City Council - Regular Meeting

Medford City Council Committee of the Whole, April 29th, 2026 is called to order. Mr. Clerk, please call the role. Councelor Callahan. Council Lemming. Council me. Council Scott Pell, present. Councelor Singh, present. Vice President Lazaro present. President Beers

present. Seven present, none absent. The meeting is called to order. There'll be a meeting in the Medford City Council Committee. The whole at 6 p.m. in the city council chamber, second floor, Medford City Hall, 85 George Passet Drive, Medford, MA, and via Zoom. Action and discussion items. 26061 offered by President Bears. Annual budget process for fiscal 27, preliminary budget meeting 2. This will be the second preliminary budget meeting of the fiscal 27 budget process. The mayor has communicated that the following departments will be present. Human Resources, Council on Aging, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, and Recreation. So, that's what we're going to hear from tonight. Those four departments, I see everyone is here. Um, we're going to take them in that order. So, HR, Council on Aging, DEI, and Wreck. So, we'll start with HR Director Crowley.

Good evening. Yes, we can hear you now. You can hear me. Okay. Um so you can see the HR budget is pretty straightforward. Um we don't have a lot of changes. We are um working on some um an increase in the dues and subscriptions because some of our training programs were under the opera funding and now we have to take it over onto our own um on our budget line item. So that's why there's an increase and um just general increases in office supplies and advertising. Um MMA costs have gone up, advertising costs have gone up. So um those are basically where our increases are in the budget.

Thank you. And if you could just give us a little update on what you've been up to in your office this year, your plans. Nothing [laughter]

been rainbows and butterflies. Um so we've been very busy. Um right now we're in the open enrollment period. Um we are um working on a quarterly newsletter. We have um started a welcome staff and we do new hires. We have um a little outline about the new employee, what they've been where they've from, what they've done, and what they're going to be doing here. So when people see people in the hallway, they know who they are. Um we just finalized and are going to go through a final review of the new employee handbook. Um I think the last one was from 2019. So it was a little outdated. So we've updated that. Um as you know we um have gone through the comp and class study and we have provided you with some information on that. We updated over 70 job descriptions because they were updated through that process. We are working on new staffing. We have several highlevel positions opened. So, we've been doing um a wide search for that and started interviewing for the assistant library director. We just promoted Sam to the library director. Um we have added some staff to our fire and police departments. Some are in the academy. Some are graduating from the academy fairly soon. So, they should be coming on board as full firefighters or police officers. We're working on a new onboarding process and um so we've been really busy.

Could you share some of the plans for the upcoming year and um any things that were not funded in this budget that you're hoping may be funded in future years?

So um right now everything that we're working on has been funded. Um we're hoping obviously to get into a new financial and HR system down the road. Um I think Munice has been thrown around a couple of times. So that would be um not particularly in my budget, but it would be nice to see. And again, we're just working on some of those items that I just discussed. They do take some time to get implemented. So we're hoping that we can get a little more automated in the HR department where we can have onboarding done online instead of we're very paperheavy driven. Some is compliance per mass general law, but some we can kind of put off to the online process. So, that's what we're looking for um over the next six to eight months.

All right, great. Um do we have questions for the HR director? I will go first to Vice President Lazaro. Thank you. Um thank you for putting this together. I have a couple of questions. Um which departments share the floater, your part-time employee that was hired this year? All departments. So, um, which departments pay for the the It comes out of my budget. Just you. Is it [clears throat] one employee? It is one part-time employee. Okay. And they do basic administration. Okay. Yeah. Um, but really just like um is it just admin kind of stuff?

Yeah, it's just admin. It's if um somebody has like one or two people in their office and they're going to be on vacation or somebody's sick and somebody's on vacation and they need some coverage, that person could go down there as well. They are housed in my office. Um they need some place to report every day and set up where we had the um elections manager bring up some um projects for her to do in my office. So, she did some mailings for them. Um we've had her do some office coverage. It's it's small projects. Second, I think. Yeah. Um does how many hours does she work? 15.

15. Got it. Um another question I had is uh something was mentioned that uh better team is currently paid through ARPA. Is there anything else that is paid for by ARP? So it was um Troliant. Got it. And then um I JJ Keller I'm not sure if that is still was still paid through OPA this year or if it ended last year but we did have a few training programs that are now coming on to this budget. Okay. Um and is that it for ARPA funding for your department for my office.

Okay. Um I do have a question that is sort of loosely based on the budget but um I was just looking at my email and I have the compensation and classification study that you sent out. um which is in 59 attachments I think. Um [laughter] it was it's a lot. Yeah, it's a big and understandably and it took a long time to process and for us to receive it. Um I am wondering since you have a new copier maybe if we could the council maybe have if if we if we wanted it a printed copy. Um yeah, we don't have the new copier yet. It's not here. It's on order. Um, but [laughter] it's on or it's in the budget for next.

It No, it's on its way. It should be here. It should be here shortly. Um, but yeah, we can put something together for council. If I run out of paper, I'm going to come to Rich's office and But in general in general, you were saying you were mentioning that you want um you were trying to move some stuff that doesn't need to be printed to be digital instead of paper. Yes, we did also talk at the meeting last night about how there's been some there was some stuff in the school department that is kind of like like unfortunately still on paper and can contribute to uh human error um mistakes that are avoidable

if they're digitized and you know we're kind of slowly chugging along in the direction of getting things digitized. Um, do you all do things digitally for the most part now that that don't need to be on paper? So, we're still very paperdriven as well like our onboarding um our enrollment into the health insurance. So, those are the things that we're trying to get a little more automated. We do send things out now instead of mailing them to applicants. We do send them through an email and they can fill them out and send them back. But there's nothing that you can go into a portal and fill it out and then it just comes into a file.

So there is some automation going on that's um easier to do with a certain population and then with our retirees everything's pretty much paper driven. Um okay. I do think that there with the new system I think my understanding is that we'll um what's it called counselor calah? Uh do you remember what the new system was called that we're moving to the the schools? Munis. It's Munis. Munis. Munis. That's for everybody. That's for everybody. Everybody. Yes. Um which will digitize a lot of things. Is that like POS and stuff? Do you all do still do POS on paper? Yeah.

Um and I think that was what contributed to what we were talking about last night being losing all of Yeah. Losing so many invoices. Um which is something we want to avoid. But anyway, this this is actually something that I would just want to say to every department and since I happen to be talking to you, I'm saying it too. But um I think it ends up being more cost effective too down the road. Um you don't have to please don't print this stuff. [laughter] That's too much. Um it is just a lot long a lot of information. I know. And there was a lot for people for them to study and look at and it's very comprehensive and we just received it on Saturday. So there's a lot to go through still. Um, but thank you for sending that over by the way. Um, and thank you for being here. Thank you.

