City Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening folks and the hour of 7 p.m. Having arrived I will call to order this regular meeting of the Keene City Council This meeting is being broadcast live on the city of Keene YouTube channel and spectrum channel 1302 the video is also streamed on the city's website and is posted by the end of the next business day barring any technical difficulties If you would like to receive an electronic city council packet to reference while viewing future broadcasts, please contact the city clerk's office during business hours or go to the city's website and subscribe to the city meeting's email list. The agenda is also accessible from any mobile device. And I'd like to ask the clerk this evening, Kathleen Richards, would you please call the roll?

Thank you, Mayor. Randy Alfilio. Here. Michelle A. Chalice. Here. Katherine I. Workman.

Here.

Brian J. Lake. Here. Jacob R. Favalese. Here. Laura E. Tobin.

Here.

Robert C. Williams. Here. Philip M. Jones. Present. Chris E. Roberts. Here. Bettina A. Chadbourne. Edward J. Haas. Here. Laura E. Ruttle-Miller.

Here.

Molly V. Ellis.

Here.

Thomas F. Powers? Here. Mitchell H. Greenwald? Here.

And I'd like to call on Councillor Jones to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance. I'd be honored. All right. I'd like to recognize Councillor Greenwald for a motion to adopt the minutes of our previous meeting.

Thank you, Your Honor. I move to accept the minutes of the May 7, 2026 meeting as presented. Second.

Second by Councillor Powers. Are there any comments or questions about the minutes? Seeing none, I'd like to see a show of hands. All in favor? The motion carries unanimously. We have 14 votes this evening, so that's unanimous. Announcements for the evening. We have one birthday, Councilor Greenwald. Congratulations. May you have a great next year. All right, upcoming dates of interest. Monday is Memorial Day. The city of Keene will officially be closed for the holiday. However, city councilors are invited to participate in the annual Memorial Day parade. The councilors are invited to meet around 9.30 on Gilboa Avenue, and I think you know you need to be there by 9.45 as the groups line up. We'll be at the transportation center in front of there again, barring rain. But we will be there no matter what. and the Memorial Day parade will kick off. For the public, we hope you'll have a beautiful day like we did last year, and that we'll greet people along the way down Washington Street, Main Street to Washington Street, over to the Recreation Center. So, great. Friday, and by the way, if folks wind up just going to the recreation center for the commemorative ceremony led by our veterans and VFW, that will begin at 11 o'clock. This Friday, June 5th, so not this week, but a couple weeks from now. June 5th through Sunday, June 14th, is the Keen Art Walk, sponsored by Menandoc Arts Alive. So everybody recognizes that event. It coincides with Saturday, June 6th. Taste of Keen Food Festival, so all sorts of opportunities to check out the wonderful art being done in our community by artists and in our schools. And also on June 6th, coincidentally, is New Hampshire's D-Day Remembrance. So we've got a couple military-like events to commemorate in the next 30 days. Other announcements for the City Council. Oh, one more. On June 19th, want to get on your calendars, everybody should have in front of their desk tonight a Juneteenth celebration, Freedom Day. That will begin. Counselor... Yes, workmen, would you let us know?

Since I blitzed you with the announcement today. Yeah, it's at 5 o'clock. I got it. So we have a series of events planned, and this is being hosted by the City of Keene Human Rights Committee, the YMCA, and Badger. It kicks off on June 12th through June 22nd with the Freedom Journey Trail through the YMCA. So that's outside, it's free, and it's self-directed so you can do it at your own pace. And then on Thursday, June 18th at 6 p.m., there's a film screening and question and answer. And this is geared more towards a mature audience, adult audience. And the film is Billy Preston, That's the Way God Planned It. So it's a really well-known film. And then our premiere event is our Juneteenth concert. And that is on June 19th from 5 to 8 p.m. at the Rec Center at Fuller Park. And we're going to have spoken word performances by Jazzy Moda and Samara Evans and a musical performance by John Lou Devoe. And then to close out the event on June 20th at 11 a.m., there's a film screening of Arco at the Keene Public Library, and that's geared towards children and adolescents. So a little something for everyone.

Thank you to the Keene Human Rights Committee and the work that they've put into this event, this commemoration and celebration. So a couple of other things for our calendars. Their public hearing for the budget, that will be held on June 4th, coinciding with our council meeting on that evening. And there will be a City Council fiscal policies workshop on Tuesday June 30th at 6 p.m. Here in council chambers So we'll get through the budget process Having gone through it have that opportunity to debrief and look at our fiscal policies going forward Okay, I think That concludes our announcements and we can get to nominations Oh, no. Not yet. I'd like to ask Don Lucier to come forward for a proclamation. We'll keep people in suspense as to what it's about. So, in recognition of Public Works Week, whereas public works professionals focus on infrastructure systems, facilities, and services that are of vital importance to sustainable and resilient communities, This service that you and your staff ensure provides for public health, a high quality of life, and the well-being of residents, businesses, and visitors of the city of Keene. And whereas municipal infrastructure systems, facilities, and services could not be performed without the dedicated efforts of public works professionals, including engineers, scientists, managers equipment operators mechanics and laborers public works staff are responsible for operating repairing improving and protecting our city's transportation drinking water wastewater and solid waste systems and facilities that are essential for daily life in our city Whereas it is in the public interest for citizens, civic leaders, and children to gain knowledge of and maintain an active understanding of the importance of public works and public works programs in the city of Keene. And thank you for the touch a truck event that will happen later this summer. And whereas this year, 2026, is the month of May, in the month of May, marks the 66th annual National Public Works Week themed, rooted in service, powered by community, which acknowledges that the roots of service run deep in public works and have propelled innovations that help communities grow into places where people can lead lives of purpose and possibility with contributions both visible, such as roads and bridges, and unseen, including water and sewer systems. Innovations such as C-Click Fix and weekly summer construction updates are evidence of you and your staff's desire to better serve our community. Now, therefore, I, as Mayor of the City of Keene, do hereby proclaim Sunday, May 17, through Saturday, May 23, as Public Works Week in Keene, and call upon our citizens to join the City of Keene, the American Public Works Association, and government agencies in activities and ceremonies that recognize the substantial contributions Public Works staff and professionals make to protecting our community's health, safety, and quality of life. Thank you for your efforts and please extend our thanks to your staff. Thank you very much.

And a word? Sure. Thank you, Mayor Kahn. Thank you for making some time tonight to recognize the contributions of the men and women at Public Works. I was confiding in Council of Powers before the meeting tonight that, if I'm being honest, city engineer was a much more fun job. It really was. This position gives me an opportunity to work with 77, I think is the current count, of just exceptional human beings. They are really an amazing team. They don't get a lot of attention. They don't have the shiny red trucks. But they are absolute professionals. They know their craft inside and out. Normally, I don't even know there's a problem until they've already solved it. And it's just a joy to work with those folks. Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you, Your Honor.

Okay.

Now we will open up a public hearing on Ordinance 202602. And I'd like to ask the clerk to read the notice of the hearing.

Notice is hereby given that a public hearing will be held before the Keene City Council relative to Ordinance O-202602 relating to the definition of family. Petitioner of City of Keene Community Development Department proposes to amend the definition of family in Article 29 of the Land Development Code comply with recent changes to state law RSA 674 16 modify the definition of dwelling unit to clarify that this term does not include transient uses such as hotels slash motels and amend sections 1.2.1 definitions and 226.4 land development code amendments to state that any modifications to the definition in article 29 that would have the effect of modifying the zoning ordinance shall follow the same application and review procedures that are required for an amendment to the zoning ordinance.

And joining us for this presentation to kick it off is our senior planner in community development, Mary Brunner.

Thank you Mr. Mayor so this ordinance is O2026-02 relating to the definition of family and really this came about because of a change to state law and as a result of that we had to look at our definition and change it and as I'll go over in just a second there are a few like ripple effects that we'll have to deal with from this but overall think this change is a positive one what we're really proposing to do is to switch from a definition that defines family based on how people are related to each other to a definition that focuses on the transients transiency or non transiency of the group and how they function together as a household unit All right, so currently the city has a definition for family that is basically states that you have to be related to each other through adoption, blood, marriage, foster children, et cetera, or you can have four or fewer unrelated people living together in the same unit. That's no longer allowed under state statute, and so what we're proposing is to replace it with the definition that you see up on the screen. which states that families shall mean a natural person living alone or a group of natural persons living together as a single housekeeping unit that is primarily non-transient. For the purposes of this definition, transient shall mean occupancy of a room or a dwelling unit for less than 30 consecutive days or rental of a room or dwelling unit for a term of less than one month. So again, it's focusing more on the transiency or non-transiency as well as how the group operates together so this ordinance was introduced to you all on february 5th it went to a public workshop on march 9th during the public workshop there were a number of questions that came up that were answered regarding how things like health and safety and property standards and things like that would be enforced. And I believe all of those questions were fully responded to. One of the items or the ripple effects that could come out of this is that this does change our occupancy limits. Right now the zoning code does set that for per unit or less that are unrelated and This does get rid of that however, I think this is probably not going to be that big of an impact for the community because we have many other ways to Address any issues that might come up be a public health issue or a safety issue We have lots of other codes that we can rely on to address any potential issues another potential ripple effect is with respect to congregate living and social service uses as you all will recall that category of uses includes things like homeless shelter group homes Resident care facility, I think is the term. There's a whole number of uses that fall into that category. And some of them could be impacted by this change. And so that is being looked at separately through a different ordinance that will be coming before you later this year. And then the final item that could be impacted by this is short-term rental uses. And actually tonight an ordinance has been introduced to kind of start the process on discussing how to address those moving forward. But essentially right now our regulations are silent with respect to short-term rental uses. With this definition of family that focuses so much on transiency and non-transiency, that would make short-term rentals illegal and keen. And they haven't really been much of a problem so far in terms of emergency calls or complaints that we've been receiving. and there's roughly I would say probably about 50 active short-term rentals in Keene and so we want to make sure that we're creating a path for those to move forward so that is also going to be handled through a separate ordinance In addition to the change to the definition of family, we're proposing a change to the definition of dwelling unit and just tacking on to the end of it the statement that this use should not be deemed to include such transient occupancies as hotel, motel, or bed and breakfast. Otherwise, that would remain completely as it is today. And then the last change is really, it's to fix a potential loophole that staff identified, which is that as we were going through this ordinance, which changes the definition of family, we realized that even though it would change the zoning regulations quite significantly technically our definition of family wasn't in the zoning regulations and so we wanted to make it clear in the land development code that anytime someone proposes a change to a definition that would actually change the meaning or the effect of the zoning regulations that it would go through the zoning amendment process so that there would be that extra level of scrutiny and public input so that's pretty much it happy to answer questions That was a lot, I know.

