and running. So if you have any questions or know of any families interested, feel free to reach out to me, and I'm more than happy to help. Thank you.

Iris Cerda: Brockton Health Agency
Hi, everyone. I'm Irish Cerda. I work for Brockton Health Agency, we're located in Brockton. But right now we're trying to open our home agency here in Holyoke. We are hiring for home health, aid, and skill professionals such as medical social workers, nurses, LPN or CNAs. Right now we have no events. But I'm the marketing assistant coordinator. So if you guys have any more questions for me. I'm going to leave my information down, and I'll be happy to meet to see if someone has something that could benefit me and benefit you as well.

I also wanted to add that I'm also a college student and a social work college student. If you guys have volunteer opportunities during the weekend please let me know. I'll give my information here so you guys could contact me as well for that.

Amy Karangekis: Attorney General's Office in Springfield
Hi, everyone, Amy Karangekis from the Attorney General's Office in Springfield. I have a few upcoming trainings and events. I sent the links and registration to Ed, which I'm sure he will circulate. But in brief, we have one coming up on September twenty-seventh, which is a free back to school educational training. It will be virtual and it will highlight basic workers, rights voting rights, military service, as well as educational payment options for students. The second is student loan webinars. They will be held on September 13th, 19th, and 20th.

The first is preparing for a return of the repayment and assessing debt relief. The second is assessing debt, relief for teachers. The third is assessing debt relief for public service workers. And then, lastly, we're going to have a Springfield wage death clinic on September 27th, and that will be held at our office in Springfield at 1441 Main Street. It's a free legal clinic and the goal is to help workers get the rights and benefits that they've earned. So if you know any folks that are owed wages by their employer. They can come to the clinic, and they can speak with a private lawyer for free. And again, that's going to be September 27th from 4 to 6 pm. Thank you, everyone.

Gloria Penagos: Holyoke Community College
I’m Gloria Penagos from Holyoke Community College. I offer some free job trainings; line cook, culinary, hospitality, hotel. Many of you guys know about it. I just wanted to take this opportunity to say, thank you very much for this connection because we are full. We start next Monday, September 18th, morning and evening time, and we are full house this time, and so grateful to all this connection and all of this information that we provide to your clients, to the community. That is why these miracles happened, so thank you so much for this.

Next, one will be in October for hotel and again for line cook, and until then for next year, for the rest of the programs will be just next year. Thank you so much again for these, connections? Thank you.


Gina Anselmo: District Attorney's Office
Hi, good afternoon everyone. My name is Gina Anselmo; I’m from the District Attorney's Office, specifically the community safety and outreach unit. So we are the prevention arm of the DA's office. We spend a lot of our time in time in the schools. We provide presentations to students on a lot of different topics. Such as social media, impaired and distracted driving, substance use, dating violence. I know that we'll be at Holyoke High and Dean Tech sometime in October to bring our dating violence program there.

We are connected up to the schools, Holyoke, and will most likely be bringing more of our programs there as well. I think he may have had to hop off but our unit community outreach expanded and we have another individual working with us named Elijah. Who I'm sure you will meet at some point and he's going to help us a lot with media and spreading the word about what we're doing as far as prevention and education in Hampden County.

Faith Sarisley: CrossPoint Clinical Services
Hey my name is Faith, and I'm from CrossPoint Clinical Services marketing team. I've left my contact info in the chat as well as our website link and events link at CrossPoint. We continue to provide faith based and traditional mental health counseling from our four Massachusetts offices, the closest one being in West Springfield. I want to quickly highlight a couple of fun events we have coming up this fall are all taking place virtually over zoom, so you can join them from anywhere you'd like.

The first one is the Seven Principles of Making Marriage Work workshop that we're currently changing to start next month. We also have our respect 101 Anger Management for men class that starts the October 7th and goes for 10 weeks online. You can learn more insight of these events on the events section of our website that I've listed in the chat with my name. And I also want to mention that we now offer life coaching. It's open to anybody you guys know anything like that. That's in the coaching section of our website. So feel free to check that out and thank you everybody and have a great day.

