COA meeting Wednesday November 12, 2025
The meeting was called to order by BJ at 3:00pm
Attendees: chair BJ, members Rachel, Kelle, and Diane, and Heath COA members Donna and another woman. 
General Business: A motion was made and seconded to approve the meeting minutes of October 8, 2025. 
There were discussions with Heath COA members about how we could collaborate to increase our number size for activities and events and reach the most amount of seniors. 
In Heath they do activities such as: 
Social Cafe- Saturday mornings drop in that is coordinated with the town library
Senior Room- has coffee, tea, puzzles, games
Brown Bag Lunch- 3rd Wednesday of each month, everyone brings their own lunches and one person from the COA brings a dessert to share. 
Needles Group- 1st and 3rd Monday of each month from 10-12, knitting and crocheting, bring your own lunch
Art Program- 1st and 3rd Monday of each month from 12-3
Men's Group- meet up on Fridays
Christmas Bizaar- December 6th this year
Heath COA meetings- 4th Thursday of the month from 130-3pm, 'Lyra' is the 'senior coordinator' (a stipend position) and is in charge of organizing the activities for seniors. 
The Heath COA members were going to bring back our activities that could be open to all seniors in the area to their COA/seniors and we will continue to collaborate in the future. 
Scheduled Future Activities:
Foot Clinics: Continue to go well- will continue this program with a $20 voluntary co-pay for those who can afford it. It was decided to split the co-pay and use half for gratuity for the Foot care nurse.- Rachel to ask Angela (accountant) what to label the gratuity during account processing. 
Walking Club - to continue indefinitely as long as weather permits. Great feedback from residents with this club.  1-1.5 Hour long from 10am-1130am. Continue to be advertised in Goal Post. Walkers have signed liability release forms. Walking club was offered as a free activity to the Heath COA
Bowling club- COA members passed a vote to allocate $1,500 from the budget to subsidize bowling for residents in the fall/winter at a previous meeting. Stefano has re-organized this for residents and it will be available on Wednesdays from 3-5pm. There has not been nearly as many attendees. It was suggested to offer this as an activity to the Heath COA and other local COA’s but the residents just pay the $15 fee themselves if not from Rowe.  The Bowling was offered as a paid activity to the Heath COA.
Drop-in Coffee/Puzzle Hour: Will be every Tuesday and Wednesday from 10-12. Donna will make sure things are set for Tuesdays and Rachel will make sure things are set for Wednesdays- Rachel will buy a few half and halfs to get us started- will advertise in goal post. Folks have come in sporadically to work on puzzle and get a coffee but not necessarily during the alotted time period.

Third Thursday Coffee Morning November: To be held November 20th. Wreath making- Carol Lively has accepted request for wreaths again this year. Sign-ups closed Thursday October 30th . Rachel and Donna have sorted out wreath materials. Need more dried fruit if possible. Location of event needs to be changed to stone church across the street due to construction at town hall- Donna to do Robocall.
Third Thursday Coffee Morning December: No coffee morning- Senior luncheon instead on December 5th from 12-2 at the Rowe camp. Will have shepard’s pie, vegi pasta dish and desserts. Will be about $25-30/person and COA will cover the cost. Also possible live entertainment- BJ in contact with Sarah Pirtle. Needed final headcount by November 5th. Rachel made flyer, put in goal post and Donna will do robocall in near future for this. Donna is in contact with Jenna from the camp and has coordinated numbers. 
Third Thursday Coffee Morning January: vision boards- Donna to get items for this sorted.
Third Thursday Coffee Morning February: ?Kelle’s sister Mardi to do a craft? 
Third Thursday Coffee Morning March: Sip and paint? Donna to look into this
Third Thursday Coffee Morning April: ? Meg Ryan to speak about Alzheimer’s and Dementia- Rachel to look into this
Future Activities in the works (but getting close):
Magic Wings Butterfly Garden: organize a trip using carpool, but COA pay for entry fee for seniors. To organize for next October! 
Grant from Lifepath: 
We need to develop some programming to use the television. BJ suggested showing the zoom broadcast of Kate Peppard’s yoga class, but the consensus seems to be that people have been doing it at home so much that they would not come out to do it in the fitness center. 
Road Scholar offers some online travel lectures, BJ will look into other programs that we might host during the week- this will be more of a fall/winter/spring activity.
Handy Person List: live Google doc still being added to, but there is enough contact details to get the list into the community. We are unsure of the logistics of putting this list out to the public- BJ will get in touch with Joanne Semanie to ask if able to add to town’s website.
Rockwell Museum Trip- post-poned
Mohawk State Forest- Post-poned
Potential future activities (but still being brainstormed)
•	Holiday Snacks (healthy)- demonstration how to make healthy snacks for the holidays. Putting together a small (easy) cookbook or folks to take home. 
•	Community Welcome Guide: idea brought forth to provide a guide to the area, services, maps, things to do etc for new seniors/residents in town. May be a multi-committee/board effort. Includes local food, shopping, fun/outdoor, handman, medical care, park maps. BJ will create a Google Doc to start adding ideas to this. 
•	Rowe “Village”- a spin-off of the ‘Village” that was set up in Shutesbury, Leverret and Wendell, providing free services /rides to seniors in town. Pre-reg/appointments would be required. Services include handman work, gardening, assistance with household chores, grocery shopping, rides/med rides etc. This is a very large undertaking requiring a lot of research- we will follow up on this at a later date. 
•	SENIOR PROM- a multi-town prom for seniors at the Mohawk HS with music, dancing, drinks and food. To take place in Spring/early summer 2026…will begin the planning for this in the future. 
•	Paint and sip- Donna to look into this for the winter- may be a zoom event, possibly paid for in part by the cultural council. 
•	Positivity Speaker- ? Richie Davis who was a community journalist and author. GCC or Rowe Camp may have suggested speakers- will look into this at a future time. ?Cultural Council to pay for this with grant money. 
•	Metal Detecting Club- still in the works- need to get permissions to walk on personal/town owned land. 
•	Pet talk- getting a local veterinarian/retired vet to come and chat about pet safety/health/ answer pet questions.  
•	Suggestion Box- It was discussed to put a suggestion box at the Town Hall entrance and in the Library for the seniors/community members to make suggestions of what activities they would like to see or topics they would like to get more information about.  
•	Check-in communities/Buddy system- Household groups of 3-4 would combine to make a ‘pod’ and check-in on each other at least weekly in whatever way suits them- Ie. Text, email, phone call, in-person, social media, etc. The COA would then do a matching process and create the ‘pods’ after sign up is complete. This is voluntary and people/households would be able to add themselves to the pods or discharge themselves as they desire. This will be tabled for the future due to lack of interest/confusion. 
Other Business/MISC:
Next meeting is Wednesday December 10th at 3pm.
Meeting adjourned at 4:23pm