This is The Empowered Caregiver Show.
If you are a caregiver or know someone who is, this show is meant to uplift you through education and support, while also lifting up every caregiver's invaluable role in society.
Now, here is The Empowered Caregiver and your host, Liza Helen Brand.
You are listening to The Empowered Caregiver, and I am your host, Eliza Helen Brand.
Today I'm going to be doing a two-part series.
Actually, this is part two of a two-part series, easier said than done, on how transportation impacts caregivers across the state.
It's something that probably most of us don't even think about.
But according to the Wisconsin DOT, approximately 31% of all Wisconsinites do not drive.
This means that approximately 1.8 million people throughout the state rely on someone else to get them to where they need
to go.
So what does that have to do with caregiving?
Well, that means for the most part.
I mean, I know not in all cases, but for the most part that there are 1.8 million people in Wisconsin responsible for getting somewhere else, for getting someone where they need to go on any given day.
And who do you think those 1.8 million people are transporting people around?
For the most part, you guessed it.
caregivers.
So I don't know if I could name a single caregiver that isn't impacted in some way when it comes to transportation.
So today I have a handful of wonderful people with me and we are going to be talking about transportation and how this issue really impacts all Wisconsinites, whether you're a caregiver or not.
We'll also be talking about the needs and barriers of caregivers in rural areas, the mental
load that comes with coordinating transportation and what the future of transportation needs to look like in Wisconsin to support family caregivers.
Joining me now is Tamara Jackson from the Wisconsin Board for People with Developmental Disabilities.
Welcome, Tamara.
Thank you for having me.
Yes, would you mind telling listeners
what your role is?
Yeah, my organization the
Wisconsin board for people with developmental disabilities Exists to talk about what policy how policies could look like to to help people with intellectual and developmental disabilities have the same kind of choices and outcomes and in their lives as able-bodied people and for so many of us we know that people with intellectual and developmental disabilities
have rely on family caregivers to do a whole suite of things.
And one of them is oftentimes transportation.
It's something that
Many caregivers don't even realize they're doing, but every time their person needs to get to a medical appointment or physical therapy or occupational therapy or back and forth to all sorts of different activities, oftentimes it's the family caregiver who is making it happen or not.
So a lot of the family caregiving time that
people with disabilities rely on is really getting rights.
And so they're one of many different populations in the state who are what we call, we term non-drivers, people who do not drive.
And they certainly are a group that relies a lot on the people in their lives around them to get them where they need to go.
Tamara, when I was researching this issue, your name pops up all over.
What is some of the work that you've done?
are currently doing around non-driver transportation?
Well, I have the privilege, our Department of Transportation has been very forward-thinking and responsive to advocates.
When we said, hey, there's a whole population of people that
we're not thinking about when it comes to transportation.
They listened and they actually formed a statewide non-driver advisory committee, which I am one of the co-chairs of as well as one of the guests you're having on this program, Denise Jess, with the Wisconsin Council on the Blind and Visually Impaired.
And I think that has really been an important way to have conversations about the great diversity of people who are non-drivers or are likely to become
on drivers over their lifetime and to just talk about how our current transportation system and policies really were designed with the assumption that everybody has a car and is able to transport themselves when that's never been true and is growing more and more true
as time
goes on.
I couldn't agree with you more.
You're listening to the Empower Caregiver and I am your host, Liza Helen Brand.
Next, I want to introduce Nick Musson, the transportation specialist with Greater Wisconsin Agency on Aging Resources.
Most of the time spent driving in the car, you know, really isn't a big deal.
It's about being mindful on, you know, planning your day and taking into consideration the needs of others and where they need to go.
So for many of us, it's that mental load that goes along with that responsibility.
And when I say mental load, I mean, not the physical task, but rather overseeing of those tasks.
It's being in charge of the never ending to do list items, constantly running in your head, remembering what needs to be done, making the phone call, sending the emails, filling out the paperwork, delegating the tax, ensuring that everything actually happens, right?
In regards to transportation, for a lot of us it's
managing those logistics involved.
And you must also carry that mental load, even when you're not driving.
