Members present: Mary Stamstad, Mary Brintnall-Peterson, Chris Moore, Gary Ace, Mary Ace, Leslie McAllister, Sandy Lott, Marilyn Kooiker, Alice Byrnes, and Lynn Keller.

Ethel Dunn was unable to attend, as she had another meeting with Susan Dreyfus at the Department of Health and Family Services.

After introductions and a brief welcome by Mary Britnall-Peterson, the following updates on related task force activities were reported:

• Mary Britnall-Peterson reported that the resource guide would be going to press later this afternoon (after nearly two years of work!), and she would be distributing copies for final review by interested members of the GRG Partnership. She will include an "evaluation" form for the reviewers with the intention of determining how "user-friendly" the guide is, rather than focusing on the content. The final format, after reviews have been completed, will be posted to the web. Mary also reported that she hoped the guide would be available for downloading by counties by the beginning of June.
• Mary also commented briefly on the plans to promote the guide beyond Milwaukee. Though the majority of people will likely learn about the resource guide via word of mouth, she and Ethel have been working with UW Extension, DHFS and the Bureau on Aging to promote it throughout their networks. Mary has also been heavily promoting the online site for the guide while it was in the final phases of editing. The address is: www.edu/ces/flp/grandparent/grand.htm. Mary also mentioned her plans to include a feature on the website to allow grandparents (and others) to click on their county of residence for the names and numbers of people they could contact.
• There was also some discussion about the process counties may use to "localize" their information for the resource guide. Though the counties will not be able to modify any of the Question & Answer portion of the guide, they will be able to download some of the other sections onto a disk so that they could include pertinent local information in their guides, flyers and on their local agencies’ websites. Mary reported that she would likely come up with some options for the types of information that may be helpful to include in the guide. The Dane County representatives on the task force volunteered to be Mary’s test site for this process. Lynne requested that Mary encourage those counties to include information on the Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) program in the resource guide if the counties have them.
• Mary also reported that there will be a section of the website for comments. She encouraged the members of the task force to regularly check the website for accurate, up-to-date policy/legislative information.

• Sandy reported that a small group of members from the GRG legislative task force met with Rita to discuss the how Dane County can better serve its grandparents who are raising grandchildren. Rita informed the group that $7800 would be available to Dane County to fund GRG related activities, with the priorities being some type of resource guide for older adults, grandparent support groups, and the development of some emergency relief fund. This money became available when the Older Americans Act including the Family Caregiver Support provision was signed into law. According to the Act, 10% of the Family Caregiver Support money that the AAA’s receive is supposed to be set aside for GRG supports. Both Sandy and Chris reported that Rita seemed interested in using the Family Caregiver Support funds for creating a Dane County version of the GRAND guide, though on a smaller scale. Sandy, Chris, and Ethel (with some technical assistance from Mary Brintnall-Peterson) will continue to work on a Dane County guide with Rita. They have a follow-up meeting on May 14^th. At this point, it is not known if there will be funds left over for other types of GRG support services.

• Mary Stamstad reported that Ethel, on behalf of the GRG Legislative Task Force, had contacted Fred Risser, Co-Chair of the Joint Legislative Council, to consider a Legislative Council study on GRG issues. Leslie Travis from Risser’s office is the contact person working on this. Ethel and Mary have contacted Jon Erpenbach, and he wrote a letter to Sen. Risser encouraging him to have the Leg Council do a study on GRG issues. Mary encouraged the Task Force members to contact their legislators requesting them to persuade Risser to conduct the GRG Legislative Council study.
• Mary also reported that there has been no activity on the GRG medical/educational access "bills" due to the legislature’s focus on the budget bill. Risser has yet to have the bill assigned a Legislative Reference Bureau or bill number. Mary suggested that in the same letter that we’re asking our legislators to write to Risser we might include a request for further action on these issues.

Leslie reported that the Wisconsin Intergenerational Network, Grandparents United for Children’s Rights, the Coalition of Wisconsin Aging Groups, and the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families are co-sponsoring an event on Tuesday, May 22, highlighting Intergenerational Week. Along with key policy-makers, advocates and relatives caring for young children, members of the GRG Partnership are invited to attend a viewing of the Academy Award winning documentary, Big Mama, which chronicles the lives of an African American grandmother raising her 9-year old grandson in South Central Los Angeles, at the CWAG Intergenerational Training Center. In addition to the film, there will be a panel discussion on the issues related to grandparents raising grandchildren. Panelists will likely include a grandparent raising her grandchild, a lawyer specializing in family law, and an expert on the Kinship Care program. Other suggestions for panelists from the Task Force members present included a legislator (i.e. Fred Risser) to get the "legislative" response to the film and someone from the special needs adoption network. Leslie will take the suggestions back to the planning committee.

Mary Brintnall-Peterson reported that the ETN system will be in place until May 2002, which is later than previously reported. However, after that time, the GRG Partnership and its committees will need to find an alternate meeting site, hopefully with technological capabilities to reach out to other parts of the state. Leslie reported that CWAG was recently awarded a technology grant from the Public Service Commission, which will allow CWAG to have satellite conference and teleconference capabilities. The GRG meetings would definitely fit in with CWAG’s goals for use of the Training Center. As part of the grant, four other locations within the Aging Network will be able to be linked with CWAG via this satellite/teleconference system. This will not only help CWAG to more effectively and efficiently do statewide advocacy, but also, this system will be available to the non-profits that use the Training Center.

Mary Brintnall-Peterson requested that the members present share any information in their local areas. The following people reported.

• Marilyn (Burnett County) reported that they are continuing to work on expanding the grandparents support group, despite an inconsistent turn out.
• Alice (Bay Area) reported that she met with the Aging Unit Directors in her area to encourage them to put in some funds to develop the a resource guide and support groups. She maintained that though she understands the value of the support groups, her first priority is the resource guide. Alice also reported that the Tribes in her area are really interested in the support groups.
• Lynne (Oneida County) reported some challenges in working with the Aging Unit people on the GRG issues, but she is committed to working with them, the family resource centers, and other community organizations on these issues.
• Chris (Dane County) reported that she is encouraged by the collaboration between the Dane County Area Agency and the county’s Kinship Care office. She will continue to work on developing the resource guide for Dane County.
• Mary Brintnall-Peterson reported that she has been busy updating the Extension GRG (www.edu/ces/flp/grandparent) and family caregiving (www.uwex.edu/ces/flp/caregiving) websites. She’s also finishing up the research project on kinship vs non-kinship caregivers with the UW-Milwaukee, and she’ s looking forward to sharing the results soon.

Meeting adjourned at 11:35a.m.