ACCESSIBILITY ADVISORY GROUP	
Tuesday 29th of January in Te Mahanga Committee Room One, Wakefield Street 5.30 to 7.30pm

AGENDA

1.	Present

2.	Welcome from the Chair 

3.	Conflict of interest

4.	Matters arising/Adoption of minutes

5.	Wellington Accessible Employment Forum Update
Jane Patterson, Consultation and Engagement

6.	Policy Forward Programme for 2013 
Geoff Lawson, Policy

7.	Marshall Court upgrade 
Tammy Mullins and Rachel Van Doorn, City Housing

8.	Building Seismic Performance consultation, Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment
CR Iona Pannett

9.	AAG Sub-groups, confirmation of membership for the year and any reports

10.	Other business 

11.	Next Meeting 
Tuesday 26th of February 2013 in Te Mahanga Committee Room One

Wellington City Council
Te Kaunihera ō Pōneke
RECORD OF MEETING: ACCESSIBILITY ADVISORY GROUP	
Tuesday 29th of January in Te Mahanga Committee Room One, Wakefield Street 5.30 to 7.30pm

1. Present
•	Members 	Rosemary Cole, Lachlan MacKay, Angela Vandepoel, Julia Mosen, Alan Royal, Shannon Morris, Linda Hobman, Jason Strawbridge, Kendal Akhurst
•	Councillors	Iona Pannett
•	Council officers   	Lisa Matthews, Geoff Lawson, Jane Patterson, Rachel Van Doorn
•	Interpreters 	Wenda Walton, Angela Murray
•	Minute taker	
•	Guests	Kezia Bennet (Whititeria Journalism student), Shani MacKenzie and Michael Ware Designgroup Stapleton Elliott 
2. Welcome from the Chair 
Apologies: none 
Introduction to Martin Rogers, the new manager of Research, Consultation and Planning.	

3. Conflict of interest
None
4. Wellington Accessible Employment Forum Update
Discussion
Jane Patterson reported back on progress on the forum.
•	It is on 5 March, 5pm – 7.30pm, Te Papa
•	Made contact with Anne Hawker at MSD and are using their format of the Employers Disability Network meetings in Christchurch and Auckland
•	Speakers are John Allen, Richard Stone and Gillian Davies has been approached.  Maybe Bob Simmons from ANZ
•	Mapping the agenda and timeline of the meeting – group discussion/ Q and A at the end after speakers 
•	Using Grow Wellington, Chamber of Commerce and HR institute’s newsletter to publicise
•	Detailed invite list – targeted Senior managers and HR managers and other players
•	Organisations that work in supported employment will have displays
•	Roles for AAG will be discussed at the February meeting
•	MC is to be someone from AAG
Action: Invite list to include universities and hospitals

5. Building Seismic Performance consultation
CR Iona Pannett
Discussion:
•	Meeting on 5th February at Michael Fowler Centre to discuss
•	Small discussion document with a range of questions include a section on accessibility
•	The Council is putting forward a submission which will be discussed at SPC on the 21st of February
•	Cr Pannett has concerns regarding the decoupling of accessibility from strengthening and will be asking officers to cost some accessible installations
•	She asked AAG to do a submission and is hopeful that the AAG submission would match the WCC submission
Action: Accessible Environment and Transport to follow up. 		Subgroup
6. Policy Forward Programme for 2013 
Presentation on the Council policy programme for the year that the AAG may want to work on.
7. Marshall Court upgrade 
Rachel Van Doorn, City Housing and Shani MacKenzie and Michael Ware Designgroup Stapleton Elliott presented the Marshall Court rebuild plans.  
Presentation:
•	Marshall Court is in Mirimar – close to the shops and transport
•	Designed for an ageing population so design needs to be flexible
•	Completely new building but needs to fit into the space of the old one
•	Six carparks and one designated mobility park (others could be classified mobility park also). 
•	Community room with kitchen, accessible bathroom, noticeboard leading into communal outdoor space.
•	Room for scooter parking
•	Bathrooms have the capacity to be accessible if required.
Discussion:
•	Should the communal room accessible toilet have a privacy screen to meet the code?
•	Could the signage be in Braille?
•	Could there visual alerts or vibrating alarms or at least fitted out to the extent that one could be easily retrofitted?
•	Could a video intercom be used at the main door?
•	Concern around cupboards being too high but also the need for storage
•	Could there be a change to the inset at the front door? 
•	Confusion regarding the 5% whether that applies to each build or the overall stock and also whether the 5% is fully accessible or fitted for people with impairments.
Action: 
Subgroup to meet with housing to clarify the 5% and definitions
Rachel to come back to the group with answers on 
•	Braille signage
•	Accessible toilet in community room
•	Visual alerts, vibrating alarms and video intercoms
•	Change to the inset at the front door.
8. Adoption of Minutes/Matters arising 
Minutes of last meeting 11 December 2012 approved.        	
Linda/Lachlan
9. AAG Sub-groups 
Accessible Environment and Transport 
Airport
•	Kendall met  with Graeme Anderson the Project Manager for the Airport Carpark Developments,
•	He saw some very initial designs which appeared positive from a mobility carpark perspective i.e. more centrally located mobility parking.
•	The designs did raise some concerns around the new drop off set up where taxis will drop off in the left lane closest to the airport and other drop offs will be on the right side of the road.
•	There are no plans to cover this area in the short term so this will cause some negative experiences if it’s raining or windy i.e. more exposure than existing drop off for people with disabilities who are being dropped off.
•	The next action is to arrange a meeting with Graeme and either the Transport sub group or a presentation at one of our monthly meetings.

