Common Council - Regular Meeting

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I'd like to call this common council meeting of the city of Dunkerk to order on this 18th day of November 2025 at 5:30 p.m. Clerk, please conduct the roll call. Council member Lascoak here. Council member Zatski here. Council member Stoyle here. Council member Nichols, she's excused. Council member at largeer here. Thank you. Clerk, please rise for the pledge of allegiance. Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you for joining us this evening. Next, we haveation of prior meetings. This is to certify that an official copy of the minutes of the common council meeting of Thursday, November 6th, 2025 is presented to the mayor on Monday, November 17th, 2025. Pursuant to section 3.03 of the Dunkerk City Charter, all items presented to the mayor are now in full force in effect. In witness whereof, I have here to set my hand and seal of the city of Dunkerk, New York, this 18 this 18th day of November, 2025. Is there a motion to dispense with the reading of the minutes and approval as presented? Moved by Councilman Stoy, seconded by Council Member Lusco. Clerk, please call the role. Council member Lgo, I. Council member Zorski, I. Council member Style, I.

Council member at largeiser.

I the minutes are approved as presented. Now move the privilege of the floor. The privilege of the floor shall be extended to any person appearing for themselves in which case each individual appearing shall be to shall be limited to 3 minutes and to any person representing any groups who shall be limited to a maximum time of 5 minutes. The privilege of the floor is reserved for members of the public to speak on any subject pertinent to the affairs of city government. The city clerk shall have the duty of maintaining such time limits. The chair may determine in their discretion whether individuals are speaking for themselves or representing groups. The chair shall maintain good order and may require any speaker to cease speaking if remarks are made in bad taste or slanderous or not germaine. The time limit specified shall be adhered to except that the chair may allow any person speaking to complete a statement or thought started before such time expires and a longer time may be allowed by the chair with the approval of the majority of the council. Privilege of the floor is now open. If there any members of the public who wish to speak, please step forward, state your name and address, and address the council.

Hello, my name is Carmen Musclla Septa. Um, I'm a property owner in the city of Dunkirk at 66 Mafet Street. Um, I am also a resident of Fredonia. Um, I am here as a property owner and the wife of a wastewater treatment operator within the city. I'm here tonight to address a serious and ongoing staffing issue that has occurred at that plant for over a decade. I'm here to address the newly increased staffing requirements due to an incident that occurred over the weekend. These issues affect every resident of the city and deserve immediate attention. To be clear, I'm not a wastewater expert, but I I know a little bit about this living it. I know enough to understand the critical role the facility plays in our daily lives. The plant processes, treats, and separates everything that goes down, the drains. It receives storm water during heavy rains and monitors rising levels to prevent basement flooding along the lakefront. The treated water is then released into Lake Erie. the same water that's the same lake that our water is drawn from. Here's what is most important. The plant is legally required to have a licensed operator on site 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. No days off. They never went home for CO. Um, right now the plant has four licensed operators to cover a facility that must be staffed around the clock. There are currently four trainees, but each require four and a half years of hands-on experience, five weeks of schooling, and passing a difficult state licensing exam before they can even operate on their own. One current operator is likely eligible for retirement, which means the city could soon be left with just three fully licensed operators to run a 247 facility.

Additionally, due to a recent serious incident at the plant this past weekend, staffing requirements have increased and two people are now required to be on site at all times. How does the city plan to meet the requirement? How are people supposed to take time off or even have days off, which doesn't occur a lot in my household? These operators, two of which have young families, are being forced to work 24, 32 hours [cough] at a time. They cannot sleep on duty. There's no beds. They cannot step away. They cannot go grab dinner. What happens when a severe storm rolls in and there are only exhausted operators left to manage that? What happens if improperly treated water enters a lake because the operator working his third consecutive shift simply couldn't stay awake? What happens when the environment the Department of Environmental Conservation steps in and finds a city for negligent and unsafe staffing levels? What happens when another unfortunate incident occurs and the outcome's not so positive? I'm urging this council and future council members to make staffing at the wastewater treatment plant a priority in your budget. It's not optional. This is a public safety issue, an environmental issue, and a quality of life issue. Before I close, I have two letters here from my youngest daughter asked for her dad to be home for Christmas for somebody to cover it. It's not a matter of covering one shift. It's three shifts. Every single year for the past decade, this is an issue. It needs to be addressed.

