City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the Wester City Council meeting. If you can please stand for the pledge of allegiance in the Star Spangle Banner.

[singing]

You see by the dawn early [singing] light [music] so proudly [singing] we held at the twilight [music] lasting who brought stripes and bright [singing] stars. Through the [music] perilous night or the [singing and music] we were so gallently [singing] [music] streaming and the rockets the bombs [singing] were singing in [music] g through the [singing and music] night that our flag was still there. Oh, [singing] say does that star spangled yet. [singing] [music] For the land [singing] [music] of the free and [singing] the home of the [music] brave roll call.

Councelor Bergman here. Councelor Bada here. Councelor Cono here. Councelor Rolo here. Councelor King here. Councelor Mitra here. Councelor Aita here. Councelor Rivera here. Councelor Rosen here. Councelor Tumi here. And Mayor Petty here. Uh approve the minutes of the December 23rd 2025 meeting. Those in favor opposed. Before we go into public participation 13, let people know is the hold 13B which is tax agreement with 401 409 Main Street. So we need a roll call on that. Roll call. Councelor Bergman. Yes. Council Bada. Yes. Councelor Economa.

Yes. Councelor Folo. Yes. Councelor King. Yes. Councilor Mitra. Yes. Council. Yes. Councelor Rivera. Yes. Councelor Broen. Yes. Tumi. Yes. Mayor Petty. Yes. Okay. We have Okay. Public participation. A person may speak no more than two minutes on any item appear on the agenda. Mr. Mayor.

Uh rule 39 items of public interest at every meeting of the city council. Under public participation portion of the agenda. The chair shall recognize any person seeking such recognition for the purpose of addressing the city council on any eligible item on the agenda for the meeting both in person and remotely. Any person who wishes to speak on more than one agenda item shall combine their testimony on all items to one appearance at the microphone. The time of speaking shall not exceed two minutes for one speaker and 30 minutes for all speakers. Rule 40 petitions. On the first occasion, any petition appears on the city council agenda. The primary petitioner shall address the city council for no more than three minutes on the subject of their petition. Thank you.

Okay. Your name is your residence and it number. Yes. Uh Fred Nathan Worester. Uh first item is 8J. Uh the item about the uh pedestrian uh crosswalk and signage at the intersections of Coburn and Bigalow Parkway. Uh

do you need to take a moment? [snorts] throw that away right away. Nope. Just

maybe. Wait 10 seconds. We wasted a couple of seconds. Could you bring back I'll wait 15 seconds before we turn the clock back on.

So anyhow, um um going back to what I was saying, I actually brought something similar to this up six months ago and I don't think it went anywhere, but but I was asking for the lights and crosswalks um flashing lights down at the bottom of Bigalow uh Parkway in in Lake A. I mean, hey, uh you got to think about the people and you got to stop people from flying down uh co I mean uh uh Bigalow down there cuz they do in fact in fact it's so bad they'll go down there see the traffic so bad they'll turn around come back up the hill and go down Coburn. Something has to be done. People too crazy out there. Um items 9A 10 C uh uh 90. I mean, hey, a near school there should be always flashing lights. And as far as the dumping about uh a 9C Heming Hick, I would say charge them $2,000. They caught they're caught dumping all the time. And as far as the um uh something has to be done, like I said, and even though you uh postponed it, uh 13B, I think it was. I mean, heck, if there is a company that is getting away and not paying proper wages or they're cheating somebody, I mean, we are pro business, but we're also pro people. Something has to be done.

Okay, next speaker. This name's your residence item number.

Hi, U Martha Sepha in Worcester. Um 13B. Um I remember in 2018 when Maniti got the TIFF. I remember being really excited that they were going to come to our city and do really great things. Um but what I've noticed is that they take their time to do projects. Um, and I also saw that when I lived in Washington DC, they sat on a lot of projects that did not change in southeast DC. So, I am solidly opposed to them getting additional tiff. Um, especially because I believe it's really important to use tiffs to attract new business, not to um invest our dollars um into projects that have already been funded before. So, I hope you consider that today and um use those dollars to support small businesses and other small developers who really are the fabric of our community. Thank you.

Thank you. [clears throat]

Excuse me. Idala has city of Worcester. I agree wholeheartedly with both the speakers that spoke before me. [clears throat] And that's why I want to call attention to the city council, the city manager, and the mayor to 9J. And I want to thank councel Mitra for putting that on the agenda which requests the city manager provide city council with a report concerning how the office of the city manager processes prioritize and keeps track of the numerous requests received by the office during city council meetings in an effort to guide the city council with best practices for making requests of the office. I often wondered about that, whether or not we were wasting our time standing before you, making these requests, giving our opinions, and taking our time out of our evening to come and speak before you. We have something to say and we feel it's important and we are paying your salary. We voted each and every one of you in except for the city manager who was appointed. So what we have to say not only do we fail him is important but it's very much important whether or not you vote to agree with us or you vote to file it. So there should be a report at some point um

how you prioritize and process what the public has to say. Thank you. Thank you.

Idella for president um Sue Mailman Worcester and school committee member. I've talked with council many times over the years about those responsible development issues and want to make some brief points. Uh we as a district and a city invest millions of dollars in vocational programs. The chamber of commerce commerce both when I was chair of the board and when councelor Mitra was chair of the board recognized workforce development as a number one issue. There is no greater way to impact demand than impact our policies that surround development. That's why I remain a staunch supporter of apprenticeship requirements across all trades and all public construction, not just in the aggregate per project local hiring goals because these programs support jobs with living wages so that our residents can work and live in Worcester. One way to solve the issue is to hire signatory contractors for all public construction. Many more trades people become certified journeymen and women through signatory programing programs. Responsible development is workforce development. Why are we rushing? Let's wait for the report from the city manager and do the responsible thing as a council. Many of you signed a responsible development pledge. This is a time when that signature is supposed to mean something. In these t times, in these very divisive days, when some of you participated in Martin Luther King programs this past weekend, you listened to Fred Taylor and others say that we have to show people what we that we stand with them. We're willing to take stands that protect them, including on worker rights issues and also giving people the accountability they've asked for with the civilian review board. Deny the TIFF for Maniti Group. Also, please uphold the work of the board of health and maintain policy around limiting the sale of tobacco product projects. Thank

you. [applause] 10A. Good evening. My name is Jiara Paulino. I lived in the city of Worcester for over 30 years. All of my children were born in Worcester. I purchased my first home here in Worcester. I've worked for both community health centers in Worcester and proudly coach little league softball at Vernon Hill. I absolutely love this city and have always shown that love through my work, service, and investments. I'm here today regarding my ongoing journey to obtain a hookah license for Namasco Bar and Lounge. This journey began in August 2024 when I approached the building department and department of public health to understand requirements. Unfortunately, I was sent from department to department and was never provided clear or cons consistent set of guidelines. Despite this, I acted in good faith and completed every step I was instructed to take. I invested several thousands of dollars in equipment and renovations following the direction of the city employees. Only after making these costly investments did I encounter repeated roadblocks ultimately being told that a 500 foot ordinance prevented me from obtaining the license. I have met with uh multiple employees of the city many who whom have agreed that it is concerning that this issue arose after I made significant financial commitments based on the guidance I was given. I did everything right yet I'm still unable to move forward. Because we're unable to offer hookah, we are actively losing business to establishments outside of the city. Customers regularly come in, ask if we offer hookah and then leave shortly after learning we do not. For over a year, I've told customers to come back and check uh check back with us while we work through the process only to face the embarrassment of still not being

able to offer what they want. This has caused financial strain. We have had to reduce staff schedules, eliminate positions, and I now perform work that we once paid employees to do. Thank you. [applause]

Good evening. Thank you for allowing me to speak. My name is Lynette Wini and I've been an employee at Nomeco for almost three years. I'm here tonight speaking as an employee who's someone whose livelihood depends on this place. This job is important to me because I rely on the income like many of my co-workers. This is how I pay my bills and stay financially stable. Some members of our staff are parents and are supporting families as well. Decisions made about this business directly affect real people. Namaskco also plays a significant cultural role. It is the only African-owned restaurant and lounge in Worcester and that matters. It's a space where people from different backgrounds come together and feel representative represented and enjoy each other's company. For many in our community, gathering in this way is part of our culture, and it's about connection, conversation, and togetherness. For our patrons, hookah is social and shared. It encourages people to sit and talk and engage with one another, and it's something our community generally enjoys. From an economic standpoint, Namaskco supports more than just the people on payroll. It provides jobs, supports the local DJs, security vendors, and brings consistent activity into the city. When offerings are limited, the decline is real. Employees feel it immediately through reduced hours and less stability. I've invested nearly three years of my life here emotionally and professionally. I care deeply about this place, the people I work with, and the community it serves. We will be more than happy to comply with all rules and health regulations and to make sure everyone who comes to Nomeco is safe and having a good time. All we are asking for is the opportunity to continue operating responsibly, to grow the city's economy, and to keep serving our community. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Thank you. [applause]

Uh good evening. Alex Guardiola with the resident, president, CEO of the Guardiola Strategic Group. Here to speak on uh item 10A, Council Rosen's recommendation that the board of health consider changing the 500 foot buff uh buffer zone restriction. Last fall, I represented a company who applied for one of the few remaining onremise tobacco licenses here in the downtown core district. They are womenowned, minority owned establishment that has a rich culture, diverse clientele that reflects the growing diverse population of the city. They unfortunately were denied because of the current 500 foot restriction. As mentioned in that hearing by a dissenting member, 500 ft is less than onetenth of a mile and its intention is not being satisfied, but rather hurting small small businesses. When the company began their journey to apply for their license, they took all the correct steps. In reliance of the city's direction, they invested over $60,000 to outfit their location to just be denied. Because to paraphrase the chair of the board of health, they are charged with promoting health and well-being of the residents, not economic development. To that, I take issue. Although we all agree the board of health has a duty to promote health in the city, it also has a second charge. It's charged with giving a license to a business and that counselors is a duty to incorporate economic development. The fact that the majority of the body uh who dismissed it like it's not their problem is shameful and a travesty to a city that has a downtown with empty storefronts up and down its main street. So, Mr. Manager, Mr. Mayor, city councilors, I ask you to please help our small businesses. If the board of health does not want to discuss economic development at their hearings, then remove the power of overseeing tobacco licenses and put it with the license commission with the standing committee on public health and human services to make a recommendation for the whole council to make a an approval. Learning that a previously approved ordinance does not currently work and making a change doesn't make our city administration look weak. It makes us look forwardinking and businessfriendly. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker,

Michael Kaine, uh from the Worester Regional Chamber of Commerce, also a resident here in the Vernon Hill neighborhood. Um again, I'm here tonight on the resolution we've just heard, um from uh our prior speakers of the real world impacts of this regulation, the 500t buffer. Um and it's producing unintended consequences that conflict with Worcester's economic development priorities, especially those surrounding an 18-hour downtown that we have. um that and that we need most importantly uh businesses you know such as the one we heard Nomeco create you know a mixed use of retail a mixed use of dining entertainment that attract residents support neighbor support establish especially neighboring establishes and keep our streets active and safe which are essential to that 18-hour vision however when we have a longstanding operator such as Nomesco wanting to go in front of the border and because there's licenses available. Um there's an inflexible geographic rule with this 500 foot rule and it's for it's going to what it's going to do it's going to cause vacant storefronts. It's going to lose jobs. We already heard when I spoke at the board of health meeting 18 jobs that was at this business and unfortunately they need to continue those 18 jobs but this rule is not allowing that. So, I implore the city council here um to look at this rule and report on it and somehow we can change it going forward. Thank you.

Thank you,

Abby Mortalero, a Worcester resident. I'll start with 9H. Um I think it's good to you have a dialogue with you know the people of Worcester and you know have like you know transparency in government and you know specifics measurable attainable relevant trans. All right. So now moving along to hold on sorry 13B. No tiffs for big corporations. People first profit second. People over people over profit. Okay. 14F. I think a house an office of housing stability is important you know to keep people you know in their homes you know pre preventing you know homelessness you know I think that is important so we should have an office of housing stability yes and 14 I the DOJ report you know I think it's important accountability ility in in government on all levels and you know to have a civilian review board and to drop the charges on Ashley Spring and Etill Hajid you know they were doing good they're good people you know doing good and you know we need rule law we need to hold ICE accountable and that's what they were So yes, the way review board and you know putting the people first, you know, putting people of Wester first. Okay.

Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening. Uh Robert Harden to Edward Street. Mr. um this is a a ongoing issue I've had with the city for what will now be 21 years of snow removal. Mr. Mayor, I contacted you this past weekend. Over the last 21 years, I have had to almost constantly call DPW to have snow plowed from Edward Street, which also affects Long View, Rockwood, and Jeremiah. These are all deadend streets with grades of 45 to 60 degrees. And at times, as most recently, plow might come through and just make one strip, leaving about 10 feet on either side of the road. Other times may not get until the next day after I've called. This has been a constant constant issue. In a few years, I'm going to have a sidewalk in front of my house finally with the Pleasant Street Project. Social contract says I have to clear the sidewalk. If I don't clear it, I get fined. If I do a poor job, I will get fined. As of right now, I have no sidewalk, but I still clear storm drains and the fire hydrant in front of my house to ensure safety. Most recent, a couple storms ago, I posted a video online of the mail truck trying to get up the street instead of drifting off to the side. What if that's an ambulance? Well, it's a firet truck may not have that issue. Right now, we have contracts with plow drivers. If they're not DPW employees, correct? If we're paying for a service, I'm bank property taxes. I should not have to come here again or call again to have my street cleared to be concerned about sliding into Pleasant Street, which always looks fantastic, by the way. So, if I happen to slide into Pleasant Street because my street's not being cleared, is that my fault, the cities, or the plow drivers?

Please pay attention to this issue. I would like to stop calling. Thank you. Thank you. [applause]

Hello. My name is Gary Hunter. I'm in District 5 and I first thing I want to do is uh go along with uh what Sue said and uh with 13B. I know it's on hold and I'm think we should stick up for our workers and we should stick up with the uh carpenters union and don't pass that resolution please. I won't go on and on about it but I think that's only fair fair market get people jobs. What I want to talk about is 9J about um getting the set up so the when they ask for reports for them to come back and um I'm looking at this uh agenda. This agenda is nothing on this agenda that's that important then compared to our world falling apart. All politics are local. Right now, we're talking about fire hydrants and not people. What happened on Minneapolis could have happened at a Eureka Street except some of the brave people that stood between the police and the young woman. We need a civilian re review board that may help that situation. We have not heard the final stuff for uh the DOJ. I see you every week. I if you noticed I usually say something and I stayed till the end of the meeting and I listen to everybody. What do you actually pass? Everything is sent to committee. I as a civilian never hear back what happened in the committee. Sent for to the administration. I as a civilian not hear back what happens with the reports. I would like a more open discussion and talk about the real issues of how

homelessness please DOJ report. Please consider opening your meetings and do talk about real subjects. You have a lot of people 200,000 people in this city that's counting on you. Thank you. Our next speaker please. And nothing's getting passed.

Hello everyone. I'm speaking on 13B. My name is Art Cook and I'm a carpenter steward and work all throughout Massachusetts. Responsible development requires commitment, sustained execution, and real accountability. It cannot be a roll of the dice, an occasional goal, or just words on paper. I ask you on behalf of all the members of local 336, please remain committed to responsible development and oppose the proposed tie for 40149 Main Street. Maniti and Bazudo, who they are hiring for this project, are both from Washington DC. Why do we need to be bringing in contractors from that swamp of criminal contractors here to Worcester? And why are we going to use our tax dollars to do that? I don't want them bringing those lower standards to our community and I don't want to give them any money. Thank you.

Thank you.

Get your name into your residence. U Nathan Kufall Milbury. Yeah, there you go. Uh speaking on 13B, I'm a union carpenter apprentice. I started very recently, but um I wanted to talk about I don't believe that we have to give Mckiti this uh this tiff. I don't see why when they bought the building in 2018, how they haven't been able to get by with what they have. If they're a big corporation that is able to bring people from out of state, then I I don't see where they don't have their own money to figure it out. Um, I also I just Yeah, sorry. Sorry. That's okay.

I feel like a responsible like environment would be just I feel like we need to check up on them more and make sure we have responsible carpenters, responsible tradesmen, and just have more uh focus on what we're doing. Thank you.

Thank you very much. [applause] Good evening. My name is Patrick Kelly, 32-year resident of Western, Mass, Worcester native. I want to thank Mr. Mayor Petty, uh, city manager Batista, and all council members for allowing me to share tonight. I'm here to urge you to deny TIFF uh, deny the TIFFs to the Maniti Group because awarding public subsidies requires public trust and serious concerns exist about whether that standard's being met by them. TIFFs are intended to support developers who provide clear public benefit while operating responsibly and ethically. When credible concerns are raised about how employees are being treated or how construction work is managed, those concerns cannot be brushed aside. They go directly to whether taxpayer dollars are being used wisely. There are documented concerns from workers and industry professionals that the Mckiti Group relies on subcontractors who are not properly qualified to perform complex construction work. That creates real risks. Unsafe job sites, construction defects, project delays, and long-term maintenance issues. When those problems arise, it's not the developer who bears the cost. It's the workers, the residents, and ultimately the city. Equally troubling are concerns about labor practices. Public money should never subsidize projects where worker treatment, oversight, and safety standards are called into question. Cities across the countries have learned that ignoring these warning signs lead to lawsuits, stalled projects, and financial losses. TIFF funding is a privilege, not an entitlement. Until these concerns are independently reviewed and resolved, the Mckiti Group does not meet the standard required for public subsidy. Taxpayer dollars should reward responsibility, not underwrite risk. Thank you.