Elizabeth Veillette: Center for Human Development
Hi, everyone. Elizabeth Veillette, CHD. I'm with the Diversion Shelter and Housing Division. I work primarily with individuals who are in family shelter. I also work with some individuals who've been able to obtain housing, and I provide the access for training and employment. No updates at this time.

Dorothy Prieto: Head Start Early Learning Programs
Hi, everybody. So I am Dorothy Prieto, and I am the coordinator for Head Start and Early Learning Programs. We serve all of Franklin, all of Hampshire, and we serve Western Hampden County. So we have Westfield, West Springfield, and Agawam currently. We have openings in actually all three of our counties for some of our program options. I did put my contact information in the chat and a little while later I also added a flyer which has a QR code where anybody can scan it and get to our website. But there's also a referral form in there, because anybody that you as a provider referred to the program, they get extra points on the priority scale. Anybody who is homeless is a foster child, if anyone in the family receives SNAP, or DTA cash, anyone receiving SSI, all of those families are automatically eligible. We don't have to collect income form or anything else. They'll just need a verification letter from whatever program they receive the assistance from that makes it really easy.

They could also be eligible by income. We do have some participants that are over income however, that number is only 10% of our population for our program. So it's pretty small and those spaces get filled up pretty quick. But our Western Hampden County sites, so for Agawam and Westfield, our classrooms have gone to a 6 hour extended day. There's still no fee for parents, they don't have to pay anything. So it's a Monday through Friday school year program for 2.9 and up and it's from 8:30 to 2:30.

We have our infant and toddler class in Westfield, and that one is also extended day from 8:30 to 2:30. No fee for parents, but that one is a full year program. So it doesn't end during the summer, it keeps going. I think it's a really good opportunity for families that, you know, don't have a voucher, and want their child to get a little bit of extra learning. Like I said, all of my contact information is in there. If you guys have any questions, please reach out. Send along the referral, You could send it directly to me, and I'll get it to my intake and outreach liaison who is stationed out in Westfield. And again any questions anything. Just give me a call. Thanks, Ed.

Diosdado Lopez-Martinez: The Support Network Holyoke
Diosdado Lopez-Martinez, I work for the Support Network here in Holyoke, 187 High Street. Basically what we do is we're working with families, especially families that have children with mental emotional health issues. And we try to help him with the IEP, 504 plans, anything to do with school, and just to get them stable and organized, and to move forward. Eddie a great job, I don't know what you do, but the weather was great for that every year.

Carl Borden: Boy Scouts of America, Western Mass Council
Hello! My name is Carl Borden. I am new here. I just started in September first with the Western Massachusetts Council, the Boy Scouts of America. I am the senior membership executive serving Hampshire, Hampton, Franklin, and Berkshire County. And you've already heard Iris, and there's also Art and Heather on the lines to our coordinators for the Holyoke region.

Betty Medina Lichtenstein: Enlace de Familias
Hello, everyone! It's great to see everyone. Haven't been on this for a very long time, thank you for the invite. So I am representing Enlace de Familias in Holyoke, as many of you know. The organization and highlights are the Family Resource Center, also working with many Haitian families and others from different countries. And so it was great to hear all of the info that you have shared. It also has a new program and because of the time I'm not going to go into each of them. And of course we have House of Colors. I've just been brought on to be the coordinator of the youth leadership and community organizing training, and I will come back if Ed allows me to explain a little bit more of that. So I just want to say, Thank you and have a wonderful day.

Angelique Rodriguez: Holyoke Community College
Hi, everyone! My name is Angie Rodriguez, and I'm from Holyoke Community College. I work in the admissions office as of this past June. I specifically am an admissions counselor for our adult learners and non-traditional students. So I'm specifically again working with anyone who is 25 and older looking to come back to school or come, pursue their higher education for the first time.