Thank you, ma'am. Thank you. Those are

Is there anyone else who wishes to speak? Going once. There we go. Ron Burnside, 165 Point Drive North. I'm here on behalf of Revitalized Dunkerk. We recently had a board as a board member, we recently had a meeting in which we discussed the city plans of planting their trees and we thought having read prior to this, city of Westfield has a tree commission set up of interested citizens, board council members, and professionals that help ensure sure that the proper trees are planted in the proper locations and they're taken care of. The city is going to be planting approximately 265 trees and I don't know if anyone even knows what the Latin names of any of the trees that they're going to plant because uh that's the only way to truly identify a tree. And we just thought as revitalized Dunkerk that it was time for the current it's too late for the current council but the new council to decide to start a tree commission to beautify Dunkerk. Thank you.

Thank you Mr. Burns. Is there anyone else who'd like to speak this evening? Going once, twice. Privilege of the floor is now closed. Next, we move to communications from the mayor, including disapproval messages. Mayor Dobas, I have nothing. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Next, we'll address the communications from the public and petitions. Notice of claim from Tammy Shr of 49 West 3rd Street for bruising, scratches, and cuts on her face allegedly due to falling on a graded road and a new height of of the curb.

Any discussion, council? Okay. Do I have a motion to refer to the law department and Department of Public Works? Moved by Council Member Zorski, second by Council Member Lusco. Clerk, please call the RO. Council member Lyscoak. I. Council member Zatski. Hi. Council member Doyle. Hi. Council member at largeiser. I. Motion carried. A walk-in request from the Dunkerk City School District to have police presence at all winter athletic events. Dates included in the request beginning November 25th, 2025 through February 12th, 2026. Is there any discussion, council? Is this okay with you, Chief? Yes.

Okay. In that uh case, do I have a motion to refer to the appropriate departments and approve subject? Good. All right. Uh moved by Council Member Zorski, second by Councilman Stoy. Clerk, please call the role. Council member Lyscoak. I. Council member Zorski. I. Council member Stoyle. I. Council member at largeer. I. Motion carried. We'll now move to reports of standing committees, boards, and commissions. Council member Lusco.

Yeah. I wanted to address Mr. Burnside and revitalizing Dunkerk and refer to Vince for he can let you know that we have an intern that a new about our new intern um and hopefully we can have a tree commission in the future in order we can become part of the tree USA.

Absolutely. Thank you so much to Revitalized Dunkerk uh for stepping up to work with uh the city in terms of uh uh trees uh being properly placed. Currently, we have two grants from the Department of Environmental Conservation and the one that we're currently working in is a street trees grant um that didn't call for a specific tree board in in this grant. We have a second grant that uh was looking to plant nearly 200 trees and point Grashet and other uh that were uh taken out harvested because of uh the emerald ashbor and and other parks and public property. So what we've been doing for this tree grant um that's for the street trees is we have been working directly on a daily basis with the department of environmental conservation forester Nate my in terms of specific locations species um planting sites down to the geo coordinates uh land longitude and latitude coordinates for these trees and to make sure they're spaced properly they're not near intersection sections that they're not the wrong type of species for uh where power lines are uh that they will be short enough. So, we have been working on that. Um we wanted to get this one started and uh we will be in the beginning of the year looking forward to the the other grant um that will plant trees in Point Grash and which we will and we have uh a tree advisory board that we are working that we're trying to put together and uh we will have that. But thank you so much Revitalize Dunkerk for all that you've done and your advocacy uh for the trees the planting of trees. Thank you. I also wanted to let everyone

know that DPW is going around and vacuuming um leaves. So, um Randy, our DPW director, is not here tonight, but you know, you want to He said that they've begun that. So, you'll want to rake your leaves between the curve and the sidewalk and they'll go around the city several times. Wanted to remind everyone of that. And that's all.