I mean, how many people feel like they can't go too far from home or be gone too long because they may need to take their loved one somewhere.
So Nick, can you tell me a little bit more about what your role is at Guar and why do you think that transportation is an issue that we need to be talking about more?
Sure.
Thank you.
So, GUAR is a non-profit agency committed to supporting successful delivery of aging programs and services across 70 counties and 11 tribes.
So, we cover the majority of Wisconsin.
And our mission is to deliver innovative support to lead agencies as we work together to promote, protect and enhance the well-being of older people in Wisconsin.
So, specifically my role
as a transportation specialist is to provide the aging units within GWAR service area with transportation technical assistance and representation within the transportation sector.
And you might ask, what does that look like?
Well, I provide transportation orientation to new aging directors and staff.
I help with state.
and federal funding applications and reporting.
So there's a number of different funding sources out there that come into these different aging units throughout the counties and the tribes that help provide and support transportation programs.
I also advocate on behalf of older adults by participating in a number of statewide committees, one of which is the Wisconsin Non-Driver Advisory Committee, which Tammy did mention previously, and I am a member of that committee.
We also are monitoring state and federal legislation to ensure our network is informed about the issues important to them.
So we work really hard to connect with all of the aging units across the state to make sure they have the resources they need to be aware and to conduct their programs and to serve older adults and help them get the services that they need.
And this includes transportation.
So if you're not really familiar with greater Wisconsin agency on aging resources, which I'm not, I'm not at the point where I'm supporting my parents or have to reach out and learn more quite yet, um, a little bit on behalf of my son with, with autism.
But if I was to call the local, um, ADRC and, and say, you know,
I'm caring for my mother and transportation is an issue.
What would they do or what would they look like?
Can you kind of walk me through that a little bit or give some examples?
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
So if they were to call into a local ADRC or an aging unit.
anywhere in the state and they were to ask for some transportation assistance.
A lot of times these aging units get funding to come support their transportation programs.
These programs are dedicated to older adults and individuals with disabilities.
So what they would do is connect them to these programs so they can get the transportation they need to get to where they have to go.
Right?
Some of these, some of these programs are paid drivers.
Some of them are volunteer drivers, but they all play a role in connecting the individual to the destination that they're looking to get connected to.
Gotcha.
Okay.
And I guess my question for you, I was going to ask it a little bit later, but here it is.
Let's talk about rural.
I mean, I,
put a post out on Facebook just trying to get some feedback from caregivers about some of the barriers and issues around rural transportation.
And I got a lot of people that replied, you know, one woman out in Richland Center said, you know, I have to drive an hour into Madison for every appointment that my loved one needs.
And if the road's bad or something comes up, that means getting a hotel room and spending the night if they can't make it back.
So I want to spend more time on this, but what do you see as some of the biggest barriers when it comes to caregiving in rural areas?
So when it comes to rural areas,
their transportation is really hard to come by, right?
And when you could look at urban areas, there's plenty of public transportation.
It might not always be perfect, but especially when you get out in these rural areas, there's very little options when it comes to transportation.
So when we're thinking about transportation in the rural areas,
the programs that I just talked about, those transportation programs are sometimes the only programs that are providing services in these areas.
And again, these are paid and volunteer drivers, right?
So it's difficult to get complete coverage in these areas, and this is all that there's available to be able to provide transportation for these individuals.
So it's important that we support these services, especially volunteer drivers.
There's lots of barriers when it comes to this kind of services.
When it comes to volunteer drivers, there could be things like barriers when it comes to insurance.
Sometimes insurance, the personal driver's insurance is not covered because the volunteer driver is accepting mileage reimbursement.
And the insurance company looks at this as compensation.
And they want to lump this personal driver into a commercial policy.
And what results of that is that either their service or their policy gets increased and moved into commercial policy or they have to quit.
They have to quit volunteering because they don't have any other options.
Well, and I know that there's some other barriers around being a volunteer driver as well.
And I want to talk about those when we come back.
listening to the empowered caregiver and I am your host Liza Helen Brand and today I am talking about how transportation impacts caregivers and I don't know if there's a caregiver out there that isn't impacted by transportation in some way shape and or form even if it's not physically driving somebody it's
coordinating it with somebody else and handling all of the logistics involved around that.