I am so excited to be here, and to start to be a part of these meetings, thanks to Ed. If any of you are willing to collaborate, I would love to hear from you. I put my contact information in the chat. The last update that I would like to talk about, which I could talk about more hopefully in the future at one of those presentation times that we have is on mass reconnect, which is a new state program recently approved this past summer.
And it is funding the tuition, and the books for adults who are 25 and older, live in Massachusetts, and are getting a degree for the first time, who do not have yet associates or higher. So if you'd love to hear more about that, or just have me table at your institution, I would love to collaborate. Thank you for having me.

Alicia Thomas: Transformative Justice
Hi, everyone! It's so good to see you and hear about your programs. I'm the director of youth organizing and leadership at Transformative Justice. Now that the school year is started, we have opened our drop in space for youth, ages 14 to 19. It's open Monday through Thursday from 3:00 to 7:00, and this is a place where youth can have a safe place to hang out, play games, build community, and receive support if necessary.

We also offer an anger management series for Young People, ages 12 to 25, and we call this series “mindful rage” because the objective is to transform anger, which is a natural emotion into a force for positive change. In the series we use role plays. We also use circle practice, art, and storytelling in order to create the space for youth to be vulnerable, to be in solidarity with one another, and to really learn how to implement strategies for de-escalation. So you can use the community referral link that I put in the chat or reach out to me through my email. That's also in the chat for further information. Thank you.

Aida Rivera: Holyoke Public Schools
Hello good morning, everyone. My name is Aida Rivera, good afternoon. And I work for the Holyoke public schools. My role is homeless education, service assistance, and enrollment clerk. What I do is I work to enroll kids, help parents, homeless, basically help parents that are shelter that are double up with their living arrangement and try to help them with resources. If you have any questions, I did put my information in the chat.

Adair Medina: Holyoke Pediatrics
I'm Adair Medina, care coordinator at Holyoke Pediatrics. I'm here with Charlene Rivera, our newest care Coordinator, and we have no updates.

Abbie Germain: Western Mass MOMS
Hi, good afternoon. Thanks. Ed. I missed the last couple of meetings. So I'm just really excited to be here. I won't take up too much time, although I do have some updates I'd love to share. First of all, if you don't know me my name is Abbie Germain, and I do represent the Western Mass Moms Program at Viability. And if you're new here what our mission includes is, providing an opportunity for mothers and caregivers to have a chance to address their stress, anxiety, and depression.

Our program includes a class it's free to join. Not only is it free, we pay our participants as they move through the program, and we do that with gift card incentives. So we've just been really busy. A lot of that is, thanks to Ed and this group. This is where we meet a lot of people. We hear about upcoming events, and we're so happy to collaborate and attend these events, specifically during the summer. We've attended a lot of back to school events and family nights and health and resource fairs. And it's just been absolutely wonderful each and every time we go out into the community. We're making great connections with community members, agency representatives. And just the collaboration has been phenomenal. And we're just really excited to be able to offer this opportunity to our participants to who a lot of your agencies. We're able to do referrals out, too. So it's all about collaborating with the community which we love.

A quick update, we just actually hired a new member of our team. Her name is Darlene. I will have her on here with me, so you all can meet her, but she's going to be helping with the enrollments of our participants, which will be great. We're always offering classes. We do offer free childcare for those that need it. We can give a bus pass. Our program is offered in English and Spanish in person or on zoom. So if you're a mom or a caregiver of a child under the age of 18. Or if you know any moms that are just stressed out over daily life of parenting, that's what we're here for.

Really if I don't know who you are, if I have not had a Zoom Meeting or an in person meeting, I'd love to get to know you. It's great to see familiar faces here today and also a lot of new faces. So I'm always looking to make connections and to schedule meetings so that we can collaborate so we can get our resources to your participants. And you can get the mom's program to any mom that you work with as well. My information is in the chat, but I did it a while ago, so I'm happy to put it in there again. But again, just thank you so much for those of you that have made our program and our progress possible, so thank you.