Thank you. Hello. Uh my name is Joe Delg Gizzy. I am a U resident [clears throat] of uh Worcester District 5. Uh have been for a couple decades now. And I'm speaking on 13B. I um really want to say immediately thank you for putting that on hold. I think this shows the council, this council is dedicated to responsible development and takes the serious uh our you know our um concerns seriously the concerns of the citizens of Worcester. I just want to remind uh the council if you don't mind just saying that the Mckiti group themselves in Bazudo who's you know down the street uh have had a history of violating the public trust. They asked for a tiff. They brought on a contractor who was a contractor who should not have been on that job. If you look at um uh the Washington DC uh lawyers guild, they put out a a public document a couple years ago on um wage theft. Bazudo and Maniti feature prominently in that document. I urge you to look it up, Google it. Um this is these are two contractors or developer and a contractor from Washington DC who come from an environment of using this as a business practice to uh cheat workers to create a system in which money goes up rather than out. Uh I know they they say differently in their uh in their public promotions and their propaganda. Um we all have propaganda obviously we talk we talk the best of what we do. We forget about the worst what we do. And I think this contractor and this developer, we should hold them account uh not just tonight but going forward. I do thank you all for um holding this item and I wish you all a great night.

Thank you. [applause]

Uh Tom Marino Worester. Uh I got to say uh some appreciation for uh some of Dr. Mitra's orders which I I can't say that I expected to say. Um apparently your colleagues haven't filled you in yet. uh smart holes 9H that's not going to happen. That might lead to like accountability and might begin to establish a system of checks and balances which a majority of this council is absolutely ideologically opposed to. Uh the rules though, let's not send one rule to the public safety uh to uh Miss Blops. Let's send the rules and let's get a document that is uh um actually going to be enforced. I mean, I pulled a rule out of the sky last week. This I mean, when you're uh uh when you're you're citing that it was enforced two mayors ago, uh that was a long time ago. Uh let's get a document that is actually uh represents what's actually enforced here. Um you know, do something with rule 9. Uh if you're not going to allow residents to bring petitions other than things that go to traffic and parking, just put that in the rules. Let's not, you know, put other people in the crossfire and let them take the blame for it. Uh, and uh, you got crime stats. Um, could we ask for a closeout report any time in the last two or three years? I don't know what looking at staring at crime stats every year is going to do to inform anything about anything. Uh, closeout report. A closeout rate, however, is actually a metric you can make some judgment about. Um, and lastly, tabled item. Uh, are we ever getting this report back on the DOJ report? Ever. I mean, you had 5,000 words come out seven months ago on uh all the problems with it on the campaign to undermine it, undermine it, the uh the B the Biden conspiracy to undermine the city of Worcester. Uh can we anybody going to take responsibility for anything ever?

My name is Frank Gomez. I'm a business rep for the Carpenters Union. I want to say thank you to the mayor, city manager, and the counselors for holding item 13B. Um, let's this be an example not only for this stiff but many others coming up in front of the city. Um, and thank you for holding the item to all the the issues that being raised tonight being solved and answered. Thank you. Thank you,

John Kio. uh district 4. Um I want to talk about 13B and 900 together. Um I think what you you're seeing tonight uh Mr. Chairman is something that you mentioned during the campaign this year, which is that there's a different Worcester that you don't seem to understand about where we talk about it all the time up at this podium where it seems like there are a lot of secret deals, backroom conversations when all we're asking for isn't that you vote differently. It's just that you talk about it openly instead of not telling us what's going on because we do know what's going on. Um, [clears throat] councelor Rosen on in 900 um asked about enforcing this sign ordinance thing. The problem with that is is that we just listened to the whole last session com complaints about not having enough inspectors. So, we're going to send inspectors out to in inspect signs for small businesses, windows facing the street, right? We're going to have that be our priority when we have major developers not doing their jobs. When we have buildings that are being reported to the city manager on a regular basis as having high low vacancy rates, but then from our eyes, our physical eyes, we can see that they are not uh full. Those those are the things we want our inspectors to actually inspect. Are these big businesses telling us the truth? Because it turns out in this case with Menkitty, this isn't just the first time that they've done something wrong. They have a track record and we gave them our money. We have to have these conversations, robust public conversations to actually have an efficient city. And frankly, you can blame the last session all you want, but the fact is is this is a track record of decade upon decade of the uh city of Worcester just not doing the conversations that need to be had in public. Talk about it out loud. Thank

you. [applause] I'm here to talk about a few different things on the agenda similar. I agree with everything Sue Mailman had said. Um

does your name and say your residence? Fiana Jaten saying 37 County Street District 3 um citizen of Worcester. Um 9J um I agree with Dr. Mitra's um request that the city manager have a report concerning how the city manager processes, prioritize and keeps track of numerous requests. Also 9K having uh provide a quarterly report about um adopted orders. That would be nice to know what actually gets adopted since we never do here. I'll hold my comment until I have attention. I reclaim my time. Can you pause the time since you're not listening to me?

No. I was just telling something important B. Go ahead. Okay. Can I add back my minute now? Go ahead. Thank you. Um, I would like to also speak on 13B.

Okay, I'll wait since you're not listening. How rude. Um 13B. We I do not support the tiffs for companies that are not responsible for development. I've read an article that over $73,000 of wage theft has happened by that company. I do not think we should be giving any tax incentives to companies that are not paying the people that work for them. Um there are many other small business owners that can barely afford to pay their taxes that I know personally here in the city of Worcester. So why give big tax incentives to companies that aren't even Worcester based? This is from a Washington DC company and there's no reason why why a company that already has a property that that needs a tax incentive now when they've already not um been responsible in the past. So I do not support that. Um also 900 um I agree with what um John just said. Um there's no reason why we need to enforce a sign ordinance now that hasn't been enforced for so many years just because one person makes a complaint about it. Um, also 9P, I agree with the senior workoff abatement pro program being able to be continued. I have many neighbors that are senior citizens. They're already volunteering in places, but they're not getting this tax incentive or the reduced reduction of their taxes. So, that would be something that we should expand and look into more. Um, also, um, I think it got not put on the agenda, but we definitely need to have a civilian re review board. You guys have already had your equity audit. The DOJ report has come out. The um bureau um research bureau has already had their report and you guys still haven't even put it on the agenda. Like you guys need to be held accountable.

Thank you. Thank you,

Steve Hart, District 1.

And thank you in advance for your attention. I'm speaking on 13B. I came here tonight cynical. Uh, I was hoping you'd get around to the yes vote, which was a certainty on the morning of November 5th of last year through the powerful influence of the Chamber of Commerce in the city. Folks are just fed up with what's going on with this issue. I looked at the Maniti Group. I appreciate the uh the clerks submitting a lot of the uh backup documentation for this project. They don't present themselves as a development concern looking for a retroact retroactive give out from the city after not completing a project they got into acquisition with seven years ago. I read the bottom lines over $560,000 development cost per unit of the 48 units. A $5,000 fine is at the bottom of miscellaneous contingency for this company. And I don't think we should be talking about that. My eyes have been open tonight about the fact that there is resistance to this. It is not a done deal. And I think the uh the options that this this uh body has is also very disappointing because if it goes into committee as appointed by Mayor Petty, economic development, Bergman, Tumi and Mitra, municipal and legislative operations, Mitra, Rosen and Bergman, The Chamber of Commerce has a grip on

this city and I think will be a powerful statement to say no. Thank you to the Mini Group. [applause] Okay. Motion to suspend the rules to allow four more people to speak online there. I I didn't do this last week because it was the first meeting after a long pause. But if you have four people on hold and would allow two minutes each respectfully, we should extend for 15 minutes, not 30. I won't support 30. That's we start with 15 then I'm fine. Okay. All those in favor post what, Mr. Chairman? 30. You said favor.

He asked for amended to 15. Did I say 30? I just said suspend the rules, but uh I thought it was just suspend the rules. Yeah. So, my motion is suspend the rules, but I'll withdraw it. You want to do 15? It's going to be 15 anyways, so it doesn't matter. So, those in favor? Okay, we got four people. Let's get to them. Okay, first speaker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The first speaker is Natalie Gibson. I'm trying to meet the resident now.

Hi. Uh, Natalie Gibson, uh, District 5. So I wanted to speak on 9J. Thank you uh Dr. Mitra. I actually want to p point out um through the chair that I have actually sent this same uh request to city council back in January at back in September of 24. It went to MLO and I heard nothing since. Many orders as people have said as of mind have gone to the city manager. We have never heard anything about them and that was what I wanted to know back then was what's happening with our orders once they get to him. Uh 9M um that's uh councelor Tumi. Um, I actually want to also say that we should probably be putting the crime stats back on the Worcester PD's Facebook site because all of a sudden they're missing. So, we have no idea what's going on except for if you go to a community meeting and you might find some stats there. Uh, to the gentleman that was talking about the snow removal for years, same problem. I've been having the same issue. I also had put that in a petition. It went to the city manager notoriously January 22nd of 25. So nothing ever came back to me. I never was told what their plans were. And it's quite frankly disingenuous of this city to have us taxpayers paying so much taxes for so many different things and we don't even have safe streets for cars or pedestrians. Thank you.

Next speaker. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Next speaker is Eric Stratton. Please say your name and city of residence and the you're calling on.

Yes, Eric Stratton, city of Worcester. Um, I'm calling on a number of them. Um, for 9J, yes. Um, I'd like to see us get some actual accountability with regards to these reports. Um, and frankly, that includes some urgency uh in terms of timeline. It is not a reasonable uh expectation that these items get sent to the city manager's office or to other offices within the city and they linger there and perish or we never hear back. This is something that frankly I would love to see the city taking the initiative on to in to become more transparent and make it clear where things are. We should not have to continue to come back to this body to get updates. Um to me that is simply unacceptable. If I did that at my work, I would be let go for not performing properly. Um, regarding 10A, um, I'm sympathetic to this business and the workers who are there. However, I would not support this. The idea behind this 500t bar, uh, uh, distance is simply to avoid proliferation of uh, smoke shops in single locations. Um this happens uh around the country in lower economic areas um where you see proliferation of smoke shops. So I actually support this ordinance as it is currently written. It seems to me that there could have been more homework done with regards to other people who held licenses uh prior to the business selecting that location. And so I think perhaps the city may want to look at a way of having a variance. But my concern is that we may see uh smoke shops sort of grouping together in denser areas especially in places that are um lower socioeconomic impact uh uh status and that this has a disproportionate um impact on those individuals. Um last item that I would have uh that I'd like to mention is 13b. Um as others have said no to this tiff. Um this is a group that clearly is a bad actor. While we support economic

development and other groups like the Chamber of Commerce uh want to see business happening here, this is not how it gets done. This instead is a real mismanagement of city funds. Thank you. Thank you, [applause] Mayor. The next speaker is Glenn. I'm going try to unmute the resident now. Yeah, I'm here. Can you hear me?

Yes, we can. There's your name and your residence. Uh Glenn P city of Worester it's a yes on 9H 9J and on 13B on 13B Merci has paid the fine required under the responsible development ordinance. Now that ordinance doesn't say that paying a fine permanently disqualifies a company from doing business with the city. It says the fine is the remedy. They've paid the fine. Let's not impose a second penalty where the law does not require one. And this is not a marginal pro project. It's a $25 million investment in Worester. Exactly the kind of investment we say we want. It generates substantial property tax revenue. It's a 10-year tie with 30-year deed restricted accessible units and affordable units. It strengthens the tax base. And the Merci Group actually has a very long and positive history with the city. They've been recognized. They've won awards for architectural innovation that they've done here in Worester. So they're not a fly by night developer. They're a known partner with a great track record in Worester. If we turn away this project after the fine has been paid, I think we send a message not just to Marquini but to every serious investor watching Worcester that even when you follow the law, you resolve the issue, the rules can still change after the fact. That's how I think you chill investment and I think we'd be cutting off our nose despite our face. And one word here about the economic development department. They don't bring projects to the council casually. They exercise due diligence. They vet. They select carefully. And when they come to you with a recommendation like this, it reflects a real considered professional judgment. And I think we should respect

that work on on Dr. uh Mitri's motions. You know, I said yes on 9H and 9J. On 9h. Okay. I just want to say I strongly support his call for smart goals. His time is up. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Last speaker. Last speaker is Keith Lairs. Join me resident now.

Hey everyone. Um Keith Lenires one main street district 1. Um I urge city council to oppose giving the main Katy group any additional tiff tie breaks. Period. Uh Worcester residents need to be aware that city council and city hall is not encouraging responsible development in general. They're encouraging subsidized speculation where developers are rewarded for buying property, holding it, and then relying on public tax breaks to finance their projects. In November 2023, this council passed the responsible development ordinance to ensure Worcester residents get something back for these tax breaks that we subsidize. The ordinance requires developers receiving tax breaks to follow labor laws, pay fair prevailing wages, prevent wage theft, and hire local workers for their projects. Developers like Manati can receive hundreds of thousands of dollars, even millions in tax incentives on individual projects from the both the city and the state. In at least one instance, Manati was found out of compliance with the ordinance after using a subcontractor cited by the attorney general for serious wage violations totaling more than $73,000 in unpaid wages. The response is a trivial fine of $5,000 compared to potentially millions in incentives from city and state taxpayers. The economic decision-making is clear. It's cheaper for Manati to violate the ordinance and be fined than it is to follow it. For the responsible development ordinance to be taken seriously, our city leadership needs to show some backbone and say enough is enough when developers break the rules. Mayor Petty, Kate Tumi, Gary Rosen, Christian King, Rob Bada, you all signed the responsible development pledge last year. So, I expect you all to honor it and stop the main Katy Group from continuing to take advantage of Worcester taxpayers. I urge you, please stop using my money and the money of my fellow taxpayers to subsidize companies

that do not respect our ordinances or the people that work here. Thank you. Thank you. [applause]

Okay, we are in hearings and orders. The motion is to open the hearing. Those in favor post so ordered. The hearing is regard to condocation on Channing Street for National Grid. Anybody opposed? Seeing nobody opposed. Motion is to close the hearing and the motion is to adopt. All those in favor? Opposed? So ordered. Petitions. Yeah, I don't see anybody here for a petition. So, petitions 8 A to HG refer to public works. All those in favor oppose, so ordered. H 8H to 8R, we're going to refer to traffic and parking. All those in favor, oppose, so ordered. We have the orders. Uh Council Folo, Mr. Chairman, I' I'd ask that we take uh number 13A out of order, please.

Those in favor? Post? So ordered. 13A. C man recommend adoption of the proposed order to establish no parking anytime zone on the portion of the Grafton Street in the 90-day trial basis and the audience to permanently establish no parking anytime on portions of both sides of the Grafton Street. Councelor,

Mr. Chairman, thank you. through you to my colleagues and the general public. Uh I commend the city manager for bringing this item forward. Uh you have to actually see this uh in person, this traffic nightmare in person to see how serious the situation is on Grafton Street. Uh this is one this is one issue that uh that uh I actually got into the district three race once once the seat uh was vacated. Uh I decided to run for the uh district 3 seat uh mainly because of issues like this. Uh Mr. Chairman, when school is let out at 2:00, uh you'll see a line of traffic from Roosevelt School's entrance as far back as some days the Burger King, which is at the intersection of Jennings Street and Grafton Street. Uh, I'm not being overly dramatic when I tell you there is no bigger public safety issue in this city than from 130 to quarter 2 on Grafton Street uh than anywhere else in the city. That is the number one public safety issue on school days when school is in s uh in session. Uh you have to see it to believe it. Now, up on the screen, I'd ask my uh colleagues to look. You'll see a picture that was taken today, and that's a picture that is every day at uh Grafton Street near Roosevelt. You'll see many violations right there in that picture. One parked by a fire hydrant. Two uh parked right

at the curb cut. State law, general law, is five feet from a curb cut. Every curb cut, other than batteries unlimited, where the owner justifiably puts uh cones out to uh allow people to customers to come in and out of his business without uh such a tough situation of being able to see oncoming traffic. So, every business that comes from Roosevelt School to Dalton Street, uh, the cars are parked right at the curb cut. People that are exiting those businesses cannot see the oncoming traffic. We have had several accidents over the years because of this. the accidents have have uh raised from uh fender benders to total losses. Uh one in one instance a gentleman was coming out of a Dunkin Donuts. The car that was at the curb cut gave him the wave to come come on and come through. He did. And what happened was a car on the who who uh was coming south on Grafton Street 122 uh on the opposite lane in in the opposite lane because those cars are blocking traffic and the and the road of traffic coming down south from uh Grafton Street toward Roosevelt. Uh the car hit him broadsided and total his car. Gentleman happens to be 80 years old. Uh had to be taken to the hospital. I mean this is just one instance of what goes on there. Now I know the parents uh have notified us that of their concern that they want to be able to pick up their children uh at release time. But

in all honesty, the safety of their children will be addressed with this item that we are proposing tonight. And not only that, but the safety of every driver and every person that takes on that section of Grafton Street each and every day. They uh the amount of people that have told me they avoid that area. They know of the situation and they avoid that area is it is you know very numerous to who to have told me I don't go near that part of the uh city from 1:30 to quarter 2. So imagine that this is what we have knowing that people try to avoid that situation. In doing this in in in uh putting this item forward, we give the ability for enforcement to take place. Right now uh general law is I'm told on a state road you can pull over but you cannot park. There are people that park at Roosevelt School as early as 12, 12:15, 12:30. They now leave their cars there and get picked up and come back around release time just to have their car up close so they can pick up their their child.

We're in your five minutes, too. Okay. Let me just close by saying You get five more minutes. I appreciate that. I five more minutes right now. Yeah, but you can't go a second time though.