Before the break, I was talking to Nick, who works as a transportation specialist at GWAR, which is Greater Wisconsin Area Agency on Aging Resources, that kind of oversees the ADRCs.
And what else is it, Nick?
in
the aging units throughout the state.
And so we're talking about transportation in rural areas and how it can be extremely difficult for caregivers to get their loved ones where they need to go and how there are very limited options if you live in a rural area to get your transportation needs met.
One of the ways that you can get those needs met is by having volunteer drivers, wonderful people that volunteer their time, driving people to where they need to go.
And this is so crucial not only to get, you know, somebody from point A to point B, but that
time also gives the caregiver some respite.
It gives them time to take a nap, run to the store, do whatever they need to do.
And quite frankly, it gives the care recipient some respite from the caregiver if they're always stuck together.
It's another person that they can spend some time with.
So there's additional value there besides getting people from point A to point B. But it's become increasingly difficult to get these volunteer drivers.
was saying one of the reasons is insurance.
You said that they want to insurance companies want to classify you as a commercial driver.
Did I get that right?
Yeah, exactly.
So the insurance companies want to classify these volunteer drivers.
They want to classify their personal insurance as a
commercial activity.
They're lumping these personal drivers into other transportation network companies.
These are companies like Uber and Lyft who are getting paid to provide those services.
These volunteer drivers who are only getting reimbursed for their mileage are getting lumped into this category.
As a result, the insurance companies are raising their rates and moving them into a commercial policy, like a driver for Uber and Lyft.
lift.
And that doesn't necessarily make sense because they're only accepting mileage reimbursement.
They're really not getting compensated above their reimbursement.
Well, and I want to talk about that reimbursement too, because you're using that word generously, right?
I mean, if I'm understanding this correctly, we're currently reimbursing at 14 cents a mile.
Is that right?
Yeah, the charitable rate right now is 14 cents per mile and a lot of the agencies that have volunteer driver programs that work with volunteer drivers just feel like that's not enough, right?
So they go above and beyond that 14 cents charitable mileage rate and actually they pay something closer to the standard mileage rate, which is about 65.5 cents per mile.
But that kind of backs the volunteer driver into a little bit of a predicament because anything over that 14 cents per mile then is considered income.
And then the volunteer driver has to report that on their taxes.
So when we're talking about volunteer driving and these volunteers being these individuals that are carrying, using their own equipment,
You know, there's some barriers.
There's some barriers because a lot of times they get increased premiums from insurance because they're considered in this livery service, this Lyft or Uber type commercial services, or they're having to pay taxes on anything over that 14 cents per mile.
And those are all barriers deterring volunteer drivers.
Well, I know the 14 cents a mile issue.
There's some legislation proposed on that.
correct?
We're working as a state to change that.
Yeah, the 14 cents per mile, the charitable mileage rate is actually a federal issue.
And right now, there's some legislation and seeks to increase the charitable mileage rate from for the nonprofit volunteer drivers delivering people products.
They are proposing to increase that charitable mileage rate from 14 cents to the 65.5 cents per mile.
And that's the standard business rate.
If passed into law, that legislation will keep the rate volunteer drivers can receive or deduct on their taxes aligned with the business mileage rate.
So that is very important because right now the standard rate, the business rate, adjusts with inflation.
And so we need that to take place for the mileage rate.
And this will put that on a level playing field with that and really help those volunteer drivers out.
I agree.
And I had Janet Zander on the show a while back, who is another strong advocate.
And I recall saying, I don't even know if you can ride a bike for 14 cents a mile in this day and age.
So I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense.
I want to move on to Denise Jess, but I have one last question for you, Nick.
In regards to the insurance, what do we need to do there?
Yeah, the insurance is a state level issue.
And so what we need to do is we need to contact our state legislators and ask them to change the law to protect our volunteer drivers from insurance companies classifying volunteer driving as commercial activity.
So it's really.
It really comes down to all of us working together and connecting with our legislators and let them know that we need to protect our volunteer drivers.