Councillor Jones. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I've got a lot of questions, but this is going to PLD, so I can ask you that. But the one question I have is, we first put in the more than four non-related issue a number of years ago because of... That's when we developed the congregate living because of frat houses and a lot of students living together. It was student housing that caused us to create that issue a number of years ago. So that's going to change now. So now if they have more than four unrelated people, do they no longer have to apply for that license?

So that's a great question and I think that will be addressed during the update to the congregate living and social service uses I know that that should be coming to you relatively soon but yes it could potentially impact that I can't answer that question for sure either way Thank you Councillor Tobin work down the line

Thank you I think I had a similar question and it was just related to college housing I think it would as I understand what you're saying say there's a four bedroom house that would be that would fall under family if it's rented as a house but not if they are renting individual rooms in the house so if I if there are four leases does that

So it would actually come back to whether or not they're living there for more than 30 days and how they function together so if it's college students that are renting out the house together and they eat meals together or they go shopping together or you know somehow function like a family unit or a household unit then they would meet that definition of family and so I think the the easiest metric to look at from an enforcement perspective is how long they're either have stayed there or intending to stay there so if they're gonna be living there for more than 30 days that would be considered a family essentially

sorry just a quick clarifying question I think what I was referring to maybe was more what the about the definition of dwelling unit because if the dwelling unit that operates as one even if there are multiple dwelling units in the same Do you understand what I'm saying?

Yes, okay. So we have two definitions on our code, one for dwelling and one for dwelling unit, and it's a little bit confusing. So a dwelling refers to the building that's used for living in, and a dwelling unit is each independent unit within that building. So a single-family home is both a dwelling and a dwelling unit. A two-family is a dwelling, and it has two dwelling units in it. three families of dwelling and it has three dwelling units in it so the units are their own self-contained living areas they have to have that cooking and sleeping and I forget what else is in there but I can go back to the definition um so yeah complete independent living facilities for one or more persons including permanent provisions for living sleeping eating cooking and sanitation so each drawing unit has to have all of that to be considered its own unit but that's kind of the distinction between those two terms so if you had for example a house with four bedrooms that's one dwelling unit even if they're renting out the bedrooms individually

I think what is probably confusing is that in changing the definition of family, it doesn't change it to household unit. It just changes the meaning of what family is.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I have a couple questions. First of all, multiple questions tonight about college students. Am I correct that the state law that triggered this change specifically calls out college students as a group that we cannot write zoning codes to discriminate against in terms of housing?

yes yeah it very clearly calls out I think I have the full language in here if it would be helpful to read that but you are corrected that it's very protective of different groups that have historically been discriminated against yeah another question yeah thank you so you talked very briefly about the possible immediate impact of this on short-term rentals

I want to just get a sense of the timeline, recognizing we have something on our agenda tonight that will be making its way through the process and coming back for a final vote at some point in the future about where short-term rentals are allowed. What happens when this ordinance passes and that ordinance is still in the process? What's the status of short-term rentals in the interim?

Great question. So in the interim, they're going to be kind of in limbo, essentially. So the reason why we wanted to get the short-term rental ordinance introduced was so that the process could get started, so we could come to a resolution hopefully soon. however in the interim there's they'll technically still not be allowed like today we don't have a definition for short-term rentals and we don't explicitly allow them but once this definition of family goes into place they'll technically be Not allowed. However, we do have some discretion with enforcement And so since we know that this other ordinance will be making its way through the process It's you know, we were not really going to be going after anyone who's operating a short-term rental in the meantime We would still continue our normal code enforcement activities But not because it's a short-term rental Good culture house

Thank you, Your Honor. Does the state law allow us to define the number of persons permitted in a dwelling unit? Do we know that?

Yes, it does.

Thank you.

I think the manager has a comment. One of you.

Well, I was just going to add, so the law that's being referenced came about from House Bill 457, and the definition talks about municipalities, towns, not being able to restrict the number of occupants of any dwelling unit to less than two per bedroom. And then it also goes on to talk about the issue with family and that The body shall not adopt any zoning ordinance within a municipality that discriminates based on the familia or non-familia relationship marital status among the occupants of the dwelling including but not limited to college students Thank you

and actually mr. mayor can I add on to my response to councillor Haas really quickly please any clarity I just want to add that while it is technically still allowed to regulate the number of people per unit staff recommends against that for a number of reasons one of which is that if you have a you know what we traditionally would think of as a family let's say you have a family with six kids eight kids we don't see a lot of large families anymore but there are still some out there we don't want to make it so that they can't legally occupy a unit just because they only have three bedrooms and we said only two people for per bedroom or something like that so we're trying to avoid creating a problem when there isn't one, if that makes sense.

Following. Thank you. No, yeah, I recognize the difficulty in that if we're going to, the state has opened up the definition of family, yet how does that relate to how many people can live together in one little space? So then we revert to fire codes and other building codes for that kind of control. But it's a complicated subject for sure. Yeah.

Which is, yeah, I'm not going to try to reinterpret. I think you've offered some clarity. Thank you. All right. Seeing no further questions from the council, thank you, Mary. I'd like to see if there are any other people in attendance this evening that wish to comment on this public hearing. okay seeing none we will close this public hearing and if there are further comments from the public they need to be in writing then that will be accepted up until 1 p.m on tuesday june 9th prior to the pld meeting on june 10th when this will be taken up further by the committee

okay we move along on to nominations and confirmations thank you this evening we have one nomination for Richard Roth to serve as an alternate in slot 10 on the Asheville at River Park Advisory Board with the term expiring on December 31st 2027 and we will table that motion until our next council meeting continuing This evening we have one confirmation for Carl Sandy to serve as an alternate in slot 11 on the Heritage Commission with the term expiring on December 31st, 2028.

And we will, no, this one's up for confirmation. Is there any, and Councilor Greenwald is up for a motion.

Move to confirm the nomination. Second.

Seconded by Councilor Powers. Is there any comment? Mr. Sandy's nomination seeing none the clerk please call the roll cancer filia.

Yes cancer chalice. Yes cancer workman cancer late Yes cancer family. Yes cancer Tobin. Yes cancer Williams. Yes cancer Jones. Yes cancer Robert yes cancer Haas. Yes cancer rattle Miller

yes Councillor Ellis yes Councillor Powers yes Councillor Greenwald yes unanimous thank you so that concludes nominations we'll move on to communications for the evening and would the clerk please read our communications into the record

We have communication from Alan Stroschein on behalf of the Keene Elk City Rotary Club who has submitted their annual request to conduct the Clarence DeMar Marathon and the DeMar Half Marathon on Sunday, September 27th, 2026.

And we'll see this motion coming back shortly, but thank you.

We will... Yeah. Yeah. This communications being referred to planning licenses and development where that license will come up Thank you, we have a communication from mayor Kahn regarding potential expansion of permitted uses in commerce industrial and industrial park zones

And we'll refer that letter to the Joint Planning Committee between the Planning Board and the Planning Licenses and Development Committee for a future date when the staff can come back with some thoughts on these different zones. Not necessarily coming back with all of them at once, but... Let's start the consideration. Councilor Jones.

Thank you. Can I ask staff if by the time this gets to joint committee, will we be able to get input from the people doing our re-evaluation? Would they be able to comment on the disparity between residential and commerce and industrial? We had that four years ago. We had that issue, and I'm just wondering if that's going to continue.

Yeah. So we will have a presentation from our assessors probably to FOP when we get closer to knowing what the breakdown of the new values will be. I'm not sure if it's going to be exactly timed, but we can take a look to see when these two items might come up.

Thank you.

Again, we have communication from council runner Miller with a request to reinstate the college city commission.

And we'll refer that a letter to planning licenses and development for further conversation.

We're taking the next four communications together, a communication from Kenneth cost in opposition to reviewing amendments to the land development code ordinance. Oh, 2025 15 a. that was adopted on September 18, 2025. The next is a communication from Kristen Petricola that contains a petition with 50 signatures in opposition to reviewing amendments to the Land Development Code Ordinance O2025-15A that was adopted on September 18, 2025. The next is a communication from Robert and Sandra Hom in support of reviewing amendments to Land Development Code ordinance O 2025-15A that was adopted on September 18, 2025. And the next, we have a communication from Robin Cost that includes a petition signed by 14 East Keene residents in support of reviewing amendments to land development code ordinance O 2025-15A that was adopted on September 18, 2025.

So those communications are in reference to a tabled item that will be taken up later on the agenda. The communications themselves are hereby filed into the record as informational.

All right. Ready for me to go on?

You're ready for us to take up committee reports.

All right. The first committee report, a municipal facility services and infrastructure committee report relative to the downtown infrastructure project financing plan. On a vote of five to zero, the municipal services facilities and infrastructure committee recommends that the city manager be authorized to do all things necessary to negotiate and execute a contract for the construction of the downtown infrastructure project to Casella Construction, Inc. in the amount of $26,058,836. Any such contract so awarded shall include language allowing the city to amend the scope of work as necessary based on the city council's final fiscal year 2027 budget approval.

Recognize Councillor Greenewald for a motion.

Thank you, Your Honor. I move the intent of the committee report.

Second.

Seconded by Councilor Workman and Councilor Gruenwald for the committee.