Okay. Thank you. Uh getting back to uh my point. Uh there people there at 12:30 and 1:00 and 1:30 for a release time at two. And they again they're parked right up at the curb cuts. They park all the way back to an intersection of Dalton Street and and uh Grafton Street and the entrance to Stop and Shop Plaza. From Starbucks Coffee back to Dalton Street, there's the length of two cars. When people are parked there, they are taking up the full width of the road. And people who avoid have to come around and avoid their cars are on the other side of traffic. We are we are forcing people to drive on the wrong side of the road and that is where all the safety issues come into play. There are many accidents. There are many near misses. And now people are even parking on Dalton Street. And as the light turns green, they get into that line of traffic to go pick up their child while there are number of cars that have already been parked for several minutes as far back as I said Burger King. and people have actually got out of the car and started arguments and almost blows. This this happens very very frequently. So, Mr. Chairman, I would ask my colleagues here tonight to give us the vote to put up the temporary

no parking signs. The city manager and the police chief have promised and have committed to enforcement being there because that's what it's going to take. Right now, we've talked to the principal of the school and in all honesty, she says it's not my job to go out there and ask people to come up and park in the That's another thing I I'd like to bring up. Uh we the the uh city council last session voted over a million dollars to add 30 plus parking spots to alleviate this problem. and nobody is going up there and taking advantage of that pocket. The principal, in all due respect, we asked her if she could speak to the parents and and she came back to say it's not her job. And in all honesty, it's not. So that's why we need police presence and we need that enforcement there. People are going to be asked to move up and and go park in those spots that we created uh for this situation. If they don't, then obviously they're going to uh have to fi uh feel the uh effect of a ticket. Uh I remember last week one parent saying that uh what are you going to do with the 40 to 50 cars? So they admit that there's that kind of number of cars that are waiting for their child to go and pick up their their child on school property. So, if we take 30 of those cars off the street and put them in those parking spots, that again, I commend the previous city council and the manager for coming up with those that that the funding for those spots. Uh that would go a long

way. Again, I'll ask my colleagues to support this uh temporary enforcement and for 90 days and let's see what happens. I hope and I I am I am pretty confident that it'll have a a dramatic effect. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Council King. Council King.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um I want to begin by uh thanking the councelor Folo for this item. Um certainly there's been a number of attempts to remedy this matter um from the city manager to the mayor, councelor Tumi, uh former counselor Russell. Um and to take this initiative to to push things forward um you know is is is a good thing. Um I have some questions um on his face. Um I'm not sure about this. I think that um I could be moved um but I stand initially um in opposition to this. I have some questions to the administration. Um and first and foremost um you know I'm not looking to ticket parents. Um the term enforcement's been used a couple of times. Um I'm not opposed to getting to that. Um but I stand before you, Mr. chairman as the father of Worcester public school student and I know I'm also a DCF social worker. I actually went out to um Roosevelt this morning around 7:30 or so I think or 7:15, can't remember. Um they get there pretty early. Um and I know it's always a race. It's a race if you're picking up kids from after school programs at the Greenale Wire. It's a race at Roosevelt School, Vernon Hill, um Flag Street, you name it. Um, and you know, I've called in the past for safety audits on those schools, um, which haven't come back. I'll reiterate, um, at some point, maybe next meeting, um, we'll pull that back out, but there certainly needs to be a plan in coordination with, uh, Worcester Police. Um, my question to the chair is this. Um, what gives me pause on this is the establishment of no parking any time on both portions. Um, I spoke briefly to

the counselor, um, and what he was saying does make sense to me, but I just want some clarification on this particular item. The way I read it, um, is that this is recommending both an adoption um, of an order to establish a parking anytime zone um, on a 90-day trial basis and an ordinance to permanently establish the no parking anytime zone. So my first question is if you could speak to the both sides of the street through the administration um what that might look like what the purpose is what's the benefits and then secondly Mr. Chairman the second portion of that would be as a point of order would it make sense to bifurcate it um and separate out into two different orders through the chair.

Thank you commissioner.

Thank you uh through the through the chair. So um there are as was noted by the council there are two aspects to this proposal. One is a 90-day trial um which could go into effect with a an affirmative vote by the uh the council essentially immediately. Um and that would apply specifically to that southbound portion of the street that's approaching the school driveway. Um where we, you know, where you see the the parents and and others who are dropping school kids off and picking them up arrive um well before school time. And that's also the location where we have this very uh high frequency of driveways. There's actually 10 driveways in an 800 foot span. So, it's a very dangerous situation to have cars parked right up to those driveways on a busy road like this. Uh and then people trying to to enter and exit the driveways. In addition, the second aspect is a proposed ordinance to make that permanent. There are portions on both sides of the road that are not suitable for parking. Um, so we have proposed an ordinance that would apply to both sides of the road rather than just the one side. Um rather than try to perfect that in the initial ordinance, our thought was we identified the whole segment in the ordinance that'll go to traffic and parking committee and give us the opportunity to then perfect those limits and bring it back down to the um the uh locations where it's it's truly necessary.

Council, yes, I'm just thinking I'm a little I'm confused. Um so by vote we take a vote we can do the the temporary signs as requested. This order also indicates that we would be um permanently establishing a no parking anytime zone which is for me it's counterintuitive. So if you could just someone clarify I mean I don't know if it's a point of order what it is but it's not it's not um the point is it's not it's not cohesive to me. It seems a little messy. It's going to go to the committee for discussion during this 90-day period and see how it works and go so be like 90 days before the traffic compartment can come back with it I would think right through the chair. That's sorry I didn't mean to interrupt but uh yeah go ahead

Mr. Chair that's that's correct. So the 90-day trial would go into effect immediately. Um to make that permanent the city has to pass an ordinance which would follow the normal process. This would be referred to traffic and parking. There'd be discussions and a hearing there. then it would have to come back to the city council for a vote on the on the actual ordinance itself to make it permanent.

Okay. Again, as that's not how this reads. um you know and so what I would request um as an amendment is that we we bifrocate this and that this particular order um is separated out that we have an order um adopting a 90-day trial um no parking anytime um on Grafton Street and then a separate order um to consider the establishment of a permanent no parking anytime on both portions. Mr. chairman. Um the way this is written, it indicates that we would be approving both with this vote. That's how it reads. Um that'd be my recommendation, Mr. Chairman. And you know, a lot of our parents, guardians, friends, folks that are are are trying to figure out um with the lack of opportunities after school and what have you in West Public Schools, these folks are zipping in and out um at 25 miles per hour. zipping in and out um you know picking up their kids and trying to get to work trying to get their kid to a relative to a friend um to someone to care for their kids until they're out of work. Um and I was able you know I've been down there before um as as counselor Tumi and others um to kind of take a look at this and you know when I went this morning it seemed a little bit improved. that went on both sides um on the graphing street side and the other side um massoid not masoy but on the other side and um you know it seems like there's a little bit of flow but the counselor is right it's not used like it could be but at the same time it wasn't as backed up but um when school's letting out I think there's a different type of flow as well because folks are trying to get back to work um after leaving work versus leaving home and what have you so you

know as a parent I hate um there to be any sort of um replication of this at our other schools um without the proper piloting without any sort of um misunderstanding by the public based on how this reads. Mr. Chairman, so that would be my amendment. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Councelor Tumi.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, I rise uh [clears throat] as this is certainly has been uh talked about on this council floor for several years. Um, I'm a former Roosevelt parent myself. I understand what it's like. But when my kids were there, it was a small neighborhood school. It was not a huge uh 600 student school building. Um, bringing in uh the number of vehicles that it does every day for parents dropping off. Um and so certainly it does make a huge impact on the uh community and safety for children. The one question I have and I I was going to through you Mr. I was going to rise uh to um also make comment that council king did regarding it's uh a little was confusing and it needed to be separated. But um I also am just curious about if we vote this, what is the plan? By saying we're not allowed to park on that certain part of Grafton Street, what is the plan that's going to be um distributed to the parents is where where they're going to go because that's part of the safety aspect of this. It's like just saying you can't park there. Great. Well, where where do they go? Do we have a plan put forward that's through you, Mr. Mayor, to whomever? administration.

Mr. Ro Commissioner,

thank you through the chair. So, we have been working with the the school to um to look at ways that they can uh address the drop off. We certainly wouldn't want to implement this until they have time to notify the parents with a specific start date. Um we are leaving other portions of the street open for parking. So once you get south of the driveway, there's actually an extended long section of shoulder that is safer and more appropriate for parking that will remain available. Um and then you know another aspect of this is that we're going to have to work with the school district to adjust and see how how parents react. We don't exactly know what people are going to do. Um so I think there's going to be a little bit of a learning process here. And I think that's one of the real benefits of having a 90-day trial to start with is we can observe and learn and adjust as we need to.

Um through you, Mr. Chair, I I'd had a uh off uh conversation uh with the commissioner um regarding the possibility of establishing um volunteer parents crossing students and walking down the street for safety sake. um and possibly talking to the uh uh owners of the uh supermarket plaza um to see if we could use some of those spots. Have we gone into that at all through you, Mr. Chair? Mr. Raleigh, Commissioner Raleigh, Commissioner, through the chair. Um I can't speak as to the conversations the school district may have had on on those. Mhm.

Um, so I I haven't personally had any conversations because it's out of our purview to to sort of um make these sorts of arrangements for how they might park. Um, and I wouldn't want to to speak for the school district. So, I don't know if those have taken place or not.

Okay. Through you, Mr. Chair, I know when I was on the school committee, a school safety liaison uh would have the police department do the traffic studies. Um, and I mean, this is not an unusual issue. I mean, almost every single school that we have in the city at release time, you know, are or going to school has traffic issues. Uh, I remember a big to-do about May Street and Nelson Place School and all of those things. So, traffic has always been an issue, but they would come up with a plan. I remember being at Wistro's Magnet School, which was also an issue. And so, they came up with the plan of how to direct the parents uh in and out of the parking lot. the teachers were out there, the principal was out there, it was highly enforced and you know, so I think there's there's got to be a little bit more conversation about responsibility um making sure that the students are safe and collaborating with uh the police uh tra the traffic um and uh mobility department um and making sure that we're all working together to make this seamless, make it work because you can't just say we're going to stop the parking without having something cohesive put in place. So I'm all for doing a trial. I'm definitely supporting that, but I'm asking that we have um a cohesive plan put together before it starts.

Mr. Mr. Manager,

through your chair [snorts] to the council. Yeah, I just want to kind of add uh a little bit and provide some a little bit of context to some of the comments and questions that uh council tumi raised. Uh I actually went and met with the superintendent, the principal uh and some of their staff, some of our staff we met and we had a conversation. We walked the area. We try to understand kind of what what are the challenges. Um one of the things that they the the school administration tried to take on was to purchase, you know, vests for the teachers so that they can at least be visible as they're outside uh coordinating the traffic. more specifically within the actual parking lot that they're in. Uh they don't overextend to the sidewalk or even to the street. They try to stay on the actual parking lot uh and coordinate some of the efforts. There is a a reality in terms of there are days where there's tens of of if not over 30 parking spaces available on the lot, right? And so the purposes of what we tried to design was to could we shift parking spaces the further back so the teachers can occupy those first um so that it opens up anything in the front end so parents can park in the front etc. And then allow the teachers and administrators to help support and uh or or guide the students to the vehicles as they're going through and then provide a better access in and out through the lot. That has been talked about quite a bit. We're trying to kind of reinforce that with these with the teachers, I mean with the school principal and their staff. Um, again, they're trying to find ways and on their end to manage uh students coming off trying to be safe that kids are not running behind vehicles and as people trying to reverse. Uh, it's a complex situation, but I think this is one of the aspects of many different aspects or different

ideas that we've brought to the table to try to address this overall issue. It's a real concern. You know, I live in the area. I drive that area quite often. Uh so I see it and I and I and I experience it and it's and it's it's a real concern. Um and where you see that uh you know, people trying to navigate uh and sometimes vehicles occupying that lane. So traffic is either on the they're trying to move in the yellow lane or sometimes even trying to go around. So I think it becomes a challenge and we're trying to find every every tool that we can utilize to provide a better safe environment in that area. I know that mentioned about uh enforcement of police officers etc. Uh our goal is not to go there and just start ticketing people. Our goal is to reinforce and provide some warnings and let people know you got to move it on. You cannot sit here. But we can't do that right now without an actual ordinance or something in place. If there's nothing in place, we have no ability to go in there and enforce people to move. Uh so that's what we want to be able to have so that we have the ability that's uh uh to enforce those rules and those ordinance and this 90-day trial will give us the opportunity to understand that is it working? Is it not working? Does it help? Does it not help? Uh and it gives us the ability then to come back and then provide better uh uh a better solution. Thanks.

Okay. So we're all set. So we have two votes. The first vote is going to adopt the 90-day emergency preamble. Roll call. Councelor Bergman, yes. Councelor Bada, yes. Councelor Cono, yes. Councelor Folo, yes. Councelor King, yes. Council Mitra, yes. Council, yes. Councelor Rivera, yes. Councelor Rosen, yes. Councelor Tumi, yes. And Mayor Patty, yes. The second motion is referred to traffic and packing the ordinance. Roll call. Councelor Bergman. Yes. Councelor Bada. Yes. Councelor Conamo. Yes. Councelor Vo. Yes. Councelor King. Point of order. Mr. Shim was the language I suggested changed as part of that also.

I'm sorry I missed the What was the language you asked for? You just want to make it clear it's not a permanent right. I would like to consider Yeah. Okay. As amended to consider it. Councelor Mitra. Yes. Councelor Ayah. Yes. Councor Rivera. Yes. Councelor Rosen. Yes. Tumi. Yes. And Mayor Petty. Yes. Okay. Okay, we go back to the uh agenda. First order is requested manager request the police chief provide increased speed and traffic enforcement surrounding the Belmont Street Community School located at 170 Belmont Street. Council Bada.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, yeah, speaking of school safety, I've heard a lot of, uh, concerns about, uh, speeding on Belmont Street, past Belmont, uh, community school in the area of like Stanton Street in Belmont. Um, so was just hoping the chief could help out with providing some additional enforcement. Um, I've heard from residents that traffic uh, regardless if there's uh, crossing guards or not, like the traffic's just really bad and people fly through there. So um was hoping that we could get some more enforcement and you know write some tickets and write some fines to really enforce that. Uh so thank you.

Thank you. So motion is referred out to the manager. All those in favor opposed. My second order request the manager request the commission parks and wreck and cemetery um initiate a a park master plan for Lake Park. Council Bada.

Thank you Mr. Chair. Yeah. I live near Lake Park, grown up there my whole life. Um it's a great section uh of the city, a great park. I know a lot of people might be familiar with it, but think it's a state park, but everything on the east side of um excuse me, on the west side of Lake A is city property. So, it'd be great to develop a master plan for that park. A lot of residents use it. There's a lot of great trails there in the woods, and it's really uh beloved park by the neighborhood in the city. So, I was hoping we could do a master plan because that's really never been done before. Um, and it's a great space that could use some some improvements.

Okay. So, refer that to the manager. Those in favor, oppose, so audited. Request the manager provide council with a draft orders to increase fees for illegal dumping from $200 to $500, $1,000 fines for secondary offenses in an effort to deter illegal dumping in the city's neighborhoods. Council Bada.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yeah, I know dumping's a consistent issue in the city, not just in my district, but across the city. And um, you know, it's a issue for residents. It's a real issue for neighbors and I was hoping that by increasing the fines this could um just help deter illegal dumping and I really think we need you to do more to to try and crack down on it. I know Dian Kahill and um quality of life team do a lot of work on that. Um, but I think it's just really really out of control and and not that it reflects anything on the city or our staff, but um, it just unfortunately there's a lot of dumping that's happening on quiet streets and and like Harrington Way, Franklin Street, uh, Bigalow Davis Parkway. So, I was hoping we could do more just to crack down on that. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you. U, Councelor Bergman, what why?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll [clears throat] I'm either going to ask to amend or oppose. I I think the order is well intended. um the number of years I've been on this council, I can say one thing that I believe um to be true um based on my experience and that is that the fines for dumping are by and large paid by the landlord, not the tenant. And by and large, the dumping is done by the tenant, not the landlord. So the nature of what this is is trying to accomplish in an effort to deter illegal dumping in my opinion won't work. whether you make the fine go from $200 to $500 or $200 to $1,000 or more because the landlord under our ordinance is paying for the tenant who's in it may very well be that the tenant is is being asked to leave and they have nowhere to put their items. I'm not necessarily faulting one side or the other. I'm just suggesting the reality which is this isn't going to motivate anybody to stop the problem. We've talked on this council about having Ballot Street open more regularly to pick up bulk items. We've talked about making dropping off tires and mattresses and TVs and other things more readily accessible to households, whether it's a landlord or the tenant, to try to avoid the illegal dumping. That hasn't yet come to fruition. I I would like to see a report as to how many of these fines have been assessed against landlords versus tenants and how frequently, you know, certain people are um not not following the law. My my sense is that nobody wants to pay those fines multiple times if not even once. But [clears throat] I don't know how they how they are going to stop it if as a landlord a tenant, you know, is going to is going to violate the ordinance. Uh it falls on the landlord. So, I mean, I I'd like an amendment to ask for a report as to the breakdown of the fines over the last

year, who's been paying them. Does it go to the landlord or does it go to the tenant? And how many people have been multiple uh offenders? Um if that's possible, then I'll certainly support waiting for the report to come back. if that's not possible. Again, I believe it's well intended. I'm not being critical of the intent, but I don't believe it raising the fine based on who pays it is going to deter legal dumping. The amendment okay?

Yeah, just to follow up, um, you know, my intention of the order was is really to address dumping, not just happening that's not that's not just happening at properties, um, but that's happening along city streets. There's a lot of times where you'll find um mattresses, furniture, it's even seen a toilet on Bigalow Davis Parkway. It's not just about dumping that's happening um in front of properties in front of, you know, home homes. Um and I, you know, certainly don't think it's just a landlord and tenant issue. I don't think, you know, there's there's dumping is happening all over the city in front of properties, um in front of sidewalks. So, it's really, you know, um not really coming at this from a perspective of landlords versus tenants or tenants versus landlords. It's just a question of can we do more to uh discourage people from dumping.

So, thank you, Councelor Tumi.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I I appreciate the order um and its intent. Um the state has um very high uh fine levels for first offense fines up to 5500 and subsequent offenses fine up to 15,000. Then there are additional penalties depending upon the type of um uh material. So I also vehicles could be seized um uh which is also what this the state is asking for. Um I know that uh local ordinances vary um by city, Worcester, Boston, Shrewsbury. So if we could get a um report back uh through you, Mr. chair if this is okay with council guada um on what's happening in other cities of our size um and also um uh local cities and towns uh that would be very helpful in terms of determining where and what and and I think it's really important um that we also uh take a look at the type of um dumping I know Aimsbury um case they had a company that paid up to 50,000 for illegal construction waste dumping. Uh so there are certainly um uh high bars and local enforcement nature of dumping uh can lead to substantially higher fines uh sometimes in the tens of thousands of dollars plus other serious consequences. Um so I think it's really important that we come up with a very comprehensive um report back that Thank you.