And I would add, when we talked about that federal legislation, I just want to note that legislation is the Volunteer Driver Tax Appreciation Act.
So both of those things we need to do is reach out to our legislators at the state and the federal level and let them know that we need some change.
Absolutely.
And it's a hard thing to ask caregivers.
I know they're stretched thin and time is always an issue, but these legislators, they don't know our needs, right?
Until somebody comes and tells them and preferably a lot of people, right?
A lot of people is that's, that's what perks their ears because now we've got lots of voters making requests and letting them know what needs to be done.
So thank you so much.
My next guest is Denise Jess.
Denise, can you let listeners know a little bit about your role?
And then when we come back, I want to talk more about your personal experience because you are a non-driver.
But let's start with what is your role and what are you currently doing to address some of these non-driver issues?
Yeah, thanks, Liza.
Thanks so much for having me today.
I am the executive director with the Wisconsin Council of the Blind and Visually Impaired.
And we are a statewide nonprofit organization with a mission to promote the dignity and empowerment of people living with vision loss.
And concretely, that means that we teach people the skills of living our best lives with blindness.
is a whole skill set.
And particularly for our older adults who are experiencing vision loss later in life, learning those skills allows people to live independently, comfortably and have a satisfying quality of life.
Blindness is not the end of the road.
We also do a significant amount of advocacy work because many of the barriers that we experience as people with blindness are rooted in
policy.
And so if we had necessary policy changes, including transportation changes where we built a systemic and system wide way of thinking about transportation, then that barrier would be dramatically reduced.
I'm a policymaker.
I serve on the city of Madison Transportation Commission.
I work with Tammy and Nick on the non-driver advisory committee.
I also work at this level in a federal
level.
So yeah, thank you.
Thank
you.
You are listening to The Empowered Caregiver, and I am your host, Liza Helen Brand.
Today I am talking about transportation and how it impacts caregivers.
I was speaking with Denise Jess, and I apologize, Denise.
I asked you a question right before we went into break, and didn't even give you enough time to answer it.
That's on me.
But I wanted to hear a little bit about your personal story.
Being blind, obviously you're a non-driver.
No offense, but I hope so.
All right.
So what is it?
What is it like?
What are some of the barriers?
What do you think we need to do as a state?
What has your experience been?
Sure.
So as a non-driver, every decision in my life is shaped by that.
So on the macro, the big picture level, and on the micro every day.
So where I chose to go to college, where I chose to live, the career that I went into, I have declined jobs or accepted jobs based on what transportation was going to look like.
Transportation every day has an impact on my family dynamics.
How frequently do I ask,
my wife for a ride without stressing that relationship or other family members or friends.
There's an economic cost to being a non-driver, you know, if you're either paying in time or you're paying in money.
So if I have a medical appointment, I can take the half a day or three quarters of a day off of work and bus to that appointment, bus back from that appointment, I'm paying in time.
Or if I don't want to pay in time, I'm paying maybe
$25 round trip to get to and from that medical appointment.
So every single day is shaped by arranging and thinking about transportation.
And that includes the pedestrian infrastructure.
So I want to make sure that we touch on that in this conversation because for many of us biking or walking is part of how we complete or do a trip.
And so in many communities,
including rural people with disabilities, blindness, older adults are trying to walk to places in order to get things done, especially if there's limited or no transportation.
And we need continual effort on creating pedestrian infrastructure connected sidewalk networks, easy street crossings, reduced speed, things like that so that our roadways are safe for all.
Um, all abilities, all users.
I'm so glad that you mentioned that Denise, because I have a 20 year old son on the autism spectrum who most likely will never drive.
And we are blessed to be living in the city of Middleton, which is pretty walkable.
So he does walk, you know, everywhere he needs to go, he pretty much, pretty much walks.
So that.
as a caregiver, even for me, has a whole nother level of worry, right?
Is he obeying the traffic signs?
Does he know when to cross?
Does he look, you know, all of that, just getting there safely.
And some of my fears, I just let go, but it's still always out there, even when it comes down to walking.
Tamara, I really want to ask you, we had this conversation earlier and you just articulated it so beautifully.
What does transportation mean to everyone?