Thank you. Very happy to be standing here this evening. The MSFI committee has worked on this project for over four years. Three mayors. We reviewed all aspects of the project. Plans were reviewed and modified. Numerous public hearings and public input sessions were held. MSFI, every month at our meeting, it's a regular item on the agenda. The public is always encouraged to come and speak and ask questions. A lot of features were considered and many were eliminated. A lot of compromises have been made. I'm going to just scan down a list. I asked public works director to go through the record, Just for the public information, this project has really been very, very heavily considered. No frills. A lot of things that we could have done, we didn't do. So I'm just going to hit a couple of them. Reduce the amount of temporary pavement during construction. Be a little bit rough, but we're saving money. Budgeted hours for uniformed officers. We eliminated lighted bollards. Eliminated granite seating wells. Eliminated the shade structure from railroad square. Eliminated compacting trash compactors. Modified the storm drains. Reduce the amount of textured colored concrete. Change the curves. I know that this is trivial, but it's not trivial, it's all money. This is stuff that we really work very, very hard considering, and I think the public needs to know that we worked in their best interest. Let's see. The field office is going to be in the transportation center. That was like a savings, I think, of $75,000. Electrical system upgrades will be modified. We eliminated the catenary lighting system in Railroad Square and the bike path. Would be great. I've seen it in other towns. I wish we could have done it, but we took it out because the priority is the underground and putting back a first-class project. And Public Works is going to be doing a lot of the work in-house, so that'll save a whole bunch of money. Now, prices have gone up as this has dragged on. The project was put off so that the downtown merchants could accommodate their purchasing and whatnot, and that cost an additional amount of money. We finally managed to get two bids. There was a delay, one week, but that didn't cost anything additional, so this all worked out really well. We all know that this project is going to be long, it's going to be difficult, but in the end, the results will be there for future decades. It's a statement that says to visitors and residents that Keene cares about this city. I personally feel that we need to leave the project intact as submitted. Don't chip away at some of the features that will make it unique and high quality. Considering the cost and the effort and what the whole downtown community is going to go through, we must not end up with a mediocre result. And I urge you to vote to authorize a contract without amendment.

Thank you, Councilor. Thank you. Councilor Cavalese.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I, too, rise in support of the committee report as presented. I have been a part of these conversations for just a fraction of the time that some of my colleagues have, but we started, when I started on council, with a project that was more expansive, more aesthetically pleasing, and we really have whittled it down to, I think, what is really necessary to invest in our downtown and, most importantly, fix the pipes that are under. main street one of the things i want to keep in mind and i want the public to keep in mind as we move forward is that yes this will be disruptive and yes this is an expensive project but at every turn we have done our best and city staff have done their best to really put together a project that addresses our needs and minimizes the impact on the tax rate so it's using fund balance it is using grants where we've been able to get them it is being creative in the ways that we think about placing the folks that are going to be on site using the transportation center for the hub that sort of thing so this is you know not a project that the council has taken lightly we have heard a lot of feedback we have incorporated a lot of feedback staff has done the same and i hope that the council will vote unanimously tonight to support this motion and allow the city manager to finally finally finally move us into the construction phase of this project thank you council philia

Your Honor, I do agree with Councillor Greenwald on one thing, and that's it's been a long, long, long road on this project. Councillor Greenwald and I actually sat on the original advisory committee five, six years. I don't even know how far back it was. We've been here since the beginning, and I appreciate everything that everybody's been through on this. It's been tedious at best. And I also agree with what Councillor Greenwald said. Whether people have agreed or disagreed, in particular, this isn't a very transparent project. I think this might be meeting 86 that we've talked about. It's been very transparent. So whether people agree or disagree on specific items, it's always been right up front. And I commend the city for that. And I also agree we're getting a lot closer. My opinion is we're real close, but we're not there yet. And let me explain that. We made reductions. I just personally feel that a few more need to be made. If you'll be patient with me, I wrote some bullet points, some notes today going back through four years of minutes. A couple of weeks ago, as Councillor Greenwood alluded to, we received our first real bids on this project. Now, despite all the rumors and estimates and projections and things Stantec said and estimates our engineers thought, we finally got a real bid. I mean, a black and white real bid rather than a rumor. Came in $2 million over what even Stantec thought. But with that said, I want to applaud the city manager and staff for finding ways to come up with the $2 million and not put that under the taxpayer, to be commended for that. I appreciate the hard work that's gone into that with city staff. However, where I decided to waver a little bit here is only a few days ago, the city council received four pages of line items. This is the project. First time any of us have received line items. I hope all of you have read these. I hope all of you have them with you tonight. Because where staff could make the $2 million difference from departments, this comes before us. This is what the city council can control. And I hope you've read every line item, because I have, and as you can see, I've done a lot of highlighting and gone back and read the minutes. I did address a couple of my concerns this week with the mayor and city manager. Appreciate their time doing that. And their comments were, you know, I should bring it up tonight. My personal opinion is these type of things should be addressed at the committee level. I think trying to do things on the fly at a council meeting are nearly impossible because we just do not have the input and the give and take you normally do at a committee meeting. But with that said, I respect the mayor and the city manager, so I'm here tonight to mention a couple of things that caught my attention. Initially, when I was going over every line item here and then back and forth, there was two items that stood out that caught my attention initially, and those are the two that I mentioned to the mayor and city manager. One was line item 670.751. I hope you have your copies with you. That has to do with rail tracks, actual rail tracks, not ties, rail tracks. Going back two years, and I had to go back to the minutes to look at this discussion, the discussion at that time was wouldn't it be nice to take some rail tracks and embed them in Railroad Square, cover them over so they can be seen, and make it look like it did when the trains went through. The comment at that time was, what would the cost of this be? The answer was, well, these rail tracks are in such surplus right now, it would be insignificant. That was it. We moved on from it. It was pretty much that quick. Well, if you look at line item 670.751, that is $50,000 to the project. Okay, it's a multi-million dollar project, I get that. But $57,000 is not insignificant. The next item that I looked at was archways. And this says basically railroad square. I remember discussing one. I don't remember discussing two, but there's two in the budget at $37,000 each. That's $74,000. Do we really need those? I guess that's a matter of opinion. I don't think it fixed the pipes at all, but that's another $74,000. $74,000 is not insignificant. So those are the two that caught my immediate attention that I brought to their attention. Then I went back home. and went through more of the line items and tried to scrutinize every line item to see do I feel that we've got the best value dollar project in front of us. So line item 908.24, that's basic four inch concrete sidewalks downtown. $160 a square yard comes to about a million and three. Yeah, we need the sidewalks, no problem, okay? It's a line item there, we need it. But then when you move to the next item, 908.242, that's four-inch exposed aggregate concrete sidewalks at $232 a square yard, which is twice as much as the regular sidewalk. Why is it twice as much? Bike lane. So bike lanes, which I've never been a favor of anyhow, but I was a minority on that. But now I'm seriously opposed to them because now we're paying twice as much for the concrete for a bike lane. I say let's just call them a sidewalk, and we would save $126,000 just by using the same concrete. Then you move down to line item 908.2401. Four-inch textured stamped concrete. That's basically for railroad square, around the fountain, in buffers. $300 a square yard. If we use regular concrete for those particular areas, that would save $532,000 from the taxpayers. It's not cheap. That's another half a million dollars. So those and other line items, I feel, might feel, need adjusting. Now, other councillors may not. You've probably gone through these four pages. There might be issues that you say, you know, I think we can do without. And that's what we need to hear. We need to hear from all 15 councillors. I'm only one. I need seven others to agree with me to have these changed, and I get that. But I want to hear what the other councillors saw. We don't think that that's a great line item to go with. So just the line items that I just spoke to you about tonight. And there were others I was concerned about, but I'm like, I can give a take. Came to a million one. I say a million one, what's a million one? Well, you know, we've been talking about, we're gonna have to spend a half million dollars on four firefighters pretty quick for a year. That million one pays for four firefighters for two years. Maybe that's not where you use the money, but when you talk dollars, when you talk priorities, that's what a million one will get you without interfering with the downtown project. Just some what I consider minor changes. And the recommendations that I make to you will not require a new project redesign. It stays the same. Just some changes, sit down with the contractor and say, we just don't need these particular parts and we're going to use more of this concrete than the other concrete. The project remains the same, does not need a redesign. We will not need a delay with the exception of maybe a couple of weeks. And I'll get to that point. Because I think the project needs to be done. I think we need to get these pipes in the ground. And I think the project needs to start this year. So we've said time is of the essence. And I still agree with that. But so is getting the best project for the dollar value. That's also of our essence. We've gone four years on this. A couple more weeks isn't going to hurt us. No one's been more critical of myself, of the state of New Hampshire, with a downshifting of the cost onto us. We know it's burying municipalities, including Keene. But I'd be a hypocrite not to look into this matter where I think we can save $1.1 million. We're telling the state You know, we're taking a pounding from you guys, but yet I feel I just found $1.1 million that we can save the taxpayers without jeopardizing the project. I understand we're all frustrated, and I understand we're frustrated tonight, so let's just get this damn project done and get the shovel in the ground. I agree. But I don't think waiting a couple more weeks after we've gone over four years on this is going to hurt any of us, especially if we can save taxpayers' money. And I haven't heard from the other 14 of you yet. You have to have found something on here you don't agree with. Council Greenwell is right. Cuts were made along the way. More cuts need to be done. So the proper procedure, I feel, is committee level. This is kind of like, some of us have been around for a while, it's like the committee of the whole. Well, that's what a full council is. Full council should never decide as a committee on the whole. Issues such as this always go back to committee, MSFI, then come back forward to the full council. Like I said, the items that I'm discussing with you tonight and the cuts that I'm proposing to make should have been done at a committee meeting. But there were no more committee meetings left. And that's why I met with the mayor and city manager and they said bring it up tonight, which I am. But it should have been done at a committee level meeting. But we didn't have enough time because we got these four pages this week. There was no time to go to committee with them. That's why I'm mentioning it to you tonight. So Basically, once again, the proper procedure would be go to MSFI committee, which between now and the next council meeting, the mayor would have to set up a special MSFI meeting for all of us to address this and get it back here in two weeks. Once again, I appreciate time is of the essence, but so is getting the best value for the project. So therefore, at this point, I'm going to move, we refer this back to the MSFI committee for a full council input in recommendations. Thank you for your time. Second.