Mike Pratt: Hampden County Sheriff's Office / HSNI
Hi, I'm Mike Pratt. I work for the sheriff's department, as well as for the Holyoke Safe Neighborhood Initiative. I've been working with Ed and Raphael Santos for almost six months now, and I have no updates at this time.

Edward Caisse: Hampden County Sheriff’s Office / HSNI
I just have a couple of updates. I just want to thank everybody for the back to school event. I believe that this year's back to school event was the best one we had yet. I see a lot of the leaders on this call today. And I see a lot of volunteers that actually participated in the back to school event, whether in the service provider area, or at the event. I will say that every year what we do is we do a debrief, and we did talk about some of the things that we can do a little better for next year. I know a couple of you that were in the Service Provider area, you probably felt it was a little packed. We are going to make some adjustments in that area next year. Instead of ten by ten tents, we're going to have four by six tents, and that'll prevent the jams that we've been seeing with the strollers hitting the legs of those tents. So I just wanted to throw that out there.

I just want to thank all the volunteers for the back to school event and all the area leaders, and why it was the best event. It was truly because of the volunteers who've been coming year after year, and our leadership team, all the area leaders who just know exactly what they have to do. I don't think I had any calls on the radio this year. I was so excited to see all the leaders really just getting the job done. I too wanted to thank the people that came and packed up the backpacks. I think we had about 70 to 75 folks pack up 2,500 backpacks in about 3 hours. It was absolutely amazing day. I'm going to put that picture of all the folks that we're packing the backpacks with these notes.

I, too, want to mention our Special Networking Meeting. That's going to be on the 19th of October. I know we always do our networking meeting on the second Thursday, of the month, but I ask you to mark your calendars. I will send out a flyer in the next day or two, if not tomorrow, probably early next week, I'll send out a flyer. But mark your calendar October 19th. It's going to be from 11:30am to 2:30pm, because we would like to see a large number of agency representatives come out. But we also want to give every agency representative an opportunity to share about their agency resources for at least 3 minutes. That's going to be the target.

It is going to be a partnership with all of us, and MassHire Holyoke. So keep your eyes and your ears open for that, and thanks so much for what you do. We're really excited about the Holyoke Hub moving forward. And if you feel like your agency has resources that could help us at the Holyoke Hub, I just ask you to understand what we're trying to do with the Holyoke Hub. We're looking at acutely elevated risk situations of young people as well as adults, as well as families, and trying to wrap multiple agencies around them, and what's called a Filter Four Team to try to help them get out of the acutely elevated risk situations.

So as we identify what the risk factors are, we want to bring agencies to the table that have the resources to assist with the risk factors. We see done a data analysis on the first 20 situations of the Hub. We also did a data analysis on the next 20, so our first 40 situations and we see all the risk factors. We're up to situation number 57. When we get to 60, we're going to analyze the data again. And at that point we're likely going to be reaching out to some of your agencies, because we know that your resources are going to be able to deal with some of those risk factors. So I do ask you when we call you, even if you can't come to the weekly Hub meetings, if you can be an agency that can sign an MOU and partner with us. We can still make your agency part of a filter four team working with a lot of other agencies to help that acutely elevated risk situation, get out of acutely elevated risk.

So what I want to do is say, thank you for coming today. Consider joining us next month at our Special Networking Meeting on October the 19th, and thank you so much for all you do. Have a great rest of the week, and have a good weekend. See you guys.

CHAT NOTES:

Faith Sarisley
CrossPoint Clinical Services, Inc.
fsarisley@crosspointclinical.org
https://www.crosspointclinical.org/events/

Caitlin Littleton
(they/she) River Valley Counseling Center, Adolescent Sexual Health Program Manager

Abbie~Western Mass MOMS at Viability, INC
Western Mass MOMS at Viability, INC 413-561-7413 agermain@viability.org Please reach out if you would like to collaborate!