Okay. So all right as amended council bat as amended is fine. Okay. Thank you. Okay. All those in favor, send it to the manager as amended. Those in favor of postal audit. Next up is request the manager review current security operations at Union Station to determine whether increased police patrols and/or outreach social services are needed to ensure that the station remains safe and welcoming to all. Council Rosen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Jim and during the long political campaign, I heard from a few people on the campaign trail and recently received an email from a woman who evidently uses the train service to and from Boston, frequently maybe commutes uh for her job. Just a few things that she said in her email that I had heard during the campaign. She was talking about uh Union Station and issues. she said, loitering, aggressive behavior, individuals approaching diners. This one was new to me, diners at Maxwell Luciano's restaurant for money. And she also mentioned teenagers. This was new to me, too, teenagers have been observed riding bicycles inside the building while commuters are moving to and from the main entrance. and she said, "The current conditions have created situations that feel unsafe for commuters, visitors, diners, and employees who use the station regularly." And that's what I heard from the campaign. And over the last several years, my wife and I have hosted international students. We host two presently, and they're both 15 years old, and they go to the train station. I drop them off and pick them up. They go to Boston via the train. And I've heard these type of issues and complaints from them where they feel so intimidated when certain people come up to them, ask them for money and so on. And I know we do have a what police uh substation down there. So I would think that maybe the police would be aware of what's going on. And I hope they are. And as part of my order though, I did say maybe outreach social services if folks down there who may be acting out and maybe intimidating people and they shouldn't be. If they need some help from the city, some social service help, then I'm fine with that. I just think some of these activities maybe go on for so long we become too accepting of them. And if these things that the woman mentioned in the letter are happening, maybe we could

just tighten up things down there and make sure that the Union Station is safe for everyone and welcome welcoming for everyone, including people who do spend inordinate amount of time down there, maybe hanging out there, but they shouldn't be allowed to certainly, you know, ride bikes there and also to bother diners at our fine restaurant down there. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Motion to send that to the manager. Council Tumi, what what purpose are your eyes?

Uh for a point of clarification um through you, Mr. Chair. Um I also received I think we all received the same email. Um and I because of the nature of uh the issue, I reached out to the to the chief. Uh and it's my understanding that uh over the past two weeks they've had a number of arrests down there and they've really tightened everything up. So uh it's underway and there is a station down there, but they they did send um send folks down to address this. Thank you. Okay. So, send that to the manager. Those in favor, do you want to speak on? No. Go ahead. Those in favor? Opposed. Okay. So, take a roll call. Roll call. Councelor Bregman.

Yes. Councelor Bada. No. Councelor Cono. Yes. Councelor Folo. Yes. Councelor King. No. Councilor Mitra, yes. Councelor Aada, no. Councelor Rivera, yes. Councelor Broen, yes. Councelor Tumi, yes. And Mayor Petty,

yes. Okay. Requesting manager request commissioner of public uh works and commissioner of transportation mobility review potential options that could be implemented to fill potholes and repair utility patches in the city, including to infra red heater repairs and emulation pothole repair. Musion I know I can't even see it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. On this item here, um speaking with the commissioner and commissioner Raleigh and Commissioner uh Westerling in regards to how we handle our potholes and really doing some research, the asphalt emulsion system um seems to work pretty well. not something that's really doable during the winter, but if it's something that we can stay on during the course of the year, it provides uh an asphalt base, a consistency similar to a thick clamp chowder. How's that? Um, but the good thing about it is the emulsion seals the hole on the sides, so you don't have that crack around the edge, which again is part of the the freeze thought cycle that we experience here. And then secondly, I don't know if it's a city requirement or if it's just a contractor and this is their contractor who they use to do some of their patchwork repair. Uh the infrared system where they heat the asphalt that's right there. Uh reallocate it, tamp it down. That's that's the premier system. And that's I've seen that done in numerous areas around the city. Um, and you wouldn't even know the street was patched. It came out excellent. So, um, I just asked both commissioners to give this some consideration as we move forward to try to get a better handle on our, uh, streets. Thank you.

Sorry. Senator Man, all those in favor of post audit. Question manage request the commission transportation mobility organize a discussion with the appropriate representatives of mass the mass dot to review traffic patent changes made to the vicinity of Grafton Street including the removal of left-hand turns of Holton Street onto Grafton Street as well as removal of access to Rice Square from Aken Street. Council Fol.

Thank you Mr. Chairman and through you. Uh Mr. Chairman, back a few years ago, uh, Grafton Street, uh, as we know it, Route 122 was redesigned and renovated by, uh, the state, the Commonwealth, Mass DOT, and, uh, they redesigned from Rice Square going south down to the base of Grafton Street, um, I 290. And in doing so, they changed two traffic patterns, which at the time I was extremely against and uh tried to uh voice my concern and uh unfortunately it ended up in the final phase of the plan. One of them is at Rice Square. Uh Actton Street is a side street that takes you to the properties of two businesses. JJ's Pizza and Palmer's Bakery and Delhi. And those two establishments receive orders uh twice or three times a week from companies that unfortunately deliver in tractor trailers in some cases and they are not allowed back out to access Route 122. Grafton Street at Rice Square, they are forced to go down the narrow street of Actton Street. And what has happened several times, many times through these years that that is the case, that one way in to Actton Street is that these trucks uh can't navigate the narrow street because it's not wide enough and they end up uh taking out side view mirrors of cars. Now, each time they do

that, uh, our insurance rates go up because that's a vehicle, you know, uh, accident that's happening, just as, uh, I I, uh, should have spoke on Roosevelt school. Same thing. Every time we have an accident, uh, the insurance companies raise the rates here in Worcester. And this is a case where government is definitely failing the people here with this decision. I want to correct that error that uh we made a few years back and it's I'm told by commissioner Raleigh that we don't need DOT that we can change it ourselves. So it's a section of Actton Street from Roy Square to Kenyon A probably 50 to 60 ft that we need to just return back two ways. Very simple. uh just takes uh new signage that take down the signage that says uh you know you're not able to access uh taking a right-hand turn out of the parking lot. And then we have to uh reactivate the green light coming out of Actton Street. And by the way, living there all my life knowing talking to people that are from Rice Square and Grafton Hill, I can't remember an accident coming out of Actton Street onto Rice Square. It's a separate light. It comes out few seconds. You're given the opportunity to leave and it's right on red. If no traffic is coming, you're able to get out. So, very simple uh answer to this uh problem that we're having now because of uh an error in judgment when we uh were told by DOT that um we should have one way there access. The second one is at the end of H Hotton Street when it uh intersects Grafton Street. Always was able to take

a lefthand turn going down uh Grafton Street toward 290 and DOT put in a medium strip concrete medium strip and does not allow the access uh of a lefthand turn onto Grafton Street. what it does, it it forces people to take a right-hand turn and you're putting more traffic into a very very uh congested intersection or roundabout in front of St. Steven's Church at Building Square. So, uh I talked to the manager, I talked to Commissioner Raleigh about it. Maybe we won't be able to solve the lefthand turn, but we're definitely going to look at uh the light at Wall Street, which is definitely uh been an impairment, not allowing uh you know, traffic to flow the way it should be. So, we're going to look at that as well. So, uh Mr. Mayor, I uh thank you for the time and I would hope we'd be able to uh at least get the uh situation on Actton Street uh uh corrected as soon as possible. Thank you.

Thank you, Council King. What purpose do you

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um I have some questions on this um so that I may support it. Um my [snorts] question to the chair is this. So, I understand um the turnout of Palmer's there. Um I certainly support that. That makes sense. My concern is Actton Street. Um I've met with family members there over the years. I believe there was a child fatality on Actton Street. It was a it's a cutthrough street. Um I've had clients and families that have lived on that street through charity administration. Just want to ask, do you recall um whether or not there was a child fatality on Actton Street?

Mr. Manager, you ch to the council. I know there's been some um public safety activity on Actton Street. I believe it's sometime in 2018. There was some incident that occurred in that area. Um but I would have to provide more definitive kind of answer, but I know that there's relatively during that time frame, there's been some there was some public safety concerns in that area. Thank you. Um, you know, get a report on it.

Yeah, I'd like to get a report on that so that I can support this. Um, without it, I would not be able to. In addition to that, Mr. Chairman, as part of that report, um, if we could get something regarding any sort of traffic caling that did occur on that street outside of the the uh, oneway aspect to it, um, would be appreciated, but otherwise, I'll support this. Thank you. Okay. Final reports, council vis. So,

okay. So, we're going to send that to manager as amended. Are those in favor? Opposed? So, ordered. Next item is 9G. Request manage council with a report concerning the feasibility of allowing residents to pay for their community preservation act sarge online on the city's website. Dr. Mitra. [clears throat]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Through you, Mr. Chair, to uh the manager. Um [clears throat] I think uh city residents have been able to pay most of the fees and uh taxes online. I think this uh community preservation act fee has been implemented almost like 2 and 1/2 years now from fiscal year 2024. The first time the fee was paid was in 2023 July. and uh residents have been kind of riding this preservation act fee by [clears throat] check and don't have the ability to pay it online. I was just wondering if it could be possible for us uh in a technologically so high uh city like ours uh if it could be feasible to see that it that fee could also be paid online. Many residents have uh requested that and I thought that I'll bring it to your attention and see if it could be done.

Okay. So send that to the set. Send that to the manager. All those in favor opposed. So a ordered. Next item is request the manager provide the council with the report concerning the feasibility of creating a smart specific measurable attainable relevant and timebound goals to see in the effort to standardize and track residents needs and transparent and effective manner. Said goal should include but not be limited issues such as the amount of potholes that can and should be fixed in in a month. Providing services for homeless individuals. determining appropriate speed hump locations and improving public safety outcomes. Dr. Mitra,

thank you again, Mr. Chair. Once again, Mr. Chair, through you to city manager. I think um my point here is that uh there are a lot of things that we need to do. I was looking at uh that we have about 33 more meetings that we'll be attending this year and we got a lot of works to do. So I thought that uh every time I come I mean this is my second time I see that we have a lot of petitions that residents are requesting to fix the potholes or surface the side walk sidewalk or pave the roads take care of the homeless people take care of the affordable housing. We have a lot of work to do. we have to bring in jobs. uh rather than having citizens telling us is there a way that we can set a goal that we can work being datadriven being integrated with our technology system being uh holistically approaching with all other different departments like DPW uh department of uh traffic and transportation mobility, our police department, fire department, inspection department integrate with each other and make an approach that can we have a goal setup that we can go and survey and find out how many potholes are there uh how many places we need to really put the speed hump rather than coming in here every time which is fine if the residents say that I need a speed hump here we'll bring it to your attention but can we being rather than being reactive can we be proactive and find out what we need to do and set a smart goal. Smart in the sense that specific, it's measurable, it's attainable, it's relevant to us and it's time bound.

Let's say we found out that there are in the city about 500 potholes are there. It could be detected if we use the technology and then we find that district one has so many district two has so many four five and we decide that okay in next month we will go and fix 20 holes potholes in each district kind of it is measurable it's time bound it's also done so I think so many other thing that we have to do you know job bringing the job bringing the businesses how many jobs you should bring every month or for the year or for quarterly basis. How many houses we should build? Can we have a goal oriented approach taking care of talking to all the departments that we have who can make it happen? Can they all set up a goal and smart goal and that's my request to see if we could do that because we are here for you know time flies. We have a lot of things to do for the city so residents can find that we are one of the smartest cities. These are happening in many other cities like Boston, Houston, Kansas, uh New York City, in LA. I read about it. So I thought maybe we should be one of the smartest cities as well using all these technological approach being integrated, being datadriven, being working together with our private partners and see that if we can approach it, make it a goal set, smart goal setting approach. That's my request to see if it could be if it could be possible for us to do and I I think that we it should be we should be able to do it because because we have the technology we have the department people who are dedicated to work rather than waiting for the residents to tell us what needs to be done. Can we find out ourselves and proactively take care of those?

Okay, send that to manager then. All set. Okay. Thank you,

Mr. Manager. Dear chair to the council, I I I appreciate this uh this order. I am I am a person that loves data, data driven um in terms of who I am. I love technology. I love to implement technology, create processes that are more streamlined. Uh that's one of the reasons why we instituted strategic plan. The city did that through that process, establish some KPIs uh for every department. Um that's highlighted in in in the budget, but also the strategic plan that we've laid out. Um I think it's something that lays out specifically these goals uh in every single department. Uh we're building our internal system technology systems to be able to have that data easily available to us so we can uh uh measure uh against it. Uh and so I am extremely excited about this but I I I highly encourage uh the counselors especially the new counselors to look at our news strategic plan that was launched last year. Uh that's the strategic plan that the city council evaluated me on. right? Uh uh in in during the the city manager evaluation, but as also the strategic plan that I evaluate my department heads. And so we would present the budget to you in the budget documents that each department will be challenged uh to make sure they achieve those outcomes of that strategic plan that we laid out uh that involved community input uh through surveys, focus groups, uh you name it. uh we had a consultant to allow uh to uh to utilize to engage community to provide perspective to be able to inform these these uh uh these goals. So I'm extremely uh excited about this uh to be able to provide more feedback and also where we're at in some of the outcomes related to the goals that we established as part of the strategic plan so that not only uh community but also the council can be fully uh uh in tune with uh the outcomes that we're doing as a city. But I think one of the biggest challenges that we have as a municipality is our systems, a lot of our datadriven systems that we need um are really antiquated. And so

we're going through the process of updating them and a lot of that takes time. Uh when you're talking about data upon data upon data, data migration, the integrity of the data, um all that stuff is extremely important. We're going through that process in many different avenues. Um and so I look forward again to to kind of bringing this report and sharing all the work that we've been doing around uh strategic planning and especially smart goals. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Um Mr. Manager, I'd also like to say that as we approach strategically, we also keep our residents informed where we are, where we're going with respect to all these things. There are so many things that we need to do as I mentioned you know not only the traffic, not only the potholes or the roads but also homelessness taking care of that. bringing in businesses in town. So we have a lot of things to do and if we can keep our residents be a breast about where we are periodically I think that'll be a great help. Thank you.

Thank you. So send that to the manager. All those in favor opposed. Okay. request the uh standing committee on municipal operations review the rules of the city council to consider amending rule three of the city council to change the seating assignments in the city council's members every six months to allow the members to sit and work with different colleagues throughout each item each term see report said seating changes should not impact the seat of the vice chairperson of the city council nor any members seated in specific occasions for accessibility purposes council Thank you again, Mr. Chair. Once again, uh this is a request I'm trying to see that we make it to the MLO committee to look into because uh the [clears throat] as you know the rule three um says that we all get the seat assigned on the first day as you pick up the lotteryies and then we are there for the entire term of our being the city council in this chamber. My thought was that that's great but I think I'm I'm very much privileged to be able to sit with uh councelor Tumi and councelor Bergman here those who are very quite experienced and I'm learning from them I like to see that we all get that kind of opportunity if we can kind of have a movement amongst us sitting the opportunity having the opportunity to sit with different other people it just is a healthy attitude it's a good way to know each other a little bit better talking discuss discussing and I think uh bonding as well. So we are trying to become a you know good council a model council and that's my thinking was there. It's not much of a work. It's just January we did one maybe in July we do again and in the four times in two two years terms we sit with different people make good friends we are friends I know that we can also go out and meet but how many times we can do that we are

so busy with our own agenda items with so many meetings probably this would force us to sit with one another I'd like to sit next to councelor Rosen get his experience councelor uh king to see that you what what I can learn from them. So I was just thinking that if we could do that probably it will be a very good gesture very good um healthy atmosphere. I don't want the vice chair seat be changed or councelor tumi's seat be changed at the same time councelor blerta will be also there but others probably can get a chance to mingle with each other in this two-year term that we are here it's just a good feeling that's what I was thinking to request if you can approve that

send that to committee council king this doesn't affect you [laughter] Mr. chairman. Um, there's no purpose out there.

I certainly appreciate the order. Um, well intentioned. Um, you know, and I just I'm I'm going to be the bad guy here. Um, you know, I've been on this council. This is my going on my sixth term and I've witnessed folks sit right next to each other and not speak for four years, much less four months. And I agree that this body can benefit from increased contact that's not in violation of open meeting laws. Um there's certainly a lot to be said about um learning from one another, which is something that I've I've done from each and everyone I've served with as well as from the public. Mr. Chairman, however, there are a number of important matters before municipal operations and legislative affairs. as a former chairman um of that body and then going way back when it was separated and there was municipal operations and legislative affairs. Um and in these times, Mr. Chairman, when we're dealing with an onslaught of challenges that we're going to have with state aid, um legislative matters, we have a petition on later today um on state resolution that could impact the city um etc. Um I would prefer um that we focus on other things, Mr. Chairman. So, um I'm going to be the dark cloud in the room. It's not for a lack of um camaraderie or anything of that nature. Um but, uh sort of the musical the the the musical chairs, the dance of this um is great in thought, but in reality, I'm not sure we're going to get what we need. What I would encourage us to do is to reach out um engage as the counselor mentioned um outside of this body um and get to know folks political values and leanings, Mr. Chairman, but I don't think that this would accomplish what we like and um

would like that committee to focus on the important work that's there and that will be coming, Mr. Chairman. So, I'll be in opposition. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, anybody else like to speak for a second time or

Well, I I still think that it's a great idea. It's not going to be that we are not going to be looking into other matters. We are still going to be serious about the matters we have in our hand. This doesn't take so much time to take away from uh anyone. I think it's just a good gesture, just a good way to [snorts] know each other. I know we can meet outside, but it doesn't happen that often practically. So my request would be to kind of take a vote and uh you know recommend it to the uh MLO committee. Okay. Thank you Dr. Mutra. All set. Okay. So just so clear then that so we have a motion. I believe Council Kings has a motion to file according to

No, I didn't I didn't make a motion. I just said I was in opposition. Okay. So we just do a roll call on the item up or down to send it to committee. Okay. And uh we're good. I'll set Dr. Mitch Council Mitch. So the motion is to send to the uh standing committee and a yes will go to stand committee and a no vote would not go to standing committee. Roll call. Councelor Bergman. Yes. Councor Bada. Yes. Councor Econom. Yes. Councelor Folo. Yes. Councelor King. No. Council Mitra. Yes. Council. Yes. Councelor Rivera. Yes. Councelor Rosen. No. Councelor Tumi. Yes. And Mayor Petty.

