City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, we'll call this meeting to order. Wow, that's a fun echo. Recordings in progress. We've got a fun echo. We've got a little bit of a new of an audio setup. As if anyone can't figure that out on their own. I'm going to keep talking here and see if the folks in the back can resolve this because this is not sustainable. Brendan, give me a flag from back there if there's progress. Or you want me to recite some poetry or sing a song? Welcome to the new curtain-less council chambers. The clerk noted that with the new backdrop behind me, I can get my passport photo from a person to save me a little time. We can't do this the whole way. This is not going to work. All right. I haven't, I guess I called it to order. Let's take, call the roll, and then we will take a recess, see if we get this sorted out.

This is roll call. Councilor Ewan Campin.

Here.

Councilor Link. Here. Councilor Scott. Present, present, present. Councilor Klingin.

Present.

Councilor Strezzo.

Here.

Councilor Saeed. Councilor Wheeler?

Here.

Councilor Hart? Here. Councilor McLaughlin?

Here, here.

Councilor Umba?

Here.

And Councilor Davis?

Here.

With 10 members present, we have quorum.

I do like that it sounds like we're all enthusiastically welcoming each other. Here, here.

All right, we will stand in recess for five minutes or whatever it takes to hopefully address this audio question.

Thank you.

Testing, testing, testing.

That sounds a little better.

Testing, testing, testing, testing.

It is a slight delay, yep.

Testing, testing. Mic check, testing. Are we good back there? Testing. Are we all set? Testing. No.

I can, can you, or ask me if I can hear? I mean, I can hear a slight echo, but it doesn't really necessarily bother me.

Test, test, test, test.

Amen.

Tess, Tess. It's still echoing, Steve. Tess, Tess, is that better? Tess, Tess, is this better? No? I can't hear in my own ears. I'm getting a no. Steve, it's not better. It's a delay, Steve.

Keep going.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10. This meeting is being held pursuant to chapter 25, the acts of 2025. Zoom and audio recording will be available immediately after the meeting. I'm not really sure right at the moment. Does anyone know any Dolly Parton? You wanna get up here? Keep going.

Mr. President.

Test, test.

Can you hear it?

Check, check.

Volume needs to go up.

Is this better? Is there still a delay?

And everyone's so sorry. One more time. Quiet, Coyote.

Check, check. One, two, three. Is that better? Is it worse?

Who said yes to worse?

Good enough? I don't know.

Better or worse? Over there.

I don't know the answer.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. This is for the Zoom only.

Ben, can you hear it? Okay.

All right, I'll call this meeting back to order. Madam Clerk, would you please, actually, I can see that there's a quorum in the room, so I think we're good there. All right, here's where we are. We have a new sound system here in the chambers. It is not functioning the way it did just an hour ago when they tested it or a few days ago when they tested it. We don't know why, we'll figure it out. For now, we got a lot of work to do, so we're gonna move forward. Hopefully everyone at home and in the recording some years later, if you're watching this, hopefully you can hear me. We are still gonna use our microphones. However, the sound in the room is being turned down to minimize the echo. Also, the contract with our closed captioning provider is, for some reason, for some issue, we don't have that right now. So we're going to be using the Zoom provided closed captioning for in the chambers here. If anyone, if folks aren't speaking loudly enough, hopefully remind folks too, but if you do have any issue hearing folks in the room, I hope at some point here we'll see the Zoom closed captioning coming up. Is that right, Madam Clerk? All right, we're working on that now. Apologies for all the technical difficulties. I don't understand the bulk of it, but here we are. So with that, I will continue to use my... theater voice and move forward um and get started we really didn't even start the meeting other than calling the role and going into recess to fix that technical issue initially so this is a meeting of the city council it is thursday august 27th my name is lance davis i use he him pronouns i am presiding over the meeting we established a quorum through the roll call Please note that video and audio of this meeting is being recorded and may be shown live on local access government channels and on the City of Somerville website and will be available for future review. Pursuant to our Rule 32, please let it be known that the City Council salutes the flag of the United States of America and let us recall our oath to uphold the Constitution and the laws of the Commonwealth to the best of our abilities and understanding. We begin our meetings with a moment of silence. Are there any councillors wishing to say a few words about members of our community this evening? Councilor McLaughlin.

Thank you, Mr. President. I want to remember, I want to remember Joanne Fontano of 26 Mount Vernon Street, my direct next door neighbor, sister of Sue Fontano, who's on the zoning board, has been the chair of that board. Very kind woman. I've lived next to her for several years and just grew up in the city, lived with her sister there, ran a hair salon together. There's always the person out shoveling the walk, cleaning the backyard, filling the pool, taking care of her sister. It's very sad to see her go. Just a little thing about her and her sister that I always found interesting is they grew up here multiple generations and oftentimes would not appreciate other long-time residents and their complaints about the changes in the community. They would always say, I'm happy the way the city is going. I like the direction things are going. Stop complaining so much. It's like, I'm happy that my streets are safer and that I have good neighbors and good family and things like this. It was just always heartwarming to talk to them. It was nice to my wife and my son and just very optimistic, upbeat people, which is sometimes not always the case with us natives. But I really miss her. She was a very sweet person, and we'll be looking out for her sister, and I ask everyone to think about her.

Yes, thank you. I wanted to recognize the lives of the people who have died since our last city council meeting in July at the hands of or in connection with being detained by a US federal immigration agency. Because even when it's not in the headlines, ICE and other federal agencies are continuing to deny people access to adequate medical care, holding them in inhumane conditions, separating families, and detaining and deporting people without rights to due process. So I want to remember Edwin Giovanni Lopez Cornejo, 39 years old, who died in Delaney Hall Detention Center in Newark, New Jersey. Presiliano Trejo Recano, 29 years old, who died while being held in Lumpkin, Georgia. Juan Jairo Coronillo Duran, 28 years old, died while ICE was attempting to detain him in St. Augustine, Florida. Jesus Manuel Arena Silva, 45 years old, died while being transported to the Folkestone D. Ray ICE Processing Center in Georgia. Joan Sebastian Guerrero, 26 years old, shot by ice agents on July 13th in Biddeford, Maine. Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, 52 years old, shot by an ice officer during a traffic stop in my hometown of Houston, Texas. Thank you.

Councilor Wheeler.

Thank you, Mr. President. I want to remember Larry Aronson, a Ward 2 resident and longtime Cambridge Ridge and Latin teacher who died last month. Larry had a huge impact on me, my family members, and friends. As a part of the passionate teaching body in CRLS's pilot school, Larry educated and sparked the imaginations of generations of CRLS students. He taught us to ask tough questions about our world and our values. The importance of that couldn't be clearer right now. Larry, our city and our country and our world, we're more alive and more just thanks to you and your fellow curiosity-seeking teachers. Thank you.

Council, you and Kevin would like to sign on to that one? Thank you, Mr. President. As the other Ben on the council, I also went to Ringen Latin. Larry Aronson made a huge impact on me personally, but he made an enormous impact on literally thousands and thousands and thousands of people. It sounds like an exaggeration. If you go... to his Facebook memorial page, there are over a thousand comments. He was not a normal teacher. It's really hard to summarize him. He was kind of a legend for anyone who knew him. He was someone who truly committed his life to civil rights and equality and treating every single person like they were special and unique and deserving of love and attention. And I I don't understand how he did it. If you walked around with him, he knew everybody, and they all had a story about him. He really, really succeeded in making people feel that way. And up until the very end, he was incredibly in touch with people, former students, including his famous former students like Matt Damon and the Afflecks and all this. He was just an incredibly supportive and loving person who really kind of set a template for what it can mean to be a pillar of a community. So may his memory be a blessing.

Mr. President, thank you this evening. This is actually one that I meant to do before the break. This is of Michael Ciparini. He was 58, of Lynn, formerly of Somerville, passed away suddenly on June 5th, 2026. He was born in Boston, raised in Somerville. Michael was the beloved son of Sandra Smith-Henron and the late Michael Ciparini, He was proud of his Somerville roots and will be remembered for his warm personality, quick smile, and ability to make everyone feel welcome. Above all, Michael was a devoted father and grandfather. He cherished his sons and grandchildren, especially his beloved grandchildren who lovingly called him Papa. He was also an avid football fan, lifelong lover of rock and roll, and devoted to his dog, Chop. He was the beloved father of Chris Johnson, Michael Ciparini, and his wife Alicia, Anthony Ciparini, and Joseph Ciparini, devoted grandfather of Jaden, Ariella, Enzo, and Landon, and loving brother of Mary Lou, Lisa, and Richard. He also leaves behind many nieces and nephews. He'll be remembered for his humor, his kindness, and unwavering love for friends and family. And then next, Mr. President, I would like for us to keep in our thoughts and prayers this evening. William Billy Fitzpatrick, Fitzso as he was known, of Winchester, formerly of Somerville, passed away after a long period of declining health. He was born in Cambridge, raised in Somerville. William was the beloved son of the late William Arfitz Patrick and Margaret Sally Meany, and loving stepson of Donald Sally. He had a deep love for golf and traveling, enjoying every opportunity to play around and explore somewhere new. Above all, he cherished his family and friends, and often saying that his friends were an extension of his family. He'll be remembered for his warm heart, loyal friendship, and happiness he found in the company of those he loved. He was the beloved brother of Patricia Fitzpatrick and Diana Fitzpatrick, loving uncle of Katie Rousseau, Gianna Moore, and the late Marissa Fitzpatrick and cherished nephew of Billy Meany and Teresa Dinicola. He also leaves many loving cousins, extended family members who will miss him deeply. And then finally, Mr. President, very recently a young man died. who i didn't know but we share the same first name which is interesting because it was really only one or two jesse's me and jesse westcott but jesse gregory he was a little younger than me and he also we didn't we didn't go to the same school but he was very beloved in the community we have many mutual friends he was young and he tragically passed away from a battle of cancer So Jesse passed away peacefully accompanied by the love of his life and family on Thursday, August 20th at Beth Israel Hospital in Plymouth. He was 46. He was raised in Somerville. He's the son of Peter Gregory and of Joyce Thomas Singh. Jesse attended St. Ann's, Mattinon, and earned his degree from UMass Lowell. He enjoyed a long career in property management. He lived in Marshfield. He loved golfing, staying fit. And he was a devoted lover of music, dancing, and his family. And he was the beloved husband of Isabel Perez. He was the devoted son of Peter Gregory and Joyce Singh. He was the dear brother of Moni Singh. He was a proud uncle of Gianna, Bianca, Mika, and Kaden. And he will be deeply missed in this community, as well as his community of Marshfield, and by his family and friends. And I ask that we keep all of those folks. And then, actually, I will say finally, especially with our Nepali brothers and sisters in the room this evening, here for Nepali... Nepali Heritage Month, the lives that have been lost in Nepal due to the extreme flooding and extreme weather conditions over there. I ask that we keep those folks in our thoughts and prayers this evening. Thank you, Mr. President.

Okay. Would everyone in the chamber please rise, however you are able, to reserve a moment of silence for the aforementioned folks. Thank you. All right, Madam Clerk, next item, please.

Next item is 1.3, approval of the minutes of the regular meeting of June 25, 2026.

All right, seeing no discussion, that item is approved. Next item.

Next item is 2.1 by Councilor Ewan Campin, commending Dan Amlin for eight years of service in the engineering division.