There is a motion and a second for an amendment.

It's not an amendment. It's a motion.

Motion to refer is not an amendment. I got it. Sorry. It's debatable.

I'm allowed to ask a question right now? I'm allowed to ask a question right now then? Certainly. Yes, okay. So, thank you. The report that we heard over the past week identified 2.32 million that would be able to come out of all of these funds that does not impact the taxpayer to cover that additional amount, correct? Correct. Am I correct in understanding that reducing the project by just over a million dollars would not change? that fact there would still need to be a million dollars coming out of these funds to cover the additional amount on the project that's correct that's correct okay thank you council roberts i hold lolly disagree with the motion to send it back

on any big project, every single one of us can sit here and say, I don't like this, I don't like that. The question is, how many people here are engineers? How many people here have been project managers doing multimillion dollar jobs? And on the city council, I think there's only one. I think there's a couple in the back of the room. When you start nitpicking, you're not looking at the potential consequences because when you take something out, you may cause two or three other issues down here that you were never looking at. And so it's like going to a doctor and going, oh, no, I don't like this. Well, I can do it your way, but I may have to come back sooner than we originally planned. Does it go? We need to get this done. Right now, for example, I was looking, 10 years ago the bond was 1.37. Yesterday the bond was 4.56. They expect the bond to be 6%. Do you know how much money that adds on the long-term project when you have to bond this? There are so many things that we as individuals can nitpick at. But you've got to look at the construction. You've got to look at the cost. We may delay it. The contractor may come back and say, hey, these prices went up. I have to come back with a change order. I just can't afford to finish the project. There are so many unknowns. on the contract side, on the finance side, whole bunch of those. No, you can send it back to the committee. You're going to have five people discuss it. Then you'll have other city councils discuss it. And then we might get back here in two weeks and someone say, I don't agree with the committee, so what do we do now? Do we send it back to the committee or do we have a four fight on here and try to do everything in one night?

Thank you, Councillor, and I just want to address that point in particular that when we did have a conversation with Councillor Filio to say that an amendment this evening on the motion would be entirely appropriate for debate among the council. So we're going to do that on the budget. We're going to accept any amendments that people wish to make on the fiscal 27 budget. We can do the same thing on this budget tonight. So hold that in your thoughts. Another thought, though, is that the municipal bond rate, fortunately, is a much more stable rate because of its tax-exempt status. And so a lot of the fluctuations that we're seeing in bond markets commercially don't affect as severely the municipal bond market. Councilor Workman.

Thank you, Your Honor. Your Honor. I'll try to be brief. I just want to highlight that there were several counselors in the room at the MSFI meeting. Counselor Filio was one of them. If anyone had concerns, our rules of order allow us to speak at committee meetings as long as we are not stating our opinion on the project. So the things that Councilor Filio just raised, those changes could have all been addressed at the committee level as he was requesting. He just chose not to bring them up at the time. These things have been in the budget. So even if without the documentation we had four days ago, He could have suggested we omit these things or change them. These weren't added on at the last council meeting. And I also want to highlight that the city of Portsmouth, there was a great highlight recently on WMUR. The city of Portsmouth is going through this exact same process right now, and it's costing them just as much. And they had the big wooden pipes out, and the conversation was almost identical to the ones we have been having. So we're already ahead of the game here. We've got to move this ball forward. I support the committee's recommendations. Thank you.

Yes, and I guess I'll steal Councillor Filio's thunder there. I appreciate what the city manager did in sharing the full details of the bid with us. It did give some transparency to costs that are below the bottom line, and that, I think, gave us some insight into the things that Councillor Filio raised.

Yeah, I just want to point out the bid tabulation was not at the MSFI meeting. It was the following day. And I will say that the point that Council Workman made about it being in the budget all along is absolutely true. These items have been in there. It's been part of the design. And there has been a lot of compromise along the way. But I wanted to clarify the bid tabulation.

I agree the city manager said one thing to clarify once again We did not have these line items until a couple days ago These weren't available at any committee meeting if they were I would have brought it up a committee meeting So and this is the earliest I could bring it up So we just want to clarify that if these were available at any committee meeting I would have brought these up but so be it as it is I Think we could start to move on if folks are willing to hold this discussion

But if you feel that there's something germane to the, uh, desire to move this back to committee, uh, go ahead. Councilor house.

Thank you. I'll try to be germane. Um, so this is a three year project. Uh, no doubt there will be learning along the way when we do phase one. We'll find out how this, what's actually under the ground, what it looks like, how our processes work, how we deal with the construction as it goes on. How will we manage the possible changes in the contract in the second year and the third year? And this isn't locked in and cast in iron or cut in stone right now. There has to be some variability as we go forward, either in additional costs or possibly reduced costs. And some of these items are way down later in the project. So I'm curious as to how that process will go forward.

And I'm going to ask that the city manager address that question as we get to the full motion. That's truly the motion right now is are we going to debate the project this evening or are we sending it to committee? Let's decide that and move on. Councillor Jones.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. As you know, I've been opposing this project. I've been all for this project, right from the very beginning, for what we have to do to fix our infrastructure. But I've been saying right from the very beginning, with a different mayor, with a different committee, separate the wants from the needs. because there's a price that comes with the wants. And we didn't see those wants until it came out, as Randy pointed out. I don't want to go over everything he just said, but that was the first time we were able to see the wants. And now we're saying, oh, maybe we don't need to pay for those wants. Maybe we could save the taxpayers some money. There's a lot of things that happened in this process. that went round and round, back and forth, and I don't see how it couldn't hurt to send it to the committee to address those small issues. If one councillor can find a million dollars, what can 14 other councillors do? I think it's just worthwhile for the taxpayers, because it's not going to hold up the timeline, and just to be able to send it back to committee. Thank you.

Okay. Council Member Ellis.

Thank you. As much as I respect Councillor Jones' opinion, I think that this project has already been delayed unnecessarily and sending it back to committee right now, even if it would only cause a delay of a few weeks, is too much. We don't know if another water main will break and we'll be under another boil water advisory like we were last year. It makes no sense, in my opinion, to send this back to committee. We need to vote on it and pass it. Thank you.

Thank you. All right. Any more debate on continuing with the debate this evening or sending it back to committee? That's all we're deciding right now. OK. Seeing no further debate. A yes vote here will send the project back to committee for debate on particular cost items. A no vote will continue the conversation about passing the motion as presented by the committee. Okay. All those in favor? Two votes in favor. All those opposed? 12 votes opposed. OK. We are back to the main motion. Are there any amendments to the main motion? Councilor Greenewald.

Not an amendment, but I just left one little thing out of my list of deletions. The fountain stays. We're not buying a new fountain at this time.

Very good. And I think the other thing that I recognize in the conversation and debate is we turned to the staff and to Stantec and asked for value engineering on the project. We did it a number of times. We did know that the project costs were challenging and the staff came back with recommendations that reduced the project by millions of dollars. And while those might have been deemed as not necessary, they pulled things from the project that could have added value to the project. And yeah, we could continue to debate this for a long time. But here we are with a project, a bid, and a contractor ready to go. Councilor Tobin.

Thank you. I think the one thing that I just kind of want to add is in this role, I've found that I really need to learn to trust people and the information they're giving me. I need to trust recommendations, decisions that they've made, trusting past counselors. I wasn't involved in some of these decisions. And looking back, some of it I probably would have chosen something different. But I pick up something where it was left off. and I make the decisions and accept responsibility from there. And so I guess one thing that when we look at this project and we think about sort of what we could say is the wants versus the needs, the frills, I just keep thinking about the spirit of place. And without some of these things to make it special, how that really impacts the entire project. It impacts the entire downtown and who we are. And through this process over the past, I think the first meeting I went to was probably back in 2018. And the question was asked, we need to dig up downtown, do we build it back the same or do we change anything? And over the past almost 10 years, we have come to a decision together as a community, taken input from different perspectives, agreed with some of it, disagreed with others, but we've kind of found this common ground, and that is the project that's here tonight. And so I will be voting to approve it.

Thank you. I want to come back to Councillor Haas's question about process review as we are going through construction. The manager, I'd like you to address that.

So once a contract, once you have allowed us to move forward and award the contract, we really don't come back to the council for any more decisions unless there is a change order required that's above our purchasing authority. Those are the times that we come back. But we are already committed to go to MSFI monthly to provide updates on the work that's being done. And you're right, as we move forward, there will be things that we'll learn in the first phase that we might want to adjust in the second phase. And so I think those monthly conversations at MSFI will be helpful. But in terms of purchase order changes, there's a limit. And if we need to come forward with a contract change above that limit, then we come to the council.

culture house thank you um yeah i uh i can see as the public experiences the new central square and what it feels like with the new light poles with the new sidewalks with the new crossings with the flashing lights and and also how we've managed the construction through that time i think there'll be a lot of

Input preferably positive from the public going forward so we have to be ready to Accommodate that input as it happens Thank you It sounds like those monthly MSFI meetings and Yes, the counselor Greenwell will have to keep track of how many meetings We have discussed the downtown project the council Williams

Yeah, this has been a very long project. Thank you, everyone, for your participation in this. We've all worked hard. We've all torn our hair out over this. Here we come to the vote. I think we've done a pretty good job. I appreciate what Stantec's done. I appreciate what the councillors in this room have done, what the mayor has done, what the city staff has done. And I predict with confidence that when all this is over, we're going to be very happy that we did this project.

Councillor Ruddle-Miller.

I just want to comment on one of the comments that I've seen come up over and over again is that people, because change is very hard and I can empathize with that feeling, but I was not lucky enough to grow up in one town my whole life. We moved a lot so I haven't seen changes in a specific place over and over and Keene has become my home since 2009 and I understand that we're used to seeing things a certain way. But I also studied history and I know that the only constant in life is change. And I think what I hope is that we're all lucky enough to be here at a time where there are kids that are not born right now who, when changes are coming up in the future, are saying, I hope they're not going to change Main Street because it's always been this way. So it's just, there's always that version with generations or generational changes and It doesn't make it easier to accept them, but I do just hope the community knows that these are changes being made in good faith, that we all want to see Keene be the best version of itself. Nobody's out to get anyone or trying to make anything harder for anyone. We want to make this as easy as possible. So I just am looking forward to what we have in three years.

