And I think it's essential when we think of, yes, I want the interaction at a rec center or a doctor's office, but when a senior at the 256 12/2/08 - PUBLIC HEALTH & HOUSING - RES. 080735 most important points, when they need that kind of monitoring can get it almost instantaneously, it's the minutes that count. I had an uncle who had a stroke, who sat in a room way too long and could never fully recover because of the amount of time that lapsed between his initial stroke. So these technologies will allow us to live longer, live better and for people to know -- and electronic interaction is better than no 15 interaction.
I agree with you. You know, one of our biggest claims of fames right now is, we have integrated numerous vendors or numerous types of technology into one box, if you will, and we cannot only see now your vital signs, we can see your behaviors, we can see your movement, your sleep patterns, we can see when you took your medication, all in one dashboard view. That's the 257 12/2/08 - PUBLIC HEALTH & HOUSING - RES. 080735 power play here, and that's on an open, non-proprietary infrastructure. A lot of my competitors out there -- and I'm not trying to market this to you -- are going to come with proprietary solutions that don't talk to other solutions. It's like having a Mac talk to a PC. It just doesn't work. So we need to have open platforms. We need to have good connectivity and we need to embrace these technologies.
Dr. Schwarz, if you're out there listening, I want you to know that the Fourth District does not have a health center publicly owned by the City, and so, therefore, I want a demonstration project in the Fourth to kind of look at that and how this can work in recreation centers and also in individual homes, particularly senior citizens.
I do believe -- I'm not trying to just throw everything out there -- that there's a place for 258 12/2/08 - PUBLIC HEALTH & HOUSING - RES. 080735 this in schools to monitor childhood obesity and such. Start today. I mean, I have the ability to do that today. So these are not the future. This is not smoke and mirrors. We do this every day. That's my job.
Yes. I wanted to thank you, Councilman Jones. It's been a lot of incredible information, and I just kind of outlined some next steps that I think would be important so we can kind of leave out of here with an action, and one of the actions that we absolutely need to support and as the Chair -- or the person who called this, I think it's important that this Committee send a letter to the Mayor and Dr. Schwarz summarizing the work of some of the presentations that were made about what the City can be doing, and that this be part of the 259 12/2/08 - PUBLIC HEALTH & HOUSING - RES. 080735 City's charge to a funded task force that is coordinated not by a depleted department, but whether that is a task that the Commission on Aging can take or not, that we commit to a process for the Task Force to continue its work and really take this dialogue to the next level. So I'd like to recommend that you draft something that this Committee submit to the Mayor and Dr. Schwarz so that we can concretely be assured that we're going to have a continuous process on this.
Thank you, Councilwoman. We will take that under advisement and make sure you see a draft of that. I want to thank you for your testimony, and I want to before we recess -- because we're not going to close this. We're going to recess at the call of the Chair. I think we've gotten enough information to warrant us to 260 12/2/08 - PUBLIC HEALTH & HOUSING - RES. 080735 continue forward, and if the Task Force is willing, we want to work with them on broadening our horizons and also our view, because it definitely did that for me. Aging in place is between now evolving to aging in a community, and I get it and this Council gets it. Couple of things we also got, that we want to do a follow-up and we want to make sure that that's ongoing. We don't want to hand it off. We want to give it a hand and continue it. And those were valuable suggestions. I learned about not just Gap Kids now, but gap seniors that fall between the income gap that are not poor enough to receive low income services and not rich enough to afford those services independently on their own income. So these are things that have stuck with us. So we're going to recess at the call of the Chair and thank everyone -- two Chairs. Thank you. For the two Chairs, and say that we are going to call 261 12/2/08 - PUBLIC HEALTH & HOUSING - RES. 080735 upon you as we evolve this thing called Aging in Place and Aging in the Community. Thank you.
Thank you. (Joint Committees on Public Health and Human Services and Housing, Neighborhood Development and the Homeless recessed at 5:25 p.m.) - - - 262 CERTIFICATE I HEREBY CERTIFY that the proceedings, evidence and objections are contained fully and accurately in the stenographic notes taken by me upon the foregoing matter on December 2, 2008, and that this is a true and correct transcript of same. ______________________________ MICHELE L. MURPHY RPR-Notary Public (The foregoing certification of this transcript does not apply to any reproduction of the same by any means, unless under the direct control and/or supervision of the certifying reporter.)