Thank you. Just one quick followup and then I'll go to councelor Scarpelli. Um, on the dues and subscriptions for ARPA, is that the full year cost or half of the year? So that's that's the so the dues and subscriptions that's including the trolant, right? And yeah, so that's for the but that's bringing on the whole year. It's not splitting half. It's not until December ARPA and then January to July. December opera and then it will go into Okay. So it's half the cost. So the ne next year the other half will have to come on. Yes. Okay. Got it. All right. I'll go to councelor Scarpelli.

Thank you, Council President. Um I appreciate uh thank you for being here, Mr. Crowley. I that I know that as you you presented are we are we currently in a in a in a freeze and uh hiring freeze and um and um one of the things you said there's rumors that what we were expecting for new hires for fire might have shifted and the numbers have decreased. Um, and the reason why I ask is, um, that I'm sure your office has been working diligently to move things along, but if this is happening, um, are we seeing, um, you know, is this looking like a uh a waste of of our our time in the HR office with moving things forward, then putting halts that or uh, can you share any information with that? So, I'm not sure if I I know the exact question, but for um police and fire, I can stop there. Um the only time that we don't get the numbers that we were looking for is they didn't pass the background check or they couldn't do the physical. So, everybody that we've put forth had the opportunity to go into the academy and become um on board with us in Medford, but for some reason on their part, they didn't make the qualifications to make the academy. And that's why those numbers may have come down on fire,

but I don't know of any hiring freeze at this point. All right. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Um, just a couple questions from me, Director Collie. Not seeing any from other counselors. Um, on the compensation and classification study, I know we got all the new job descriptions. Is there a report or a presentation on like what went into it? Charts, tables, kind of the table. There was an Excel spreadsheet. It was the very last attachment that has the um the salaries and where everybody fell on the line. Yeah. Um I can try to um get some information about what else went into it if that's what you need. That's

Yeah. More is there like an executive summary document? Um I think that would be helpful just to understand. We can put something together. What's the work that went into it? Um, and and I think yeah, a lot. And and I think it's, you know, harder to understand it in 60 documents than in a page or two. And you probably can't get all of it into a page or two, but I think it's I mean, I can try to summarize as best I can and then um send you out something over the next couple of weeks. That'd be great. And I think it'd be helpful maybe to have you back in a month or two to present on it. Maybe we could have half an hour or an hour just to talk about it. Um I know we had kind of the first wave of a couple of changes that you wanted to get in before the new fiscal year, but I'm guessing there might be more to come.

Yeah. So those were the ones that were most misaligned. Um, and the way we put them on the um, agenda yesterday was really in line with what the comp and class study proposed and and changing that and moving that. I think I tried to explain that yesterday. we'll we'll put everything else out of whack a little so that it it might be beneficial to hold off on any changes until we do the full um review through the summer and the fall that we really need to dive into the new classification system that they've proposed. Okay. And then do maybe some more changes next budget season seeing how things go.

Yeah. And I think like that that kind of understanding the process, we've never really had a presentation on it, so we haven't been able to understand the process. So, you know, we just kind of had these these came up and um but we didn't have the backing information other than in all of those documents trying to I looked through that last spreadsheet and I was like, "Okay, I think I understand." As long as I'm first on the agenda, I'm all for [laughter] it. We'll we'll we'll make it just last night. I was the last on the agenda, so it would be nice to be first. Someone's always last. It's [laughter] every every me

every budget season um we we end up you know Rich Lane is always in here saying I can I be first next year um he's he's also so we will we will uh for this meeting it'll be probably before a regular meeting um early in the night and we'll we'll make sure it's just that or maybe one other thing and if there's two things I'll make sure you're the first I'm getting older so it's hotter to stay up later

me too [laughter] Um the other thing you know and I I think I may have brought this up last year or I brought it up at another point. I'll come to you in a second. Um is related to the compensation and classification study. You know we don't put the calfs on in in MUN code. You know it is an ordinance but it's not an ordinance that's include included in our ordinances if that makes sense. It just says reserved and then when we update it like the amendment last night it's like reserved formerly these sections. Um, and I think sometimes that makes it hard, you know, certainly for me and I think for residents to see what are the changes that are happening year-over-year. Um, what are the changes in our our union contracts? Um,

you know, I know those contracts are available on the city website, but really having all of the compensation information in one place and and understanding that it's an ordinance and an ordinance is voted on by the city council. you know, those kinds of parts of it, I think, um, can get a little lost because we're no longer putting it on there. My understanding is that decision happened maybe 10 years ago, previous administration. Um, and I I would like to think about how can we put, you know, are you guys keeping that section up to date in in a private document or, you know, our our calf schedules? Yeah. Yes. I I keep them up to date and every year we adjust. Yes.

Yeah. And I think, you know, either if we could in the interim maybe see that and then maybe as part of this new classification program, figure out a way to get that back into the ordinance, I think that would be valuable from a transparency perspective. So, just something to on the radar, but if you do have the updated cap schedule, I think it'd be really beneficial for us to get a copy if possible. Okay. So, I can I can certainly do that once we, you know, once all the budgets are passed so I know what what it's going to be. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. So, about sending you something, then sending you something again in the next month or so. Yeah. I mean, personally, I wouldn't mind having this year and next year. That's valuable, too. You'll see the years because I have like five years on each. So, you'll be able to see.

Yeah. If you if you just have a spreadsheet now that's two clicks away, please feel free to send it. And when it's updated, send it again. And then and then you have time to update. I won't be bugging you for it.

Um, all right. I saw Councelor Sang and then Councelor Callahan. Councelor Sang. Lisa, um, thank you for for joining us. Um, I was wondering what the progress is on, uh, filling vacancies. Um, I know counselor Scapelli alluded to it earlier. I see that there's a uh $500 increase the line item for advertising, but that we've also only spent uh, just bit just a bit more than 1,000 this year, this fiscal year on it. Could you kind of walk us through what we're doing so far on it? um and explain the numbers a little bit.