Councilor Ewan Campin.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Congratulations, Dan.

So I am very happy to be here in collaboration with the mayor's office to give this recognition to Dan Amelin. Dan has worked in the engineering division for eight years. has been involved in many, many projects, but I'm thinking about the Somerville Ave sewer project and the Spring Hill reconstruction project. These were two of the biggest and most complex engineering projects in Somerville history. Unbelievably difficult, obviously, for residents, for local businesses, but also on the city side, just incredibly complex. And both of them, Dan played an absolute critical leadership role, and they have been enormous success after all of this work. So we are very sorry to lose Dan, but very happy for your next steps. And it is our honor to give you the citation.

Thank you very much. Do you want to say a couple words? Yes.

Thank you.

Council, good evening. Again, I'm Dan Amlin. I work in the engineering department. I am very honored to receive this citation here this evening. I don't want to take all the credit, however. A lot of that I want to give back to my colleagues, peers, and friends over on Franey Road, over in the engineering department. Without their support, their guidance, their experience, and their willingness to share their knowledge, I would not be standing here in front of you because I would not have succeeded. So that said, I am very thrilled to see a lot of the projects I've managed come to fruition, be completed, and allow for future generations to enjoy. And I'll end briefly by a quote that our director says quite often. I am very, very happy to be part of a team that builds a better Somerville. Thank you all.

Thank you. All right, Madam Clerk, next item.

Next item is two.

That item is approved, next item.

Next item is 2.2, a citation by Councilor Umba commending Ramon Bueno for his commitment to climate action.

Councilor Ba. Thank you, Mr. President. Madam Clerk, can you read the next item as well, please?

Next item is 2.3, a citation by Councilor Umba commending Eliza Johnston for her commitment to climate action.

Thank you, Mr. President. Will those gentlemen come forward, and I will say a few words, and then I'll meet you guys at the podium. So thank you, Mr. President. Tonight I have citations for these two members of our community who have been incredible advocates for climate action. Eliza Johnson served for 17 years on some of these commission on energy use and climate change, and later on the Interim Climate Action Commission. Ramon Bueno also served for nine years on both iterations on the commission. Climate and sustainability work in Somerville has transformed and grown so much over that period. They have helped lead at every step of the journey from helping the city win a green communities designation from the state in 2011 to developing the climate forward plan first in 2018 and then in 2024. They played important roles in sustainability programs like our community choice electricity program. So tonight we want to take this opportunity to recognize both of you for your service as commissioners and also for laying the foundation for the newly formed Climate Action Commission, a body that will push our government and our community to continue acting on and adapting to climate change with the urgency that it demands. for nine years of service on the Commission on Energy Use and Climate Change. His contributions have advanced the city's goals in reducing climate pollution and dependence on fossil fuels. Congratulations. be it hereby known to all that the city of Somerville City Council and the mayor offer their sincerest commendations to Eliza Johnson for 17 years of service, wow, on the Commission on Energy Use and Climate Change. For her contributions have advanced the city's goals in reducing climate pollution and dependence on fossil fuels. Thank you so much.

Thank you so much.

First of all, thank you very much. And it's like before, it's an honor to be brought here with this citation. If I can have just a couple of minutes, I had a chance to reflect on the past decade and what brought me to want to participate in the commission. My background was in science engineering, but then I had worked for like over a decade with climate economists. So I came with that perspective on what the best science and climate economists were saying was going to be happening, which is that the coming century was going to be worsening if we didn't take actions, that the cost of action to adapt to things but also to prevent future things is high, but much worse is the cost of inaction because of the consequences. and the importance of the socioeconomic conditions in the city being taken into account, and equally to make good plans based on science, have the staff to develop the plan, to implement the plan, but also the city have the leadership to then support it because there are many cases where the first few things have happened and then nothing moved. It's been really very satisfying to see how the city went and developed some of the climate forward plan, now through its second version, how it's really in its key elements includes looking at the vulnerabilities of different parts and sectors of the city, and then for the last three mayors to have had the support of Joe Cortotone, Katiana Valentine, and now Wilson. So for someone like me, it can't be more satisfying than to look back and see what, I didn't do it, but to see what, to have been collaborating with great commissioners, with great, The staff and the development of the staff at the Office of Sustainability and Environment over the past decade is incredible. The staff is super talented, and to see the support from the city council and the mayors It's no surprise that some of it's now being cited, not only nationally, but occasionally international forums for what it's doing. So I'm the one who's really wanting to thank the city and the staff for what it's done. So thank you.

I'll just follow with some brief remarks. Just to say, you know, when the commission, when I started on the commission, it predated OSC. So we were the staff and we were responsible for sort of rolling up our sleeves, becoming a green community, tracking the ESCO and working really closely with, at that time, the aldermen to get some of the groundwork laid for what became Somerville Climate Forward. But I echo Ramon and just appreciate the work that we've all done together, the professionalism, the staff, the support, the amazing talent within OSE that's grown over the last decade. phenomenal and the partnership that we've had with the City Council has been a wonderful experience so thank you all and look forward to more work from the outside mr. mayor like to say a few words yeah thanks mr. president yeah

I know Ramon and Eliza, outside of their work on multi-member bodies, but we're here to talk about what they've done. I'm not gonna, Councilman Vaughn went through all those accomplishments, I'm not gonna repeat that. So instead, what I wanna say is, if you go to look how to join a multi-member body in our city, you go to our website and you click something called Be Somerville. And when I think of these two, I think of people who embodied that. They are Somerville. I'm really glad Eliza mentioned that about how their work predated having OSE. such that they really were carrying the workload on that. And I think it says so much about our community. They're willing to step up and do that and lead us forward to a point where we are now, where, as you heard, people do look at us as a city, as someone to... embody and I think that that's everything so I'm just filled with gratitude thank you so much for the council about thank you for putting this in we were honored to do this with you and I'm everyone looking at how you can get involved in your city this is a great way to do it thank you of course when you're the last to speak you get all your talking points taken away but thank you and through you

I am Steven Nutter I'm the chief sustainability officer for the city of Somerville and as has been said before before what is now the sustainability environment division we had citizens community doing things all the way back to 2001 25 years of climate change um and i could sit here and list all the different technical you know and programs and pieces and things like that and and ramon and eliza definitely bring those things but the other half of climate action is community work and it's really only because of our community that we have the wealth of leadership that we do now so i just want to say uh thank you uh to both eliza and ramon and know that i have your phone numbers so i will be in contact as an informal advisor over time and thank you so much thank you council i'd like to request a very brief recess to take a couple pictures see no objection we'll have a brief recess take pictures we'll come right back

All right, I'll call this meeting back to order. I can see that there is a quorum present in the chambers. Madam Clerk, those items are approved. Next item, please.

Next item is 3.1, Light Path, applying for a grant of location to install 41 feet of conduit in Grand Union Boulevard from existing telephone conduit near the intersection of Revolution Drive and Grand Union Boulevard to a point of pickup at existing manhole 29310 next to 188 Assembly Park Drive.

All right, I now declare this public hearing to be open. Is there anyone in the chamber or online here to speak on this item? Sir, please introduce yourself for the record. Go right ahead.

Absolutely. Good evening. My name is Jeffrey Harrington. I'm from Lightpath Construction Manager. I am here requesting permission to install this conduit for an existing tenant of a property.

Mr. Harrington, can I interrupt you just to ask a favor? Can you pull that microphone down? I can hear you, but I want to make sure folks online can hear you. Thank you.

We're here requesting the application to install a new conduit to support telecommunications services for an existing tenant at 188 assembly square row they're requesting diverse fiber optic services to protect a new internet that they're putting up at that facility and we are requesting we've tried to use existing pipe as much as we can which is over 90 percent of it so we don't dig up the streets but this last little section we need to join a power manhole system to a communication manhole system so we're requesting that excavate our approval for excavation okay thank you is there anyone else here to speak on this item

Anyone online? If you're on Zoom, please use the raise hand feature, which is down at the bottom of your screen. Seeing none. All right. There being no further comments, I declare the public hearing to be closed. Is there any discussion? All right. Seeing none, that item is approved. Next item.

Next item is 3.2, Eversource applying for a grant of location to install 208 feet of conduit in Taylor Street and Sydney Street and one new manhole 32883 from utility pole 387 slash four, passing through the new marble manhole 32883 to a point of pickup at 9 Taylor Street. And we have Ms. Duffy here to speak on the item.

All right, and now let me try that again. I now declare the public hearing to be open. Anyone here to speak on the item? Jackie Duffy? We can, go right ahead. So 188 feet on Taylor Street, 20 feet on Sydney Street to a new manhole to provide electric service to 9 Taylor Street. I'm just reading this from the screen because the audio's a little low in here. All right, thank you Ms. Duffy. Anyone else here to speak on the item? Anyone online?

I am seeing none, Mr. President.

All right, seeing none, then that I would declare the public hearing to be closed. Any discussion? All right, seeing none, that item is approved. Next item, Madam Clerk.

Next item is 3.3, Eversource applying for a grant of location to install 201 feet of conduit in Charlestown Street and Allen Street from proposed manhole 32885 to a point of pickup at 37 Allen Street.

All right, I now declare this public hearing to be open. Is there anyone here to speak on the item? Jackie Duffy. All right, thank you. Is there anyone else here to speak on the item? Anyone online? All right, seeing none, I declare the public hearing to be closed. Any discussion?

Mr. President.

Councilor Scott.

Thank you, Mr. President. I just had a few questions about this. First of which, this is a long run down the center of the street to provide power to a lot where there is an existing pole with a transformer directly in front of the lot. So through you, Ms. Duffy, what is the reason why we need to actually dig up the right of way here?

Ms. Duffy, could you pause one sec? I want to get the audio in the room here a little bit louder.

Mr. President, I'll just point out that it seems like the transcription is working well, for whatever that's worth, as a way of understanding what Ms. Duffy is saying.

Thank you. All right, go ahead, Ms. Duffy.

Counselor Scott?

Okay.

Ms. Duffy, is this power supply to a transformer that is going to be placed on site by this project? All right. Do you know if that's a surface pad mount or a vaulted transformer? Okay, so you're placing a new manhole on Charlestown Street. You're running 201 feet of conduit to the property line and then you're... That's right. So the 37, it will be a subsurface of Alton Transformer on 37 Allen. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate it. Mr. President, the project hasn't actually gotten its building permits yet, but it is projected to be a new 24-unit project there, passive house. So as much as I know the folks on Allen Street don't deserve any more disruptions after all the projects that have been going on down there the last few years, I'm I can't see any reason to deny this. I would just implore Eversource to see if there's any other way to connect up to that than digging a trench through 200 feet of Allen Street. Thank you, sir.

Ms. Duffy, you get all that? All right, if you come up with a new idea, let Councilor Scott know, will you?

Yeah, well, hey, at least there's no double poles on Allen Street, sir.

All right, thank you, Councilor Scott. Any further discussion? All right, seeing none, then that item is approved. Next item, Madam Clerk.

Next item is 3.4, Eversource applying for a grant of location to install 51 feet of conduit in Prescott Street from Utility Pole 287-8 to a point of pickup at 53 Prescott Street.