Yes. Okay. Next, I'm requesting uh city man council to report concerning how the office of the city manager processes priorities and keeps track of the numerous requests received by their office during the city council meetings and effort to guide city council for the best practices for making requests of the office. Council Mitra.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Once again through you to Mr. Manager. Mr. Manager, this is u not to put you on the spot about how you process, but I think I was trying to make it I was trying to make it probably find out that last time when you when we in the meeting, I remember you said you have about 1,500 orders that uh that you accumulate that needs to be so I was trying to see that we need to be more practical, something that we can really afford to do. If we are giving you, we're 10 of us. If we come here every week and on the average have three orders each or four orders, we're giving you about 40 orders a week or 30 orders a week. That's about 2,000 orders almost in 50 weeks. That's overwhelming. So, I'm seeing that if that's the situation, can one person handle it? And how do you process it? Can the residents know that how did all these orders getting processed? Is there a track that we do this we pick up these orders and have a visibility of how it is moving and then finally the order is uh given back to the council reported as you move forward. So is there a tracking process? But if it looks like that it is way too much then a person can do. We are all human being. We can only do so much. We all have other things to do. We have family. We have other things. So can we then in that case think that okay the there are orders we can bring but can we then restrict it to maybe two orders per week so that you can handle it. My my question was that is this really getting a process? Is there a way that we can help that if you say no that's okay I can handle all these that look to me like it's overwhelming to have that many orders to kind of process and then people probably don't know how it's getting processed which one is getting

picked and which one is not getting picked so I thought that maybe you can let us know how your process is so we counelors can think that do we need to make a change in this is it too much can we really do it and from From that point of view, I'd like to request you to kind of give us your way how you handle this. Mr. Manager,

through the chair to the council, I'll touch a little bit on that and then I'll happy be able to provide a report. Um, you know, the the process of answering uh the council orders. I'll take that specific just council orders because I know that tonight some folks made reference to petitions to other items and that's totally separate. I'm looking at specifically orders that come from the counselors on on the council floor, not excluding committee orders, too. So, not only do we receive hundreds from this council throughout the year, but also committee submits orders as well when committees are having discussions and want further information, etc. Um, what I do is I oftent times what I have done is I have tried to engage with that's why I do one-on-one meetings with the counselors. Um, and so I try to discuss those orders with the council that put them forward and say, "What are you looking for? Do you want me to do submit this? Is this a simple email? Is this a a simple thing that I can just get an answer to you, etc." Oftent times, that's simply what they're looking for. They just want an answer. So, I'll provide the answer, whether it's a text message, a phone call, an email, or I verbally communicate in a one-on-one meeting, but it doesn't generate a report

to the council. Um they are reports that then sometimes we put together because they're very important not only to the council but also to the public that people need to know. So we'll put reports together to inform everyone. And sometimes those reports there might be multiple counselors that kind of alluded to that kind of report at different meetings. So we try to compile that and answer that collectively. Uh but you're right, we got hundreds. So when I think about my three years as current city manager, thousands. Uh right. And so we look at that specifically per every counselor and I try to work that through with every counselor. And some counselors say, "Well, that's not a priority right now. This is my priority. Can you work on answering this one?" So that we we'll do that. Um and so I try to do that through our one-on-one engagements with the counselors. Um understanding and knowing that sometimes depending on what community wants and what community needs uh in terms of their advocacy, it could be something that's a little bit more pertinent. um that requires our ability to put a comprehensive report um that does take time um and want to provide something comprehensive for the community and the public to digest. So uh it all depends on those reports but that's typically how I engage specifically only to the council uh orders. The petitions that go to uh oftent times those petitions will go to the respective committees the committees that all of you counselors report to um and conduct business. You then make decisions that then comes to the the the the departments and the departments will then put it on the list of uh of things that have been adopted uh for to be able to to to to do or or to rectify. Um, and so again, that that's kind of how you typically the engagement goes, but most often than not, there's some of these orders that are coming forward um are answered through just conversations that we're having um and and and rather than just submitting a full report because otherwise a report could be simple a simple paragraph, but should I be submitting a simple paragraph report to

the council on answering one question? I don't know. But again, the way we've done it has not not only my do it, but probably predecessors of mine as well has probably been through that effort and engaging in conversation directly with the counselor.

Thank you, Mr. Manager. [clears throat] The point is that u uh it's not only the you know the the petitions you have committees, it gets distributed. So, but the orders are most of the time it is a request to the manager. So, it comes to you. So you get too many orders and that's was my point was that how it is processed and people out there when you bring in the reports it's not only for the council to give the report. We are working here for the residents for those people who are out there who are looking how this process is done. How is this orders all these orders are being picked and done? If you can just have a sort of like your way of doing it that we pick it this way and then we talk to the counselors and we pick the do based on their priority. I think people will be happy to know the process. I think that's what they are looking for and I was think that let's be transparent on that and um see that we we are here to serve the community serve the residents and their needs. So that was my request. Thank you.

Thank you. So we report back on that. that to the manager or chairman. Council King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I um

I arise initially in opposition to this. I could be moved um and you know the act of filing an order um conveys the will of the council to the city manager. In addition to that, at times when the council's in alignment with the people, it conveys the collective will of the people and this body, Mr. Chairman. Um, and I don't want anyone to leave this conversation or this presentation with any sort of notion that this falls um on the city manager individually without resources. Um, so as this is written, I would not support it. Um, if we want to include the 8,000 employees um that assist in executing uh the manager's will and the manager's direction, if we want to include the uh multiple departments and divisions across the city as part of this, I will support it. But on its face, I would not. I would recommend by way of an amendment, Mr. Chairman, is that included in that report is the workforce and the capacity. Now, we know that there's always staffing issues and the like. Um, I've called for staffing analysis of various departments, HHS for example, reorganizations so that the work can get done. Um, but there's nothing more important um than this body conveying the will of the people and of this and and in terms of legislation um and in terms of direction to the city manager. We've heard time and time again from folks in the political sphere, in the public sphere, um about, you know, how does the the the council, how does the manager know what the council wants, right? You got 11 different people, 11 [clears throat] different values and priorities, and you got the, you know, the the chair, the mayor, and what he wants. Um, and then

we appoint the clerk in the order. So, how's that all work? How's that that that flow? Um, and so my amendment would be that all of that be included in this. Um, and I could support this matter, this this item. Um, if that was not accepted, Mr. Chairman, as a friendly amendment, I'd be in opposition. Um, and if not accepted as a friendly amendment, I'd make a separate motion. Thank you. So, we have an amendment to ask also include the workforce in the capacity of the manager.

As long as I think the process needs to be known to the people. So, that's what I'm asking for that. Sure. We we have probably 20 uh 25 orders today. We had over 30 orders probably last time. We just want to see the how it is processed. That's all. It was through the workforce. I know city manager has a lot of workforce to work with. But that's what we want to know how it is done and that's what it's about. Thank you. Okay. So as amended to the manager all those in favor opposed. Next item up request the uh city clerk provide the council with the quality report outlining the various city council orders adopted over the previous three months. Council metro.

Yeah. Uh this is kind of tags along with the with the previous one that I thought if uh uh through [clears throat] you uh Mr. chair to the city clerk if I could request that you know if he has last three months or the orders how it has been processed I think uh city clerk can provide us that I think that would be uh that would be a good idea for us all of us and also for the residents to know how it's getting processed for the we have some idea in that way so that's my request okay I'd like to sign on to that Mr. chairman. Okay. So, we send that to uh thank you the clerk as amended. All those in favor? Opposed. Next item is

court stand committee on public health and human service hold a public hearing for the purpose of making a recommendation to the city council concerning the advisability of endorsing and supporting H1370 an act relative to the Massachusetts primary care for you filed by Representative Rich Haggedy. And also as a relative primary care excess filed by representative Greg Watts said bills have already been endorsed by the Worester Board of Health, the cities of Springfield, Cambridge and Mass Medical Society and UMass Memorial Health among several other major medical societies, advocacy organizations both regionally and nationally said historic primary care legislation known as primary care for you will increase access to primary care making it free for the patients or practices that opt in no co-pays or deductibles and will dramatically decrease health inequities in Massachusetts. Council Rosen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, this order came from my recent stint as a member of the Worcester Board of Health and as it mentions the Worcester Board of Health along with other local agencies, hospitals and agencies, hospitals, boards of health, councils, boards of selectment all across the country have been talking about the crisis in primary care. A lot of uh doctors in their studies, in their learning areas are choosing not to go into primary care. They want to specialize in areas they're more interested in and areas that are more financially lucrative to them. So, we have a crisis in primary care all across the country, including here, of course, in the city of Worcester. A lot of folks who want to get a primary care physician aren't able to find one, let alone one that they choose. and they'd like to have those days seem to be behind us. I know I was with Reliant Medical and I am and have been for decades and my uh longtime primary care physician retired and I was worried about getting anyone and they assigned me to someone. There was no choice. Take this person or you're done pretty much. You don't have primary care. So, I took that person and uh it's not the way it was years ago, but we do have that shortage. Now, there are bills in the legislatures all across the country, and these are three that deal with primary care. It's called primary care for you, and they they mirror the legislation that's being talked about and passed in different states, cities, and towns are supporting it across the country. I'm not going to go through all the separate bills, but I've I've asked for this to go to the public health committee, which I chair, and we'll take a look at this. And obviously there's so much here. Uh but we'll come back and make a

recommendation to the city council. So I'm not asking for anything tonight. We'll advise the city council. Should we endorse these? Is it worth doing? Uh will that help the legislators who are sponsoring these and support these? Will that help them get these passed and through the legislature? So uh again, primary care crisis. What can we do in the city of Worcester to help things in our Commonwealth and in our city? We can take a look at some of these bills and see if they're worth our support. I know the board of health have already voted on with the board of health. We are supporting these strongly supporting them. And what came out of that meeting months ago when we decided to support these was uh let's lobby the Worcester City Council and see if we can get their support too, just like Springfield uh city council and Cambridge City Council did the same thing. So here I am in a way lobbying you tonight but just asking for the public health committee to take a look at these and see if it's good stuff and if they should come back it should come back to the council for endorsement. Thank you Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. I'll send that to committee. Those in favor opposed. Okay. Next request manager uh request police chief provide council with the 2025 annual report on crime stats. Council Tumi as it reads. Mr. Chair, send to the manager. Those in favor oppos. So ordered. Next item request manager by council to report concerning the number of vehicles owned by residents in the city that are not registered at the owner's current address as Massachusetts state law requires owners update their address with registry of motor vehicles and 30 days anytime they move and also require residents to update their address with the assessor's office. Council Tumi.

Uh thank you Mr. Chair. This has been an issue um especially with a a large city uh such as Worcester um with a lot of people moving in and out um uh not really recognizing it's come up a lot of times when when uh people are dealing with resident permit parking um and uh I know especially with the colleges the the residents Massachusetts law says if you've moved you've got 30 days uh as if you're living in in Massachusetts uh to register to your car at the address that you are at. And I think it's very there was a recent uh thing that came up I think it was on social media where there was somebody talking about that uh as an issue and I think it's something that we really need to take uh take uh a look at. Um it's uh it certainly does uh impact uh the community. So um I look forward to that uh report and seeing what we can do to um uh get that going. Thank you.

Okay. Senator Manager, all those in favor? So ordered. Next item. Request manager request commissioner of inspectional services notify owners and managers of several city businesses especially along main south quarter from federal square to Webster Square that they in violation of city signance that prohibits signage from covering more than half of the window area of the business. an effort to um politicize to publicize and seek corrective action and to endorse the city's signance without saddling any small business with fines. Council Rosen Noita.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh Mr. Chairman, the last phrase, several words of this is what's important. Enforce the city side ordinance or get rid of it. Some people don't want to enforce. I understand that. Then maybe if we're not going to enforce it, we shouldn't have it. So maybe that's something that we should look at. But without saddling any small businesses with fines, I'm not looking to hurt any businesses uh along Main Street in District 4 from downtown Franklin Street up to around Clark University and beyond. Not looking to hurt businesses. That's why I have this on there. I don't want to saddle them with fines, but I've heard from a few sources that the city might be close to enforcing this sign ordinance, which says businesses cannot cover all their glass windows with signage. They're not allowed to do that. And that's a common ordinance all across the country in cities and towns. It's common. Maybe it's enforced in some, maybe it's not. I think it was originally implemented especially here in the city of Worcester because we had some businesses that were involved in some illicit activities and they didn't want people looking in so they felt they would cover their windows. I'm not saying that's what they're doing now. I'm just saying that's why there's that sign ordinance here in Worcester and maybe in other locations across the country. this some I think someone tonight one of our speakers talked about this item and said this hasn't been discussed or enforced for decades. I was on the council the last time it was discussed 2019 April I think less than seven years ago. Not only was it discussed there were several businesses especially in District 4 along Main Street that were fined. They were fined and they were told to take down the signs or you're going to pay a fine. it was enforced. The district 4

council, I believe at the time, also supported it because she heard in many of the neighborhood meetings that this is they didn't like that. They didn't want windows being blocked. They had some problems in certain streets and certain areas in certain neighborhoods when the kids were walking to school and so on. We had this discussion. It wasn't decades ago. It was 2019, not even seven years ago. So, if there's going to be some enforcement, I would just like to see the city notify the managers and owners of the business, you can't do that. Take the signs down halfway, half the window. That's fine. I don't want them fined. I know because I've heard from some people, they're against this. I don't know how you can get be against it when I'm trying to warn the businesses. Do you know what might be coming? Maybe a hefty fine. And if you're going to have to remove them anyway, then don't take the fine. let's just do it now. Some people said we shouldn't have that ordinance. That was hinted at earlier during the public uh uh comments. That's a whole different story. The idea is we do have the ordinance. I've heard the city is close to enforcing it. I'm trying to help the small businesses. Take down the signage. Keep it at 50%. And let's not find them. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Council Bergman. Council Council, he haven't seen that. Okay. Well, yeah. Uh, thank you, Mr. Ch. Um, so yeah, I mean, there are there are definitely throughout the city um some businesses. So, I I guess I just have a couple questions of clarification to to the to the chair, to the city manager. Is it 50% I want to start off at that. Is it 50% of the of the windows are to be covered or not covered? I think that that's that might be incorrect or there isn't a number just

uh through the shift to the council. It depends on the establishment, but I would we would have to verify that through the law department in terms of our ordinance. We would have to look at the ordinance. Uh this is currently something that's currently being enforced by the license commission. Our purpose here um and I think what the council is trying to ask is is there an ability for us to continue to enforce or provide more proactive enforcement with the businesses uh because there are oftent times where the license commission is going in, they see these things happening and then there's further violations that are happening in the business because literally from top to bottom the entire windows are covered. Um and so we're seeing more of that. I'm hearing from some folks in community. It's come up in some neighborhood meetings. So again, this is something that we've uh tried to uh as part of inspirational services um you know uh thought about if finding other ways uh that we can try to enforce that and also have engaged businesses as part of that. Um but right now especially to the specific of the 50% I would have to verify that in the ordinance. I I don't have that at the top of mind right now.

Okay. Thank you. And uh do the chair to the city manager. Um, do we know when when businesses uh start up, do we know if this information is shared with them so they understand like what percentages um, you know, when they register with the city, do they do they have is that part of, you know, registering for the city and understanding some of the policies of signage and things like that? I know when there's sales of like uh the liquor store, they have to put the signs on how old you are, tobacco, and all that stuff, but are there shared information on what's allowed when it comes to signage? manager

through the sh of the council. We provide the information publicly. We don't provide that as a package for any business that's opening up a business to tell them these are the ordinances that are pertaining to your particular business. Uh and what you are required to do. Uh we don't have any kind of system set up that way. Um but currently right now all of the ordinances are available and so when we engage the businesses we try to encourage them to to pay attention to the ordinances that are pertaining to that business in terms of how they operate because some businesses uh are required to as part of the side owners to be to to to because of the establishment and what they do. Some some may not require that. Um, so again, it it's something that we encourage, but there's nothing right now as a kind of welcome package or something that we give them for them to be able to have knowledge of that.

Okay. No, that's fine. I think um, you know, um, I think the most important thing is is that I I don't want businesses being fined or hit. Um, I think they should be, you know, um, the same thing when I did a drive-thru with with, uh, the tobacco unit. We went in and they they notified them first, reminded them, you know, expectations of signage and things like that. um what they can sell, what they can't sell. Um so I did appreciate that that drive-through with them. But um I think that's something that we just make sure we focus on um so they know going forward and if if they don't, then yeah, a fine needs to be uh put in place. I think we talked a lot about fines all day today. So, I think we should uh make sure that we're at least sharing that information with the residents um because it's uh it's important and and and again, I think it looks better when you're driving down the street where you can see into into the uh into the stores and see people um interacting versus not being able to see and and know what's going on. So, thank you. I appreciate it.

Thank Mr. Manager

uh through Chanso. I appreciate that. And and actually one of the the spirit of this order is exactly what we want to do. We want to make sure that we inform people. We go out there, we let them know uh kind of what the side ordinance is, give them some warnings, some opportunity to course correct. Uh and then after multiple times where they have uh negated to correct the action or course correct or or change or and remove some of the signage, that's when we will then apply the fines. Uh so again, we're trying to uh be proactive in this in this effort. there's a number of businesses uh in the city in different pockets where from top to bottom the entire thing is covered. That also presents a public safety issue. If there was something that would have happened in it, we would have no visibility into the business entity. And so again, it's it's something that we want to make sure that uh we're consistent, but and I appreciate this order uh because it falls in line with what we're thinking and what we want to do uh as a city.