So, it was a little hard to hear you, but I think Are you asking me how we're advertising for vacancies? Yeah. And

yes, I think I think the the question was um if I and if I get it wrong, Justin, jump in. The advertising budget is 5,500, but the actuals are only showing a,000 spent. And what's the progress on filling vacancies? And, you know, are we utilizing the advertising budget for that purpose? Yeah. So, the advertising budget sometimes we don't get the bills in until like right until before I say, "Hey, listen. If you don't send me the invoices for MMA, you're not going to I got to move money over." So, there there will be more bills coming in that it's going to absorb that cost. Um, we are filling vacancies. Like I said, we just um promoted Sam to the um library director. We um are interviewing for our building commissioner who has now um moved on. We have the the clerk's position we're advertising for. So, we are um advertising in the appropriate places and we are filling vacancies. It's some some positions are very unique, so they're harder to fill. Um I just uh my benefit administrator just um notified us a couple about a month ago that she's also retiring. So um there's a lot of movement in the city. But yeah, so we are um expending that money and it's just the way those bills come in. They eventually catch up so we can get those paid. And um we we also ask department heads if they have specific sites that I don't have access to or you have to be a member. we don't have access to pay for the membership and they have it that they're uh more than um they can absolutely post on those sites. We did do that for the library director. The um trustees had some kind of library website that they took our post and posted it. So we we try to do as best we can. We send them out to colleges if it's um depending on the level of the um

profession. So we are utilizing every avenue that we can. I'm not sure if I answered his question, but any other questions, councelor Singh? No, I'm good. Thank you. All right, councelor Callahan. Thank you. Mine is actually just to follow up on the uh compensation study. I just want to um make sure like this is something that we're going to schedule for a cow or is it already scheduled? Like I just want to make sure that this gets committee of the whole. Yeah. Uh it's not already scheduled. Okay. Yeah. I'm not sure when you think in May or June would be a time for us to, [clears throat] you know, we could we could coordinate around our regular meetings.

I I can reach back out to you. Let me just look at my schedule because it's it's with other things that I take care to in my department which are um not um on this budget right here. I will try to figure out when the best piece will be and then I'll try to get you that summary so that we can have that. All right. Great. Yeah. I think our meetings are May 12th, May 26th, June 9th, and June 23rd. So, so definitely won't be in June, so it would have to be the end of May. Okay. All right.

Um I also did look at the um the spreadsheet in there and I have number a number of questions. So, um I will look forward very much to um having you be able to dedicate some time to understanding that compensation study. That would be fantastic. Um, thanks so much for being here and for all the work you do. All right. Um, any further questions for the HR director? All right. Seeing none, thank you, Lisa. All right. Thank you. Have a good night.

Have a good night. We will go next to Council on Aging, Pam Kelly. And since I I didn't do it before I recognized Lisa, just we'd love to know the differences between fiscal year 26 and 27, um what work you've been up to this year that you'd like to highlight, some plans for next year that you might like to highlight, and then any items not funded this year that you hope will be funded in future years, and the floor is yours.

Thank you. Um thank you for having me in person tonight. I'm sorry I wasn't here in person last night. Um, so I see that we actually, excuse me, actually only have a slight increase to our budget for fiscal year 27. Um, of course, the first one is the colas and step increases. Uh, the second is our part-time social worker went from 25 hours a week to 30 hours a week. uh fringe benefits for the employees, which is just a short um mileage for the social worker when she does all her traveling around for the outreach to the different members who are homebound. Um and the telephone internet, our contract rate increase for the internet. So, that is the only um increase that we've had for our budget for this year. some of the things that we accomplished last year that we're very proud of. Um we did a complete uh we did a complete lo overhead uh look at what we were doing at the senior center to attract younger adult seniors to the center because we know as people age they always say I'm not going there that's for old people. So, we did a rebranding and marketing and we came up with a new logo, engage, connect, and thrive. And on in our logo, we're using the initials MSC. Um, instead of saying M Medford Senior Center all the time, trying to get rid of the word senior, but not taking it out completely because it's important. That is our identification. Um, we also uh are changing the newsletter. We're going to Canva hopefully very soon and um getting more social media uh on Facebook and on Instagram getting it out as much as possible because we know not everybody wants to read a paper newsletter

anymore. However, they are still important for the older adults who don't have the internet access. Uh so we completed that and we're very excited to have that going forward. We also have done a great job with enhancing our health and wellness programs at the senior center. We did a um MGH had an aging mastery program where they focused on healthy aging and longevity and that was a 10-week program inhouse at the senior center which every year does uh wonderful feedback from the seniors themselves and from the students at MGH that are teaching the class. Our food pantry program we offer twice a month and that continues to grow. We're averaging over 70 people uh every other Tuesday and we get all of our pro products from Mystic Market and it's as she said last night, it's protein, there's fresh produce, there's um non-p perishable items as well. They go home with two bags filled with groceries and it's very helpful for our community. Uh Mystic Valley Elder Services of course feeds the daily congregate lunch program and they did uh resource 7,590 meals just at the senior center last year. We also offer a grabandgo program which started during COVID and we continue it to this day because many people don't want to sit at the auditorium and have lunch. They might have other things to do. They come in for a class, want to take a lunch home and go do something else, pick up their grandchildren. That we served 8,476 meals on top of the other 7,590. So food and nutrition continues to be um a need in the Medford area for our older adults.

Our fitness and exercise programs, we had 7,776 duplicated participants attending nine different exercise classes throughout the year. uh in our staff, our grow our staff, as I said earlier, our social worker increased from 25 to 30 hours per week, which was very helpful because her need is really prominent in the community. Um not only does she stay in the office, but she does outreach throughout the community for people who don't want to come into the senior center or cannot attend the senior center. We've added uh Taichi and tech support programs. And one of the things that we really promote is our volunteer program. We had 96 unduplicated volunteers contri contribute 11,768 hours of service over the year. So, we utilize our volunteers for many different things at the senior center throughout the year. Whether it's sitting at the reception desk, um sitting at the sales desk where we they do tickets and take information, whether they're helping with parties, delivering newsletters, working in the kitchen, our volunteer outreach coordinator puts them to work. And we find that once we get them as a volunteer, they love what we do and then they continue on. They're not afraid to come into the senior center now. They want to continue on with us and do the activities and the trips and the tax programs and anything else that we offer. So, I find it as a it's a lead to get the people in the door, start them off as a volunteer. So, those are some of the things that we were able to complete throughout the year. And some of the goals for next year,

we want to continue increasing our program participation by at least 10% um throughout fiscal year 2027 and only 10% because unfortunately in our business we also have people that age out. So we lose people, we need to gain them back. So 10% I feel is a good year a good number year after year. Um we're also implementing at least five new programs and we're going to try to implement two offsite offerings whether it's at a senior housing unit or another location to have things that are not just at the senior center. One because we're running out of space at the senior center and two not everybody wants to come to the building. We are also going to look at conducting a new community needs assessment for the senior population to see what is it they need, what is it that they want, and how we can fulfill those. So, we're going to look for a survey, whether it be online, in the newsletter, and on the website. And one of my long long-term facility planning programs is going to be asking for a feasibility study for a new building. [laughter] And I do say long long because I know it takes many many years. But with the population of the senior community growing year after year, Medford has a very large community of 12,744 based on the federal fiscal year. I'm sorry, the federal federal fiscal year 2020 of that number that I can use on my grants and stuff for 10 years. So that was an increase from the 2010 federal census.