Thank you, Council Member Satski. Thank you, Elliot. On August 7th, we had a meeting, public safety, where you agreed to write the necessary documents and resolutions to address the parking issue. On October 6th, I emailed you to see where we're at. You failed to respond. On October 21st at the meeting, I asked you about it, and you said, I quote, "I will get that to you immediately." On November 6, two hours before the next meeting, you sent me an email saying that it was not done yet, but you'll have the draft shortly and it'll be prepared for the next meeting. Here we are at the next meeting. No response since the two hour before the last meeting. What What is your explanation as to why you refuse to work with council as part of your job as the city attorney?

I apologize. That's not good enough, Elliot. That is not good enough. Okay. You are a waste of taxpayer dollars in my eyes because you have not committed yourself to this council at all for the last almost two years. Okay? And you should be ashamed of yourself. And Kate, you should be embarrassed that you appointed him to be the city attorney.

That's all I have. Thank you, Council Member Stoyle.

I got enough. Thank you. Uh council's now completed its budget review sessions with all city departments. Want to thank the department heads once again for their preparation and engagement throughout the process. As we said from the beginning, our mission this year has remained consistent to take a thorough, responsible, and realistic approach to building the 2026 budget within the constraints of the city's financial position. Uh we anticipate receiving formal guidance from the office of the state comproller this Friday as required under the Dunkerk Fiscal Recovery Act. uh their recommendations will be an essential part of finalizing the budget, ensuring it meets all statuto uh statutory requirements. Um looking ahead, the finance committee will meet this coming Monday, November 24th, at 9:00 a.m. in the Sterns building first floor conference room later that same day at 5:30 p.m. Council will hold its final public budget hearing before we move toward adopting the 2026 budget at our next regular meeting on December 2nd. We appreciate the public's continued engagement in this process. We remain committed to delivering a budget that's both transparent and fiscally responsible for the residents of Dunkerk. With that, it appears there is no unfinished business. So, we'll now address the pre-filed resolutions. Clerk, please introduce resolution number 60 of 2025.

Resolution 60-2025, resolution authorizing budget line modifications for fiscal year 2025. Any discussion, council? Okay. Seeing none, clerk, please call the role for the vote. Council member Lyscoiaak, I. Council member Zorski, I. Council member Doyle, hi. Council member Atlarge Wiser, I. The resolution is hereby adopted. Resolution 61-2025. Resolution authorizing lease agreement county fair association. Any discussion? Council. Okay, seeing none, cler, please call the role. Council member Lgoak. I. Council member Zatski. I. Council member Stoyle. Hi. Council member at large wiser.

I the resolution is hereby adopted. Resolution 62-2025. Resolution award bid 2026 sludge and grit hauling Dunkerk water pollution control facility. Any discussion? Council. Seeing none, clerk, please call the role. Council member Lecoak. I. Council member Zorski. I. Council member Stoyle. Council member at largeiser. I. The resolution is hereby adopted. Resolution 63-2025. Resolution awarding bids 2026 treatment chemicals water pollution control facility and water treatment plant. Any discussion council? Seeing none, clerk, please call the role. Council member Lascoliac. I. Council member Satski. I. Council member Stoyle. Hi.

Council member at largeer. I. The resolution is hereby adopted. Is there any new business to be discussed this evening? Okay. Hearing none, I'll entertain a motion to adjurnn. Moved by Councilman Stoy. Second by council member Sattorski. Clerk, please call the role. Council member Lasco. Hi. Council member Zorski. Hi. Council member Stoy. Hi. Council member at largeer. Hi. The meeting is now adjourned. Thank you everyone.