Thank you, Councelor Bergman. What about councelor Kane? [snorts]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I I mean, I appreciate uh this is one of those orders tonight that I will say that I appreciate the sentiment of it. I'm also happy to hear that the intent isn't to saddle and I think that word's been used or word similar to that, saddle business owners um with fines. However, and I'm going to oppose this for the following reason. It is saddling the code department. it sat on the code department to go out make inspections on something quite frankly I've personally never heard one person tell me councelor Bergman I've got a problem with such and such a business they have a sign that takes up more than half their window I mean we we take a vote every year on tax rates and and I am a part of the group that always supports the lowest residential rate and I know what happens to the commercial businesses how difficult it is for them to survive it's a choice I make but when it comes s to other ways to support small businesses. I do my best and one of the things I think is incredibly prohibitive um when it comes to small businesses is when you start inspecting these types of issues. Now, if there is a true public safety concern, I stand corrected and and perhaps um there should be letters that go out through the assessor's office to everybody that pays a commercial tax rate reminding them of the ordinance. Perhaps if they have to get a permit, if it's a liquor store or or another type of business or lottery store, whatever, that condition of their permit is that the check box is checked, that the windows aren't covered. We're going to go with a tape measure and measure the windows and the size of the sign. Maybe they're going to get a different size window. Maybe they're going to get bigger print signs. I mean, I I just think it's not a best use of the inspectional services. We've got residential units that are unsafe that we're doing our best to keep up with.

And now we're going to go take the resources of the inspectional services and have them go measure the signs versus the size of the windows. I personally think we can do better public safety wise by using the inspectional service personnel to go into residential units where people's lives are in danger. Uh if the case is made that this is a public safety issue, I I could stand to have my mind swayed, but at the moment I don't see it. Councelor King.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, happen to agree with councelor Bergman on this one. Um, I'm opposed to this. Um, you know, I I know for a fact the impact this will have amongst some of the business corridors in the city, our small businesses. Um, you think about Main South, that's actually this is targeting. when you think about um like it mentions Webster Square, Lincoln Street um etc. I certainly know that um I certainly have not heard about concerns for the sign ordinance as councelor Rosen mentioned since he last brought it up and I remember he's brought up more than one time on the when you were in um so it was a number of times but that's the only person I've ever heard it from Mr. chairman. And the one thing we know about sign ordinances as we heard tonight, there's vagueness attached to it. Um certainly appreciate there's going to be communication. I agree that it may it will um tax, for lack of a better word, uh the ability and capacity of code. Um I'm still waiting for my 110 report um on those inspections. So there's a lot to do there. Um I'm opposed to aggressive enforcement, Mr. Chairman. Um targeting our small businesses isn't it. Um through the chair to the administration, um is there any sort of ordinance about pulling down dark shades in the business where you can't see in through the chair? And what is that ordinance,

Mr. Manager? And are we enforcing it to share to the council? Yes. Uh that that is um sir, if you want to I do want to correct uh I do want to confirm uh council that the the percentage is 50%. The current active ordinance we have a current active ordinance the city of Mr. Chairman, can I reclaim my time? 50% uh to reclaim my time. Okay. Uh through the chair. Yes. The dark shades are primarily for liquor establishments and nightclubs and it's a safety issue. So there is uh license commission regulations and that's that's for those for the clubs and for

liquor establishments specifically. Yep. Okay. Outside of that, is there any ordinances um pertaining to that to those shades? Uh no, the sign ordinance is different than that.

Thank you. So is Mr. Chairman. Um thank you. Um I'm aware of the ordinance for the clubs. I know that they've been enforcing them on a couple of them um as has been communicated to me and rightly so. Um, but nothing prevents these same businesses from, you know, shading the business up. And, you know, the the idea that there's something perhaps nefarious going on or what have you, um, is concerning to me. I don't want to cast that light on it. And I was certainly proud to bring forward um, small business tax reliefs last term, um, that we were able to realize with the support of the city manager that'll impact close to 3,000 business, small businesses. Um but this sounds a also a little about about um perhaps government overreach in this way. I heard the I heard the comment that you know when we see this sort of uh violation that they go in and there might be other violations that they find. The tentacles of the government is is is reaching out. Um, and I personally have some reservations that way, Mr. Chairman. So, for all of those reasons, um, I will not be supporting this item. Um, and perhaps they're right. Maybe the sign ordinance does need to go. Um, and I'm certainly willing to explore that. Um and again um you know this being set upon and pushed on the small businesses um resulting in fines and the like is not something I think we need to go to right now. Um particularly with the challenges at hand um in in how we see these businesses um floundering and some who are successful here in the city. So it's a no for me. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay, councelor Rosen for second time. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, this came up. We talked about at length in 2019 when I was on the council and it wasn't Gary Rosen's order as you remember. Okay.

It was John Kelly who was commissioner of inspectional services brought in a report to the council. I think we all spoke about it and he was saying that I have the figures I think here somewhere he had if I remember it was 19 fines they had fined 19 people the inspectional services was already going in and that's what I've heard I've heard now that inspectional services andor license commission have been looking at these signs and they're ready to go in and find businesses and my colleague said I won't say which one My colleague said tonight that we don't want fines given to these small businesses. That's unnecessary fine. That's what it says in the freaking order. A signed ordinance without saddling any small businesses with fines. I'm trying to help the small businesses. I'm not trying to hurt them. I'm trying to strike first. Some of you are saying that I want them to catch these businesses. you don't think you're saying that and find them. I'm saying no, let's educate them. Let's tell them what the sign ordinance is. Let's not find them. Let's help small businesses, my colleagues, and you see a resolution coming up which is to help small businesses. So when you start accusing people, oh, they're against small business, they want to hurt small business, it's certain neighborhoods. That's ridiculous. It's ridiculous. I'm just saying we have an ordinance. It hasn't been enforced since 2019. I guess it's about to be enforced by colleagues.

It's about I can't look certain ways. You got to tell me which angles I know the rule is. Come on. It's about to be enforced and it might hurt small businesses with fines. Why don't we take a vote tonight to let them all know that you probably shouldn't keep 100% of your windows blocked. Okay? You probably shouldn't do that because you a fine might be imminent. That's all I'm saying. I'm not trying to hurt small businesses as some of you have been accusing people of for several years in the city council. Come on, let's change the attitude. Let's change the attitude of the Worcester City Council. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you, Council Rivera. Probably by Council King. Just for clar clarification purposes, is there a way to make the businesses aware without getting fined? I mean, I understand the order says without getting fined, but I obviously know the fine eventually is coming. So, from from the um chair, Mr. administration

through the ch of the council. Yes. And that is the purpose and that's some sometimes the action that the current license commission takes. Uh they go in, they verify and they let them know, hey, you can't have that. Now, sometimes the license commission goes in not because of the windows that are covered. They're going in because of other inspections that they have to do and then they see the windows and say, "Hey, you're not supposed to have that. You should rectify that. And if we come back and you don't have then there could be a potential fine." So again, it they're trying to advise the on the on the the the uh the business owners, but again, this is this is something that residents and neighborhood, they may not have come to some of the counselors, but the neighborhood meetings I've gone to, those are the things that come up, right? And and so there are residents and there are neighborhoods here where they're really concerned about that small business that always seems to have some traffic in and out and everything is covered and they don't know what's activities in those business. So they just want to be able to encourage us to fulfill what the ordinance says. 50% is the ordinance. Now if the council the will of the council is for me not to enforce the ordinance then should we have an ordinance or not? That's a decision that the council has to make. I I don't think we should remove the ordinance. What I think is we should enforce the ordinance like every other ordinance that we have that the council and the public wants us to enforce. Again, this is something that it's be come up that again the council has bringing up and the council has brought it up for the sake of us providing some education, some warnings so that they can begin to uh uh to remove those things from their windows.

Thank you. Thank you, Councelor King.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, through the chair to the administration. Um before I get to that, I just want to respond to some of the other comments. Look, it's clear we know where um a majority of these businesses are located. Um and those are in business corridors throughout the city. Um again, I'm concerned with any sort of aggressive enforcement. Um I can certainly appreciate educating folks. Um but again there's a lot of things that we're asking as councelor Miter mentioned earlier for our city to do um through the charity administration is this because the way it seems based on this particular order that there is a new focus on this. So to the administration, um, is this part of business as usual or as the council mentioned, he's had some discussion with some stakeholders and this may be a new point of emphasis and that's my um interpretation of it, not necessarily his wording to the chair.

Mr. Manager,

uh, through the chair to the council, the license commission actively uh, enforces this this ordinance. What we're seeing is we're seeing an increase in this in many different uh business quarters across the city. Uh small businesses, smoke shops, etc. Um and so because we're seeing that increase, we want to be able to get ahead of it and provide information, warnings, uh let people know that you can't do this, tell them what the ordinance is so that we don't see that continue to escalate in the business quarters. Uh and so the what this order is trying to ask us is basically asking us I'm just taking interpretation of the counselor uh ask us to to to to provide some information uh outside of an actual violation or or an actual uh citation

through the chair. Um so you're saying to not enforce it and take some other action. Is that right, Mr. Manager? Is that is that what you just said? I want

Yeah. Through the to the council. I think I think part of the enforcement is education, right? You have to provide your education upfront. You provide the warnings. You let people know so they understand the ordinances, but if they don't then rectify or mitigate the issue, then then we then can come back to say, "Hey, you haven't done it, you you're going to be fined." Um, and so the this my understanding from the spirit of this is to do exactly that. educate, tell them what the ordinance is, tell them that these are the things that are uh that within the city ordinance with for their establishments and that if they don't remove that or or pivot or rectify the issue, then we would then come to enforce. Thank you. To the chair to the administration, can you speak to the uptick that you mentioned? What are the dimensions of that?

Mr. manager uh through the cher council. It's just we've seen uh in different quarters of the uh the business quarters in the city um that we've seen some businesses we've seen an increase in number of businesses with that. We don't have uh uh an actual uh data to to sit here and tell you this is x x amount of businesses that have covered their entire uh uh uh their entire windows. But again, we're seeing that and so we want to be proactive. And so if the if the inspectors are seeing uh these businesses that are covering the windows, we would then go in and provide some education and and information on the ordinance. Thank you. Thank you, Councelor Bergman.

I don't I [clears throat] don't mean to rise a second time on on issue like this, but um I just want to kind of clarify one or two things. I um I certainly not suggest anybody here, particularly Council Rosen, is opposed to small business. My concern in this item is the fact that it has to involve code enforcement and there are other ways I believe you could uh spend code enforcement's time and resources better. Uh when Worcester Worcester's downtown was probably thriving the most it ever was. We've all seen pictures TNG puts you know then and now column. We have books in Facebook. You can see pictures all the time in various Facebook posts of downtown Worester the early 1900s. bustling with people. Markets everywhere. There are signs covering front windows everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. Everywhere. Go to New York City. Go to Boston. Go to Brooklyn, New York. Go anywhere with this major business. There are signs everywhere. I just think it's a bad message to say that we're going to go around with a tape measure measuring the size of your sign versus the size of your window. Unless and until it's proven to me there's a real public safety issue. If it's a cression of criminality, then there shouldn't be a back door way to get in there. There should be some other way to go in there and see if there's some illegal activity going on. But it's not the nature of this ordinance that bothers me. It's the fact of the unintended consequences and the resources being employed by the code department. Council Rosen mentioned an order coming up a resolution. I'm going to support the resolution because I don't believe we should be like a nanny state and a nanny city. Let people function and operate their businesses within reason. There's nothing proving to me that this is a problem. What if before the election somebody put up signs for us in their front windows in their business and left them up to the appropriate amount of time, which I

think is two months. So, we're going to say, "Oh, something illegal is going on in there because we can't see in there." That's that's permissible. So, I don't buy the argument that because somebody's windows are covered, there's necessarily some illegal activity. If there is, then police department and and others should have the evidence form probable cause to go in. But it shouldn't be based on the size of the sign. Again, I'm going to finish by just saying this. I think the resources of the code department are better spent making sure stairways, fire escapes, means of egress for residents are clear and free of debris and are are up to code that people can exit and enter buildings safely than it is measuring windows and uh signage. Thank you.

Thank you, Council.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll just be real quick. Um I I don't think it was uh mentioned that um illegal activity is is is taking place or there was concern for that. Maybe maybe it was mentioned, maybe I missed it and I apologize. But um I I will say that I I've received uh many of text messages and phone calls regarding um signage on on a lot of the businesses um covering um most of the of the of the storefronts and stuff like that. So, um, and and just doing the work that I've done on on Pleasant Street with some of the TDI were, that's what the focus was on. It was it was opening up those windows and letting people see the different uh the different businesses and and bringing them more alive, taking off the the the the gates or the grates in front of the windows and putting up newer windows with some signage, but also having an opportunity for uh businesses to um showcase what they have inside. If you're walking down the street, you could see what's going on. Um, not just what's going on, but what's what they're selling. Uh, maybe, you know, there's a network center that that's having an event. If you're walking by and it's all covered up, you really can't see it. But it's also opportunities to for for making it more inviting. Um, when things are are are closed up and bottled up, they don't seem as inviting. Um, so that's the work that's been done on on Pleasant Street with the TDI and um, and I really appreciate that. Now, um, again, I think this is we're kind of getting sidetracked. This is to help the small business understand that this is coming down the road, right? And we want to support you. I understand you um, Councelor Bergman's um, you know, what he's saying, but this isn't, you know, attacking the businesses. This just is letting know, hey, we're not happy about it, but we're letting you know this could potentially happen. So, I guess my

question to the city man to to the um to to the mayor is um how often h have you been experiencing this and how many times has um an inspector gone in and how many chances or how many times has have they been notified? Is it we see you next time we come you get fined? Because I I don't I don't think that's that's been happen as as often. Um but again, it's just to notify them. Hey, this could potentially happen. But again, this is a good conversation because it's like what what what other things can we do? How can we notify our business owners? And I think, you know, we're we're all mentioning that, you know, our small business. How what better ways as a city can we do that? And that's honestly as as as district counselors to let them be aware, start knocking on their doors, meeting with some of the businesses and say, "Hey, these are the things that going on. How can we help you? How can we help you with better signage? What can we do as a city to help you, you know, um with your marketing and more signage?" So, I mean, there's always a positive uh twist of things that we can do as a city, not just uh try to knock things down. So, sorry, but can you answer that question if you remember it,

Mr. Manager? Luc, I can't answer to the specifics of the data that you're asking for right now. Uh we I would have to provide a report. We would have to analyze that, understand uh what are the work orders that has been established or some of the violations that the license commission that I would have to compile that and put that together. Uh because right now off top of my head I don't have that data.

No, that's right. I mean I wouldn't want that. I think um for me as a counselor I would probably um maybe work with inspectional services to figure out you know at least in my district how can I support these businesses understand you know what what's coming down the road? How can I support them? And then again, what what other ways of u advertisement we can we can help whether it be signage on the on on the walls of the business, A-frames outside, like think of creative ways to help these businesses um versus just regulating to uh 50% of the windows, right? So, I would love to maybe set up a meeting with them as well. Thank you. Thank you, Council Rivera. Uh uh officer had asked a question, answered it. Okay, so we're good.

Thank you. So, I guess this is an up or down vote that we're doing. Okay. So, a yes vote would be support council Rosen. A no vote would to support um council Bergman. Okay. And council king too. No, it's just on the item. [laughter] It's not about supporting anybody. Mr. I'm just trying to get everybody's news. So, I'm just want people understand how they're voting. That's all. That's not how it works. Um roll call. Cergman. No. Council Bada. Yes. Councilor Economo. Yes. Councilor Vo. Yes. Councilor King. No. Council Mitra. Yes. Councilor Ha. Yes. Councelor Rivera. Yes. Councilor Rosen.

Yes. Councilor Tumi. Yes. And Mayor Penny. Yes.

Okay. 9P request the manager consider expand the city's senior work off abatement program to allow for taxpayers aged 60 years or older to volunteer their services to the city for a reduction in their taxes. Councelor Bergman, thank you. Hopefully this is less controversial. Mr. Mayor, um it was a program that's been working well. I don't think there's a limit to the number of people we can put on the program and and help seniors work off their taxes uh up to the maximum amount, which I believe is $2,000. um if they want to. It's not forced upon them. It's simply a question of trading off the cash that would come into the city coffers versus the work that would be put out um by the senior residents being over 60 now. I I don't like to use that word senior, but I guess I guess that is the cut off. So hopefully we can expand it and uh work with city manager can work with perhaps the assessor and the treasur figure out. I think we had 20 people last year if that sounds right. uh see if we can I would like to say see if we could double it but I'll certainly open to any suggestions within reason. Thank you.

