Item 11.1 - Attachment 1

Access Advisory Committee Minutes 16 February 2010

MINUTES OF THE ACCESS ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEETING HELD IN MEETING ROOMS 1 & 2, GROUND FLOOR, COUNCIL CHAMBER BUILDING, CIVIC PLACE, PARRAMATTA ON TUESDAY 16 FEBRUARY 2010, COMMENCING AT 5.30PM.

PRESENT

Leonie Clarke, Jim Grainda, Barbara Jones, Debbie Manuel, John Moxon, Duy Quang Nguyen and Peter Simpson

IN ATTENDANCE

Tanya Owen – Community Capacity Building Officer and Joy Bramham – Administration Officer.

1. WELCOME

John Moxon welcomed everyone to the Access Committee.

2. APOLOGIES

Apologies were received and noted for John McInerney – Acting Service Manager Community Capacity Building Team.

3. CONFLICT OF INTEREST DECLARATION

There were no declarations made regarding conflict of interest at this meeting.

4. Confirmation of Pervious Minutes from 15 December 2009

A copy of the Minutes of the Access Advisory Committee meeting held on 15 December 2009 had previously been forwarded to each member.

RESOLUTION (Manuel/Grainda)

That the Minutes of the meeting of the Access Advisory Committee held on 15 December 2009 be taken as read and confirmed.

5. GENERAL BUSINESS

5.1 International Day for People with Disabilities

Tanya Owen updated the committee about progress in organising the International Day for People with Disabilities. There was a working party that met on Tuesday 16 February and decided that there would be two (2) working parties:-

- One to organise a forum to be held over two days leading up to IDPWD

- One to run the events at IDPWD as per other years

The working party workshopped ideas and possible ways forward.

The forum working party will meet on Monday 22 February from 2-3:30pm on Level 11 Darcy Street and be facilitated by Tanya Owen with Chris McAlpine facilitating the working party for the organisation of the IDPWD day event.

There has been no additional money allocated for the day and therefore to host the forum, the IDPWD event will not be able to afford a stage. John Moxon stated that previous IDPWD’s has been a very successful day due in part to the stage attracting and retaining people and the forum will only attract a limited number of people. He also expressed his concern over the fact that the people who nominated to run the forum have not previously participated in the planning for IDPWD.

The committee discussed the possibility of sponsorship being obtained for a stage. Tanya Owen said that this can be done, with a sponsorship agreement directly allocating the funding towards a particular use/activity. Tanya Owen said that working party participants can find interested sponsors and put them in touch with Chris McAlpine, who can ensure that a letter/agreement is written. Tanya Owen also suggested that this issue can also be brought up at the IDPwD working party headed by Chris McAlpine.

5.2/3 Westfield Carpet & Automatic Ramps at Parramatta Train Station

Tanya Owen advised the committee that the recommendations from the meeting of 15 December 2009 have to be approved by Council before any action can be taken. The next Council Meeting is on Monday 22 February 2010 and a report on the Access Advisory Committee will be considered. Tanya Owen also advised that she has draft letters for Westfield’s and Railcorp that can be sent to Committee members to review before being sent as soon as Council provides its response.

5.4 Corner of Harris and Crown Streets, Harris Park

John McInerney has contacted David Gray - Senior Project Officer-Transport and he was not clear on which crossing point was problematic and needed more information. John McInerney and Tanya Owen went to the site and didn’t find any problems with the visibility but it was a low traffic time. Leonie Clarke will contact her friend and ask her to provide photos of the low visibility area and write in detail what the actual issues are so that Council can determine if solutions are available.

5.5 Review of Public Domain Details for Disability Access

The committee agreed that the document was very technical without explanations and was in part illegible. The committee ask that in the future, documents that are given to the committee for comment should be made understandable for someone of reasonable intelligence, and if someone could explain the document at the meeting, or after the document is received.

The committee asked why Kati Westlake and/or Eric Martin were not able to attend the meeting to explain the document. Tanya Owen explained that Kati Westlake has been dealing with personnel issues with large changes to her team and as such was not able to attend or provide an update on the progress of the report. Tanya Owen stated that the proposal had yet to be finalised. When these issues have been resolved, the committee would like to hold an extra meeting prior to the next Access Committee meeting with Kati or Eric so that they can be informed of what is going on during planning phases.

ACTION That Eric Martin or Kati Westlake be invited to attend a meeting at their earliest convenience to explain the document to interested Committee Members.

5.6 Communicating with the Hearing Impaired

The factsheet was received by all members of the committee.

5.7 Arts and Disability NSW

The committee noted that the consultation for this report was not undertaken through Parramatta Council but acknowledged that other service providers may have been contacted. The committee decided to not seek further communication with Accessible Arts at this time.

5.8 Evac Plus Chair in Council Chambers

Tanya Owen stated that she has contacted Grahame Copeman –Security Coordinator about the installation of an evac chair on every level of the Council Chambers Building, however Grahame Copeman is currently on leave, so she is awaiting a response. Tanya also enquired about the possibility of having a fold out transitional wheelchairs available on the ground floor. While it was noted that such an option would be good when having to leave a wheelchair upstairs during an emergency, concerns were also raised about some people not knowing how to safely push a person in a wheelchair and this could result in an injury.