Agreed. Thank you. Councillor Roberts.

When we first started working on the project, we had a group of people over here that wanted a bare bones project. Make Main Street and everything a sterile street, a boring street that no one wants to drive. Then you had another group over here that wanted everything. For example, we were giving an example of a place out in California that got about $20 million from the Department of Transportation and how they made the center of the town really good and attract businesses, attract housing. Not only did they get the grant, but they had a heck of a lot more money to work with. So we've been going back and forth, back and forth. Neither side has got what they want, but we're taking care of all the basics, which we have to do, because we don't know what the climate is. Their saying is, we're getting more rain, but they're going to be intense periods. I was in the 2005 flood. I don't want my house to flood again. I want extra culverts, wider culverts, and things like that to handle the water. Yes, okay, we wanted to put in bike lanes and everything. Then the object, well, why do we need bike lanes if we can put bike racks and people can just walk a quarter mile up and down? So I think while no one got what they want, I think we did a really good job of getting what we can afford. And that's the biggest key here. Not dreaming or nothing on the other side, just paying the bare minimum and like to sit downtown boring. So the people who worked on it, everybody around, even the people from the public and the city council who all put their input in, we're getting something we can afford and we're going to get something we should be proud of.

Thank you. All right, seeing no further hands in the air, I think we are ready for a motion. This is, unless anyone calls for a roll call, is a hand vote. We have a motion on the floor. And it's to accept the committee report.

Okay.

All those in favor, signify by raising your hand. That's 12 votes. Any opposed? That's two votes. Okay. Motion carries 12 to 2. Thank you very much. Moving on to item D2.

Planning Licenses and Development Committee report relative to Keene Family YMCA request for road closure of Summit Road for the Autoromp Youth Triathlon Race June 7, 2026. On a vote of five to zero, the Planning Licenses and Development Committee recommends that the City Council grant a revocable license to the Keene Family YMCA for the Autoromp Youth Triathlon Race on Sunday, June 7, subject to licensing requirements identified in the staff report, including associated road closures. All permissions granted herein are subject to compliance with the city approved safety protocol document, which becomes a part of this license.

And Councilor Filio for the motion. Move to carry out the intent of the committee report. Second. Second by Councilor Jones. Thank you.

I think this vote might go a little bit quicker. Yeah, this is the annual request for the road race on Summit Road. Pretty standard procedure. Once again, though, a great event. And I pointed out one of the great events is actually not downtown. So the committee voted unanimously to approve this, and I hope the full council will also. Thank you.

Thank you. And to any of the Youth Council members who attended today, it's June 7th. It's not next weekend. So I messed up in advertising it. But the input that came from the Youth Council was, We need more of these kinds of events in the summer, and so I guess I just want to offer my thanks to the YMCA for sponsoring something that gets youth involved in some active activities, and that other groups step forward and offer these, because I think there's some appetite in our younger population to want to have these opportunities to be outdoors more often. All right, motions on the floor. Any comments further? All those in favor? Motion carries 14 to nothing. Okay, moving on to D3.

A Planning Licenses and Development Committee report relative to Black Cloud Brewing Company requests for permission to serve alcohol at their Sidewalk Cafe. On a vote of five to zero, the Planning Licenses and Development Committee recommends that the City Council grant permission to Black Cloud Brewing Company to serve alcohol beverages In connection with their Sidewalk Cafe license, subject to customary licensing requirements of the City Council, compliance with requirements of section 46-1191 through 46-1196 of the City Code, and compliance with any regulations of the New Hampshire Liquor Commission. This license shall expire on November 1st, 2026.

Councilor Filio for the motion. Thank you.

I move to carry out the intent of the committee report.

Second. Seconded by Councilor Jones.

Okay, this is a request from Black Fraud Brewing Company, which used to be the former Modest Man. Obviously, they've changed ownership now. Most of these owners here now were former employees of Modest Man, but with that said, Whenever a new business comes before us, and now this is a new business, they have to come before the council first to get an outdoor liquor license. After this point, as long as there's no problems down the road, the city clerk will reissue it without coming before council. With that said, the committee voted unanimously to approve. Hopeful the council will also.

Any comments about this? Seeing none. All those in favor of the committee report? Motion carries unanimously. D4.

Finance Organization and Personnel Committee report relative to the New Hampshire Humanities Council Community Development Finance Authority, CDFA grant. On a vote of five to zero, the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee recommends that the city manager be authorized to do all things necessary to accept and expend a grant of up to $3,800 in support of two programs that facilitate community building.

Recognize Councilor Powers for the motion.

Thank you, Your Honor. I move to carry out the intent of the committee report.

Second. Second by Councilor Roberts.

Thank you, Your Honor. This was brought to us by the Library Director. The money is coming from the New Hampshire Humanities Council through the Community Development Finance Authority. It's $3,800 for a pretty neat project. that's going to last over a period of time and essentially it's centered around community conversations on a number of topics a number of different groups youth seniors anybody in the community and they kind of guide and facilitate these community discussions over at the library. There will be facilitators provided. There will be money for food, child care, and any supplies you need to run this program. And our local partners here are Hannah Grimes, the City's Human Rights Committee, Monadnock Diversity, Keene YMCA, and the Monadnock Interfaith Project. It's an excellent project. Please approve. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor. Any comments, questions? I appreciate the library's creativity in going after these grant funds. It's great. Councillor Tobin.

Just a quick comment. I ran into someone the other day, a stranger, and one of the first things he mentioned was what an amazing library we had. Specifically, he mentioned the large print section and how special that was for his mother. So I just thought I'd share that.

Yeah, absolutely. Seeing no further comments, all those in favor of the committee report, motion carries unanimously. Thank you. Moving on. D5.

finance organization and personnel committee report relative to the acceptance of 2026 AARP community challenge capacity building micro grant on a vote of five to zero the finance organization and personnel committee recommends that the city manager be authorized to do all things necessary to accept and expend the 2026 AARP community challenge capacity building micro grant in the amount of $2,500

powers for the motion thank you your honor move to carry out the intent of the committee report second second by council roberts council powers thank you your honor this is another program that's just great coming to the community uh we were briefed on the program by city planner forts and it's an aarp community challenge capacity building micro grant $2,500, and it's to work with our folks on the bicycle pedestrian master plan. Three to five bike walk, talk, around the city audits, which will focus on a couple of us, the senior population. And our friends are the American House, Covenant Living, Keene Senior Center, et cetera. So it's another program that's being brought. It's being managed by Community Development upstairs. And this, along with everything else they do, and the funding comes from AARP. Perfect. Say thanks to AARP and please pass it.

Any further comments? Councilor Coburn.

I just want to add real quick that I was reading through our master plan the other day and happened to notice that this is actually, I think, one of the items in the matrix at the end. Great.

Thanks. And this is kind of a shout-out, but thanks to Councilor Williams and Councilor Haas for joining me on the mayor's bike ride last weekend. Yes, we'll try ways to improve that over the next year.

I have to say that the mayor made it the whole way without putting his foot down.

Well, there were a couple stops. Because that's what you got to do when there's a stop sign on the bike path. Councilor Riddle-Miller.

I just wanted to say that it's great that there are services like this where there are people being brought into the conversation and how they would best use certain things, because I didn't realize until the past couple of years, and I don't remember the actual source, so pardon me for not citing myself, but curbs didn't used to have a gradual... on them because they did not think about the fact that people had to use wheelchairs or anything to get onto them. And that was only brought up when people were like, how do you expect us to get on a curb? So these types of services are really important when you're actually talking to people who are using things and whether or not it's actually accessible. So this is great to see.

Thanks. Thanks for that compliment. Okay. Ready to vote? All those in favor? Motion carries unanimously. On to D7. No, sorry, D6.

Yes. A Finance Organization and Personnel Committee report relative to the Technical Services Agreement, Southwest Regional Planning Commission. On a vote of five to zero, the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee recommends that the city manager be authorized to do all things necessary to execute a technical assistance agreement with Southwest Regional Planning Commission for the Ash Willett Green Space Project. Okay.

Councilor Powers for the motion.

Thank you, Your Honor. Move to carry out the intent of the committee report.

Second. Seconded by Councillor Roberts. Councillor Powers.

Thank you, Your Honor. This action is pulling together four or five different parts of a beautiful program on Ash Wheeler Street. And so many thanks to Southwest Planning for coming up with some of these ideas and facilitating. What we're asking to be authorized is the manager can sign the technical assistance agreement with Southwestern Regional Planning for the green space project, which will be our part of a park, amenities, et cetera, abutting the Ashwili River. pretty deep when you start reading into it. But we've already received $35,000 towards this project. Southwest and others have gotten donations. And now we're just pulling it all together with this design and them assisting with it. And I understand that in the next couple of weeks, we will have another step that will come through that pulls it all together. And drive by over there if you want to see progress. It's great. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor. Any further comments? I'll add that Todd Horner, the executive director of Southwest Regional Planning, stopped by today. Among his thoughts were ways that he's helping the city and using northern borders in this program under northern borders was a creative way to tap into dollars that are less competitive than other areas. components of northern borders, so that was creative on their part, but Annie Bohannon, thank you for your efforts in advocating for this and helping apply for the grant. This is a win for the city. Okay, all those in favor of the committee report? Motion carries unanimously. D7.

Finance organization and personnel committee report relative to the recreation trails recreational trails program grant Key State College pedestrian bridge on a vote of five to zero the finance organization and personnel committee recommends that the city manager be authorized to do all things necessary to accept and expend a recreation trails program grant for $80,000 for the trestle bridge on the ash will it rail trail a

Councilor Powers for the motion.

Thank you, Your Honor. I move to carry out the intent of the committee report.

Second. Second by Councilor Roberts.

Thank you, Your Honor. This is $80,000 coming to us from the state. And again, it has a number of steps. And we're getting to a solution to the trestle bridge. There's one way to refer to it. Or the steel bridge that not too many people see. But it's an important element in the trail system. And there's some timing involved. That's why we're here tonight asking that this be... approved for the manager to sign because there's a process that goes forward now the state and The company's going through this process have to be in line all at the same time, so Please say yes. Thank you.