Thank you council a purpose. I just want to sign on to it. So okay so we'll sign as amended sign to the manager. All those in favor opposed 9q request the city manified council to report reviewing the large number of streets with permanent winter parking ban signs. determine if such signage is needed given how few snow days have recently occurred and the challenges associated with on street parking. Council Bergman,

of course, I put it on and now we've had a number of snow days, but in general over the last four or five years, you know, we've had I think I checked last year we had on average about four or five snow days. A lot of the streets are permanent no parking, winter parking bans. And I recall being on traffic and parking and I had an order a couple years ago similar to this where it seemed to me that many of the streets where the no parking both sides of the street were not major arteries. They were streets where easily it could be parking on one side or we could remove the winter parking ban altogether. Understanding that it would be declared parking ban would still require them to take the cars off the street. The problem with the winter parking ban either on one or both sides is it's automatic. You cannot put your cars there all winter. Now, if we're only having four or five or six snowstorms a year, it seems to me problematic that where parking is limited on many of these side streets, we're telling people, find other places to put your cars um because there's a permanent winter parking ban. My understanding, and I remember having this conversation with DPW um at the time, was that many of these streets were added to the list many many years ago, and clearly we had more significant numbers of storms and and types of storms than we do now. And I just think it's a time to revisit and look. I know there is public safety issues. Some of the streets really can't afford to have a car on either side. But I recall looking at the list of some of them and many of these streets, you'd be surprised the fact that how minimal traffic goes through those streets and nevertheless is permanent parking bans on both sides of the streets. And lastly, let me just say with those permanent winter parking bans come tickets. And if we can take some of the cars off the street uh [clears throat] not jeopardize public safety and avoid the consequence of people getting tickets, I think it's a win for everyone. Thank you. Okay. So, I send that to the manager. Those in favor oppose, so ordered. Next, I'm requesting manager work with

Massport to repair or replace the existing signage in the vicinity of 411 Challenge Street to direct the motorist to the Worester Regional Airport as the sign has become illegible. Council Rivera, pretty much as it reads. Uh, uh, I put a picture of the attachment so you guys can see it. Okay, gotcha. So, that's the manager. All those in favor post so ordered. Request to manage request commission public works um repair, replace or upright the post with knocked over in the front of 39 Indian Hill Road. Council Okono as it reads, Mr. Chairman.

All those in favor? Opposed? So ordered. Request manager request commissioner parks recreation cemetery cut down two dead trees at Roosevelt Park on Indian Hill Road. Council Cono as it reads. Those in favor post or ordered. Council C. Wister does hereby recommend and encourage the WISA board of health consider reviewing and changing the 500 foot buffer zone restriction passed in 2023 that prohibits new retail tobacco licenses within 500 ft of other tobacco retailers and effort to promote economic development to support women and minority owned businesses and to retain and create jobs and to promote the city's vision of the 18hour downtown. Council Rosen.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Jim, this came recently a few months ago in front of the Worcester Board of Health when I was a member of the board of health and as you heard from I believe the one of the owners of Noah Meco and one of the employees and you heard from Alex Guadiola who's represents them and we heard from the Chamber of Commerce representative too and Noah Meesco is located right next creed in lower Pleasant Street down towards Harrington Corner. Been there for a while. They have live music and uh it's been a struggle downtown. Struggle downtown business. And next door, the Creed has a smoking bar. And the city of Worcester through the rules of the board of health, the rules of department of public health allows about 15 smoking bars in the city of Worcester. 15 of them and I think we're at 12. We have 12. Noah Meco said, "Boy, we're having trouble. We're struggling. We're a downtown business. We're minorityowned. We're female owned." Just what worries, they help out these businesses, all businesses, especially if they're minority owned and female owned. So they said, "What can we do to increase our business so we can keep our 18 employees stay in business?" and they said, "Well, let's try to add a smoking bar like our next door neighbor, the Creed has." They came in front of the board of health. It had nothing to do the the discussion had nothing to do about the evils of nicotine and tobacco. We all know that. Everyone on the board of health, everyone on this council, we know about the the evils of nicotine and tobacco. That wasn't the discussion. The discussion was does the board of health maybe adjust its rules take a look at

its rules see what it can do because it has a lot of authority has a lot of power the board of health okay it's not advisory so Noah Meco said we talked to the city about opening a smoking bar because there's still two or three more openings we want we weren't we didn't ask to be the only smoking bar in Worcester that might have been a different hurry. I wish we didn't have any, you know, cigarette sales, smoking bars, but we do. We do. It's legal. We have that fine. So, they asked the city and evidently someone from the city said, "You have to put in a ventilation system. If you're going to have a smoking bar, you got to have the right ventilation ventilation for health." And I guess they did that. Now, I don't know the figure. I didn't hear it tonight from the speakers, but I was I thought it was close to $60,000 they invested in a new ventilation system for Noah Meco to get their smoking bar. No one said, "Well, you're right next to the Creed. They have a smoking bar, so you can't." So, they come in front of the board of health and they make their case and they had probably 10 out of the 18 employees that all spoke and said, "We want to keep our jobs and so on." And the board of health and they're good people. good people on the board of health. Uh the board of health said, "Well, you know, our business isn't economic development, it's health." And they turned the whole thing around, the whole discussion with Dr. Castile, who I highly respect, Dr. Hirs, who I highly respect. They said, "We don't want another smoking bar because the creed is there and nicotine and tobacco and smoking are unhealthy. We know they're unhealthy. But you can have it if you move 500 ft up the street. It's all you got to do. Even though it's unhealthy, even though we don't want it, just take the Noah Mexico business and go 500. It's less than two

football fields. So that makes it okay. So I started to think about the 500 foot, you know, uh, buffer zone. And I said, "This is ridiculous." I said, "People now can go to the creed right downtown, a legitimate good business for our 18-hour downtown someday. We don't have that many businesses downtown. Let's keep them all, the ones we have. They can go to the cree and do the smoking." So why should noco have to go 500 feet away? It's not that far. It's less than two football fields. They've invested money. It was a five member board of health at the time. Mike Prada, former city councelor Gary Rosen at the time, former city council, who have learned here in the city of Worcester that economic development is always important to everyone. It's always important and we've always supported it. So, we couldn't vote against Nova Mexico. We said, let's give them the permit. We want to keep the 18 jobs. You want to keep business downtown. We want to support minority owners. We want to support uh female owners. If they move up the street, what's the difference? 500 feet. Let's keep them open. Three to two. The board of health said, "Nope. Economic development's not our bag. It's anti- tobacco and nicotine."

You're in your psychop

since Okay. And I'm almost done. They uh the board of health gives out hundreds of tobacco licenses. Smoking bars. Okay. retail, cigarettes, whatever else we do. They give out hundreds of these licenses. Their business is economic development. We work with businesses all the time. And the good thing, we got two letters that night, the board of health from this city council supporting the board of health, understanding and supporting economic development in downtown Worcester. And those two during this difficult political campaign we were going through, those two letters of support came from two candidates for mayor. They agreed. Mayor Petty, councelor King. They both agreed. And I said had the letters in hand and I brought it up that night and I said, "Here's two people who have opposing ideas running against each other for mayor." I said, "But they both got it right. Let's support businesses in downtown Worcester. This council does not have the right to overrule the board of health. Okay? We don't have that right. But we can make recommendations and they're reasonable people. There's two openings on the board of health, too. My opening and another person moved out of Worcester so she couldn't continue in the board health. So, there's only three members now, but soon there'll be five members. and maybe they can take a look at the 500 foot buffer. And in the case of Noah Meco, give them a chance. Give them a a year chance. We did something else early with 90 days, right? Let's give them a chance. They've invested in the expensive ventilation equipment. Okay, let's support them. Board of Health, if you're watching tonight, and I know at least one is, please reconsider the 500 foot buffer.

You're hurting no Mexico and that could be hurting businesses in the future. I know tobacco is evil. I know nicotine is evil and unhealthy. That isn't the question. That's not what this order, this resolution, pardon me, this resolution is addressing. It's addressing economic development and help for business here in the city of Worester. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Next up, we have uh Council Carmel, followed by Council Bada, followed by Council Rivera, followed by Council King. I just want to sign on to the item. Just want to sign on. Thank you. That was easy enough. Council Bada.

Yeah, I'm opposed to this because what's going to happen, and this might not happen on the west side of town, but it definitely happens on the east side where you have tons of these little smoke shops that are unsightly. They have terrible lighting. There's one on Hamilton Street near my neighborhood. They light up the whole block at night. Uh they sell to underage kids. A lot of these businesses, I'm not talking about Nomeco and bars. I'm talking about little smoke shops. And and if I'm correct, that will also that includes these little smoke shops through the chair to the city manager. Is that correct, Mr. Manager?

Through through the chair, to the council. Um I think that's what we want to do uh as part of as as part of I I think this conversation or this resolution here is to address them separately. Uh I think currently right now we address but we want to also moving forward address this 500 rule and address the business and what the use of that business what they're doing uh differently because right now they're all being assessed the same way. And so no matter if it's a smoke shop, no matter if it's a lounge, no matter is if it's a grocery store, no matter if it's a a gas station, they're all being assessed the same way. Um, uh, right now the only decision is the 500 foot kind of parameter. Um, not the actual business itself. And that's an area that I think we're more interested is in addressing the actual uh, business uh, in terms of what they do and what they sell.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, Council King. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um, just have some some questions here. Um, certainly I support this business, Nomeco and Creed. Um, I believe Creed's also in support of Nomeco having this opportunity. They certainly invested a lot of money. Um Juliuskuma over at Nomeco has been one of the most reputable um proprietors of this sort of business, the bar and lounge um that we've had in the city. Um, one of the things that I I wanted to kind of note was, you know, when you look at these sorts of establishment, the lack of distinguishing between the various types, you know, Nomecos is an over 21 uh club. It's not a store where you can go in and purchase things um without proper ID. Um and again they've been very um you know responsible that way. My understanding as well is that creed and pleasant things were grandfathered in as an exception to the 500 ft rule. Um and all of that kind of plays into this. So, um, part of what was supposed to occurred from the board of health was, uh, recommendations as relates to this ordinance. So, I have two questions to the administration. Has the board of health provided any recommendations with regards to any amendment or anything pertaining to um this 500t restriction since uh, Nomeco came before that? Two, is there an appeals process for Nomeco for variance?

Is that possible? Um and then uh three um if you could share for the public's purposes the difference what uh influence you have or don't have on the board of health. My understanding is that's a separate entity that you do not have control of because there was a statement made earlier and I don't want any misperceptions that we would like this to happen. we would like them to do this that and the third and I just want to clarify for the public's purposes um my understanding is that that's a independent entity through the chair. Uh Mr. Manager

uh yes through the chair through the council uh to answer the last question uh the city administration has no authority in uh providing or creating regulations for the border health. The board of health creates their own regulations. Um the city administration has the ability to recommend uh and then they have to vote it on. They are regulatory body and so they have uh the ability to make those regulatory decisions even outside of the council floor as well. They can make those regulatory uh decisions. Um so in answering uh your first question uh relative to uh I I apologize the first one was um

recommend

oh the recommendation yes recommendation yes yes recommendation board of health so the board of health specifically the board of health has not provided any recommendations the division of public health has been working with the law department in creating a set of recommendations that we will put forward before for the border of health for them to react to. Uh but the board of health specifically, they themselves are not pro have not created or provided any recommendations. They have supported this 500 foot rule. Um and so in my conversations with the board chair, we have uh communicated that we we would like to change the process and that we're going to be putting forward a recommendation to the board of health uh uh to change uh some of the regulations or the way the regulation is being uh uh enforced currently. Thank you. And is there uh is a variance allowable? And if so, how much time must pass before it's revisited by the business through the chair?

Yeah. Through the chair to the council. Actually, one of the challenges um that we faced in this situation is uh we as an administration in in advocating and trying to support some of our small businesses um is that there is no variance process. Um once they make a decision, the decision is made and that's it. Um and so there's no uh opportunity for the business to actually appeal that actual decision of the of the board of health. Um and so again and there's no kind of seek of a variance where the where the where the entity itself is trying to seek hey I am just doing hookah. It's very different than retail. Could that be a special permit or variance based on the condition or kind of the the the the business model that we're trying to uh achieve? And and and and there isn't a process for that. And so once they make a decision, the decision is final. And again, that's something that again we want to evaluate as part of our recommendation to evaluate so that they there is a process. Currently like there is processes in the license commission for liquor licenses. Uh there's a whole plethora of pro of ways in which you can either appeal hearings, you can you know there's a whole bunch of series of of of of different processes that happen through the legal license process. So again that's that's something that currently right now does not exist.

Thank you. and um through the chair to the administration with respect to the um communication with um the board chair. Could you share a little bit more about that? Cuz as the councelor Rosen mentioned, um those are folks that are very focused on public health. Um we haven't heard a lot of that tonight in this discussion. Um there was concern back then. I'd spoke to folks about um politicizing this. Some folks pointed out that the folks that voted for it were former counselors. Um and then you have myself and the mayor looking to support these folks. So if you could speak to the public health aspects of this from your perspective as the um city manager was the Mr. Manager.

Yeah. To this chair to the council. I think one of the things that we try to do in the administration, we try to balance the needs of the community uh but also take in consideration um some of the aspects in terms of promoting business and supporting them but also at the same time supporting our public health and some of the regulations and and the protections that public health uh officials want us to adhere to. I think I think the the the where where the with this order or this uh uh order or this ordinance started was that there was a a number a series of numbers of uh businesses where young uh uh individuals were attending um or being sold items, tobacco items that they were in violation. And so the idea was to create an ordinance that would one uh cap the number of businesses in the city uh that that provided or pro sold uh these types of tobacco products and then and then two try to have a little bit of better enforcement and separation so that it's not completely segregated in one particular neighborhood uh where you have x amount of uh tobacco businesses in one particular neighborhood but I but it's spread out across the city. Um, and so that was the nature or the essence of what this was created. But I think there was unintended consequences that we as a administration have seen in terms of balancing the interests of businesses like we're seeing here with New Mexico as a clear indication of a challenge where where you're in a you're in a downtown business quarter or you're in the downtown quarter where there's the night life is in downtown, right? And uh and this business has been operating for many many years. great work in terms of the stuff that they're doing there. Um, they've invested, they want to expand their their their uh their ability of offerings and then now they're faced with this challenge and and so I I I think us at administration is we want to be able to balance that and have a

regulations that have better processes and and better direction uh for the small businesses when they're trying to uh operate a tobacco license uh here in the city. And and so in being uh in in addition to that, I I've met regularly with the board chair. We've shared some conversations about this and what our position is as a city and what we think we should recommend and what we think should come forward and uh for them to consider. Um uh they're they've been open uh to that conversation. Um sometimes they're, you know, they they've they've they've shared their positions with me. Um but right now we feel as though that uh there's a there's a better process and so we're going to try to recommend that to them and hopefully um that's something that uh that has been able to they they can be able to see that there's a benefit and that businesses and supporting businesses and supporting public health is not mutually exclusive. You can do both and I think this is what we're trying to achieve you as a city.

Thank you Mr. Chairman. I think with that explanation, I can I definitely can support this. Um, you know, I'm interested to see what we can come of with regards to adult establishments um here in the city as relates to um the 500 foot buffer. Um, and I don't want anyone to make any mistake about it. This is not to undermine the authority of the board of health. I've had folks reach out to me and ask me to file this because it's outside of our purview. Um, I don't think that's the answer. Um, I agree with um giving Nomecos a chance and and similar situated um businesses in a way that that that does not um you know have an impact on on folks underage um and public health related public health matters. And I also don't want um again just to reiterate anyone to think um that this body is going to is is attempting to undermine the public health interest of the city. So um I will be supporting that with those um clarifications. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Councelor Bergman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I I too support this and since it's a resolution I arise [clears throat] to support it without amending or or um asking for any other authority to uh to rise. I will say that uh I tried and believe I have been consistent my time on the council. I I think there are times where regulations are warranted but they by and large should be done by the state. Um there was a vote taken on this floor regarding flavored tobacco. There was a vote taken on this floor regarding uh new gas stations, all of which I said at the time and many of those votes I was in the minority as far as the number voting. Um and perhaps on the losing side of some of those uh I said in all those occasions that if we're going to regulate anything, it should be done through the state, not through the city because invariably people go elsewhere. Flavored tobacco being an example, they may not be able to buy it in Worcester, so they go to the surrounding towns and do business there. if it was banned statewide. That's a whole another story. Um I I never liked um this [clears throat] not because I in favor of tobacco. I am one person that can honestly say something similar to Bill Clinton. I don't think I've inhaled it. If I have, it was infrequently. Um so I don't smoke. Nobody in my family smokes. Although my my children, despite the fact I advise them otherwise, do like to take a vape. Um but I I'm not a smoker and nor is my wife. But I I do think it's unfair to have these arbitrary uh requirements like 500 ft. And I say arbitrary because why not a thousand? Why not beyond that? Why why at all? Um this isn't going to stop people from smoking uh or or using a hookah bar. They just go to the one that's already there that's grandfathered in. So I don't think it's really helping solve the problem at all. And I also say it's inconsistent because you know we allow marijuana facilities. we don't worry

about the dangers of people under 25 using marijuana. Uh probably one of the biggest abusers um of public health nationwide and city Worcester is no exception is fast food restaurants which which do a terrible service to people that eat there and we don't choose to regulate fast food restaurant restaurants and I'm glad we don't. Um, but I'm just saying that there are many things we can we can choose that aren't in the public safety as far public health as far as what they sell or what they produce. So, I do support this. I don't think there's any harm in in relaxing this rule. I think there were a lot of things done over the last council or two that to me bothered me because they kind of mirror it in my mind. Others may disagree kind of the nanny state mentality that we're going to tell you what's good for you. And I think people always find a way whether they smoke or whether it's alcohol or whether it's hookah or whether it's flavored tobacco to find what they want legally elsewhere if we regulate it in Worcester. Again, I'm all for doing certain things statewide, but I'm I'm not for doing things selectively city by city and as a representative of the city of Worcester, I certainly support the resolution. Thank you.

Okay, Council Tumi, all set. Okay. I just Oh, son. Okay. Well, you're on Mac. Everybody's okay. Council Rivera, I just want to know I don't know if it's an amendment or anything like that, but or or a suggestion, but is it possible so they can remember this is I know this is going for the board of health to review. Um but maybe even possibly if they they don't want us do this is uh a 500 buffer for if it's you know uh remember this is 21 and over like they how do how do you tell adults you can't you can't smoke you know we don't you understand what I'm saying? Yeah.

It's like I don't know if it's 21 and over establishment although smoking should be anyways they don't they don't they don't meet those 500. They don't need the 500 buffer zones. You know, I think that's what we're that's what we're trying to do, I think, with this resolution, right? Mr. Mr. Major.

Yeah. Through the chits of council. Yeah. Is we're trying to we're trying to create uh the resolution is is is basically trying to support um some of the discussions that has happened on the on the board of health and some of the discussion with the small businesses about that we need to kind of rethink the process of the 500 ft. Um uh because again the if if you have a lounge that has hookah, should that lounge be treated just the same as a gas station that sells tobacco? Two completely different Exactly. Right. One of them you can actually potentially have someone go in and buy a product that might be underage.