Linda Manning/Easterseals
Easterseals Massachusetts, Pre-Employment Training Coordinator. 508-471-1575 lmanning@eastersealsma.org

Carl Borden WMA BSA
Western Massachusetts Council, Boy Scouts of America (new) Senior Membership Executive 484-374-5366 (cell) carl.borden@scouting.org

Shannon Burke
Holyoke Pediatrics, Adair will be joining also with a new care coordinator Charlene. burkes@holypeds.com

Elizabeth Veillette
CHD Diversion Shelter and Housing Division, Employment Specialist Navigator

Penny Dugan
CHD Outpatient Holyoke, Program Supervisor of Pediatric Services. This is a new program and we are looking for community partners, would love to collaborate! (413)420-2318, pdugan@chd.org

Brianna Owen
Director of Community Engagement & Impact at Rise Above, serving youth experiencing foster care through funding fun activities such as sports, gymnastics, six flags tickets, concert tickets, bikes and more! Send me an email if you have clients experiencing foster care Brianna@weriseabove.org

Dorothy Prieto She/Her HSELP ERSEA Coordinator
ERSEA (Enrollment) Coordinator CAPV Head Start & Early Learning Programs Office 413-387-1234 Work Cell 413-834-2564 dprieto@communityaction.us

Betty Medina Lichtenstein
Enlace de Familias coordinator of youth leadership and community organizing training program (brand new) Betty@enlacedefamilias.org



Angelique Rodriguez (she/her/hers)
My name is Angelique Rodriguez (she/her/hers) with Holyoke Community College in the Admissions Office. I am a community outreach and admissions counselor in the office who specializes in recruiting and counseling new students who identify either as Adult-learners & Non-traditional students. My # is 413-552-2243 and my email is arodriguez@hcc.edu. I would love the opportunity to collaborate with any of you and am very happy to be able to be a part of these meetings moving forward!

Gina Anselmo
Hampden District Attorney's Office, Community Safety & Outreach Unit Gina.Anselmo@mass.gov

OFF. Colon HPD
Holyoke Police Dept. 413-650-0546, 264@holyokepd.org

Kathy Viens
Holyoke YMCA, 413-534-5631 kviens@holyokeymca.org

Aida Rivera
Homeless Education Services Assistant and Enrollment Clerk Direct-(413)512-5360 Office-(413) 534-2000 airivera@hps.holyoke.ma.us

Mark Gaudet
referral counselor for Adult Education at MassHire Springfield (Tues am) and MassHire Holyoke (Thurs am) (413) 588-8042, mgaudet@valleyopp.com. I offer information and support to folks seeking English classes (ESOL) or Literacy-Low Level Ed- GED/HiSET classes. I also teach ESOL at Valley Opportunity Council

Gloria Penagos
FREE JOB TRAINING WITH HCC - https://www.hcc.edu/courses-and-programs/workforce-development/free-job-training-programs gpenagos@hcc.edu - Gloria Penagos

Heather MacInnes
Iris Sosa. Boys Scout of America Western Massachusetts Council. email: iris.sosa@scouting.org.

James Maloney
Assistant Director and Program Supervisor,
Hope for Holyoke Peer Recovery Center
Office: 413-561-1020 ext 5160
Direct Line: 413-315-5798
Email: jmaloney@gandaracenter.org

John McCarthy
John.j.mccarthy@uscis.dhs.gov Citizenship and Immigration Services Boston District Office. There will be a virtual presentation on the renewed Family Reunification Programs for Cuba and Haiti and the introduction of a new Family reunification program for Colombians, Salvadorans, Guatemalans and Hondurans. This presentation will be hosted by the Boston Public Library on the evening of 9/27/2023 from 6 PM to 7:30 PM. To attend you must register with the BPL by going to their website at bpl.org Once on the site go to the Events Calendar and to 9/27/2023 at 6 pm you will find the program listed there and the information on how to register for the virtual event. One further piece of information is that the program is not yet posted on the BPL site but should be posted by Tuesday of next week.