Thank you. I mean comes from families

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Just real briefly, I want to thank staff for their diligence on this. I understand the order of operations, so to speak, at the state level for how this grant is apportioned out and when it's apportioned out has changed a little bit. This is a project that is really important to my constituents. The constituent who first brought this to my attention is in the room tonight. This is a critical piece of pedestrian and cyclist infrastructure in Ward 1. This matters to my constituents. We've been trying to get this done for a long time, and I'm really glad for the opportunity to work with staff to finally move this forward.

yeah thank you counselor counselor jones thank you uh thank you very much for bringing this forward if you ever take a walk on that bridge you can feel the softness as you walk on it it's uh it's it's a very good thing to have um and i originally this was going to be a project a freeway project uh being paid for by uh the city the college and pathways for keen we're gonna and so that's over now this this concludes it all correct

We're still looking for your money. So this is a portion of the grant that we received, but we are going to be seeking the donation for a match from Pathways and from Keene State College. And so far, I believe that they are both in favor of that.

Yes, they are. OK. Thank you.

all right let's hope all that aligns because this could have happened a year ago maybe and uh it needs to be done as was pointed out uh and i think everybody in the city really benefits from this one uh it's not just a neighborhood project it's a great trail yeah and it abuts to the redfern bridge

I'm going to need another name now for the trestle bridge.

All right. I'll move to the vote quickly. All those in favor? The vote carries unanimously. Thank you. E8.

A finance organization and personnel committee report relative to the acceptance of health trust wellness grant. On a vote of 5-0, the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee recommends that the city manager do all things, be authorized to do all things necessary to accept and expand the 2026 Wellness Grant from Health Trust in the amount of $2,500 to be used for employee wellness activities.

Councillor Powers for the motion.

Thank you, Your Honor. Move to carry out the intent of the committee report.

Second. Second by Councillor Roberts. Councillor Powers for the motion.

The HR department brought this forward. This is an annual event for us because we've participated in the past and it's had great results and it's something that you really want to be able to do and sometimes you don't have enough money in your own budget. So the $2,500 is used towards the efforts to have a number of programs throughout the year for a variety of different folks that work for the city and are looking for a little extra push to work on these wellness programs. Recommended to be accepted unanimously. Thank you.

Thank you. Any comments on this? Seeing none, I know this is not the largest grant we're approving this evening, but it does give visibility to the donating and granting organizations, and that's part of the recognition in return for the funding that is kind of the quid pro quo. Anyway. All those in favor of the motion? Motion carries unanimously. On D9.

A finance organization and personnel committee report relative to the 2025 hazardous materials emergency preparedness HMEP grant award. On a vote of five to zero, the finance organization and personnel committee recommends that the city manager be authorized to do all things necessary to accept and expend the 2025 hazardous materials emergency preparedness grant award.

Councilor Powers for the motion.

Thank you, Your Honor. I move to carry out the intent of the committee report.

Second. Second by Councillor Roberts. Councillor Powers for the committee.

This is a program for the fire department. Chief Martin was with us. $7,197 from the hazardous material program at the state, which is funded federally, works its way down through. And this is for training props. If you read it at first, you go, whoop, whoop. I'm not sure I want a bulk tank cargo. But it's a simulator. And quite frankly, some of these simulators are better training props and tools than the actual thing. So this is a great addition for them to be able to do this kind of training. various locations $7,197 it requires a 20% match but in this case the in-kind activities setting up program setting up the props the other equipment that's necessary for it will work towards it so there'll be no actual dollar that has to go out to match it so recommend unanimous approval thank you

Thank you, councilor. Any comments? Seeing none, all those in favor? Motion carries unanimously. Thank you, councilor Powers. All right, moving on to the city manager's report.

Just a couple of items for you this evening. A quick update on the airport solar project. The city has received planning board approval from the town of Swansea for the project. That was a long process to get through, and in the end, really they only requested one thing, and that is a section of the solar array is visible by some homes, and so they asked for some slates in the fencing, and we agreed to that. just how much is going to depend on when we actually do the installation and what it looks like. But really, other than that, they were very supportive, and so we're happy to have that done. And moving forward, there are some additional permits that we are still seeking, but we are currently anticipating an August 20, this summer, August 2026 construction start with the project expected to go live late in 2027. So we're still on track for those dates. I've also met with both Cheshire County and the town of Swansea regarding potential group net metering agreements associated with the project. Both organizations have expressed strong interest in participating. And so at this time, we are awaiting final municipal electric usage from the town of Swansea because it'll be the difference that we need that will go to the county. So we need to figure out Swansea's usage first. And then the next step will be legal review of all the draft agreements. And then I just wanted to alert everyone, we've talked about this before, but the fire department is getting ready to present to FOP at their next meeting. So May 28th, regarding staffing needs and operational impacts. And so this might be one that you might want, if you don't attend in person, to catch on YouTube. The FOP committee will also continue its review of the fiscal 27 proposed budget. and develop recommendations to the full council in advance of the public hearing, which is scheduled for June 4th. So we're coming close to the conclusion of the budget process as well. Those are my updates.

Great. Good updates.

Good updates in that the solar array has so much potential for the city and for its partners. So glad that they're recognizing the value that can come from it.

They are, yeah.

Okay, we are now moving on to a report of an item on more time.

The Finance Organization and Personnel Committee report relative to Councillor Jones' draft resolution for consideration addressing the burden on local property taxpayers. On a vote of five to zero, the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee recommends placing Councillor Jones' draft resolution for consideration addressing the burden on local property taxpayers on more time.

Thank you. And more time is granted. And you've got an item before you this evening from the city manager that was requested by the FOP committee at its last meeting. So that no doubt will be a part of that committee's packet this coming week. Okay. Moving on to ordinances for our first reading.

A memorandum from the Public Works Director accompanying Ordinance O-202607, an ordinance relating to water and sewer utility charges.

We'll refer that item to the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee.

Thank you. A memorandum from the Senior Planner accompanying Ordinance O-202609, an ordinance relating to short-term rental uses.

That was referred to previously in the meeting and that will be referred to the Joint Committee of Planning Board and Planning Licenses and Development to establish a public workshop. Short-term rentals, so there had been a lot of community interest. I'd say a year or two years ago on this topic I hope the community is Paying attention still I suspect that interest hasn't gone away.

It just hasn't accelerated which is a good thing but in council families Thank You mr. Mayor just real briefly because the city manager confirmed that there was just a flash vote survey done on this and

yes there was a flash vote survey that just recently happened and we had the results although i haven't read them yet but we'll be happy to share those results with you okay moving on to another one a memorandum from the senior planner accompanying ordinance o 2026 10 an ordinance relating to the definition of short-term rental

obviously related to the previous item, so we'll refer this one to Planning, Licenses, and Development Committee to be placed on more time until the public hearing on Ordinance 202609 has had its workshop gone through the joint committee process and then can be considered by PLD. Item 4. A memorandum from the human resource director accompanying ordinance O202611 an ordinance relating to fiscal year 2027 wage schedules And this will be referred to finance organization and personnel committees as well okay we're moving on to ordinances for a second reading that will come for a vote

a Finance Organization and Personnel Committee report relating to delinquent accounts. On a vote of five to zero, the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee recommends the adoption of Ordinance O-202605. Ordinance O-202605, an ordinance relating to delinquent accounts.

And Councilor Powers for the committee.

Thank you, Your Honor. I move for the adoption of Ordinance 202605.

Second. Seconded by Councillor Roberts and Councillor Powers for the committee.

Thank you, Your Honor. Essentially, this is to make our city ordinance and regulations consistent with state law. It can get pretty confusing if you spend a lot of time trying to figure it out. But we were a little bit out of whack, and some of these changes happened in Concord, and we don't catch up with them. And it was the appropriate time for the city to address this. So you can belabor it if you wish. But one of the first things that this councilor told me when I got elected was, there's two things you don't want to happen when you become a city councilor now. that you didn't forget to register your dog and you pay your water bill. So don't get on the list. But, you know, the utility, no matter what utility it is, it does become complex and can be confusing. In our case, months so four times a year but during that period there's a time when you can't shut the water off for anybody so that period is when you see the most accumulations of delinquencies and if you have a delinquent accountant there are methods to work on that go to Public Works, give them a call, or even email them. And there's a payment plan. There are a number of things that make it easy. So, yes, we have some delinquencies. Yes, we push at it. We're not going to make any more money or any less money by this particular change. We're just going to be legal in what we do. Thank you.

Thank you, Counselor. Any comments and questions? I'll point out that in this item, there is made explicit, too, that the rates being recommended for... I'm sorry. I jumped ahead. Never mind. Never mind. I'm not commenting on that. I jumped ahead. Yeah, go ahead. How did I do that?

So a big part of this change is to bring us in compliance with the allowable interest rate that we can charge on delinquent. The other thing just to note, and we're going to be pushing out a lot of information about this before we start doing it, is we haven't actually done this before. We haven't actually charged this this past due fee and so this will be new for some people but we have a growing dollar amount of past due accounts and so I do think this is something that we really need to do and in order to make sure that we're funding the system appropriately but we need to get the word out there before we start doing it as well so there'll be a big push for that okay

Seeing no further comments, all those, no, we need a roll call on this motion. Yes.

Councillor Filio? Yes. Councillor Chalice? Yes. Councillor Workman? Yes. Councillor Lake? Yes. Councillor Favalese? Yes. Councillor Tobin? Yes. Councillor Williams? Yes. Councillor Jones? Yes. Councillor Roberts? Yes. Councillor Haas? Yes. Councillor Ruddle-Miller?

Yes.

Councillor Ellis? Yes. Councillor Powers? Yes. Councillor Greenwald? Yes.

Thank you. Motion carries unanimously. Thank you. I'm not sure how I managed to do this, but anyway, I'm a little bit out of order. But nonetheless, please do J2.