You know, I'm putting it in contents to caregiving, but it really impacts everyone.
Can you speak to that?
Well, you know, we all start our lives as non-drivers and we will likely end up there.
And I think when you have a society that has built its assumptions around everybody being able to get where they need to go on their schedule via their own personal vehicle,
you leave out a lot of people.
And we don't have systems where people who are non-drivers can actively get where they need to go on their schedule.
And you've just heard Denise talk about arranging her whole life in terms of where do you live?
What jobs do you take?
How do you make everyday decisions that are totally revolved around the transportation options that aren't available?
and that sometimes determines what you can and cannot do.
And in rural areas, you know, we talk about transportation, like non-driver transportation, it's really important to understand that there's only 81 public
transportation systems in the state.
And they don't all look alike.
Some of them are cab systems.
Some of them are bus systems.
The bus systems don't always go where you want to go on your schedule.
You know, there's a lot of places, most places where there aren't really any other options except for some very small programs that have limited funding and actually might only be
available to certain populations of people, you know, the requirements of how you access those, those transportation is limited by who if you fall into a specific category.
So when I think about like, what does it mean if you are a driver and all of a sudden that you're not right by temporary circumstance or more permanent condition, it
really is life-changing.
And for a lot of the caregivers out there right now, you are filling in the gaps of systems that don't exist for non-drivers.
And you may not even be aware of it.
Your ability to drive is supplementing a system and transportation network that has not thought about or been centered around non-drivers.
And non-drivers
are a big group.
They look different.
There are kids who are under age 16.
They still got to go places, right?
Every shlepper in a minivan.
We
don't wish I am
one.
We're all there.
There are kids that are delaying or never getting a license.
Part of that is costs of vehicles and insurance costs are a thing.
Drivers' education.
So there are people who are never becoming drivers.
there are lots of people where ownership of a car is not an affordability issue, lots of low-income working people who are reliant on public transportation, a lot of paid caregivers who are reliant on public transportation.
And then of course, as we age, the average man outlives their driving years by about seven years, and the average woman is about 10 years.
When you think about people who are drivers now, who are likely going to be non-drivers, for potentially a significant portion of your life, if that happened today, for most drivers, they wouldn't know where to begin in order to keep navigating their life.
And it's something that Denise has always lived with.
that mental load of trying to figure out, can I do something?
How do I do something?
Do I have plan A, plan B, plan C, plan D in the work as things fall apart?
And we haven't done the work to understand that from a policy perspective, we're all going to be in a situation at some point, very young, very old, some accident in the middle where we are not drivers.
That will limit our lives unless we do something very different.
Right.
And you're talking about these 81 fragmented systems.
And one thing that we didn't even mention is that if your county or area has one of these systems, it can perhaps get you around within that area.
But then we also have the crossing, the, the county lines and the law, you know, what if somebody in a rural area would like to go see a loved one that requires getting a plane, you know, now they have to figure out how are they going to get.
to an airport or somewhere close to them.
There's millions of examples right where you end up crossing the county line.
Nick, how does your agency handle that?
Well, typically when we get an individual that calls in and is looking for help, especially when it
involves crossing boundaries.
We usually have to work with a lot of the either the municipalities or mobility managers in the area and mobility managers are really charged.
with helping individuals make that connection from point A to point B. And they help those individuals connect all those different services to get to that final destination.
And a lot of times we have to actually piecemeal it together.
The mobility manager will have to come in and work with one agency to get them so far and maybe connect them to another to get them to the rest of the way.
Wow.
And is that, is that something that I'm just curious?
happens a lot.
Is this a struggle that you see a lot of people going through or is this an occasional need?
I'm just wondering how much time and resource really goes into piece working this together.
I
think it happens quite a bit.
There, you know, there's always
an occasion or an appointment that someone needs to get to that falls outside of these boundaries, whether it's a municipality or a county.
And a medical facility sometimes could be a number of counties away, right?
So this does happen, I wouldn't say a lot, a lot, but it does happen every now and then where these individuals need to travel through these different boundaries and sometimes
We all have to work together to make that happen.
Well, and I could see that need increasing in in the future.