All right, I now declare the public hearing to be open. Is there anyone here to speak on the item? Okay, thank you. Is there anyone else here to speak on the item? Anyone online? Alright, seeing none, I declare the public hearing to be closed. Is there any discussion? Alright, seeing none, that item is approved. Alright, that brings us to the first of our out-of-order items this evening, and It's a long list, so bear with us, but we want to make sure that we get some important things out of the way, just so you all understand. We try and bump things up as close to the beginning of the meeting as we can when folks are here, to speak on them, to be present for them. Normally, that happens pretty early, but since we have a long list, it's still going to be a while before we get through all of them, but I promise we're moving everything through as quickly as we can, and then we'll get to all the other stuff after that. So we're going to take up, unless there's any objection, we'll take up item 7.31 and then 7.32, those are two proclamations. We'll then go to 4.2 and then after that 7.1 and then back to 4.3, 4.4, 4.5, 4.6, then 4.12, then 9.28. Okay. And then we have 7.4, 7.26, 7.29, and 7.30. And when we get to each of those, if there is any objection that you thought of that you can't think of right at the moment, then of course raise it. But that's the plan. So Madam Clerk, could you read our first out-of-order item, item 7.31?

Yes. Item 7.31, Mayor's communication proclaiming July 2026 as South Asian Heritage Month in Somerville.

Mr. Mayor. Mr. President, delighted to be here with you, proclaiming South Asian Heritage Month here in Somerville. We have an amazing South Asian community here in our city. We know it's a substantial population. We also know what they contribute to our city. So we thought it extremely appropriate to proclaim this. And I'll point out that coming up on Saturday, September 5th, is a Nepali street food festival. I believe right out here in the concourse. So I encourage people to come to that. I also appreciate Councilor Klingon's remembrance for the lives lost here recently in Nepal with the tragedies there. But on a happy note, I want to just... lift up our amazing South Asian community here in Somerville, and we have some folks here on hand. Should I read the proclamation? I know you have a long meeting, but it's a long proclamation.

Why don't you give us the Cliff Notes version, Mr. Mayor?

High level, it's observed annually, celebrating the histories, cultures, traditions, and contributions of people with roots in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, and the Maldives. And South Asia's home to a rich diversity of languages, faiths, customs, art forms, cuisines, and local and cultural traditions, reflecting the distinct identities and experience found across the region throughout the global South Asian diaspora. so we have Nepali class Boston that participates in city events and it was a Sunday school program established in 2014 and continually operates in Somerville since 2018 that's an amazing thing that happens over in 80 Somerville school and we're hard at work working with summer public schools to make sure that that continues you've never gone over and witnessed that I encourage you to it's it's amazing the non-resident Nepali Association NCC USA Massachusetts chapter is a valued community partner that promotes cultural awareness inclusion and civic engagement through events including the annual Nepali New Year flag-raising ceremony and the Nepali Street food festival I just mentioned organized in partnership with the summer office of immigrant affairs and the summer arts and culture division And they've also demonstrated a long commitment to serving residents in times of need, including during the COVID-19 pandemic, by connecting community members with resources and distributing important public information. So yeah, South Asian Heritage Month, it's great that we do it. We have some folks on hand to accept the proclamation, and I believe Mr. President was clear with you ahead of time to deliver some very quick remarks.

Be happy to receive some remarks from the folks, absolutely. Why don't you introduce the folks, or have them come up and introduce themselves for the record, and the floor is yours.

Who wants to speak first?

Good evening, everybody. I represent Nepali Class Boston. Like Mayor Wilson just said, we started our program back in 2014 with seven kids, and we are now 150 students strong, and 150 because we are limited space-wise and resources-wise, because it's a purely volunteer-run program. And this recognition really means a lot. And I would love to share this with all my volunteer team members who dedicate their Sundays, you know, it's their entire Sunday to serving these kids who are ages 5 to 15. And it is their second home. It's the sense of belonging, the peer relationship. It truly is a place, a happy place for a lot of our children there. And I really hope that Somerville continues to support programs like ours. It's been a privilege, you know, finding a home for our program. And we are very grateful to the city and also Somerville Public Schools.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, everyone.

My name is Samundra Shrestha. I'm a vice president of NRNA NCC Massachusetts chapter. Today, I'm really grateful for this recognition. First of all, I would like to thank you, City of Somerville, for this meaningful recognition. We are truly honored and grateful for your support and encouragement. This recognition inspires us to continue serving our community with dedication, unity, and pride. We deeply appreciate the city's commitment to celebrating diversity and recognizing the contribution of the Nepali community. We value our strong partnership with the city of Somerville and look forward to working together for many years to come. On the behalf of NRNA Massachusetts chapter, I would like to thank once again for this honor. We truly value your continued encouragement. Thank you.

Good evening, City Council members and everyone joining us today. My name is Harmon Carr and I'm a rising senior at Somerville High School. I'm honored to be here as a speaker and I would especially like to thank Mayor Wilson and City Council for giving me these opportunities. Today's proclamation is definitely personal to me because I come from an immigrant Indian family. Growing up, my family and I often had to figure things out on our own. There were resources we didn't know existed, systems we didn't fully understand, and moments when I found myself searching for answers and trying to navigate things that I was still learning myself. While these experiences were difficult, they shaped my advocacy. Through my American Civil Liberties Union Club at Somerville High, I worked to educate young middle schoolers about civics, their rights, and the importance of using their voice. Seeing the lack of civics taught in schools, I hope these efforts can help young people feel more informed, empowered, and confident in participating in their communities. I also advocate for greater language accessibility for Hindi and Punjabi speakers in Somerville. Through petitions and conversations with community members, I hope to have resources and opportunities more accessible because I believe language should not be a barrier to feeling included and fully participating in our community. For the South Asian community of Somerville, this proclamation is not just a recognition on paper, it's a message that our community has seen and that our stories matter. It recognizes the families who have made Somerville their home, the parents who made sacrifices for their children, and the generation of South Asians who contribute to the city every day. For young people like me, seeing our community recognized by our city is powerful. It tells us that we do not have to change between our culture and community. But I also hope it reminds us that recognition should not be followed by continued action, but by listening to our communities, ensuring that every family feels included. But I am proud to stand here today and celebrate not only where my family comes from, but also the community we're continuing to build here in Somerville. Thank you.

Any questions, comments, discussion? I saw a few folks indicate they wanted to have a quick recess to take pictures, which is one of our favorite things to do. Do you want to do the other proclamation first? We can certainly do that, and then we'll do it all in one recess if that's okay. All right. Not that we take cues from the mayor here, but I think it's a good suggestion. We like a good idea when we hear it. So that item is approved. Stay put. Don't go anywhere. We'll take some pictures in a minute. Madam Clerk, if you'll read the next item, the next proclamation.

Next item is 7.32, Mayor's Communication Proclaiming August 26, 2026 as Women's Equality Day in Somerville.

Mr. Mayor. Mr. President, fantastic idea of yours to take this up as well before the recess. Thank you so much for allowing us to do a second proclamation here. Man, it seems like we shouldn't have to be here proclaiming something as obvious as Women's Equality Day, but, you know, we look around and we see the attacks on the rights of women and on women's health care. And, yeah, it's important that in a community like ours that even when something is a real shared value, that we still stand up and proclaim it just in times like this. So, you know, it's... It's obvious, I think, to everyone in this room how much women's equality means. We don't need to go through what women contribute to this city. We all see it. So I think it's vital, though, like I said, that we issue proclamations, that we say this given the national climate. And so here we are. to proclaim August 26, 2026 as Women's Equality Day here in Somerville. And we have the chair of the Summerville Commission for Women, Alex Barbat, here with us. I'd like to, if you see it fit, like for Alex to give some comments here to the council. Absolutely, go right ahead.

Hello, hello.

I'm Alex.

Thank you. Speaking on behalf of the Somerville Commission for Women, we're glad to be here tonight as the city recognizes August 26th as Women's Equality Day. And since the national proclamation of Women's Equality Day in 1973, we know that we've made a great deal of progress in furthering the rights and status of women in society. But one question I have for the city of Somerville is, do we know how much progress that we've made? And do we as a city know what's left to be done in our community? I've been co-chair of the Summerville Commission for Women since last summer, and one question that's come up over and over throughout our conversations has been, do we have the data for this? When we came together to set our strategic priorities, we realized that it was surprisingly difficult to find data specifically on women in Somerville. Eventually, we aligned our strategic priorities with the State Commission for Women, which are promoting equity in healthcare, dismantling economic barriers for women, and increasing representation for women in politics. And those are definitely important to Somerville. But if we don't know where we're going, If we don't know where we're starting from, we don't know where we're going. If women and the unique challenges that women face are not intentionally considered in our data and in our community, in our policies and our solutions, we lose important information about the lives and experiences of 51.1% of our city. We lose out on being able to celebrate the growth and accomplishments of our city as we grow into being a more just and equitable community. So as we proclaim August 26th as Women's Equality Day, I want to commend the mayor and the city council for the progress that we've made in furthering the status of women in Somerville. But I also want to ask, do we know what comes next?

Thank you.

Any discussion? All right, we'll take a brief recess for some pictures for both of these proclamations, and then we'll come right back. Stand and recess.

Thank you.

right i'm going to call this meeting back to order i see that there is a quorum present in the chamber madam clerk would you read our next item please next item is 4.2 by counselor hart and counselor link that chapter 6 of the code of ordinances be amended as detailed within counselor hart thank you so much um so

I want to really appreciate here. So this is a ordinance banning the use of rodenticides on municipal property. And I really want to appreciate the work of Save Somerville Wildlife and all of the advocacy that they have done on this over the years. And then also appreciate Mayor Wilson and his action on this. And before we... I want to ask a member of Save Somerville Wildlife to come up and speak, but I'll just say that a lot of people are concerned about banning rodenticides, given that we have such a massive problem with rats in the city. And the fact is that the rodenticides do not work to control rats on a population level. If they did, our We would have the rat problem under control because we've been throwing more and more poison at it for many, many years. I just wanted to put a plug in for what should residents do when they see rats. You can report rat sightings to 311. It really helps the city to have data about the rat sightings. Also, if you have burrows or a serious problem in your yard or on your street, you can apply for the rodent control assistance program and the city staff will come to your home and really help you identify the causes. So I really encourage people to make use of those resources. And of course, we know what does work is eliminating access to food, water, things like that. So don't put out bird seed. Put away your bird feeder. Clean up pet waste. If you have fruit trees that are dropping fruit this time of year, be sure you pick all of that up. Just all of the common sense approaches that we know do work to help control rodents. So I'll stop there and let Councillor Link and then Save Somerville Wildlife speak. Thank you.

Councillor Link.

Thank you very much, Mr. Preston. Thank you to the Council from Ward 7 for including me on this. This is something that I've also felt quite strongly about. Obviously we do, as Council Hart said, we need to continue to try to work to control the rat population, but we know that one thing that actually does control the rat population are owls and other raptors and these natural predators that we're killing with these rodenticides and I think it's really important that we we already know just recently there was a bird of prey that died and we know that there's probably much more than that that we don't know and I think It doesn't make any sense to all of the harms that are kind of causal to this. It doesn't make any sense to continue down a path that we know is not working already. So I'm 100% for this. Thank you.

Other discussion? You want to sponsor a speaker?