Planning licenses and development committee report relating to the process to amend the zoning text and zoning map on a vote of five to zero the planning licenses and development committee recommends the adoption of ordinance Oh 20 20 608 ordinance Oh 20 20 608 an ordinance relating to the process to amend the zoning text and zoning map Recognize concert filio for the motion.

Thank you move the adoption of ordinance. Oh to 26-08 and

Seconded by Councillor Jones, Councillor Filio.

Basically, for all intents and purposes, this is a housekeeping type of an ordinance which is meant to expedite and speed up how we handle things. So non-controversial, I hope, and voted unanimously over the full council law. So thank you.

Any comments on this item, Councillor Jones?

Thank you. This is a simplifying version, so I'm glad it's going through. It will help handle it administratively. At the committee level, I did mention that when this planning board takes their vote on whether or not this is supported by the master plan they should give the reasons why i asked for that they said i was told it doesn't need to be part of the ordinance that we would just ask the planning board to do that so i hope that does happen and the new vote that's being done by the city council the pld part of the city council uh... once again It has no meaning whether all five of us vote no. The petitioner still has the right to have his ordinance heard at the full city council.

Thank you. Councilor Haas.

Yeah, thank you, Your Honor. This helps expedite the process between committees, and that's a great thing. Anything that we can do to get closer to timing as things happen, because people forget. I mean, when we run over several months, there's such a span between things. Most of the people have forgotten what actually happened originally, unless they've been micro-focused on it like we all are. So I encourage this to other committees to seek out such opportunities. Thank you.

Yeah, it is unique to planning council which is a state mandated body uh... it just uh... lining that up with our council meetings and public notice uh... is is a challenge for the city clerk and this will accelerate her actions and uh... accounts for jones your comment about uh... having how uh... items from the planning board relate to the city's master plan. I see the director of community development in the audience this evening, as well as anybody else who wants to carry that message forward to the joint committee meeting. But let's just make sure that Councillor Jones' thought is carried back to the staff. Very good. And we did.

yes we will absolutely do that i i just want to clarify it will be a recommendation because we can't direct the planning board to do that but we are definitely going to carry your message forward my point has been made mr connor thank you yeah good uh okay uh with the no further questions with the clerk call the roll

Council Fillion. Yes. Councilor Chalice. Yes. Councilor Workman. Yes. Councilor Lake. Yes. Councilor Favalese. Yes. Councilor Tobin.

Yes.

Councilor Williams. Yes. Councilor Jones. Yes. Councilor Roberts. Yes. Councilor Haas. Yes. Councilor Rudder-Miller.

Yes. Councilor Ellis. Yes.

Councilor Powers. Yes. Councilor Greenwald. Yes.

Okay. All right. So, we've covered that, we've covered that, we've covered that, and we are on to resolutions. Would the clerk please read K-1.

all right i'm required to read each resolution number and description a memorandum from the finance director slash treasurer relating to the appropriation of funds for fiscal year 2026-2027 bond issues as follows resolution r202610 relating to appropriation of the funds for the ash willett river green space Resolution R202611 relating to the appropriation of funds for the Asheville River Dam repair dash removal. resolution R2026-12 relating to the appropriation of funds for the downtown infrastructure improvements resolution R2026-13 relating to appropriation of funds for the gilbo avenue solar pavilion resolution R2026-14 relating to appropriation of the funds for the lower winchester street reconstruction Resolution R202615, relating to appropriation of funds for the roadway preservation and rehabilitation. Resolution R202616, relating to appropriation of the funds for the Robin Hood Park improvements. Resolution R202617, relating to appropriation of the funds for the stormwater resiliency. Resolution R202618, relating to appropriation of funds for the Martel Court Bypass Project, Resolution R2026-19, relating to the appropriation of the funds for the Downtown Soar Improvements Project, and Resolution R2026-20, relating to appropriation of the funds for the Water Distribution Improvements.

Thank you. Those motions will be referred to the Finance Organization and Personnel Committees next meeting. Thank you. On to K-2.

A memorandum from the Public Works Director accompanying Resolution R-2026-21 relating to funding for the Downtown Infrastructure Project.

And that, too, is referred to the Finance Organization and Personnel Committee. And K-3.

Submission of a petition from Attorney James M. Callahan on behalf of property owners Paul C. and Gail M. Dubriski accompanying Resolution R-2026-22 relating to the absolute discontinuance of a portion of a right-of-way across a portion of property located on Elm Street identified by tax map number 521-004-000.

And this is referred to Municipal Services Facilities and Infrastructure Committee and their meeting on June 24th, 2026. And that will allow enough time for notice to abutters, which is by our code.

okay we have an item on the table like to ask the clerk to read that a planning licenses and development committee report relative to the request to review recent amendments to land development code Oh 2025 15a that was adopted September 18 2025 on a vote of 3 to 2 The Planning Licenses and Development Committee recommends placing Councilor Filio, Jones, and Haas' request to review recent amendments to the Land Development Code codified with adoption of Ordinance O2025-15A on more time. Councilors Ruddell-Miller and Williams voted in the minority.

So we're going to take up this communication requesting to review amendments to the Land Development Code adopted September 18. with the passage of Ordinance 2025-15A At the council's meeting of April 16th, the request to place this matter on more time failed, and the item was tabled to this meeting date. The council has received a number of letters over the past 30 days, both pro and con related to this request, and they've all been read into the official records of the city. And hopefully you've all had that opportunity to review them both tonight and in the past meetings packet. In order to allow the full council to debate this matter, I'm not going to refer this. I'm going to look for a motion to determine the disposition of the request to review these land development code amendments. I'm looking for a motion.

So moved.

second motion to grant more to grant to grant more time I'm sorry to refer it back to you would refer it back to the PLD committee to refer this communication yes the communication back to the PLD okay let's say clear the motion is to refer the communication to the Planning Licenses and Development Committee that is the motion

I'm sorry, just a point of clarification. So this is to move the communication. Oh, I'm sorry. It's to move the communication. We've had quite a bit of communications, but does that mean that we are granting the request to have a review of the actual ordinance itself? I'm a little confused.

that will be for the committee but attorney yeah just want to address that question because I was thinking about this as well the item that's in front of the City Council right now is just the original letter from attorney and counselor filio which right now doesn't have like a committee recommendation attached to it or anything for the you to carry out it's really just a new item similar to like when a communication comes in without any council involvement so just like with a communication those options that are in front of you what you'd like to do

Those are your options tonight with this item Yes, because council workmen just to clarify so that would basically be Restarting this from scratch from when it was originally referred and heard Referred to PLD and then heard at the PLD meeting on April 8th. So we're just reinventing the wheel tonight

If we there's been no disposition on this communication, that's just silly.

Okay. Thank you.

Yeah, mr. Williams

Well, I have a lot to say on this, but I'll let some other conversation go forward. I just want to mention that there was a petition with 50 signatures on it. I'm sorry that you're not able to have the signatures in front of you, but it was in opposition to rolling back the progress we've made on housing, and it was asking not to go back from six to four units in the medium density district. And it was signed by people all over Keene, and I was especially proud that it was signed by a whole bunch of young people and a whole bunch of renters.

Thank you. Councillor Filio.

Okay. Well, obviously, we've had, and I know the last time we had the council meeting, a couple of councillors said, geez, they hadn't heard from anybody. Well, that's changed. We've heard from a lot of people. And all the intent was here, and like I said, as far as the ordinance goes, I wasn't on PLD at the time, but I've certainly heard enough from our constituents that they want to discuss it. And once again, as I said last time it was here, that's exactly what we want to do. We want to discuss it. Everybody that wrote a letter, everybody that signed a petition, everybody that wants to talk about it is welcome to show up at the PLD meeting and express their concerns one way or the other. And that's it. That's what we're looking for. And I said before, it It actually shocks me sometimes when we tell the constituents we know better, never mind. While we have heard from a lot of constituents, both sides, I get it. All it says is, it goes back to PLD, and let's let our constituents, the people who elected us here, have the chance to speak. Let's not censor somebody and say, well, I think this amount of people are going to go this way, and I think this amount of people are going to go that way. And I like the ordinance, and I don't like the ordinance. That's irrelevant. The relevancy here is we send it back to committee and allow our constituents and taxpayers of Keene to have their say. Either way. Thank you.

I've got a lot of hands now, so I think I saw Ruddle Miller first. Let's hit this side of the room, and then we'll come back to Fabelise and Workman.

Sorry, I lost my train of thought there for a second with who's on first. So we have received a lot of communication. I think a lot of that communication is re-communication from the same people that communicated back in the late summer into early fall, and I'm not saying that's right, wrong, or indifferent. Lot of a lot of similar sentiments and then there were new people that provided information as well The one thing that I really want to make sure happens is that we stick to facts because there's a lot of things that have been included in letters that are easily refuted with what is in the land development code and what is allowed with zoning and what is currently on the books as far as laws in the city and And I think people have a lot of concerns that are very their their potential concerns at this point But a lot of those can be referred back to well, this is what's required of parking This is what's required of the building and I want to make sure that whatever conversation is happening is happening based on facts not based on theoretical concerns because of what is being imagined is what might happen not what is allowed to actually happen based on zoning and ordinances that we have and So that is all. I did read all of those communications. I have created an email folder specifically for this ordinance to keep track of pros cons what have you so that is that is my only feeling at this point in regards to more time is that I feel like if we go that direction what needs to happen is we need to create essentially a list of all the issues that were brought up which I believe somebody wrote in a very good letter going over a lot of concerns that were brought up and what the actual law is around that so that that's that's all and i'm not trying to say that feelings don't matter they do matter and i understand the concern but sometimes the feelings and the concerns can be easily quelled with this is what is actually happening that's all thank you counselor ellis thank you um i've had a handful of communications from constituents mostly

requesting us not to go over this again. One person had a couple of concerns and when I addressed them she thanked me because she'd been misunderstanding what the ordinance actually did and when I explained to her some of the code issues she was like, oh, okay, thank you for clearing that up. I also think it's disrespectful to the planning board, those that serve on the planning board and PLD and the council last year when they They weighed all these issues, and I think it's very disrespectful to the work that they did to just rehash the same information over again. But I think it's also very significant that in the two petitions we've received, the one in favor of leaving this ordinance as is and not reviewing it had 50 signatures and the one in favor of reopening it had 14. I think that kind of demonstrates what the constituents believe about this matter. Thank you.