Um, and I'd like to engage at least two key stakeholder groups uh for input in going for that long-term goal. So, I think that's all I have for present and future, but I I can answer any questions that any of you may have for me. Thank you, Pam, and thank you for everything you're doing at the senior center. I'll go to Vice President Lazaro and then counselor Mallet. Thank you.

Thank you. So, I just wanted to highlight um how much work you do on food insecurity for seniors and uh how that really touches um residents of Medford and of all age ranges and um it something that we talked about last night in the CDBG meeting was um you know there are actually a few different nonprofits and you're this is a city department um but Mystic Valley Elder Services um Mystic Market, uh the Mystic Valley YMCA, there are many organizations that um try to tackle food insecurity for residents of Medford. Um there are the seniors, but there's also children, people of all ages. So, um, food insecurity is still a big issue and I really appreciate the work that you do to address that. And it takes a lot of different people working all the time to try to make sure everybody in our city is safe and fed

and housed and uh taken care of. So, just thank you for that work. Um, and it's really important and all of the work that you do is important, not just the meeting the basic needs of our seniors, but also giving them a place to feel connected and that they have a sense of community. Um, because that's really important, too. Uh, really contributes to everybody's mental health and um, it's very exciting that uh, we still have such a robust uh, organization um, in the square as we you know move forward and grow. Um, so thank you for being here. I really appreciate the presentation. Thank you very much. Thank you, Vice President Lazaro. Counselor.

Um, yes. I also want to say thank you so much for all of the your hard work to um as someone that has been dealing um with aging parents um very much so. So hearing some of the different offerings that you have um was really helpful. And I have I have been receiving your newsletter as well and I know you hold a lot of different activities which is terrific. Um my question is actually a little bit more about the social worker. I know um you said that uh they move from 25 to 30 hours and they're doing both in-house and outreach out in the community. What would you say is kind of um percentage of time in terms of in-house as opposed to going out into the community? Um what would that look like if you had a full-time person? like what is what is that kind of uh volume that you're seeing both in and going? I I I have um um my father-in-law is had been homebound. So knowing that there there were these services were uh really um impactful for my family. So um knowing that you have both is uh really helpful to to know and I want to make sure people know that they exist as well. Well, currently I believe our social worker is about 15% of her time is outreach right now

and that keeps growing as people start hearing that she can go to their homes now. She has the time to um reach out to them at their homes or for example today earlier she was at the library from 10 to 12. It's another great place for her to be to meet people and um so yeah, I can see it growing if she has more hours and is able to fit them into her schedule. She does everything pretty much by appointment because not every appointment is an hour long or a half an hour long. Sometimes she's on hold with Medicare or Social Security office for a good 45 minutes and you can't get through to them and seniors will just hang up. They don't want to even try. So, she does it for them.

Wow. And she'll sit and talk about other things and really open a conversation to find out what other needs they may have. So, that's terrific. um a as you're seeing this like the um 25 to 30 hours would would kind of the hope to be more of a full-time position in this role. Is that something that would would help to also grow some of the work that you're doing? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. With more hours that she's able to work, the more people she can see and help.

Terrific. Um and I was just curious what is the average age um you mentioned of people that come uh to the senior center and and then um you know what do you see normally in that too? I actually one of the great things that we have at the senior center is a program called my senior center and I can run reports

um any in many different ways. Uh, and I re did run a report today and just to give you an idea, um, and it's not 100% because not everybody fills out their participant form and puts their age in, but right now the average age is between 75 and 79. Um, with second in place is ages over 85. So, but I think that's the one that maybe not everybody has their age. I have to have an intern or somebody kind of go through all of those that are listed and give them a call and say, "Okay, what is your birth date?" and get them correct.

Um, but yes, 75 to 79. The other really nice thing is our um living alone, we have that as a question. And right now in our participants, we have 89.7% that are living with someone, whether it's a family member or a spouse. And only 10.3% are living alone. Wow. So that's really good. You know,

um let's see what other we also can break it down by male and female. Now, this has always been an ongoing thing with all senior centers that the females always are much higher and ours is at 76.9% female and male is at 23.1%. So, we that's one of our goals is to bring in more um we're having a men's only breakfast. We have um a history with Mike that's going to start up next month um because we feel that if we bring in more programs like that a sports type uh talk and topics monthly we're going to bring that in. Um but there's different things that we're thinking so that we can attract the men because we find that the men unfortunately are less likely to come into the center. One of the things that they all did mention is oh I'll go down. Do you have a pool table? [laughter] I don't have I know

I don't have any space for a pool table [laughter] because I would have Sounds like an Sounds like an opportunity for somebody to donate a pool table that folds up [laughter] or um extra room. [laughter] That would be nice. That would be nice. Great. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Thank you for all your work. All right. I think that's [clears throat] all of our questions for Council on Aging. So, thank you so much for the presentation and um really appreciate everything that you're doing. It's so important and um thinking long long term is is good. So, I'm hoping we can work on that over the next few years.

Absolutely. It'll be on my next budget as well. Great. [laughter] Thank you. And we'd love to have all of you come by and visit us again. Of course. All right. Thank you.

All right. We'll go next to our director of diversity, equity, and inclusion, Francis No, to talk about the budget for the office of diversity, equity, and inclusion. And do you have just want to make sure do you have a presentation or you just you just have that for reference? Okay. Just wanted to make sure in case we so we could get it up, but good. Great. All right. Um, thanks for being here, Francis. Great to see you. Same questions as for everybody else. if you could talk about some of the differences between this year and next year's budget, some of the work you've been up to this year, um some plans for next year, and some items that you hope to be funded in the future that weren't able to be funded this year.

Right. Um thank you so much. All right. So before I start, I heard something about some extra room. So I want to plug my new chambers. Councelor Beers, I believe you and I have already spoken about this and councelor Sang who is on Zoom, the big chambers for all the events since we have now spilt over out into the hallway and down the stairs. I hear we're building a ballroom.