Yes, I'd like to sponsor Morgan Penny from Save Somerville Wildlife.

Council Hart would like to sponsor Morgan Petty. I see no objection. Afterwards, Councilor Clemon. All right, go right ahead. Please introduce yourself for the record and go right ahead.

Thank you. So my name is Morgan Pinney and I am a Somerville resident and member of Save Somerville Wildlife. On August 22nd, DPW installed this year's mural created by 11 Somerville High School students on Mystic Avenue. The painting pays tribute to the majestic and beloved bald eagle known as MK who died in 2023 from rodenticide poisoning. MK died in Arlington, but of course wildlife do not observe municipal boundaries. In the fall of 2023, my children and I marveled at the red-tailed hawk that frequented our small private way, swooping and perching in trees and on roofs. Just after Thanksgiving, I found that hawk stranded on the ground next door. She could not fly. I managed to get her to a rehabber, but she did not survive. Her blood failed to clot despite a week of round-the-clock treatment by the rehabber. In the span of a few weeks in the winter of 24-25, three dead owls were found in Somerville. All were tested and all had lethal doses of anticoagulant rodenticides in their blood. Over the last several years, Somerville residents have reported, transported to rehabbers, and advocated for hawks, owls, foxes, and other wildlife devastated by rat poison in our city. Earlier this month, another hawk was found in Union Square, rescued, and died the next day. Somerville's rat problem cannot be solved by poison. Evidence shows that this bait actually provides yet another food source for rodents, thus exacerbating the issue. A rat's reproductive cycle is rapid, their biology is adaptive, and their populations continue to explode in our cities. Raptors are rodenticidal by nature. A single owl is capable of consuming more than 1,000 rats a year. Yet human irresponsibility is decimating these would-be partners. Somerville must join the 30-plus cities and towns in Massachusetts like Lowell, Newton, and Brookline that have passed home rule petitions and codified ordinances banning the use of these harmful chemicals. Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilor Klingon. Thank you, Mr. President, through you. I want to thank my colleagues for bringing this forward and thank the advocates in the community and activists in the community. I'm happy to sign on to this. I'm also happy to see that I believe the mayor put forth a home rule petition, hopefully allowing us to ban it citywide, not just on city property as this does.

We're going to talk about that right after this.

We will be talking about it right after this. But I'll just speak on this. I won't speak on that then. But, yeah, just aside from the cruel death, the cruel, slow death that rats endure, rodenticides, they also harm other wildlife, including our cats and dogs, if they happen to get a hold of one that's eaten rodenticide. And then there are many in the U.S. There are thousands of accidental human rodenticide poisonings each year. so putting this poison into our environment into our city is uh it's not serving as far as the purpose that it serves it does a lot more harm than good we know that we need to control the rodent population through means of You know, making sure food sources, water sources aren't available. As you all know, I got the administration to do de-ratification week. And, you know, the city brought out their machine that essentially they'll use to – CO2 in the boroughs. But we need to be vigilant. And this is really about, oftentimes in this city, it's about absentee landlords not taking care of their property. And so, you know, as a community, we need to come together and really try to encourage our neighbors, fellow property owners, what have you, to address this. And I do love the mural. It's amazing. They put up this new piece right on Mystic Ave with a tribute to MK. So, yeah, happy to sign on this. And Thank you again. Appreciate it.

Councillor Scott.

Thank you Mr. President and I thank my colleagues for bringing this forward. Hopefully this is indicative of an intention from the executive to change city policy. I know previously our response to homeowner requests about rat control is to dispatch contractors who place out that rodenticide rat bait so I'm hopeful that we'll hear from the administration about a larger systemic change. I know there have been multiple Multiple efforts called for over the years to support the raptor populations. You know, I had a falcon nest just above my house last year with three fledgings and haven't seen them this year. It's frustrating, although I... I'm sure my colleagues who are knocking doors for state-level offices have noticed how large and fearsome the rats are in Ward 2. The hawks and the owls that we have are our best tool. So I really appreciate this. And as I said, I'm hopeful to hear about a larger systemic change of approach from the mayor's office on this. So thank you.

Thank you. Councilor Wheeler.

Thank you, Mr. President. I appreciate my colleagues putting forward this ordinance, and I also appreciate several people, including my colleague from Ward 7, pointing out how much more effective, how much more necessary it is in addressing the rat problem to address rats' access to food than using poisons. I did some research in the last couple weeks on this as an amateur person interested in this question. It's very consistent. Everybody agrees that poison is, in some cases, useful for temporarily depressing a rat population. But in the long term, there's no solution if you are not cutting off access to food. And quite simply, we are not at the point as a city where we are doing enough to cut off rats' access to food. And several of my colleagues have mentioned some of the aspects of that. Sometimes it's landlords who are hard to get a hold of, where we're not allowed to enter their properties and do mitigation. but there are also some cases for example commercial dumpsters in Somerville have to get a license every year according to our municipal code every single year we have to as a city say yes your dumpsters are good we currently in my opinion simply do not have the staff to enforce that to make sure that in every case a commercial dumpster closes latches keeps rats out, keeps rats from having all the food they want all night long. So I just want to make clear this is something where maybe one day we'll get to the point where we're doing so much cutting off access to food that we say we have no choice but to use poison, but we are not there now. Thank you.

Councilor Bob would like to sign on. Other discussion?

Councilor Clayton? Real quick, just two other quick points I wanted to make was that I read this really great article in The Guardian recently titled, I Love Rats, But We Can't Live With Them, The Headache of the Rise in Roading Populations. And this guy's been working with rats for decades in the sewers of New York City. And, you know, we recognize that rats are dangerous to humans' health. They carry diseases, so that's why he's saying we can't live with them. But they're also very similar to us. They're very smart. So the best way is to make sure they're not repopulating. And with the last, he mentions the mild winters that we've had and how they've really been the impetus for a huge explosion. So just be mindful of that with the mild winters that we really need to be extra vigilant on making sure that we're not feeding and housing rodents as they continue to procreate.

Okay. So that item will refer to legislative matters. And then can we read item 7.1, please?

Yes, 7.1, Mayor's request, requesting approval of a home rule petition to regulate anticoagulant rodenticides.

Mr. Mayor. Mr. President. We've heard how, despite years of a policy of not using first-generation and second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides on public land, and not having those used as part of our residential rodent abatement program, we're still losing raptors. And that's happening because they're being used on private property. And so... We'd love to stop doing that. Problem is we're not authorized to do that currently under the state. So the first thought is let's get the state to ban them statewide. And there's an effort underway to do that. It looked like this year that might happen. We did not see that progress in the most recent legislative session. So I wanna put in a home rule petition and join over 20 other communities who've put in similar home rule petitions, asking Beacon Hill to give us permission to ban these on private property so we can stop seeing the deaths that we're seeing from our raptors and other wildlife too. It's clear this is the next step in this. It's clear that we need this here in Somerville, so I'm urging the city council, and I'm confident you all will go along with this too, for my conversations with you all. let's put another home rule petition on the pile. Hopefully this moves the state to ban them statewide, but otherwise, please approve ours and let us go do the thing that we know we need to do here. Thanks.

Thank you. Any discussion? All right, seeing none, that will follow the previous item to legislative matters. Thank you, Mr. Merritt. Madam Clerk, next item, we'll go back to 4.3, I think we're at, right?

Yes. 4.3 by Councilors Hart, Mba, Ewing, Kampen, Link, Strezzo, Wheeler, and Davis to end the Supplemental Nutrition Assistant Program Access Crisis.

Councilor Hart.

Thank you so much, Mr. President. So in a moment, I want to invite up a speaker, a resident to speak on this issue. But first I want to just provide a little background on this resolution. And I also want to appreciate Director Lisa Robinson and City Staff Alisa Abel, who worked very hard on this and have been you know really advocating on this issue so um what we're seeing in the case of snap as throughout other government services and all the things that we hold in common as public resources is that our government and our collective wealth is really being dismantled and undermined in order to take money from most of us and funnel it upwards to the wealthiest in the US. So not only do people depend on these services for food and nutrition, but people depend on the jobs and the work that they do to help our society function. Massachusetts has an opportunity here to do what is right and push back on the direction that the federal government is moving to help people keep employment and access to food. This resolution lays it out very clearly. Rather than reading the entire thing, though, I just want to read some of the key parts that really illustrate the problem. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, is one of the most effective anti-hunger assistance programs in the nation. But from January to April of this year, 91.5% of callers who had to take an action or get the Department of Transitional Assistance to take action to get or keep their SNAP benefit could not reach DTA due to high call volume and insufficient staff to answer the phone lines. That's almost 92% of the calls. So since last July, when President Trump signed the one big beautiful bill into law, the SNAP caseload has declined statewide by nearly 175,000 people, including 62,000 children. And to be clear, this is people who have been cut off and lost their benefits. This has resulted in a loss of more than 360 million federal food dollars, and the participation in Somerville alone has dropped 15% from November 2024 to April 2026. That's about 992 residents. And the decline in the 02145 zip code was as high as 20% during the same time period. Across the state, child participation in SNAP has decreased by 18%. So again, these numbers represent children and community members going hungry from being cut off. And there is, the data indicate that much of this decline is due to the lack of capacity to process the applications at DTA. The data show that from January through April of this year, procedural issues led to 70% of application denials compared with just 50% in times of higher staffing. So I'll read the last two clauses of this resolution. While the federal government is focused on cutting programs that have served our residents well for decades, we know that Massachusetts can choose differently by investing in SNAP and DTA's workforce. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the City of Somerville that the Somerville City Council urges the Healy-Driscoll Administration and the Massachusetts General Court to prioritize ending a SNAP access crisis in Massachusetts that is preventing members of our community from tapping into this powerful resource. Somerville City Council requests the hiring of additional DTA caseworkers to ensure those eligible for SNAP are able to receive and maintain benefits. So thank you. And I want to... After my colleague speaks, I wanted to sponsor a resident to speak as well.

Okay, Councillor Bhat.

Thank you, Mr. President, and thank you, Councillor Hart, for including me on this. I just want to just uplift the fact that, you know, when we talk about access to SNAP, it's not simply a matter of whether benefits exist. You know, it is whether eligible families can reach the system and receive the support that they are entitled to. So when we talk about thousands of residents, including children and families, losing SNAP because of overwhelming phone lines, understaffing and procedural barriers, the consequences are felt directly in households. Food security and by local organization already stretched thin. trying to fill the gaps. So at a time when federal cuts, you know, are making it harder for families to put food on the table, Massachusetts, in our state, we must ensure that its own systems are accessible, responsive, and adequately staffed. So I really hope that, you know, through this, we just want to reaffirm that this city council urges the administration to help it really administrations, and the Massachusetts General Court to act with urgency by investing in DTA and hiring additional caseworkers so that eligible families and residents can access and maintain the SNAP benefits. So thank you for, you know, putting this forward, and I hear my time.

Thank you. Councillor Scott would like to sign on. Any Councillor Wheeler would like to sign on? Any further discussion? Councillor Hart, you said you had a speaker. Councillor Scherzer, did you want to have a comment? I thought I saw your hand up. No? Yes?

Thanks, Mr. President.

If you'd like to speak, now's the time, and then we'll go back to Councillor Hart.