GENERAL BUSINESS

6.1 Westfield Shopping Trolleys

Barbara Jones stated that a Westfield Security guard informed her that she was not allowed to take her shopping trolley to the Westfield bus interchange due to Council By laws prohibiting the removal of shopping trolleys from the vicinity of the shop.

ACTION: Tanya Owen to clarify existing laws around trolley use, and/or policies of Westfield and Council, and ownership of land relating to the Bus interchange. Based on the results of this, to clarify if the following recommendation is possible, and if so to proceed with the recommendation.

RECOMMENDATION (Jones/Clarke)

That Council write to Westfield Parramatta on behalf of the Access Committee in relation to:

- Informing Westfield that preventing people with mobility issues from taking the shopping trolley to the bus interchange is inequitable because and some people may not have the capacity to carry shopping bags for this distance;

- Requesting that security guards monitoring this should have the flexibility to allow for those clearly struggling with shopping bags and who request to do so, to take the shopping trolley to the bus interchange;

- Raising the possibility that if there are concerns around left trolleys becoming a hazard at the interchange, that trolley collection bays be installed at Stands A and B of the Bus Interchange.

6.2 Station Staff at Parramatta and Lidcombe Stations

Duy Nguyen asked if a letter could be sent to Railcorp requesting more staff at Parramatta and Lidcombe stations because of problems around ramp access and disembarking at the right station. Committee members stated that the guard needed to be alerted before the station stop so that the ramp can be requested, and suggested that there may have been communication problems and that Duy Nguyen print cards requesting the ramp and which station he needs to get off at and report back to the committee on his success with this.

6.3 Smart Cars

Duy Nguyen asked if letters could be written to car companies about designing cars for disabled people. The Chair Person, John Moxon stated that this was outside of the scope of the committee but that demonstration cars were exhibited at the International Day for People with Disability.

6.4 Traffic lights

Duy Nguyen asked if it would be possible to have a remote control for pedestrian lights. The committee informed him that most CBD traffic lights are on a timed sequence, and as such, pushing the actual button already in place does not have any effect and that a remote would not be feasible in this established traffic management process.

6.5 NSW Community Building Partnership Grants

In August, the Community Capacity Building Team (John McInerney) and the Department of Recreation Services (Nick Wright) applied for funding to improve access to key public buildings in Parramatta available under the NSW Government’s Community Building Partnership grant program. The committee acknowledged the law states that all public buildings should be accessible to all people, however as these are existing buildings there is a clause about ‘justifiable hardship’ if it is too expensive to make these alterations.

Council asked for $123,500, to be matched by Parramatta City Council, but only received partial funding for $58,000, which to also be matched by Council. So, in total there is $106,000 available for improvements.

A list of projects as submitted in the funding proposal was tabled at the meeting. The Access Advisory Committee has been asked to prioritise the works and that works that are not able to be funded by the grant will be done as and when funding becomes available.

The committee commented on the fact that the hearing impaired, sight impaired and physically handicapped have all been included in this list. The committee decided that it would be fairer to prioritise by facility rather than each individual project, which is difficult to do regardless as they have not all seen all sites to assess the level of importance for improvement.

Tanya Owen stated that in considering prioritisation, the Committee consider that the Heritage and Information Centre has had a request from the Deaf Society for the instillation of a permanent hearing loop.

The facilities and works in order of priority as established by the Access Advisory Committee

No	Facility	Works/ Equipment	Number	Unit cost	Total Cost
1	Parramatta Town Hall	Hearing Loops Braille Signs	4 20	5,500 100	22,000 2,000
2	Heritage and Visitor Information Centre	Hearing Loops	2	5,500	11,000
3	Dundas Valley Library	Hearing Loops Braille signs Wheelchair Access Disabled Parking	1 10 1 1	5,500 100 30,000 2,000	5,500 1,000 30,000 2,000
4	Aunties and Uncles Co-operative	Door widening Disabled toilet Braille Signs Disabled Parking	1 1 15 1	3,000 30,000 100 2,000	3,000 30,000 1,500 2,000
5	Ermington community centre	Wheelchair Access ramp Braille Signs Hearing Loop	1 15 1	30,000 100 5,500	30,000 1,500 5,500
6	Dundas Valley Community Centre	Hearing loop Braille Signs	1 15	5,500 100	5,500 1,500
7	Central Library	Hearing Loops Braille Signs	4 20	5,500 100	22,000 2,000
8	Ermington Library	Hearing loops Braille Signs	1 10	5,500 100	5,500 1,000
9	Arts Society Cottage	Wheelchair access ramp Disabled Toilet Braille signs	1 1 15	30,000 30,000 100	30,000 30,000 1,500

NEXT MEETING

5:30pm 20 April Tuesday 2010

Meeting Rooms 1 & 2

Council Chambers Building

The meeting concluded at 7:18 pm