Councilor Fevelles? No? Councilor Workman?

Just quickly, Councilor Ruddle-Miller said a lot of what I was going to say, and I actually have seven pages here of bullet points that I am happy to go over tonight to avoid this going back to committee again. But in essence, all the reasons that were brought up and addressed for either revisiting or submitting the communication originally, or reasons for more time, both from counselors and from constituents, both noted at April 8th's meeting and April 16th's meeting, now on page four, have all been addressed, like Councilor Redelmiller said. And they were based off of failings. So I'm happy to go one by one through all of these. But we'll be here for a while. So the points are, I mean, it's just repetitive. And it's based off of people being unhappy with the original vote. And if that's how we use our time, then every person could bring up every vote. at any time because the discussion is never going to end. Someone's always going to be unhappy with a decision made at council. So I just, again, see no new arguments for why this needs to be revisited. It's not quelling free speech. It's not quelling people from speaking. Just putting a period at the end of a sentence that has already been discussed at length and all concerns have either been acknowledged and or addressed. And again, our job as counselors are that liaison to bridge the gap between city government and constituents. It is our responsibility to listen to constituents then ease those fears or address them but and we did that so I don't see a need to continue this conversation anymore thank you Councillor Williams Councillor Flea yeah I just want to remind everyone that city staff time is a limited resource and

I don't like the idea of spending it on issues that we've already gone through at length. We came to a decision after numerous meetings on this topic, after a lot of input from many of the people who we've heard from more recently. We came to a decision. We put a period on it. Let's not change that under a question mark. I don't want to spend a lot of city staff time on this when there's really more important things that they can be doing. I've asked that the city staff take a look at what we can be doing to move forward with the master plan in housing, which is really what I think our priority needs to be, is figure out how we can make housing more affordable and keen. This has been a problem for years. We've worked very hard on this. Additionally, you know, the mayor just sent in a communication asking city staff to take a look at industrial and commercial areas. I think that's also a worthwhile way to spend our planning department's time. But if they're distracted by figuring out how to rewrite this ordinance, they're not going to get to these other priorities that we have. And so I think, you know, I feel bad for people who feel like they didn't get their way in the original vote, but I don't think we should necessarily give them another bite of the apple by going through this entire process all over again. We should say thank you for your communications and let it go at that. We can perhaps revisit this in the future after it's had some time to take effect. There have been no buildings under this ordinance so far. I really hope we get some soon, but part of that indicates that it's really not having a huge impact on our community. And I don't expect it will. It's not a big change. However, you know, five or ten years' time, maybe it'll be result in half a dozen or a dozen more units that are on the market at affordable prices for people to live in. And I think that's a worthy thing for us to be doing. So I would really, I ask that we not send this back for another round because I'm not sure we're gonna get a different answer this time and I don't wanna spend all that valuable city staff time.

Councilor Filio. Just briefly, and I agree with it, Councilor Villanueva just said, facts. That's exactly what we want is facts. None of us should be, none of us are experts on this to be giving facts. If somebody calls me, says they want my facts, well, my facts are going to be my opinion based with facts. My opinion based on what the facts are. When it comes back to committee, they will get facts, not from the city councilors. They're going to get facts from planning, from the city attorney, legally, and from those that work with this issue on a daily basis. Facts coming from city councils can vary quite a bit, because a lot of times our opinions are our facts. So let's let this come back to committee and let the chips fall where they may. And I don't know where they're going to go, but I'm certainly not going to stifle the comments from our constituents on either side of the issue. Whichever side they want to go, bring it. And if they have a comment one way or the other, city staff will address, is that a fact or is that an opinion? So once again, it should go back and let our constituents have their say.

I feel like this goes against the point of order.

I just need to address the statement that was just made for clarification that if I'm ever asked a question and I don't know, I don't share my opinion, I ask city staff. because they are the experts. So I have been in touch with community development and asked a lot of questions of our staff regarding this ordinance and what it means and the changes that have been made historically to other areas around Keene because there seems to be this inference that this is targeting a specific community, which it is not. There have been changes to other types of zoning over the years that have otherwise sometimes been unpopular as well. There are a lot of zoning changes that need to take place in more than just Keene because unfortunately a lot of the history of zoning has been exclusion and making sure certain types of housing cannot be in certain neighborhoods. So we are kind of undoing and that's not in reference to anything anyone in Keene has done. It is just a historical fact of what zoning was often used for. So just to say, and just in case this is ever quoted, if you call me, I'm not going to give you my opinion on what I think the facts are. I will find out what the facts are before I tell you.

Thank you, Your Honor. All right, to be germane again. This is a matter of all the discussion we've had over the past couple of council meetings and over our PLD meeting that we had this year on this. This is way more than any of the discussion we had originally on this issue. It's great to see more people stepping up, coming to the meetings and expressing their opinions. I was in all those PLD meetings. Yeah, there was talk, but it was a very limited audience. We've gotten so many more people engaged in the government process here. By continuing a discussion in a PLD forum with this as the basis of it, and the basis of reviewing this is because there were concerns about the process and how it went forward. The idea of putting four disparate ordinances into one where You had to vote for all of them at once, whether you liked them or not. That was pretty disturbing, among other things in the process. And enough of a minority representation. Yeah, it was voted on council eight to seven. There were seven councillors who thought that it shouldn't go as it did. As Councillor Tobin expressed before, we have to trust each other sometimes and maybe go against what our instincts are. Further, it's not a new burden to staff. We're not asking them to rewrite any new ordinances yet. It would have to come back here for that direction. We're just asking to have another time for allowing people to come forward. And finally, what a great opportunity to use this as a springboard for those other 50 people, as Councilor Williams mentioned, for them to come forward and express the opinion that this is good and do more of like that and push it forward that way. So there's not more burden on staff. There was a close vote. We have to respect minorities in this country. And let's have one more round of it. Thank you.

Okay.

Is it something new? Go ahead. I think for the first time on this matter.

Yes, thank you. Where to begin? So I didn't feel great about the first time this letter, when I saw this letter and three of the committee members had signed it, it kind of seemed like we knew where it was heading. I didn't feel great about reopening an ordinance or a conversation that essentially had no scope. It wasn't addressing a specific point. It was addressing an ordinance, which now Codify has in all of these different little places. So that just kind of sounds like it's now revising any part of the Land Development Code without just because it came through as one ordinance. So I didn't feel great about all of that, but we went along with that. We decided to send it back to committee. At the committee meeting, I expected there would be some clarification about what the goal was. I did listen to all of the, I either attended or, watched every PLD and joint PLD that discussed this topic. So I heard some of the same conversations, the same confusion. When it went through PLD the first time, someone did question the four to six. I think it was one of the petitioners who actually decided that it was important that the ordinance went through as the petitioner presented it. So to hear that now that was not a good idea after we voted on it kind of seemed confusing to me. We allowed the topic to be reopened, came back, voted to not give more time, and now it's here in front of us again, more time to me sounds like another kind of vague idea that's just a conversation and honestly, I would have expected that there is something new about how this ordinance is being implemented that's a problem. That's what I would expect to be referred back to PLD. But it's just deciding that we want to talk about an unused ordinance again. And if we want to do that, I mean, we can go through all of our ordinances. I'm fine doing that, but it seems like we should just go through them sequentially then.

Thank you.

Question's been called. Let's go to the vote. Let's go to vote. Yes. We're voting on a communication that's been received by the council that has no determination as to how it's been handled. So we have a motion to... refer this to Planning, Licenses, and Development Committee. Is there a point of order? Councillor Jones.

Your Honor, I never got to speak to this for the first time.

I know that. Would you like to speak to it?

Yes, I would. Call the question.

I know the question's been called, but I'm the chair and you didn't get to speak.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and I'll be short. A lot of this is about clarity and transparency, starting with this came from a private petitioner who paid a lot of money for this to do. They have to pay for the staff. They have to pay for the permit. They have to pay for the notifications to go out. petitioner did not get his action voted on it was amended along the way so when it got to council it was a different version than what he asked for and what he paid for uh... so that's one of the things that i don't think are clear uh... another thing is uh... as i mentioned earlier when we talked about the joint committee process uh... substantiating why it's backed by the city master plan and yes, the planning board did vote that it's supported by the master plan, but I'm looking right here at the new master plan. Under pillar four, the vibrant neighborhoods, it says support vibrant community neighborhoods that reflect their unique identity. And I think we're taking that away.

Councilor, I hate to hit you with the point of order. We're talking about whether to send this back for more discussion, not discussing the facts of the ordinance.

And I'm given reasons why it should be go back.

I think the body has heard quite a bit of testimony. So, Councilor Jones, if you could wrap this up. Thank you. I mean, please.

I'll skip three and four. I'll go right to five because we said we do depend on our staff, and our senior city planner said it might be better. She said it to the council. It might be better if we could dissect this into different ordinances.

All right. Manager?

I don't remember exactly what she said, but the gist of it was about there were a lot of things going on with the ordinance, and it might have been easier if it had been separate, not that we should go back and separate it.

Now I think everybody in the room has had a chance. And a request for a roll call? You could do that.

I did that.

Thank you. All right. So everybody clear. There's a roll call. If you vote in favor of the motion made by Councilor Filio, we will refer this back to committee. If you vote against this, this will be considered by the chair as informational. Okay. Councilor, would you please call the roll?

Councillor Filio? Yes. Councillor Chalice?

No.

Councillor Workman? No. Councillor Lake? No. Councillor Fevely? Yes. Councillor Tobin?

No.

Councillor Williams? No. Councillor Jones? Yes. Councillor Roberts? No. Councillor Haas? Yes. Councillor Ruddle Miller?

No.

Councillor Ellis?

No.

Councillor Powers? No. Councillor Greenwald? Yes.

five in favor nine opposed and the motion has failed and we have a correspondence that I will ask to be filed as informational that brings us to the conclusion of this meeting there's no further business before us we are adjourned