Economic Development and Governance:
Alan requested the Council for a copy of the guide that was made last year 
7. Other business
Annual Report 
The Annual report will be going to SPC in April.  The list of AAG activities has been prepared and the rest of the report needs to be written by AAG.  
Action:
Lisa will send the list of activities to all the members 				Lisa
Group to think about the Annual report. 						All

Snapper Card
Contact from Deaf Aotearoa regarding Snapper and concessions for disabled. 
There is currently an inequitable ad hoc system in place. Deaf Aotearoa have approached Snapper for an explanation and getting a change to the concession card.  Concessions and ticketing are the responsible of Greater Wellington Regional Council and Tass Larsen has sent an explanation.  
•	Concessions are part of the fare review that the GWRC are looking at.
•	The system is historic and unfair as it covers some disabilities and not others
•	The GWRC would like to standardise the approach to fares, but given the funding available is unlikely to want to increase the number of people receiving concessions.  
•	In general GWRC has taken the approach that it is a higher priority to allocate funding to increase the accessibility of public transport by improving the accessibility of infrastructure, vehicles (trains/buses), and information to the disabled community, rather to allocate funds to concessions.
Options for action
•	Contact DPA, invite GWRC to meeting, Social subgroup to progress
Action: Lisa to invite Matthew Lear GWRC to AAG meeting			Lisa
	 Social subgroup to discuss and put forward an AAG position 	Social 

Lower Cuba St upgrade
Considered to be still very dangerous.  
Action:
Lisa to follow up with Steve Harte regarding this.  				Lisa

Wellington City Council mobile apps
The recent apps that have been released are not accessible 
Action:
Lisa to follow up with Council staff.  Julia is happy to meet with whoever is responsible to show them what happens when a screen reader reads it. 	Lisa

Building Compliance training
Jason Strawbridge in his role at Spiire is in the process of being contracted to provide Building Compliance training to WCC consents processing staff, and is keen to involve some members of the AAG in a walk about on the waterfront and/or civic square buildings.  The reason for AAG involvement is give the WCC staff a better understanding of how barriers in the built environment can affect different disability groups, and to also strengthen the working relationships between council units and the AAG.  A date is currently not set but they are looking at late February.  Jason will confirm the date, and then people can let him know if they are available.                                                  			Jason
				
Change to parking on Wakefield St 
It has been proposed to move the accessible car park on Wakefield St to make more room for more buses.  Lisa to follow up the status of the project.     Lisa

Accessible Wellington Action Plan monitoring
AAG to gain an understanding of the monitoring process for the Action Plan
Action: Lachlan and Kendall are meeting with Jenny to discuss how the Action Plan will be monitored.							Lachlan and Kendall

8. Next Meeting 
Tuesday 26 th of February in Committee Room One.  

Appendix 1
Follow up actions

APPENDIX 2
SUB-GROUPS AND MEMBERSHIP							

Accessible Environment and transport (including urban design, open spaces)
Jason, Kendall, Julia, Rosemary, Lachlan, Angela

Economic development and governance 
Alan, Julia, Lachlan, Kendall

Arts and Culture and Social and Recreation
Angela, Linda, Kendall, Rosemary, Julia, Shannon