Thank you. I'm happy to sign on to this. I wanted to thank Councillor Hart for putting this forward. expand the conversation because poverty is often silent and so is hunger. Hunger is often silent and many people don't really know what's in our neighbors cupboards at home or refrigerators are at home or not. Just some quick statistics with what's going on in SNAP and the new federal regulations and the complications and the new recent convoluted process aside from the staffing issues statewide but federally. how complicated things have become where undocumented residents are no longer eligible for SNAP. And even victims of human trafficking were kicked off the US eligibility for receiving SNAP. With the work requirements that are now in place federally and how complicated that has become, first off, statistically, most SNAP residents are already working. They aren't being paid enough. They're not paid a living wage. Their time isn't valued and considered. to make a living wage, as we've seen. So it makes it more complicated that that would be seen with contempt to kick them off the ability to survive and their families to thrive. Where corporations like Walmart and McDonald's in the past have had helplines to get them to SNAP, but not actually pay them living wages, and how unfair that is. And I am genuinely concerned for Somerville residents, and colleagues, you've heard me talking about this before. It's happening in our backyards, next door, right around us. And I really, I don't know if Mayor Wilson is still here, but if he is, I'm hoping that with the administration we can figure out some kind of creative solutions to really address and work hard to expand food accessibility in every way. I'm grateful that... Mayor Wilson, in his first month of office, worked with me and the CTE program to get that little free pantry, food pantry, outside of City Hall. If you haven't seen it and you've seen that colorful box right outside of City Hall, the one is a mail-in ballot box and that's cool too. It's all colorful. We worked with the carpentry department and installed that box so you can contribute and bring free dry pantry goods and place it inside of that box right outside City Hall. Also, there's going to be a new community fridge that's about to be installed. I haven't heard that it has been yet, but the church on Central Ave, the Greek Orthodox Our Lady of Greek Orthodox. Thank you. Thank you. I said that. But it's, anyway, so Central Ave is about to put forward a community fridge almost in fall. So it's very soon in the making. So that will leave us with four community fridges that are here. But we know that's not enough. We know that the volunteers and the food acquiring is constant and the increase is undeniable. And we have to keep talking about it, but we also have to keep acting on it and pushing to end food poverty and poverty itself, of course. So I'm leaving those thoughts with us tonight and going forward and what we can do to change that and looking for active, proactive, constant solutions and bravely talking about it constantly too.

Thank you. Councilor Clayton.

Thank you, Mr. President. Through you, I'd like to sign on to this. I never know what, you know, Haley's my boss, this is asking for more employees, whatever. I can give you some perspective, not only from just growing up and, you know, on government cheese and going out of the welfare office has become much more high-tech and I speak from experience that I work for EHSIT and we support those workers in those offices of DTA and I hear the amount of people that are in those offices every day and just how hard these DTA workers are working get people their SNAP benefits and I don't know if they're wrapped up in part of a freeze in state employees or not but I know that I certainly can imagine due to volume that they they need much more help and so I'm happy to sign on to this and support my my union brothers and sisters in the dta offices to get more more people more support so that when people do miss a document and they get kicked off and their benefits get cut off they don't go hungry um they they have access to those benefits so um thank my colleagues for bringing this forward and uh you know happy to sign on thank you thank you counts all right

Thank you so much to my colleagues for the support, and I'd like to sponsor Ray Santana to speak.

Council Hart would like to sponsor Ray Santana to speak, seeing no objection.

And just to note, Ray is gonna also speak for another resident who couldn't come tonight, so I hope we can have a little grace in the time limit. Understood. Thank you.

Thank you. Hi, everybody. My name is Ray Santana. I'm the president of the Mystic Tenant Association, a resident-led organization serving 455 apartment homes in the Mystic View and Mystic River communities. I'm here to speak about the urgent need for more caseworkers at the DTA office. The families I represent include low-income households, seniors, people with disabilities, and residents facing language, transportation, and technology barriers. They depend on DTA benefits to meet basic needs, especially as the cost of groceries and everyday necessities continue to rise. The DTA is understaffed. Paperwork submitted on time can remain unviewed. Calls go unanswered, cases are closed, and essential benefits are interrupted because workers are carrying more cases than they can reasonably manage. I have personally experienced these problems. I submitted documents before deadlines multiple times, but because they were not reviewed in my portal, my benefits were shut off, and then it took weeks and sometimes months to correct the issue. I have also waited on hold for hours, only to have the call disconnect and be forced to start over. For a family living paycheck to paycheck, this is not a simple inconvenience. It can mean an empty refrigerator and weeks without food. Today, our community received food boxes, and within 15 minutes, every box was gone. Families who rely on these resources are left without food for weeks or more. Now, I imagine that box was a family's only option because DTA had not processed these case or wrongfully closed their benefits. Food pantries are doing everything they can, but they cannot replace a properly staffed public assistance system. Families should not lose access to food because paperwork is sitting unread, and caseworkers should not be expected to manage multiple case loads. We need increased funding, more caseworkers, reasonable caseloads, multilingual assistance, and reliable ways for residents to resolve urgent problems. I asked this council to work with our state delegation and demand immediate investment in DTA staffing. A delayed case is not just paperwork, it's a child's meal, a family's stability, and a community member's dignity. That was me. So I'm gonna read a letter from Kathy. She happens to be a Mystic resident as well. I wrote my speech before I read hers, so it kinda ties into each other. So she writes, I'm very grateful for my SNAP benefits, but I have difficult time reaching DTA when I need assistance. For example, I have been out of work and at home for the past two months. Throughout that time, I've been trying to connect DTA. I begin calling around 745 or 750 every morning because I know the office opens at 8. I hope that if I start early enough, someone might answer my call. At 8, I continue calling, but I'm still unable to reach anybody. The system says that all lines are busy. As a Massachusetts resident and a mother of three children, I believe we should receive better service from programs that so many people depend on. As a single mother, I am very busy managing my children's appointments and my own responsibilities. I cannot go to work, visit the hospital, take my children to their doctor's appointments, and go to the DTA office at the same time. I cannot be in two places at once. That is why it is important for us to be able to reach DTA by phone. If I am at the hospital or somewhere else, I need to update my information, I should be able to call and speak to someone. DTA tells us if we stop working or our hours decrease, we should report it because our income determines the amount of benefits we receive. We must also report when we begin working more hours. However, when I'm working, I do not always have time to visit the DTA office in person to provide those updates. I currently receive benefits, but I had no income for two months. My children are also out of school, which means we need more groceries and food at home. I spent two months trying to inform DTA that I'm no longer working. Submitting documents is another challenge. Documents must be uploaded using a phone, but I do not know how to do that. Technology is difficult for me, so I have to ask other people to help me upload or fax my paperwork. As a Massachusetts resident, I would like DTA to make its services more accessible. It should be easier for residents to contact someone, report important changes, and submit required documents. I hope these services can become easier to access for all Massachusetts families. And everything she wrote basically supports what I've gone through personally as well. It's a horrible system that they have going. In the DTA office, workers do their best, but something has to change for people to be able to get their benefits.

Thank you.

Any further discussion? Council Streisand? Okay, seeing no further discussion, then that item is approved. And there was instruction for a copy to State Delegation as stated in the item, thank you. All right, very good, thank you for that. Next item, Madam Clerk.

Next item is 4.4, a resolution by Councilor Unba and Councilor Hart in support of a fair and dignified resolution for an international graduate student at Tufts University.

Councilor Ba.

Thank you, Mr. President. It's a pretty detailed resolution, but the main highlight is that an international graduate student at Tufts has experienced significant hardship arising from a dispute concerning her academic standing and the circumstances surrounding the termination of her program. So this resolution is meant to address not only the circumstances that led to the student's departure from Tufts, but also the lasting academic and financial consequences she may continue to face. Because international students can be particularly vulnerable when academic disputes affect their educational records. Future opportunities and ability to navigate immigration and employment systems so you know we as a city have a responsibility to stand for academic integrity due process and freedom from retaliation while recognizing that the goal of this resolution is not reinstatement but a meaningful path forward so we therefore call on the tufts university to engage constructively with the student her representatives review and correct any grades that were retaliatory or improperly altered and provide appropriate compensation for the financial hardship she has experienced. And I really urge Tufts' leadership to resolve this matter fairly, transparently, and with compassion so that this student can move forward with her education and career without unnecessarily and lasting consequences And so that our community can have confidence that speaking up about unfair treatment will never come at the cost of a student's future. It's, again, I think, I just, it would be nice for us to read this resolution, you know, put it on the record.

You have the floor, Councilman.

Madam Clerk, would you mind reading the resolution, please?

I do not mind. Whereas the city of Somerville recognizes the important contributions that international students, scholars, researchers, and workers make to our community, our institutions of higher education, and our commonwealth. And whereas Tufts University is an important educational and economic institution in the city of Somerville and has a responsibility to uphold principles of fairness, academic integrity, due process, and respect for all members of its community, and whereas an international graduate student at Tufts University has experienced significant hardship arising from a dispute concerning her academic standing and the circumstances surrounding the termination of her program, and whereas the Medford City Council previously adopted a resolution expressing concern about the treatment of this student and calling upon Tufts University to address the circumstances surrounding her case, and whereas since the adoption of the resolution circumstances have changed and the appropriate path forward is not to seek the student's reinstatement at tufts university but rather to ensure that the student has the best possible opportunity to move forward with her education and career and whereas allegations have been raised that grades were changed in retaliation for the students exercise of her rights and advocacy concerning her treatment, and that these changes have the potential to cause continuing and significant harm to her academic and professional future, and whereas the preservation of retaliatory or otherwise improperly altered grades on a student's academic transcript can create lasting barriers to further education, employment, professional advancement, and immigration-related opportunities, and where a student has also experienced significant financial hardship as a result of the circumstances surrounding her case, making appropriate financial compensation an important component of a meaningful resolution, and whereas a fair resolution should seek not only to address past harm, but also to give the affected student the best possible chance to continue her education and career with dignity, free from unnecessary and continuing consequences arising from the dispute, and whereas Somerville believes that institutions of higher education must be accountable for ensuring that students are treated fairly and that academic records are maintained with integrity and without retaliation. Now, therefore, be it resolved that the Somerville City Council urges Tufts University to work toward a fair and comprehensive resolution of this matter that will allow the affected international graduate student to move forward with her education and career with dignity. and be it further resolved that the Somerville City Council calls upon Tufts University to review and, where appropriate, remove or correct from the student's academic transcript any grades that were changed as a form of retaliation or otherwise improperly altered in connection with this dispute, and be it further resolved that the Somerville City Council urges Tufts University to provide appropriate financial compensation for the significant financial hardship and losses the student has experienced as a result of the circumstances surrounding this matter. And be it further resolved that the Somerville City Council encourages Tufts University to engage in constructive process with the affected student and her representatives to reach a resolution that addresses both the academic and financial consequences of this matter. and be it further resolved that the city clerk is directed to transmit a copy of this resolution to the president of Tufts University, the Tufts University Board of Trustees, and other appropriate university officials, and be it further resolved that the Somerville City Council reaffirms its commitment to protecting the rights and dignity of international students and to ensuring that students who raise legitimate concerns about their treatment do not face retaliation or lasting academic and professional consequences for doing so.

Thank you, Madam Clerk. Madam Clerk, could you read item 10.2 as well?

Mr. President?