I chief of staff, any objections? [laughter] Um anyway, no but you know I had to I had to do my plug. Yeah. So basically um for my office the budget is pretty much the same. However, you will notice increases that are due to um calf realignment but also the ending of OPA funding. my 15-hour a week disability specialist out of that office was funded through OPA and so that ends on December 31st at 11:59 p.m. Um the reality is prior to that I was running that office on a 65hour a week work week. Um and as you know that is just not sustainable. So that's sorry it just um went off. That's where one of the increases comes in. Another slight increase has to do with the um cost of events. Many of our vendors basically have just allowed me to give them the same amount for the past few years. and with all the changes that have taken place um that's not doable anymore. Additionally, we have the stipens for the disability commissioners who have actually become an extension of that office today alone. Well, starting yesterday and today, there were four requests for Nick and I to do something and we're already booked. [laughter] So that's when I have to call on my commissioners, especially the ones that have the CAM certifications to go and sit in on our behalf because these projects cannot wait. Um so that's what you know that's what you are seeing as

far as the increases in the budget. What has the office been up to? Perhaps a better way is asking what hasn't the office been up to. Um a lot of times people see the outward facing work of the office. They see the events. Um, they see the community building. Um, they see the out andabout, but they don't necessarily see the internal aspect, the compliance aspect, the staying up to date with all the changing laws, i.e., um, web accessibility guidelines, right? That was supposed to occur for us as of April 27th, 2026. Um, we are a community of more than 50,000 people. So everything that is on our website, be it schools, be it cityside, be it our library, if it has the city of Medford seal on it, if it is associated with the city of Medford, if it is a program that we use, it needs to be accessible. If it is not, then you get me in trouble. So I would um just want to make sure that that aspect is understood. And then on April 20th, the federal government pulled back and gave us an extra year. much to our relief. So even if we didn't create the document, if it is on the website, it needs to be accessible. So keep those things in mind as we move forward, as we talk about um utilizing different programs. Um in addition to that, there is also a lot of internal work that gets done. Um you've noticed when you come in that the two bathrooms on the first floor are in the remodeling stage. It's not remodeling about aesthetics. It's those bathrooms were never compliant to start off with. Whilst they may appear accessible, they were still not compliant. So, we are a public building and we need to make sure that we have compliance within the structures

themselves. So, that's just the beginning of that phase. In addition to that, we work with our facilities director, right, to review some of the facilities needs such as the bathrooms, looking at the schematics and ensuring that we can say, "Yes, this is good to go." Um, in doing that, we could go up to the third floor and work with planning, development, and sustainability. all the, you know, new businesses and new developments that come in, those plans have to go through my office. And whilst, you know, many of the developers have lots of different lettering behind their name, we find faults. They're beautiful, but guess what? The tree that you want to put down is actually considered not accessible because when it fully blooms, it loops over and it creates a visual barrier. These are the things that um we do. So sometimes you could walk in and Nick and I are on the ground with a, you know, giant uh plan of thing that we're looking at. In order for us to do this, we also have to attend training on a regular basis. Um I'm sure as you've um seen with our finicky feds, what the law is today is not what it is tomorrow. So that means every day before I go in, there are certain things that I check to make sure nothing has changed. um so that that way I can make sure I'm providing the most upto-date um information. There's also the community outreach piece, right? This is the DEI office. Whilst we are here at city hall and city hall opens and shuts, humans are humans. Things happen in this world. So there are things that could happen in a specific community and it filters down and it affects our community as well. So there is always that outreach and trying to assess okay what is an emergency who needs to actually hear from me in the moment and many times there are many

emails that say listen I'm on a shutdown can I get back to you on Monday you know let's make some time um it doesn't stop there it goes on and on how do we interface with federal compliance civil rights equity everything else well you saw the uh director of human remains earlier on today [laughter] I know she knows I refer to her as that. That's that's that's our inside joke. She knows I refer to her as that. But what you know what Lisa will tell you is that many many times we have to sit down because our laws intersect but many times they also oppose and we have to sit down and determine what is going to be in the best interest of the city. So you talked about advertising. One of the things that, you know, I'm really proud about is that we don't have to do so much individualized advertising. We can now use better team. You stick it on that portal, it sends it to over a 100 job boards when you are getting when you are receiving your candidates. It actually shows you where your candidates are coming from. So you decrease the amount of time you spend, but you widen the approach and you widen the opportunity to bring in um different candidates and candidates that you typically would not um bring in. There is that there is the ongoing um um informal and formal training on communication interview structures. Um, many people don't realize that these are things that are looked at by the Department of Labor. And it's not so much, oh, um, is the question appropriate? It's really more about is this question going to cause somebody to share something that they should not be sharing. Um, so it goes on. [laughter] I'll stop there for now.

Great. Thank you, Director. No. I'll go to Vice President Lazaro. Thank you for your presentation. Always appreciated. I wanted to ask you the same question I asked Lisa about ARPA. Is there anything else that you anticipate? Um is is ARPA finished for your department or are there more things that are still being funded? No. Um that is the only position that is funded through ARPA. I'm sorry. And my language access. So yes, but they were finished. Right.

That's right. So as um as the DEI office, the federal government doesn't care where you were housed. They just care who was your civil rights person. That those monies are not just for translation. If somebody wanted to attend a meeting and they needed ASL, they needed CART has to go through ADA that's funded with that. if they want to attend programming at the library or an event that the school is having this um or Pam already left the senior center it that those monies are used to pay for that service.

Okay. So as ARPA funds finally finally end um we will still see an additional increase in future years of that that tail end of that for like the final so that our future budget years um level funding will just be like one more step up but not very big and then it'll be kind of finally ARPA's gone. Okay. Now, we can expect to see this amount going forward.

Um, I will I what I will say is that you should expect to see a new amount as of July 1st of next year because ARPA ends this year. So, we will what you're seeing is just a best guesstimate of what we'll need from January 1st of next year to um till June 26th of next year. Got it. half of next year,

half of next year, and then in the new fiscal year, you will definitely see an increase. And it also depends. There are things that we can't control, right? We can't control who's going to be moving into the city. We can't control how active and engaged our residents are going to want to be. The reality is, if you're doing a good job, your residents are going to want to be more engaged. And whilst your residents become more engaged, they're probably going to have different needs. Um, for sure. And your part-time employee, you just have one part-time employee, correct? So, you're like a one and a half employee department. Yes. And how many hours does Nick work? Um, uh,

is it Nick? It's Nick, right? Yeah. Nicholas. Yes. 15 hours. 15. Okay. Um, uh, okay, great. Um, that those are all my questions. I appreciate you being here. Okay. Thank you. Great. Do we have any other questions for Director No. All right. Seeing none. Thank you, Director Noaj. All right. Thank you so much.