You know, there's a lot of smaller rural.
hospitals that, that are really struggling, that are closing.
Uh, you know, I know out in Richland center, they said, well, first the only dentist that accepted, you know, Medicaid, Medicare, what have you is gone and now the eye clinic's gone and, you know, things are disappearing.
So people are having to travel further to get where they need to go.
Um, I'm curious for, for all of you, what your thoughts are.
Where do we go from here?
What do we need to focus on?
Let me start with this.
If we had maybe a magic wand, what would that look like?
I can kick it off.
This is Denise.
making sure that we actually have transportation systems.
So one of the pieces would be legislation that allows for better cross municipal transportation.
The medical things that you're talking about are very true, but there's also needing to get your ID.
updated so that you can vote and you have to go to maybe a DMV that's several miles away and so you've got to figure out how you get there.
You know one of the things that's not often thought about with the non-driver is that we would actually just like to do things beyond just those necessary appointments like going to visit family or visiting a kid that's in college and so that lack of cross-municipal transportation has impact on our social emotional well-being.
as well.
So that legislation that allows for cross municipal transportation to occur is incredibly, incredibly critical.
I agree in that I was thinking about that in the back of my head as we were talking earlier, you know, we're talking about the essential medical appointments and things that need to be done, but that's not the only reason we get in a car.
I'm in the car every day.
I rarely go to the, rarely go to the doctor.
So it's all of those other, those other things keeping you connected to your community, to your family, to your employment and just social engagement.
They most always require transportation.
Now you all three are part of the DOT non-driver initiative.
Is that correct?
So I was reading some of the minutes of the notes that I found online.
I'd like to call myself the ultimate Google stalker.
I can find anything.
And it was fascinating.
But tell me a little bit more about that.
Tamara, what are your main goals with the non-driver initiative?
I mean, I think there's a tremendous opportunity to really center our thinking around non-drivers.
And when you start thinking about, okay, how does this impact somebody who doesn't drive?
All of a sudden, the world and your planning and how you're investing looks very different.
Does it work for the people who have the biggest barriers?
And it turns out, we know this from disability world, that when you improve accessibility for the folks who have the hardest time, you actually make it better for everyone.
And I think that's been a real shift in thinking, not only with the department, but it's a shift that needs to happen at our local levels too, because the proportion of people who are going to be non-drivers is increasing.
It's not decreasing.
And that's not only a demographic trend, it's also a financial trend.
And you're right.
You know, the places that people need to go, grocery stores, drug stores, all sorts of places, you know, your life cannot be on hold and limited if just because you cannot drive a car.
Because that's going to be a true
statement for more and more people in a state.
And the time to plan is now.
Is now.
And we're going to talk about that
right when we come back.
You are listening to The Empowered Caregiver and I am your host, Liza Hellenbrand.
Today I am talking about transportation and you may think, what does that have to do with caregiving?
Well, I can tell you personally from my world it had just about everything to do with caregiving because the job that I took and the work that I did and how I scheduled my day always kind of revolved around my son and his needs.
So it impacts.
a lot of caregivers.
And to make change, like I said earlier, there has to be community involvement.
I mean, I would love to think our legislators just lay in bed at night and try to dream up ways to help Wisconsinites.
But unfortunately, I don't think that's how it happens.
It takes voices and it takes a lot of voices.
And that's kind of what I want to talk about.
Denise, can you share some of your thoughts on local involvement?
Yeah, I think if we've got...
1.8 million non-drivers.
If we had that much energy going into advocating on these issues, I think we would see something different.
So getting involved at the local level is a great place to start and thinking about where is it that you have passion.
So Liza, you talked about your son and his ability to walk and your concerns about his safety.
So a great in-road is to become a pedestrian.
and advocate and start reaching out to your local elected officials and going to meetings and speaking about this intersection right here is extremely dangerous.
If we did X, Y, Z, it would be safer and here's who would benefit from that or talking with your transportation network folks about if we did a bus stop here and here, this is how that would be beneficial.
It's really got to be
real people's lives in front of policymakers and decision makers to have this issue come alive.