I'd like to read 10.2 in the record. Sure.

item 10.2 Rocco DiRico submitting comments regarding item 26-1302 in support of a fair and dignified resolution for an international graduate student at Tufts University I just want to note that that item came in this is Rocco DiRico's the community liaison with Tufts it's a

On behalf of Tufts University, a comment related to this item. So I just wanted to call attention to that. We're not going to read it, but that item can be placed on file 10.2. Any further discussion? Councillor Hart, did you want to speak to this?

Yes. After Councillor Hart. Mr. President, I'm glad you mentioned that, because he sent me those stuff. So I'm glad you brought that up. And so I will pass it on to my colleague. Yes. The vice president of government and community relations sent me the same stuff. So it's online, it's attached to the minutes. I'm glad.

It is a separate item on this agenda. It can be found under item 10.2 because it came in after the primary agenda was said. Amazing.

So I'll pass it on to my colleague and then we have one speaker for the item. Councilor Hunt.

Thank you, Councilor Mabau, and I want to appreciate Councilor Mabau's leadership on this. And just to say briefly, you know, right now the position of international students and students in higher education is so precarious for so many reasons, and I really appreciate appreciate that our community supporting students and and international students especially and and the importance of having a union as well so i'm grateful that i could also sign on to to support this effort And I do want to appreciate Mr. Dorico's statement, which said the Director of Labor Relations will be checking in with the union. So I appreciate that action from Tufts. Thank you.

All right. Councilor Ewen Campbell would like to sign on. Councilor Wheeler, you haven't spoken on the item. Councilor Scott and Klingon would like to sign on, and then we'll come back to you for a second crack. Councilor Wheeler, go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you to my colleagues for putting this item forward. One thing I just want to be clear on is that this resolution does not presume that we know all the details about what happened in this case. What it does do is articulate the principles that are at stake here, and it calls on Tufts to engage in good faith towards a fair and comprehensive resolution of this matter. And as my colleagues have said, in an environment where our federal government treats shifts in academic status as grounds for street-level abduction, our government and educational institutions must be absolutely sure academic status is being handled fairly and thoroughly. Thank you.

Thank you. Council Bob.

Thank you, Mr. President. At this point, I would like to sponsor Chris Molinari to the podium.

Council Bob, I would like to sponsor Chris Molinari. Seeing no objection, please step forward and introduce yourself for the record.

All right, testing, testing. Hello, never done this before. Thank you, Mr. President, to the members of this council and to members of the Somerville community. Thank you for your time. My name is Christopher Molinari. I'm a proud member of the Somerville community and a steward for the Tufts University Graduate Workers Union and SEIU Local 509. Somerville is a community of workers and scholars from across the world. My own grandparents were immigrants here from Sicily in the 1960s. That's why I am personally appalled by Tufts University's hostility towards an international member of our community in the face of evident mistreatment. We first learned of her mistreatment when her summer job at Tufts was suddenly rescinded just a few days before it was supposed to start. As an international student, any threats to her continued employment and enrollment at Tufts could directly threaten her future in this country. It turns out that these issues had gone far beyond the summer appointment. In violation of our union contract and rights as graduate workers, her advisor forced her to perform off the books, unpaid teaching assistant work during the spring semester for a class he himself teaches. This was on top of her documented responsibilities as a research assistant, her academic course requirements, and her dissertation work. This time commitment aggregated to nearly double what our contract limits. And despite her attempts to keep up, grading late into the night, proctoring exams, holding office hours, and providing continual updates on her work, it was never enough. She was constantly belittled, sometimes publicly in front of coworkers, and made to feel she was not working hard enough. That change in appointment, we believe, was direct retaliation for concerns over this unpaid work being raised. It was during this time that we had noticed that this person's grades dating back to last fall were retroactively changed to show unsatisfactory research performance when no such grade had existed before in violation of Tufts' own grading policy. To make a very long story short, we grieved 11 separate contract violations with the university, all of which were denied despite us providing appropriate documentation of these offenses. Graduate School of Engineering Dean Karen Panetta then sent the worker a letter the day after receiving the grievance response saying that she was being administratively withdrawn from the university using the retroactively edited grades as justification. As of now, Tufts has largely succeeded in evicting this worker from their job and their program of study. When some of my colleagues commented on a similar resolution from the Medford City Council, we argued that this worker should be reinstated and given their job back. However, given the incredibly hostile atmosphere towards her from her advisor up to Tufts administrators themselves, as well as changes to visa rules at the federal level, she has decided that the best path forward is to continue her studies at a different university. This will be impossible if these retaliatory grades stay on her record. I implore you to vote in favor of this resolution. A vote in favor is not only a vote for some semblance of justice and a future within this country for a beloved member of our community, but also a statement to Tufts that we do not appreciate neighbors who so brazenly trample upon the values our community believes in. I and the graduate workers of Tufts University, thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion? All right, seeing none, that item is approved. Next item, Madam Clerk.

Next item is 4.5, a resolution by Councilors Mbah, Strezzo, Ewen Campin, Link, Wheeler, Hart, and Davis in support of security officers in Greater Boston and airport service workers at Logan International Airport.

Councilor Bhat. Thank you, Mr. President. This is about the workers who keep the Greater Boston offices, laboratories, university, and Logan International Airport safe, clean, and functioning. deserve access to quality, affordable health care. Many of these workers disproportionately are people of color and immigrants. And they are being asked to provide essential services while struggling to afford the health care they need. Even as the industry they support generate enormous, enormous economic wealth. Some of it believe that a strong regional economy must work for the people who make that economy possible. And that employers and major institutions have a responsibility to ensure that contracting does not become a pathway to lower wages, weaker benefits, or diminished dignity at work. This is what we are seeing here. So we therefore stand in solidarity with these workers and the greater Boston property owners, security clients, the contractors, Marsport, airlines, and airport service contractors to bargain fairly. I always use the word fairly. I always read this word like it's not, this is just a fair request. In good faith to provide quality, affordable, employer-paid healthcare. So we call on our regional economic leaders to recognize that prosperity should be shared by the workers. We'll make it possible and to take concrete action to ensure that no worker is forced to choose between putting food on the table and getting the health care that they need. This is ridiculous. And so before I, you know, I will pass it on to my colleague, you know, and then I would like to sponsor Stanley

to speak to this resolution sure happy to co-sponsor this why do you raise some and why this is important that we are talking about this and that I'm really imploring everyone to stand in support and solidarity and also to spread the word, how important it is. According to 32BJSEIU, For security officers, 15% full-time security officers and 30% of local airport workers surveyed report being uninsured. 16% of security officers report taking on medical debt in the last five years, and 19% of airport workers report skipping meals or cutting back on groceries. So with that, I want to lift up and have our speaker lift up this conversation, get some action on this, and have our sponsored speaker speak.

Any other discussion before we hear from the speaker? That's fine. So I, Councillor Baugh, would like to speak. Your name, sir?

My name is Stanley Washington III.

Counselor, I would like to speak, I would like to sponsor Stanley Washington. Any objection? Seeing none. All right. State your name again for the record and go right ahead.

My name is Stanley Washington III. So good evening, counselors. Thank you for the opportunity to be here. My name is Stanley Washington III. I'm a security guard and unit steward at Faneuil Hall and a public policy and community advocate. And I'm here today not only to speak for myself, but... but for my fellow security guards and airport workers who are facing the same struggle, the fight to have affordable, quality health care. First of all, I want to thank the Somerville City Council for standing with security guards and airport workers who are fighting for health care. Your support means everything because behind every uniform is a person, a family, and a community that deserves to be healthy and treated with dignity. For security guards like myself, health care is not a luxury, it is a necessity. We work long hours protecting buildings, historical landmarks, supporting communities, and making sure other people can go to work safely. But when our own health care is uncertain and incredibly unaffordable, it becomes harder to take care of ourselves and our families. This isn't just a security guard issue. Airport workers are experiencing many of the same challenges. They are working hard to keep our airports running, yet they too are being forced to fight for something as basic as access to quality health care. Right now, bargaining is dragging on with very little progress. Every day that negotiations stall is another day that workers are left wondering what their future health care looks like. That's why we need your continued support. We are not asking for special treatment. We're asking for a fair, strong contract, affordable healthcare, and the dignity that every worker deserves. Counselors, we hope you continue to stand with us by reminding employers that the people who protect our communities and keep our airports safe deserve to be protected as well. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak tonight, and thank you for standing with working people. Thank you so much.

Thank you. Councillor Klingham would like to sign on. Councillor Link, do you want to speak to the item? Go right ahead.

Thank you, Mr. President. I just want to say that I sat in a meeting with this union and I heard all these stories, these really, really powerful stories. Stories about people who are skipping doses of their medications so that they can still pay their rent. And, you know, when I think about these things, you know, we're talking about the SNAP benefits earlier, this corporate welfare that, you know, we've been subsidizing and just kind of begging for more. It's just so incredibly frustrating to hear these stories again and again. And I really, really hope that it's a whole diaspora of different people different bosses that really have to step up to the table here. And I really, really, really hope that they all hear loud and clear that this kind of treatment of these workers, it just can't go on. And it's incredibly frustrating to hear. And I hope at the very least these companies that are in and around Somerville will listen to us.

Read the discussion. Council Bob, back to you.

Yes. Thank you, Mr. President. I think, you know, since we didn't have to, you know, belabor the entire resolution, we just need the city clerk to send the appropriate copies to the folks that deserve to get that.

As indicated in the item, right? Exactly. Very good. All right. That item is approved. Next item, please.

Next item is 4.6, resolution by Councilors Umbach, Strezzo, Ewing-Kampen, Link, Wheeler, Hart, and Davis, in support of Service Employees International Union, 32BJ, facility workers at Tufts University.

Councilor Batt. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you. My alma mater, I'm sure, Councilor McLaughlin, too, 32BJ. You know, this is... facility workers at Tufts University, and they are essential workers of our community whose daily work keeps the university again clean, safe, welcoming, and functioning. As custodians, grounds, workers, desk associates, and skilled trade people, these workers contribute directly to the success of one of Somerville's largest institutions and deserve to be treated with dignity, respect, and fairness. Just as simple as that. And so their current negotiations are about modern wages. They are about family, sustaining compensation, affordable health care, strong benefits, and protection that allow every worker, including immigrant workers, to feel secure in the workplace. As a major employer, Anchor Institution in Somerville Tufts has both an economic responsibility and opportunity to demonstrate what good labor relations looks like. So we therefore call on Tufts University again to bargain in good faith and reach a fair and timely agreement with SEIU 32BJ that recognizes the essential contributions of these workers and provide the wages, healthcare, and benefits and workplace protection they and their families deserve. So, we as the City Council stand with the workers who help our institutions strive and urge TUF to lead by an example. At this point, I will kick it back to my colleague before we sponsor James Goode to speak to the resolution. Councilor Strasse?

Thank you, Mr. President. So, some thoughts on this. Tufts is that a letter by the union was sent to Tufts and the current proposal that Tufts is proposing is not sufficient. including that last time I checked, and I'm sure you'll update us if anything has changed, but I think it's the same with the information I have, that Tufts is proposing that the following unsettling highlights be included in the new contract, a mere $0.64 by average salary increase in the new contract, and Tufts has rejected a request to reduce the monthly health care premiums for members, and Tufts is proposing eliminating the commuting pay When members are called into work. Has anyone looked at the gas prices lately? Anyway, doesn't seem like it's there. And this council stands with you. And with that, I'd love to sponsor the speaker alongside my colleague.