Elijah Ayers
Community Outreach and Media Specialist, Hampden County District Attorney's Office, elijah.ayers@mass.gov 413-505-5932

Denise Kelly-Lachat
Hampden District Attorney's Office, Holyoke Juvenile Court, Holyoke District Court Diversion Specialist

Sandy Ward
volunteer with Funeral Consumers Alliance of Western Massachusetts, https://funeralconsumerswmass.org/
Email us: fcawmass@gmail.com
Or call and leave message for our FCAWM volunteers: 413-376-4747. We answer questions from the public, and do presentations to groups.

Alicia Thomas
Pa’lante Transformative Justice
Director of Youth Organizing and Leadership
Alicia@palanteholyoke.org
We have a drop in space for youth ages 14-19 open Monday-Thursday from 3-7pm where youth have a safe space to hang out, play games, build community, and receive support if necessary.
We also offer an anger management series for young people ages 12-25. We call the series of classes Mindful Rage because the objective is to transform anger, a natural emotion, into a force for positive change. In this series, we use role plays, Circle practice, art, and storytelling to create space for youth to be vulnerable, to be in solidarity with one another, and to learn how to implement strategies for de-escalation. Please use this Community Referral link to register for our Mindful Rage Series or request a Pa’lante hosted Circle.

Erica Vasquez
Erica Vasquez, Holyoke Pediatrics BH Care Coordinator. vasqueze@holypeds.com. Unfortunately, I have to step out to meet with a clinician.

Sicry Garcia
Hi everyone,

Sicry Garcia from Nuestras Raíces. I want to invite you to the Harvest and Cultural Festival. All the information is in the flyer. I hope to see you all. If you have any questions feel free to reach out. This is the update flyer.

Francheska Bermudez
program coordinator of 413Cares.org. 413Cares is a resource database in Western Mass where you can search for resources near you.
Interested in learning more? Contact me for a training (fbermudez@publichealthwm.org)
Sign up for our newsletter
Like & Follow us on Facebook

Miguel Arce
Department of Social Work, Springfield College, marce@springfieldcollege.edu

Gabriel Martinez, U.S. Probation
Springfield Office, Gabriel_martinez@map.uscourts.gov

Meghan Williams
Atlas Farm Mobile Market mobilemarket@atlasfarm.com 413-835-1507

Jessica Gilmore PO Hampden Superior
Probation Officer Hampden Superior Court Email Jessica.lewis@jud.state.ma.us

Elizabeth Veillette
I forgot to put my contact info, sorry.
eveillette@chd.org
413.266.9840

Jennifer Yekel
MSPCC/Eliot in the survivor services program. jyekel@eliotchs.org

Bianca Frederick
Hello everyone, I'm Bianca Frederick from RFK Community Alliance. I oversee A.I.M. (Achievement In Motion) youth mentoring program. I can be reached at Bfrederick@rfkcommunity.org

Yahaira Diaz
Roca Holyoke Assistant Director 413-441-6913 Yahaira_diaz@rocainc.com

Lani Ortiz
DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps Community Coordinator, iortiz@dialself.org 413-834-2061 Please reach out if you know someone who could benefit from this program or if your organization would like to host a DIAL/SELF AmeriCorps member! Feel free to reach out with questions as well (:

Heather MacInnes
WHOA https://www.facebook.com/413WHOA?mibextid=b06tZ0 9/16 Moses Scout Reservation Russell, Ma

Dorothy Prieto She/Her HSELP ERSEA Coordinator
Ways to apply

Jodi Ripka CPNP-PC
Holyoke High North Teen clinic

Nayroby Rosa, OneHolyoke CDC
Director of Community Engagement and Resident Services. 413-409-2004 email: Nayroby.rosa-soriano@oneholyoke.org

Julia Popkin, Community Legal Aid
https://communitylegal.org/get-help/

Sicry Garcia
Nuestras Raíces will be doing a farmers Market this Saturday, here is the flyer. Please share with others friends and family that might be interested
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out
413-535-1789 x209

Heather MacInnes
New Program for Teens -Stem/Engineering/ Skill Trades w Northeast Paving