All right. We'll go next to our recreation department. We have Kevin Bailey here, recctor. Um same questions as everybody else. What's changed from this year to next year? What are some of the things you've been working on this year? um some plans for the upcoming year and anything that's not funded in this upcoming budget that you'd like to see funded in a future year.

Perfect. Yeah. Uh well, first of all, thank you council for having me tonight. Um just kind of give an update for the recreation department. This is actually our ninth year. I always track uh the first year that I I started. So, we're going into our ninth year as a uh as a full-time recreation department. Um, this year, one of the things that we always do year after year is our our department goals. So, you usually do see that in our report. So, I I wanted to kind of go over what our goals were last year and what our goals are for next year. Um last year uh when we were looking at different goals, we wanted to listen to what feedback we got from our our our community and we also met with all of our um instructors, our managers to get an idea of what are core things that we want to be working on. Um and it as a department goal, it's something that all of our managers should be working towards. uh certain ones had uh point of contact of the goal to be uh achieved but we wanted the entire department to work on that. Um so one of the first things that we did talk about was trying to enhance our teen programs. Uh we've heard that from different residents um I know just talking with other recreation directors being part of the uh Massachusetts Wreck and Park association that is one thing that we continuously talk about is having teens engage in recreation programs is always a struggle. It's probably our hardest age group to work with, but it's probably the most important. So, we wanted to enhance the teen programs that we currently have as well. Um, we've been doing teen nights. It's been going very well. We've had um roughly about 20 children um on on Friday nights, but we know that we can do more with that, and we wanted to make it better. Um so, one of the first things we started off with in the beginning of the year is to do um a teen survey. We had um over a hundred

responses which was great and it did kind of help make a guideline on how we can um bring more enhanced teen uh programs and classes. Um, some of the things that were really interesting, things that uh, teens were really interested in, of course, are video games. And that's one that we do know we we struggle. We want to get teens out of playing video games all the time, being active, being engaged, but we also know that is something that they like, and that is something that we want to incorporate in some of our programs. Um, maybe on a limited basis, but we do know that that is something that teens are looking forward to. Uh we also had a very high response for painting crafts and surprisingly ping pong tables. So we did purchase two ping pong tables and we added that to te night. That was a very easy one. Um another thing that was very um for activities that were really important and that scored very high was our field trips. And what was a little surprising for me was CPR and first aid classes. And the third was our babysitter training which is uh no surprise to me. Um so we are working on that. Um being a uh lifeguard instructor myself, I can teach CPR and first aid classes. So that is something that I am planning on taking on when we do have our um office administrator back up and running and uh being able to take care of some of more of the back end of the department stuff. And that's the same with our babysitter training. Um that is something that I can teach and I'm still debating whether we bring in a contractor to teach that or for me to just uh teach it myself. Um but again once we have our office ad administrator um running and taking care of the back end of some of the uh office stuff I think that is something that would free up some time to be able to do that. Um we also talked about field trips. Some of the most popular ones was the trampoline park snow tubing and laser tag. Um so we did start working on that. Um trampoline park was uh our most

recent field trip very well attended. Uh so we are working with um different uh lodges for um um um our snow tubing trips next winter and then laser tag was a little bit of a surprise to me but we are working with some vendors right now to try to add that in as some field trips. Um we also tried some art and uh art and craft classes knowing that that was scoring really high for for teen nights. We did try a teen clay potting uh class. um we actually didn't get enough enrollment. So we are going to still try to work on that, try to do a couple more art and craft classes, but we are trying to make some progress and and meet that u from the survey. Our uh next um department goal was to expand expand our um our therapeutic recreation programs. Um, with that, as uh I mentioned last year, we did do a uh collaboration between Malden and Somerville Recreation as well to try to share um our resources and do a tri city uh adaptive program. That is something that has been um done throughout the Commonwealth. Um last year when we were attending our state conference, a lot of the awards and recognitions was actually from different towns that were doing this tri city. Uh so this is something that we're also trying as well uh just to try to collaborate and bring all those resources in. Um for our department specifically for MedFed uh we did also attend uh a method method method family network autism support group and we tried to talk about different program ideas and we came up with an idea of like an all sport type of class. Uh that was something that we were working on winter long. Um, we do have the instructor. We do have the course curriculum, but of course, as you know, um, with the flooding down at the gym, um, we are not running programs down in the gym right now. So, we kind of have that on pause right now. But the

instructor, the curriculum, uh, we are ready to go once we get that, um, resolved. Um, we've also worked with Somerville Recreation on the adaptive teen night. So, we're alternating sessions between Somerville and and Medford. Um, and that kind of helps. um not only go to different groups so that there's more um children in the program itself, but it also helped us out so that other nights were able to do other things like the field trips and and our teen nights. One of the biggest success is our Hoops Without Limit. That's a partnership through Tus University that offers a free basketball program. Uh we started that out a little bit into the fall and uh we continue that throughout the winter and into the spring season. And then just like our other programs, we've continued with our adaptive uh swim lessons. We've done coordination stations that uh are still continuing to to run. Uh our final um goal was to try to get more rentals down at Lacy Rink. Um Lacani Rink right now is running um just barely getting by um with our our finances. it does work off of a revolving account. So, we do want to make sure that we are bringing in enough revenue to sustain the hockey rink. And one of the things that we did talk about was uh to come on board with Catch Corner. Catch Corner, if you're not familiar with it, it's an online app. It's very similar to like uh Airbnb for houses, but for this it would be for recreation facilities. Um hockey rinks are very common um on this app, and we've actually found um that to be really profitable. We've had 29 ice rentals and that really helped us out to find those little gaps. So, if we're in between high school hockey season before they start practicing from 3:00 to 5, we might be able to get a couple of rentals in there from four to five before wreck hockey comes in. So, if we can find those type of gaps or we're in between this one hour gap between one rental and another, we can kind of fill that in