Councilor Straza would like to sponsor James Good. Any objections? Seeing none, please introduce yourself for the record and go ahead.

My name is James Good. So good evening, my name is James Good. For six years I've been working for facilities as a groundskeeper at Tufts University on the Medford-Somerville campus. I am also a proud member of SEIU 32BJ, which encompasses facilities employees across all three of the campuses. I'm here this evening to ask on behalf of our union the council's official support for a resolution for a fair contract from Tufts University. Our labor negotiations began in April, and the bargaining units have met around six or seven times. To this point, we are still negotiating with very little movement from the university on many issues, two of which we maintain as our most important. First, annual wage increases, which to most recently the university has conceded only to come up 2% per year, which is not only well below the goals for the union that we established before this process, but is below cost of living increases in the area. Additionally, health insurance costs have been big for us. Tufts covers significantly less. than other universities in the area, which is the standard, which results in more costs put on to the employee. We've simply asked for something a bit more comparable to the other universities in the area, which I believe they've refused. Our previous contract expired on July 1st, meaning we have been operating without a contract for just under two months now. This is understandably very uncomfortable for a lot of people that I work with. Being a facilities member for Tufts labels us as essential employees. That label comes with expectations to always be available to the university, which often results in sacrifices in our personal lives. However, we understand the role that we have and the importance of our work. It's thankless work that we provide, but we do it proudly. We do view the labor contracts from the university as their way of acknowledging and thanking us for this work, So needless to say, this process has been very frustrating for us all, as it comes across as the university refusing to truly acknowledge the service and the results that we provide for them on a daily basis. So that is why I'm here before you today, humbly asking for your support and a resolution to this contract, because throughout this process we have found that any support that we gain, no matter how small, goes a very, very long way. And so with that, on behalf of all of my union members I'm representing today, I'd like to thank you for this platform, your time, and your potential support. Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilor Klingin would like to sign on. Any discussion? Councilor McLaughlin, go ahead.

Thank you, Mr. President. I'll just speak on all three of them because I feel like every item applied to me directly in one form or another at one point. My mother was a janitor at MIT, represented by 32BJ. My brother was a security guard at Harvard, represented by 32BJ. I went to Tufts University, was a groundskeeper and a custodian at two different points. And at the opposite end of all of these are the most powerful institutions in the region. who have plenty of money to take care of the working people who do all the work around here in this community. So I just want to sign on to all three items and offer my support. And thank you all for representing for people like myself.

Very good, thank you. Any further discussion? All right, seeing none, that item is approved. And that will take us to 4.12.

Item 4.12 by Councilor Ewing Campin and Councilor Klingin in support of retaining Route 80 service through Somerville. Councilor Ewing Campin.

Thank you, Mr. President. The MBTA is undertaking a large-scale improvement project for the entire bus network. It's called the Better Bus Network Project. And overall, this project is incredibly important. Really a great project. It's been very effective. The MBTA claims it has already contributed to a significant increase in 20% ridership over the past year. But as part of the improvements that the MBTA is making to the system overall, they are also cutting or reducing, removing service elsewhere. One of the changes that has effectively already been approved is a cut to a really important bus route in Somerville, which is the 80. For folks who aren't familiar, this is a bus, if you get on it at Lechmere, it runs down the McGrath Highway, turn right onto Cross Street, left onto Pearl, goes through Gilman Square, continues up Medford. And the argument that the MBTA has made is that this line is redundant because of the GLX. That's when they made the decision, when the GLX was still in the future. So, several community groups, including the Mayor's Pedestrian and Transit Advocacy Committee, the Gilman Square Neighborhood Council, have made really, really strong arguments that this section of the 80 bus is really not redundant with the GLX. I could go through some of these reasons that the resolution does so, but I'd prefer to sponsor Alessandra Siter, who is here with us virtually, to speak to the council on why this route remains so important. And just before we do that, I wanna make this really clear. The T is asking for public comment on several changes, including this one. The public comment period is open until September 8th. That's a week from this coming Tuesday. So for folks who are learning about this now or who have been following this, I really encourage you to make yourself heard. If you Google Better Bus Network public feedback, you'll find links to a survey or email or a place to send mail. And with that, I'd like to sponsor Alessandro Seiter.

Councilman Kempin would like to sponsor Alessandro Seiter. Any objection? I'm seeing none. We have her virtually. One moment. Can we get the volume a little higher in the room? Try again. We're getting there. There we go. That sounds good. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Councillor Whaley would like to sign on. Councillor Klinger would like to sign on. Councillor Link would like to sign on. Councillor McLaughlin.

Thank you, Mr. President. I'll also sign on and note that I was riding my bike here today going down Cross Street and the 80 bus was coming right towards me. Not anywhere near a Green Line station. Cross Street, Pearl Street, a lot of these areas. You could be standing in front of the entrance to the Green Line station in East Somerville and not be near the train because you got to walk about six minutes down this long path just to get there. Not accessible area at all. And I don't want to see this bus leave. I don't want to see any buses leave. What's frustrating to me with the fact that the MBTA is stating that we're losing these bus lines because of the green line, which is something we invested in personally, $50 million, city of Somerville. contributed to decades of work, lawsuits to get the Green Line where it is. And now, because of that, we're going to lose bus lines. And that makes no sense to me, especially considering we have invested in bus lanes all over this city, including McGrath Highway, including Broadway, including all these areas. And we've built up new bus stops as well, where some of those stops don't even have buses coming to them anymore. so this is just frustrating to me as someone who has this bus cut directly through my neighborhood to see this happen when we should be getting more buses in this community i would like to see any bus lane in the city should have no more than a 10 minute wait and that would be good for us but it'd be good for the whole region to show people how we can actually have a real transit-oriented city. And instead of taking away buses, we should be adding more. So I support this resolution. I'll be submitting my comments to the MBTA and encourage everyone else to do the same. Good, Councilor Clayton.

Thank you, Mr. President. Through you, happy to co-sponsor this. Thanks to my colleague for doing most of the heavy lifting. And thank you for the community members who are speaking up this evening. Most of you know I grew up in Somerville, and I lived in all different parts growing up. The 80 bus has been a bus that I've taken probably hundreds of times growing up throughout my life in Summerville. I agree with some of the sentiments that have been mentioned here. The resolution put it perfectly. We don't have an accessible station. um on top of that we you know a lot of times the green line isn't even super reliable i mean we shouldn't be cutting out any modes of transportation um especially ones that go by our some of our most vulnerable population buildings like was mentioned 240 pearl which is in my ward So yeah, I urge everybody to, I know that META every now and then floats these things to kind of test it. They've done this with the 95 at least twice on Mystic Ave and residents of the Mystics came out in force and put a stop to that. And I know they've tried this with the 80 before and hopefully we can get them to cover their senses and keep this important vital route in our community. So thank you to my co-sponsor and my colleagues and the speakers. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. President. I just want to thank my colleague for leading the charge on this. Besides, this person who spoke online, that's my boss, just for the record. So any reduction or elimination of Route 80 service could disproportionately affect residents who have the fewest transportation alternatives and also undermine Our broader goals for equitable and sustainable mobility. So I just want to underscore that and that we need to continue to advocate for a transit system that connects neighborhood and ensure that no resident is left behind because they cannot afford or access a car. So thank you. Thank you, Colin.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Seeing none, that item is approved.

Mr. President, quick question. Item 7.4, the fire department salary contingency appropriation, is that one that we are taking out of order?

It is now second on the list. Great, just want to double check, thank you.

9.28, then we'll go to 7.4. Item 9.28, Ann Ryan submitting comments regarding 90 Washington Street.

Council Member Goffin on this item.

I would like to sponsor Ann Ryan to speak about 90 Washington Street.

Councilor Goffin would like to sponsor Ann Ryan. Seeing no objection, Ms. Ryan, please approach.

My name is Anne Ryan. In 2007, having lived in my car for eight and three quarters years, I became a project-based Section 8 tenant at Cobble Hill. I also became a Somerville resident. And I asked to speak to you, the city council about Cobble Hill, the largest open green space in East Somerville, because I am terrified by the current plans to develop 90 Washington Street. And I'm also worried about the dynamics of municipal real estate governance. My understanding of the current status is that Somerville Redevelopment Authority has approved and is forwarding a single developer's plan to place housing in commercial space that will pay back the developer's investment over time and relieve immediately Somerville's $29 million legal debt. I may have the number wrong. is my understanding that during the search for developers, the Citizens Advisory Committee was told by the SRA that expressed interest in preserving the green space was not realistic and had to be revised. It is also my understanding that attention is being given to zoning to protect the current green space. That much needed zoning is not yet articulated, nor do we know how it would be administered. The worst case scenario is the residents of Cobble Hill will lose not only the sound and 10 degree summer temperature protection, that's provided by the surrounding berms and trees, but also the internal green space, because our landlord, Corcoran Jenison, has to replace 37 parking spaces and increase wheelchair access parking spaces. The extent of the disruption to Cobble Hill residents' lives is not well understood. We live with our own language barriers. Conversations using cell phone translation apps are not in general use. The municipal attention given to the arts community is enviable. And the cultural trust strategy is inspiring. MAPC support is crucial to the success. I'm equally inspired that the Somerville Urban Forestry Committee has twice published statements about the value of Comble Hills trees and berm. Could the elderly living in a beautiful park receive Somerville's serious environmental programmatic attention? Historically, elder services are supervised by the mayor's office. That's the council on aging and the Commonwealth takes care of, um, summer of Cambridge elder services. We at cobble hill are quite isolated. It is my understanding that in the relocation of police and fire services in union square, Somerville fire department does not yet have a new site. The fire department is our most frequent, relied on, and trusted public service. The current control over Cobble Hills Green Space is defined by a project designed with the economic aim of real estate return on investment, and it overbuilds housing on a very limited space. As designed, it destroys the quality of life for residents at Cobble Hill, and it maims the over 40-year environmental cohesion the park now achieves. East Somerville has endemic soil pollution. Cobble Hill is an opportunity to start lasting soil remediation programs. Sustainaville should not need to nimby its soil. Somerville agency interactions are very time demanding. If there is a concerted effort to sustain Cobble Hills Park in the city's ecosystem, I would be grateful to join that effort. Thank you.

Thank you. Any discussion? All right. Thank you, Ms. Ryan. That item will be placed on file. Next item, Madam Clerk.

Next item is 7.4, Mayor's Request, requesting the appropriation of $937,409 from the salary contingency account to various fire department personal services accounts to fund a collective bargaining agreement with the Firefighters Association of Somerville Local 76 Union.