And so if everybody just took some time to do that in their lives, we would create a potential groundswell that helps move the dial on this issue.
challenges the assumption that everybody drives to get to where they need to go.
That's still a dominant paradigm in our communities.
Well, and I like how you said, okay, so if you're talking about pedestrian issues, that's assuming that there's things in place.
You're talking about bus routes.
That's assuming things are in place.
Nick, when you live in rural Wisconsin, there's nothing in place.
You know, I would imagine some people don't even know what to be asking for.
Can you speak to that at all about how we can create some momentum movement and change to help support these caregiver?
and others in rural areas?
Yeah, to add on to what Denise was talking about, participating at your local level, I think there's plenty of opportunities, especially in rural areas.
There's regional planning commissions out there, and they're in charge of putting together long-range transportation plans, which takes into account all forms of transportation and non-drivers as well.
So I think that there's plenty of opportunities if someone wanted to participate within these different planning processes.
Counties and municipalities have comprehensive plans.
So I think there's plenty of opportunity to take advantage of these different planning efforts that take place and really voice your opinion and start that movement and talk about these issues.
I think these are perfect places to be able to connect with your local
uh, representatives and make sure they're aware of what you want to see for the future.
Well, I like that voice your opinion and tell your story because some people are probably thinking, Oh yeah, sure.
I'll join a transportation committee in my, my free time.
Yeah.
Right.
Right.
But really it's just making those phone calls and saying, Hey, you're missing us.
You're missing a big.
part of the population.
I'm calling.
I'm telling you what it looks like and what it means to me and my family.
Tamara, what's
your take
on that?
So I think I'll talk about two things.
And the first of all, I
think your comments about elevating the issue and reminding people that non drivers not only are here,
But they are a big part of the population is half the battle.
I mean, most of the planning that has happened in the last 75 years has happened without non-drivers at the table, because guess what?
They couldn't get to the meetings, right?
And it was an amazing revelation.
We had a conversation with a number of planners and, you know, they talked about, well, we've done all this process about
And these issues have never come up.
And then all of a sudden, the planner was like, oh, but all of us, we all drove to the meeting.
So thinking about who you're missing, when you don't think about asking the question of, OK, now what does this mean if somebody doesn't drive?
That is an important thing that caregivers can do to tell their story.
that might be an email or a phone call communication.
And you may have to, like there's power in reminding people that you've set up a process that is not accessible to a good part of the population who will be affected by your decisions, whether that's the local municipality or transportation planning or others.
I think that's a really important reminder and a drum beat that needs to keep going.
And it leads into my second piece, which is, you know,
It's not only we've built a system that assumes a car and doesn't think about non-drivers first and foremost.
A lot of our other systems also don't think about people who don't have a car.
I like to pick on medical professionals because we
you know all have that experience of well here's your appointment time and it's in the middle of the day of the first shift where absolutely anybody who works has to take time off and you don't get a choice and nobody asks how you're going to get there right
um
or you have some sort of
process that needs to happen within a certain time frame and nobody, you know, it's just assumed you'll be able to get there.
This is another great opportunity to have a polite statement saying, hey, I'm a non-driver.
or I'm a caregiver and this appointment time means that I will have to drive across three counties to the regional medical facility.
Could we maybe do all of our appointments back to back so I could make that trip once?
Or could this be done in a different way?
Is there a way we could think about designing this interaction so I can skip the trip?
And I don't think that a lot of our systems have ever thought about that because if somebody doesn't show up for an appointment,
we just blame the person and we never think about why they're not there.
And so often for non-drivers, the reason is their transportation fell apart and they couldn't get there.
So it's time for all of us to really be thinking about where do we keep having these conversations so that businesses understand this is something they need to build into their process, to their protocols, to the things that they do that help their business run better.
What an excellent point Tamara and I didn't even take into consideration the appointments and the businesses and how we can all really get together in brainstorm.
How can we make?
I guess life and I was at a loss for words.
How do we make life more accessible, right?
To all and to support the family caregivers that are dedicating their time and money to getting people to where they need to go.
I just want to thank you all so much for being here today and hopefully we can get some momentum on this issue.
Thanks for having us.
Yeah.