Nancy Garcia
Megan Gross, Bilingual Language Development Lab, megangross@umass.edu, https://blogs.umass.edu/bld/recursos/
Supporting Bilingual Families: https://forms.gle/mF8GKBZGoXgVBU1s9 [this is a survey about plans for this year]
Study on Zoom: https://arcsapps.umassmed.edu/redcap/surveys/?s=YJEYENEM9D

Heather MacInnes
New Program for Teens w Entrepreneurship starting your own business w Junior Achievement

Nancy Garcia
Bilingual Language Development Lab, nancygarcia@umass.edu

Heather MacInnes
Ongoing Teen program at Barnes for Avaition Careers

Jodi Ripka CPNP-PC
534-2033 main # for Teen Clinic HHS North under Holyoke Medical Center/River Valley Counseling

Bianca Frederick
I have another meeting I have to hop off. I have added my company, program, and email. Hope you all have a great day.

Melany Mendoza Mass Mentoring She/Her/Hers
Manager of Community Engagement Mass Mentoring Partnership mmendoza@massmentors.org Please, go here to register for the next “MMP Connects” WesternMass meeting: https://www.eventbrite.com/cc/mmp-connects-regional-meetings-1683909

Iris Sosa
Outdoor event all day https://www.wmascouting.org/content/103693/WHOA

Nayroby Rosa, OneHolyoke CDC
I'm sorry I have to cover in the office and must log off. Good afternoon everyone! Great information as always!

James Maloney
Hope for Holyoke's Recovery Day Event (Tomorrow, September 15th) and September Calendar

Jennifer Yekel
01:15:13
MSPCC/Eliot we offer case management, individual counseling trauma assessments, victim’s compensation assistance and group therapy. The Holyoke office is accepting immediate referrals so please send people our way!


James Maloney
Unfortunately, I have to get going to another meeting. It was pleasure to see you all again. Best wishes! Hope to see you at our event tomorrow! Take care!

Elijah Ayers
I have to leave for another meeting, I look forward to meeting you all soon!

Caitlin Littleton
sorry all, I do need to go, so I wanted to offer my email: littleton_caitlin@holyokehealth.com. I'd love to connect with anyone from Springfield, Chicopee, or Holyoke public schools to discuss implementing our sexual and relationship health course! Hope you all have a great day!

Iris Cerda
Brockton Health Agency located 285 Maple street, Holyoke Massachusetts, (508) 219-0101 ask for Iris Marketing Assistant Coordinator at Holyoke.
Personal Information if Volunteering Opportunities come up Iris Cerda Social Work College student 939-308-4668 I’ll be happy to help as long as I am available:

Sicry Garcia
I have to go back to the office. Thank you for allow me to connect with all of you. Thank Ed

Gina Anselmo
Attached is a list of programs within the DA's Community Safety & Outreach Unit. Gina.Anselmo@mass.gov

Yahaira Diaz
https://rocainc.org/ Attached you will find the Roca link

Meghan Williams
Thanks so much everyone! if folks what to help support Atlas Mobile Market to get back up and running so we can continue our stops in Holyoke please contact me at mobilemarket@atlasfarm.com

Dorothy Prieto She/Her HSELP ERSEA Coordinator
I have to hop off. Please don't hesitate to reach out for connecting a parent or if you would like us to present to your staff or participants.

Mark Gaudet
One last update from Valley Opportunity Council- in addition to the STEP vocational ESOL programs at HCC (Culinary and CNA/HHA trainings), VOC is continuing it’s ESOL CDL training program. For those interested call or email Helena Dixon, 413-612-0206, ext 208, hdixon@valleyopp.com

Abbie~Western Mass MOMS
Western Mass MOMS 413-561-7413 agermain@viability.org
It was awesome!! Such a great experience!


Old Business / New Business
Next Meeting is a special meeting on Thursday, Oct 19th at the Summit.




Contact Information:
Edward Caisse
Hampden County Sheriff’s Department
(413) 858-0225
ed.caisse@sdh.state.ma.us
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