with catch corners. So, that um has helped us out a lot. We've also expanded our birthday party program. Um last year we only had four birthday parties and this year um we've had 18. So um we are trying to um bring in more of that dead time in the hockey rink and uh bring in a little bit more revenue which has been helpful this year. And then for our goals this year, uh, when we talked to the department, one thing that our our managers have talked about year after year, and we've been a little hesitant is to do birthday parties, but we get that request all the time from the public if they um, if the rec center can be rented out for birthday parties. I've been very hesitant, to be honest, over the years, especially with the Shiovali theater um, on Fridays and Saturday nights and with our programming to try to find that rental time. My biggest fear is to try to do a birthday party on Saturday and then have a last minute uh Shiovali theater event where we would have to cancel. I I I really feel strongly having children myself, I would imagine with a two-eek notice of having a birthday canled or have to be rechanged can be very frustrating. Um but we did look at that that Sundays is uh might be a better opportunity. looking at the Shiovali theater, historically they're only running about four um four shows on a Sunday throughout the year. So very few times um and then that's usually in the morning. So if we did something more in the evening um I think we're pretty clear of that. So we are going to try to do that next year uh to do um the birthday parties on Sundays. Um the other thing that we've talked about is as you know car park is uh almost completed. Uh we're just finishing up the basketball courts. Um but we know when that basketball court is open um it's going to be one of the best outdoor basketball courts with the shelter and all that. Um so we do have some really strong basketball coaches on

our team right now and we did talk about trying to do an outdoor basketball league. We're already doing one. Last spring we started a true outdoor recreational uh youth basketball program uh with Coach Scary. That's gone very well. This year we're now partners partnering with the um police department and we're running a uh another session of that that's already sold out with a with a weight list. So we would like to continue that and when the uh basketball court is done at car park, we would like to try to do a league over there. Uh the very last uh goal, and this is one that I I uh really thought of and came up with, is I'm seeing over the years, uh recreation departments do an annual survey. And in previous employers that I've worked for, we've also done annual surveys so that you can go year after year to balance out um how how you're performing and where you need to put your attention towards. um and especially coming up with the department goals. We're looking at the last survey that was done was prior to having a recreation department in 2017 to really get um a standard uh request of what people would like to see within the recreation department. So, I'd like to uh next year start an annual survey, something that we can make sure that we use as a baseline year after year that we can send out. As I said, I've done it in previous employers. I've um seen many other rec department do this as well. And I think it'll be really helpful to do that year after year, but I think it will be also very helpful when we are coming up with department goals to have a survey to refer back to. Um as far as the budget this year, um you will see some increases. Many of the increases that you see on there is

through um our uh collective bargaining uh contract with uh the teamsters. Um we did settle the contract this year. It is backdated for I want to say three years. Um so you are seeing an increase and that's really to do the the back of uh the past three years. That's why you're seeing an increase on a permanent full-time. Um other than that, the ones that um are not under contractual agreement is um um um as um um as a level of funded. Awesome. Great. Thanks, Kevin.

Thank you. Um I'm going to go to Vice President Lazaro and then councelor Lemming.

Thank you so much, Kevin. I just wanted to highlight a couple of awesome things that you said. Uh the first was the swimming instruction. Super important. Super great. Love that you always highlight that. I know it's really important to you. Um and you know the more that we can do for that for our uh kids and our students and every every age even you know adults that don't know how to swim yet. You know I know that there are lots of programs for every age of person who lives in the town. Um, and uh, car park is so exciting. The the playground being open, the field is amazing, the pickle ball, the dog park, it's all so good. It's so exciting. There's just been like this series of improvements in our parks that have been so incredible and it's very exciting to see. And I know when the basketball court opens up, it's going to be amazing. There's also a skate park over there. Has everybody been to this park? It looks so good. Um it's I exercise there every Friday. So [laughter] I've been like seeing the improvements in real time. It's really it's really awesome. Um one thing I wanted to ask about which is like you won't have done this because we haven't started the process but um councelor Sang and I talked uh last term about um how can we how can we make public bathrooms in our parks a reality? Um like brickandmortar public bathrooms. We have portaotties. Um, I can tell you that at Playstead, our Medford Youth Soccer, so wonderful, such an amazing program, takes over my life. Absolutely takes over my life. I have a third grader and a fifth grader and they both play soccer, which means every single every single day of my life is at a field [laughter] um in the spring and the fall. And I use a lot of the portaotties at uh Playstead Park and there's no toilet paper. there's simply no toilet paper. [laughter] And um I I know that that doesn't change if you have a brick and mortar one, but

probably a little bit it does. And um it would be not only useful for the families and the kids, anybody visiting the park, but you know, anybody who would need a facility out in open space. It would help everybody. Um I know it's expensive. Um, but I think we should be, you know, continuing these conversations and and just touching on it every time we talk about your budget so that it's still in our minds and something that we can come back to and say like [sighs and gasps] how would it be something that's feasible for us to try to do.

Okay. Um, I think those are things that we can we can certainly think about. Uh, portaotties is certainly a conversation we've had in the park commission uh multiple times. Uh there has been discussion on whether we could do a um contract and have the city actually do portaotties in all of the of the parks. Um there is some concern of if we did a full permanent one as you said like the toiletries and and such. I know myself having two portaotties at the city uh is run by the ruck department was at the con shell and um at duga park. Doug Park I don't have too many issues with but with a condent shell if you remember the rec department did a shared agreement between Pal Boston uh farmers market and with us

and we did a shared porta potty last year we had those are super nice those are like next level portaotties though those are like different aren't um so we actually decided not to as a group we decided not to do uh shared portaotties this year because last year we had so many um challenges of farmers market comes in and the uh locks were broken and it was in really poor condition as you said like lack of toilet paper and it was continuous phone calls of

the porta potties are dirty you have to clean it you know myself and our staff have run down there ourselves with our own toiletries trying to clean it pal at times has taken a hose and try to clean it out themselves to make it presentable um so if we were going to duplicate that into about 23 different parts parks. I think that's something that we would have to really think about logistical on how we are going to um maintain that as well. Yeah.

And it does make sense if you're doing once a week uh to toiletry or bathroom cleaning, you know, that's only once a week that a company's coming out and stocking the toilet paper and cleaning it out. So, if we were really going to do that, you know, are we going to what would it cost to do multiple cleanings or once a day or is that something that DPW or uh some push off in our department to do the cleaning? But I think that's a lot of logistical things that we would have to also put into consideration if the city was going to take that on.