It's very unlikely you're going to be underage or 15 or 16 years old and walk into a hookah lounge because there's going to be a bouncer there checking IDs and etc. Right. And so right now we treat everything the same. Uh and we treat and we say the 500 foot rule is the rule no matter what business is what. So you could potentially have two smoke shops that have 500 fleet. Is that the best for that neighborhood? Right. Uh is it diversity of businesses etc. And and also what we're trying to think about is you know I understand sometimes the concentration of certain businesses right but hookah lounges are more so in the nightlife area. Um, you know, do we want a hookah lounge, you know, all the way up Burnt Cole Street or or or a Massoya Street or I don't know, right? And those are the things that if it's if it's a downtown and we're trying to create a a night life, a 18 hour downtown in the city so that all of us and anybody can enjoy and go out to eat and enjoy all the things that downtown has to offer. you know, are we are we saying no because of the thousand foot rule and moving businesses different spaces of the city or may not be the right place for that because it should be in the downtown area. So again, we want to look at it differently and I think the best applicable kind of process that we have is the liquor license process. It's a very thorough process. it's highly regulated and there's different mechanism that people can utilize and and and not every business is treated the same uh because of those things that I've mentioned and and then also there's appeals process there's hearings there's things that allow the businesses to to come back to a liquor license uh and this there's also enforcement that the that the license commission has around liquor license so again this provides a little bit better process that I think right now currently uh does not have

yeah I agree obviously I'm not a smoker uh But I I think uh hurting small businesses or bringing business to city wester was what's important as well, you know. So it's a good balance. But thank you, Council King for a second time.

Mr. Chairman, just real quickly through the administration. Um some of the concerns again have been upon this body infringing on the autonomy of public health. Um you have some recommendations you're working on. Can you kind of once again reiterate and speak to um sort of the parameters around your administration and and the board. I think folks understand our we stated we don't have jurisdiction. Um so if you could just speak once again so that folks are not being misled at all that this is a vote um that's changing anything.

Yeah. Through the chair to the council. So the board of health is a regulatory board. They have the ability to set regulations and then the city uh creates uh and enforces those regulations. Uh just like the council body uh you have the ability to vote ordinances. Um the city manager recommends that, right? And so we'll submit a recommendation to the board of health, but it's up to the board of health to decide uh if this is a recommendation that they want to take forward. They can choose not to and they can continue on the 500 foot rule. And that's something that again we would have to then work with our businesses and our community. Um but I think right now I think what what the resolution is speaking to is I think the bo the council body wants to share their thoughts uh like it was shared in letters to the board of health as a body to say hey you know maybe there's an opportunity to look things differently uh from the regulators the legislators of the city which is the council body and then the city administration to provide some recommendations. So, I think that's the kind of the the nature of what we're trying to do. Um, but again, at the end of the day, the board of health has the right to make that decision.

And lastly, I know that um once again, I know that Creed established it right next door was in support of this as well, but in terms of the um competition that might occur if this is lifted in a way, um you know, I know there's a cap. Maybe that's going to change the cap. I don't know how you would do one without the other, but I don't know. That's I guess something that we'll see. But um would certainly be interested in a report around um how buffer zones impact economic vitality uh vitality of small businesses that are closely situated. Um you know, I think it says a lot that you have two businesses, two minority owned businesses that are in support of one another here. um but would like that in the form of a report to inform this body and go to committee because I think that's also a critical component in addition to what you mentioned about a proliferation in the past we've had proliferation of um alcohol establishments um these smoking sorts of of businesses or places that are selling tobacos um that's similar to the sign ordinances are in certain locations in the city and that's part of the reasons as you mentioned that we we put the cap on it. Um so um I certainly support this one and um leave the small business alone with the signage.

Okay, we're going to uh roll call the resolution. Yes, we support the resolution and no vote would not support the resolution. Roll call. Councelor Bergman, yes. Councelor Bada, yes. Councor Cono, yes. Folo, yes. Council King, yes. Council Mitra, yes. Oh, yes. Council Rivera, yes. Councelor Rosen, yes. Council Tumi, yes. Mayor Petty, yes. Okay, we are on 12A. Motion is to advertise the proposed ordinance. All those in favor, oppose. So ordered. I'm sorry. Do a roll call on that. Roll call. Councelor Bergman. Yes. Councelor Bada. Yes. Councelor Cona. Yes.

Councelor Folo. Yes. Councelor King, yes. An Mitra, yes. Aa, yes. Uncle Rivera, yes. Answer Rosen, yes. Answer Tumi, yes. And Mayor Petty, yes. 12B, refer to traffic and parking. Those in favor of post ordered. Uh 13 C is held under privilege regarding the ordinances of 2008 to modify 15-minute parking, 30 minute immediate parking, two-hour immediate parking, and commercial load zone on portions of Water Street. the motions to council king.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I I I I held this um I was in opposition without the appropriate I didn't have enough information. Um I have spoken to the counselor uh Folo and I spoken with um traffic and was it traffic and mobility whatever it's called and um Mr. Batista um and I spoke to some of the businesses down there um over the weekend and I just wanted to be clear about how this would play out. So, I'm just going to ask to the chair, to the administration, if you could just clarify um that this is in support of businesses and and kind of moving people along. We know we have significant parking issues there for folks that are working in that area um as well as folks who are frequenting the businesses. So, if you could just like in 45 seconds just explain the sequencing of this, how we're moving from 15 minutes to 30 to to I don't know if it's an hour or two, whatever the case may be.

Yeah. Yeah, through the chair to the council. We've heard from a lot of the business and residents in the area in terms of some of the challenges uh when we first instituted some of these uh ordinances uh when we were looking at overall the parking in the canal district uh in in in relation to uh to the polar park. And so one of the things that we wanted to do here is we're kind of uh changing some some of these elements uh in terms of the 15-minut 30 minute to provide more opportunity for the businesses. So there's flow uh uh and opportunity for more parking uh more time uh but also in the areas where there is too much time reduce the time uh because it's impacting the business in a negative way. So we wanted to uh support some of the work that they're doing there.

Thank you. And I think one of the most important one one of the important aspects of this is also um for loading commercial loading zones um adjusting that that's been a huge challenge there. has caused a lot of uh traffic impediment, pedestrian impediment. Um so I appreciate the time that I had to review this. Thank you. Okay. So motion is to advertise. Roll call. Councelor Bergman. Yes. Council Bada. Yes. Councelor Economo. Yes. Vaso. Yes. King. Yes. Mitra. Yes. Aa. Yes. Mr. Rivera, yes. Mr. Rosen, yes. Tumi,

yes. And Mayor Penny, yes. Chairman, motion to suspend the rules if we're almost done. Yes. Motion suspend the rules. Roll call. Councelor Bergman. Yes. Councelor Bada. Yes. Councelor Econom. Yes. Councor Vo. Yes. Councelor King. Yes. Councelor Mitra. Yes. Council A. Yes. Councelor Rivera. Yes. Councelor Rosa. Yes. Tumi. Yes. And Mary Petty. Yes. Council King followed by Council Vizor.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's uh come to my attention today that there are some needs um and some communication that might be helpful to our students over at West Public Schools. Um we know that um there are financial challenges on the city side and on the school side. This motion is simply just to request city manager explore uh with the superintendent any additional city revenue streams that might be available in the interests of extracurricular activities towards the public schools. Mr. Chairman, I know that there are currently ongoing conversations um between uh the city and the schools and I just would like to add that this council supports that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Can we maybe amend that in the future? council came to say that we should develop some fund that maybe in the future maybe not on the city side on the school side that if we have these extracurricular activities we have this money available. Sure. Sure. Like Yes. Thank you. And I don't know if there's a way to get something to committee on this to my education committee but maybe um you want you want to move this quickly though. Yeah. No, I want this to move. I'm just wondering if I can add to the motion. Um, and yeah, maybe an update on potential uh sources or communication because we know it's always a battle between the money. Thank you.

Okay. All those in favor as amended. Also ordered. Council Pole.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Through you. Uh in the last week or so, we've had a few snowstorms and uh uh I've received phone calls from uh many constituents regarding uh snow removal and ice and uh sanding and salting of their streets and uh this weekend it uh increased uh you know several calls this weekend. So with that, I would ask the city manager to request the commissioner of public works to provide city council with a report concerning the department's performance during uh this past weekend, January 17th and 18th, 2026 snow events, including but not limited to one, why pre-treatment of roads did not occur, two the timing of the start of snow operations, three the sufficiency of the number of snow equipment operators and four the sufficiency of the number of pieces of equipment. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Okay. So, I'll go all those in favor of postal ordered. Oh, I'm sorry. Council Carnival,

if I could um just ask on that item and then I'd like to comment if I may. um asked for a friendly amendment to even just put on there on that report the amount of calls from police, fire, EMS for service um sanding services or plowing services, especially on especially this past um Saturday. It was um things seemed to be delayed in getting out there and um it was an issue. You could see some streets, look right, it's down at bare pavement. Look left, we got issues. But um I would ask that in the form of friendly amendment of my colleague here. Um in addition uh Mr. Chairman, I had the pleasure this morning of being with our probably the majority of the Snow Force team up at Skyline Drive, Many Familiar Way, um on a on an educational class on brining. And I can tell you right now, um the city has not been brining of late. what we have coming down the pike and the city manager can certainly certainly elaborate on this is probably going to be the state state-of-the-art system that I think will change the way we handle our snow removal our uh salting operations here within the city. Um and I can tell you this being in that class this morning for three hours the men and women of DPW are dedicated. They were They want the help, too. They're the ones who on Saturday or Sunday who are being getting phone calls from their inspectors or their superiors. I need you to run up here. I need you to run there. They want to be able to do a

superior job as we all want them to do as well. And I can tell you the commitment from from the the staff is there. Uh Commissioner Weserling um was there as well. And I feel in the next week or two, uh, maybe three weeks, we're going to see some, uh, tremendous impacts here in the city. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. So, we're all set. Council Bergman, I

I know the hour is late. I'm just going to help try to wind this up, but I felt compelled to add a few comments on the last um topic, which is snow and ice treatment, snow removal. Um, it's no secret the last few years I've been particularly uh inquisitive about what's happening at DPW. One of the [clears throat] things that concerns me most, you know, when I hear comments from my colleagues and I certainly had some calls, not as many as the district councils, I'm sure. Uh I do follow social media and saw number of people that had difficulties this weekend and my own street is a is a hill quite treacherous at times. And I noticed I certainly don't expect to get treated any differently than anyone else that the uh snow removal and [snorts] the ice treatment comes very late. Doesn't seem to come when it's needed. It seems to come almost after the fact. What concerns me most about all of that and that's why I'm rising is that [snorts] we've had it pretty good as far as mother nature. Last weekend we had maybe two, three inches on Saturday, maybe four inches on Sunday. You know, there's some talk and it may go out to sea of a pretty significant storm coming this weekend. But whether that happens or not, we're due for a pretty big storm one of these days. And if we're not doing well with two and three inches, I can't imagine what we're going to do with a foot plus. Um, you know, I I have reached the point, maybe this point happened a few years ago where I I just can't accept the excuses. I hear them all the time, you know, can't do this, we can't do that, this and that and the other thing. I was here and some of my colleagues were here too when we increased the snow removal budget. I think we went from we added I think we went from 4.2 million I could be off a little bit to $6 million. And a lot of constituents say, "Oh, I expect the snow removal and the ice treatment to be really good now that we increased it by that much." Well, since that time, the storms haven't gotten worse. They've

probably gotten better. And in my opinion, the service and treating this the ice and removing the snow has gone downhill. And I just can't explain. I can't make excuses for it. And when I hear somebody from Edward Street who spoke earlier talk about history, what really really drives me over the edge is that history isn't getting done well. We've got supervisors and inspectors, double layers of people getting paid to make sure that Edgeword Street and other streets like that are getting done done well. And we've got three layers of something not going right. And I just can't justify to constituents how we're spending money for the snowplow operators, the inspectors, and the supervisors, and we still can't get it right. I just can't explain it to them. I'm going to not explain it to them in the way of making excuses anymore. The explanation I'm going to give them is that I'm going to bring it up like I expect my colleagues to till we get it right because there's no reason why we went from that $4.8 million to $6 million and we've gotten worse, not better.

Council King. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And um we've been at this for a long time with regards to the snow. I just wanted to ask the city manager for some clarification regarding um the snow operations um as it's been presented. It was stated that they haven't been brining, etc. Can there be some clarification from the administration on um some of the comments that were made tonight for on behalf so that the public can be informed? [snorts] Yeah, through the chair to the council. I think one of the comments that was made is about brine. Brine is basically a solution which is basically water and salt mixed together and you bring go down the street and and it and it provides that that material onto the road and you see kind of some lines, some stripes into that. Um we pre-treat our roads. We do salt in our roads. Uh we haven't been brining probably in the last two to three years. uh there's been uh differences of opinions uh that has h that had occurred at the uh administration level at DPW and that's something that we're addressing right now. Also, the equipment uh was outdated uh and so we are creating we're we've purchased a brand new equipment, state-of-the-art equipment, probably one of the best uh uh out there um for particular for Brian and so we're going to be putting that forward. Uh we purchased it already. Our hope is to get that live and going right now. All the staff is going to the training. That's what the uh the counselor earlier alluded to. Uh all the members of DPW that operate and are involved in the operations are going to the training right now. Our hope is to activate this Brian system uh for this upcoming uh storm that we're anticipating uh this perhaps this weekend. Um but again this is something that we have tried to manage and address uh because again uh we haven't been using that in the past

couple of years but that doesn't mean we haven't been pre-treating our roads. Our roads have been pre-treated and we spend significant amount of time pre-treating. Um and so that's important to notice uh or to know uh to uh to confirm that we have been pre-treating. It's a different type of pre-treatment, but brine in itself, when you talk about the solution of brine, is simply water and salt mixed together. Uh there's no magic potion about what brine is. It's literally water and salt um that goes into the streets um that provides a little bit of of kind of pre-treatment. But we do pre-treat our roads with salt. Uh I think one of the challenges and I've been very frank and open about that in the discussions here when we talk about the overall DPW challenges has been staffing. Staffing is the number one issue when it comes to operations not just in this city but across the state. You look at mass DOT you will look at any other community staffing becomes the number one issue in terms of capacity having the number of staff to be able to operate the number of equipments having the right number of contractors. We've losing contractors. Not that the city is losing contractors in terms that they don't want to work with us. Losing contractors in the sense that they're no more longer in operations. They've chosen to leave the snow plowing b industry in its entirety. So, we've come to this council floor uh and and providing some suggestions and recommendations of increasing the the the stipend uh for the snowplow operators uh because that's been a challenge. We try to increase some overtime opportunities uh for our union labor force to be able to have access and opportunity to do that uh as well because they're being called at midnight at all hours of the day, 24 hours, 36 hours of operating. We're doing that uh uh uh in a in a very comprehensive way. The last, I believe, budget, if not the last two budgets, we recommended to shift the $6 million. We actually reduced the budget to five and a half

because over the past five to 10 year span we saw that we were not spending the $6 million overall and that was something that was communicated here in this council body during the budget sessions and so we reduced it to 5.5 uh million in the five an additional $500,000 we put it for capital expenditures for more equipment. Uh, so the $6 million is being used, but 5.5 is for operations and 500,000 is for capital so that we can continue to uh buy more equipment. We've purchased over, I believe, over 10 equipment, 10 pieces of equipment in the last year. So, we're doing everything we can. We're bringing new trainers. Like I said, this training is happening. This person goes all statewide and nationwide to provide these trainings. We're doing a little bit of everything. Yes, sometimes the conditions and the what's happening on the road is a problem and we acknowledge that. We hope that this Brian pre-treatment is going to provide better uh management of the pavement uh a as we move forward. Uh but we also acknowledge and I haven't shied away from this that we also have a capacity issue when it comes to not only the staffing to operate it but also staff willing to do the overtime hours. Uh staff willing to do overtime and that's sometimes a challenge as well. And that's something that again we're working with our labor partners uh to incentivize or find ways that we can get our staff to be able to take on uh these hours and operate these equipments.

Thank you for that. Sorry for that longwinded.

No, it's necessary um for the public and I'll just Mr. Chair make a motion um that we get the proper stakeholders so they can speak to the strategy of no snow operations um to um the appropriate committee public works uh for a discussion uh forth with um so that committee can take it up um and there can be some more um transparency because I think you know because of this order by councelor Folo um you know we've educated the public a bit maybe we get a little bit patience maybe not because as councelor Bergman said uh we've been increasing the fees and the rates and buying equipment etc for some time um but I think that the more transparent we can be um and they can speak to operations and where they focus on first um in terms of priority would be helpful uh for the public consumption. Thank you.

Thank you. All set. Yes, the city manager already answered the question. Um, I will also like to sign on and and the last thing I'd like to say is the last storm because I had a lot of 311 complaints and a lot of residents calling and and needed issues, but in the last storm only two. So, we're moving in the right direction. So, I'm hoping [laughter] So, Mr. manager.

Just quickly before I I think it's important to notice uh one I want to acknowledge the men and women of the department who are literally sometimes 36 hours non-stop working. Um we we've done a great job thus far this year in our main arterials. I think you know over this past weekend I remember driving into the main road I was like wow this looks great but the side rows I know it's been a problem. The department acknowledges that as well. They know, and acknowledge it, and they're trying to come up with solutions to do that. One is capacity. Two is to try to introduce this Brian system that we just acquired. Uh to try to see if this that way we can address our side. They acknowledge that. They know that. They talked about it today in our in our training. Uh that the counselor was there, myself, I was there as well. Um so again, we're hoping that there's better outcomes, better solutions um to address, but we acknowledge and we know that we we can do better when it comes to our side streets.

Thank you. Motion as amended to the manager. All those in favor post audited. Motion to adjurnn. All those in favor opposited.