Yeah. I mean, it's a major it's a major thing to take on. I just everything is a major thing to take on. And I'll be honest, I ran into a gentleman from the parks commission this morning in Donuts with a Difference and we were chatting and he reminded me about the bathrooms in the park uh and how that was priority from last term. Y um and it didn't happen and the conversation began and then went nowhere, which is pretty common in government. Um

yeah. Um, but I think if you don't keep bringing it up, um, it really won't ever go anywhere. And, um, just like accessibility, uh, things like public facilities, benches, um, coverings for bus stops,

standard things that make your built environment comfortable um, for everybody. It it makes it makes the entire world more comfortable for everybody. So, accessibility improvements make everything more accessible for everybody. Um, and that's a parallel I'm drawing here. Anyway, the point being, um, I would love to talk about bathrooms in the parks at some point in the future. I'm talking about it right now. It has no bearing on your budget. This is a fine budget. [laughter] Thank you for presenting it. I appreciate it. I hope someday it will also include um brick and mortar bathrooms. Not at every single park, probably at the biggest ones, the most used ones. Um but I really uh I just hope that we keep bringing up the things that are maybe a little difficult, a little idealistic, but still important.

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Vice President Ozaro. Councelor Lemi,

thank you. Thank you for the presentation. Kevin, um can you talk a little bit about the um part-time office manager because that did come up quite a bit last year in the requests for the uh for the part-time office manager and the therapeutic recreation specialist which I think turned into a more general request for an inclusion specialist um which we held the uh education and culture committee meeting on last time. But I'd I'd just be interested to know how the uh uh how the office manager position is uh the part-time office manager position is going, if it's managed to take some work off your plate and uh how that's how that's been working out.

Yeah. Um so we we we did get the funding for it and we have been um we've had had it posted for a while. Um to be honest, we've had some pretty bad luck with it so far being on a part-time basis. Um we did uh originally hire made a job offer to one one employee um and then just before they were about to start they said that um they've had some family uh issues come up and um decided that they weren't going to continue. That required us to repost. We did hire a second person uh and then a month later said that they uh had to resign that position as well. So the position is currently open again for the third time. I mean I mean yeah it's part-time for 27,500 a year. So, if if somebody's working, I it's I I I personally think if you're if you're having trouble filling a position, you probably should offer a slightly higher amount um in the posting, which this isn't on you because this this did come up in conversations with the uh with the administration last year, but my only request for this budget uh would be to uh uh which would go to you to the or to the administration is to bump up the offering for the part-time office manager because again you I I I understand this didn't really come up in your presentation. It was a very good presentation but a lot of the conversations had to do with you know you shouldn't be the person who's responsible for picking up the phone in the office. You shouldn't be like doing all this administrative work sort of uh uh behind the scenes. you should have somebody who's more uh who's more dedicated to that so that you and uh the other folks on your staff can have more time to to run these programs. So that's uh uh that that'll definitely be a request coming from me. Thank you.

Great. Thank you. Thank you, Councelor Leming. Do we have any further questions for recreation director Bailey? See none. Thank you, Kevin. I have one actually. Yes. What's the timeline on the uh on the gym floor?

So, [laughter] I don't have actually too much information to be honest with you. So, um the idea was to put in the in the in the sports court. Um one of the concerns that was brought up is the plywood that's underneath the gym floor is showing um water damage as well. And that brought into looking at the base and underneath the floor where they're seeing that there's water underneath the floor as well. Um the mayor and the facilities director uh and and and Tim from DPW actually have met and discussed this. And one of the things that we're concerned about is we don't want to spend all that money put in a new gym floor knowing that the plywood the subfloor is showing any type of water rot or if there is water coming in from the subfloor, we don't want to put it in and then find a year or two later more water damage. Um so we don't know what the con the extent is of how much uh water is actually coming underneath. Right now the facility director is working on that and bringing in companies that are specific to um water mitigation who like does like basements and making sure that water um basement doesn't flood and such. Um, so there are a couple of companies that I know I've done a walkthrough as well with one of the companies. Um, but they are planning on doing some exploratory of actually ripping up sections of the gym floor so that they can evaluate what the um subfloor looks like, what the concrete at the bottom level actually looks like, and if water um is coming in, how they can patch and make sure that it doesn't continue.

Okay. So, I will have more information once we know the extent of the water damage. Great. I mean, yeah, I mean, that's sounds good. Obviously, we wouldn't want to replace something over something that's not in good condition, and that makes a lot of sense. So,

it's unfortunate that we are down as long as as as we are right now. Fortunately, it's springtime. All of our programs are now going outdoors. things that are typically done at the rec center is either going to the hockey rink or we moved it to like um Hornell uh street hockey rink is doing all sports samplers and a couple of other programs there. So we do have a little bit more time but um certainly we want to get this done and make sure that in the fall we uh have the ability to run our programs as as we should. All right, thank you Kevin.

Thank you. Well, that seems to be it. Um, Madam Chief of Staff, I just do have one question for you. Um, for the next couple of weeks, um, just wanted to confirm meetings next week and the week after. Um, we have a a zoning meeting next Tuesday. Um, it might be better for everyone if we don't double book that night. Um but next sounds like we're on the same page because just given where we stand right now budgetarily and what we're working through. I was on a meeting with the school department today, we need more time. Okay. Um next Wednesday is available if there are any departments that would be ready.

Yes, I think we can make that work. Is it are we able to transmit the information late Thursday? Yes, late Thursday would work. And if if absolutely necessary, we could publish an agenda on Monday. Okay, wonderful. So we could even transmit the information. We could plan to transmit the information on Friday and just simplify. Yeah. And if if you just want to let me know now that you want until 12:30 or 4:30 on Friday and we'll work it on get it out on Monday, that's fine. That's that let's agree on that. Great. Thank you.

Um and the week after I think we would have a short hour meeting on Tuesday and then I have to double check right now the Wednesday availability. Um I think I reserved it for the budget. Um, no. There's a community development board, city council joint meeting that day. So, okay. So, only Tuesday the following week. Yeah. Okay. Sure. So, we might need to go into the the week after that. Okay. It sounds like and and and yeah, we we also may need to discuss at some point um timing on budget delivery as well. We can take that as it comes. I don't have any definitive um it just all depends on the next several weeks. All right. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. Good night. Vice President Lazaro. Motion to keep the paper in committee and adjourn. On the motion to keep the paper in committee and adjourn by Vice President Lazaro. Seconded by seconded by Councelor Lemming. Mr. Clerk, please call the role. Council Kelly, yes. Council Lemming, yes. Council me, yes. Council Scott Py, yes. Council Singh, yes. Vice President Lazaro, yes. President Vickers. Yes. Send the affirmative done the negative. The motion passes and the meeting is adjourned. Thank you.