Mr. Mayor. Mr. President, very happy to be here talking about this one. We have a contract with Local 76. And this is a very good thing. I want to credit Steve Tolman. Steve, come on up. Senior labor advisor. Steve came in. This was the first negotiation that Steve worked on from beginning to end. And we also need to really credit our city's labor council, Matt Sirigu. When I talk to our public sector unions, they to a person uh pretty much talk about how amazing matt sirigu is to work with matt has an ability to uh he's a total professional you know he can negotiate uh while never you know seeming to disrespect the other side i think that's really important uh when we're sitting down at you know on the opposite sides of the table But yeah, Local 76 came to us back in February, February? uh and we said let's get down to it and it was a relatively short negotiation i want to thank local 76 for being really good negotiating partners here uh i feel really really good about this contract uh they're gonna talk here soon i think but uh i think well we'll let them talk about how they feel about the contract uh but i want to give steve tolman credit if it uh pleases the president i'd like to have steve say a few words seeing no objection i'm happy to recognize mr tolman

Thank you. First, I commend all of you for your good work here tonight and all the things that you're supporting. But to the mayor's leadership, this contract, he wanted it done. He wanted it on time. He values the firefighters. We all know what firefighters do for us. They certainly are the safeguard of our cities. What the mayor said about Matt Sirigu, you guys should know you have a gem. I've worked with Labor my whole life, and I just think he's terrific. He would have been here tonight. He's on vacation, so don't let him know. We don't want him. to get a big head or anything, but literally I say I've never worked with a guy as competent and considerate. The way he treats people, the way he negotiates, he's fair-minded, and you're very fortunate. Our city is very fortunate to have a lawyer who is representing us across the table. And so it's an honor for me to be on the other side of the table, I can tell you that. And I just want to say that it worked. the firefighters, you know, not everybody was fully happy when it was done, and that's a sign of a good contract. So, Mayor, thank you for the kind words, but it's your leadership that said, let's get this done and let's get this on time. And the most important thing is, it's only the first one. The mayor's striving to get all our contracts. You're doing it, and you're telling cities and towns and different, you know, issues that they want to get things done on time and they want to be appropriate. That's our mayor, and that's what he wants for our city, so I'm honored to be part of it. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Tillman. If there's no objection, I'm happy to recognize representatives from Local 76.

Thank you, Mike Jefferson, President of Summit Firefighters, Local 76. I just want to thank the mayor. I want to thank Steve. Obviously, if Matt was here, I would thank him, too. Everything you just heard is true. We came to the mayor in the end of January. We had several requests before the bargain even started. Those requests were honored, so right off the bat, we started on the right foot. This is my seventh bargaining team that I've been on. I've been on this job for 18 years, bargained for two units, suppression, fire alarm. We shook hands before July 1st, before this expired. Because of the summer break, we had to ratify this certain process to go through. That's why we're just bringing it to you guys tonight. Otherwise, this was September through May, we would have been here sooner. I have never seen something move this fast in 18 years. I have never worked with people across the table that were respectful, open-minded, Every time we left, we had two more meetings scheduled. That is unheard of. So three administrations, seven teams. It has never worked like this before. I am very happy with the results that we got in the contract. It ratified overwhelmingly. And this is what bargaining in good faith is supposed to look like. And I'm excited going forward for all the other unions. We're going to get in there for fire alarm, by the unit, and hopefully we do the same thing with them. And I just want to, again, thank the mayor's team. I hope you guys vote to fund this. You're always allies to us, so I'm confident, confidently optimistic. But until it's done, I'm going to sit back and wait. But thank you all for giving me the time. All right. Thank you.

I do see Budget Director Mastromoni in the back of the room in case there are some questions about the numbers. Councilor Wheeler?

Thank you, Mr. President. I would like to see this immediately approved tonight, so I move to approve this item.

Councillor Whelan moves to approve. Any discussion on the motion? Councillor Scott.

Yes, Mr. President, on the motion, I just want to congratulate the mayor's team and, of course, the union. We've approved a lot of these, and there's a distinctive difference between somebody saying thank you, the process is concluded, and somebody who was really actually pleased with the process. So this is all credit to the new administration taking a different approach to labor negotiations, apparently. So thank you. I'm looking forward to voting for it. Further discussion?

All right, seeing none, do we need a roll call on that one? We do not, all right, seeing no objection, then that item is approved.

I'm sorry, I misspoke, Mr. President, we do need to.

Oh, let's take a roll call anyway, it's just for fun. Yeah. And also because apparently we need to. Roll call on the motion.

This is a roll call to approve item 7.4. Councilor Ewing-Campin. Yes. Councilor Link. Yes. Councilor Scott. Yes. Councilor Klingin. Yes. Councilor Shuzzo. Yes. Councilor Saeed. Councilor Wheeler. Yes. Councilor Hart. Yes. Councilor McLaughlin. Yes. Councilor Mba.

Yes.

Councilor Davis. Yes. With 10 members in the affirmative, that motion passes.

All right. Very good. Thank you. Now it's official. All right. Next item, Madam Clerk.

Yes, next item is 7.26. All righty, that is Mayor's request, requesting confirmation of appointment of Michael Avery to the Elections Commission.

The administration has asked that we consider this one this evening for approval. I think if given the election calendar, it was pretty clear to me why that might be and that was confirmed that there's some need to get this member into office ASAP. We have Commissioner Salerno here if there's any questions. Commissioner Salerno, did you want to say anything on the item before we go to any questions?

I'd like to say good evening to everyone. And it's very interesting what happened here. And this fellow before me is a tough act to follow. But anyway, my name is Nick Salerno, Chairman of the Board of Election Commissioners. And we have been like one commissioner for several months. And we are facing a very serious election next Tuesday. The mayor came with a person, a recommendation that he had to replace the previous person who was deceased. I happen to have known him for several years. He's a high-ranking officer in the fire department, a veteran, and a man about town. And I think that we would be very fortunate to have him. He can be very helpful to me, to my staff, to the other commissioners, because he has worked with so many departments here in the city. I know he'll be a tremendous asset to us during the election season. He moves pretty quickly for a fellow who spent a lot of years in the fire department. It's vital to us that we have a fourth commissioner in place. We need the help, and I want to thank the mayor for making such a fine recommendation as Michael Avery. And having said that, if you'd like, I'd like to, through the chair, have Mr. Avery come up and answer any questions you may have for him.

Absolutely. Very well. I did. At my request, the clerk did send a note to the council earlier earlier this week, just noting that this would be the request so that folks would have a chance to take a look at the request and come up with any questions. So, Mr. Avery, thank you for being here. Councilor Clingan.

Just don't we have like three members here that need to recuse himself from this? Sorry.

Interesting question. We'll leave that up to the law department. Any questions?

Mr. Chair, it's no question. I think it's pretty clear to colleagues, traditionally, this would have been referred to committee, but we've had the circumstances surrounding this, so I move to approve.

Council Bob moves to approve. Any discussion? All right, seeing none, that item is approved. Congratulations, and thank you for being willing to help.

Thank you all very much.

All right, Madam Clerk, next item.

Next item is 7.29 mayor's request requesting approval of the technology specific surveillance use policy for body worn cameras.

We get that take that up together with 7.3 please.

Yes, next item is 7.30 requesting approval of the surveillance technology impact report for body worn cameras.

all right so just a quick bit of background for folks who are regular viewers and there was a special meeting called by the mayor over the summer in order to put previous versions of these two documents before the council during that meeting there was discussion about there still needed needed to be some some improvements made and I raised many of those myself but Ultimately, the Council voted to approve those two items so that the process could move forward. Speaking for myself, the issues that I had were not substantive so much as drafting and clarification and just making it easier to serve the transparency purpose that these documents are intended to serve. I've had conversations with Manager Hellman and with Attorney Sirigu, and these changes reflect those discussions. They are before us. My thought is that because – just because I was – you know putting time into this over the last few weeks um maybe not everyone had a chance to do that so they are here before us there is no there is no there's no particular time sensitivity um to to pass these changes so it will be my suggestion to the council ultimately and we'll hear from manager hillman to uh to talk through what the changes are i think is that your intent but that these we do have a public hearing scheduled and legislative matters on this which was the public hearing that was requested by the community according to the Charter so it is my thought to send these to committee so they can they could follow that and if we hear some good ideas to make additional improvements that we that we're able to make then reason not to do that so that's sort of the background manager Hamlin do you want to sort of walk us through specific detail but give us a sense for what we're looking at here versus what was voted on over the summer

yes thank you mr president through you um reminder i'm john hillman on the public safety role project manager here in the city um as you know counselor davis gave some of the background on this but um we're just resubmitting for your consideration both the t-sub and the stir this evening um you know it was our administration's commitment to collaborate with the council on fixes and revisions so these documents were approved in you know last month based on the feedback from the council we have in addition to some format and technical revisions Included a few points of clarification and details I would just quickly highlight. These include a commitment to a good faith effort to prioritize any public records request from a civilian subject of body-worn camera footage. We have a thorough acknowledgement of the risks of this technology and the clear need for rigorous oversight included in the STR. Um, some stronger language emphasizing footage access for post, the post commission, um, and as well as any future local oversight body that contains rules and regulations that grant access to footage, um, as well as a clear declaration that in the event of a conflict between the TSUP and the, uh, police's body-worn camera policy, the TSAP would prevail, subject to the city's fulfilling its specific collective bargaining obligations. So we've included some redline attachments in this for you all to review along with the updated documents. And so with the phased implementation of this program upcoming, we look forward to the council reviewing these updated documents. Thank you.

Very good, thank you very much. Any questions, discussions now? As I said, my thought is to send these to committees so we have a chance to digest them in due course and also hear from other members of the public if there's additional input, but any questions at the moment? All right, seeing none, then let's refer both of these items to legislative matters. Thank you. And then I'm going to ask if you want to take a break, but since it was raised here, let's go back to the regular order of business and start with item 4.1 because it relates to what was just mentioned. Was it on these past two items, Councilor Link?

Okay, let's go to 4.1 and then, yeah.

Sorry, Mr. President.

If it's possible, could we just take one more item out of order? 4.10, I apologize.

All right, let's go to 4.1 and then we'll go to 4.10.

Okay. 4.1, order by Councilor Davis in his capacity as president that this council schedule a public hearing regarding the establishment of an entity to provide civilian oversight of the police department.

okay thank you manager Helen mentioned some of the provisions in the body one camera documents that were revised to better anticipate a potential Oversight Commission that was a subject that was brought up in the in the deliberation of the body one camera uh process um and uh i i noted and we heard from the administration their commitment to move forward with that uh here we are i've had i've had um a couple of discussions with members of the administration on a the timing for process um no substantive i haven't any substantive discussions as yet but This is the first step. This is essentially calling for a to-be-scheduled public hearing on civilian oversight. I anticipate over the next two or three meetings we'll have various steps with hearing from the administration on where they are on the process of coming up with a proposal, the first of which will be receiving input from the council. We will then hear sort of the first... the first draft or sort of, you know, first sort of formation of that proposal at a subsequent meeting and then give both council and the public time to digest that as well and and then after that have a public hearing um after which the the matter will be in legislative matters um where we will then move forward with uh bless you with a um with uh drafting an ordinance as uh as members of the council are aware and and for bless you as a member of the public to be where this um a number if not a majority of the issue issues Well, there are significant issues relating to civilian oversight that are required to be bargained with the union. So my intent is to put the horse out in front for the cart this time. And so that's why we've sort of designed this schedule. There will be some discussions that will have to happen in executive session. So you'll see that. But that's sort of the loose framework of the schedule and the plan. We will all hear more detail as we go forward. And of course, councillors are welcome to individually reach out to the administration if they have input or thoughts or want to kind of get a preview. But that's sort of the plan. So the reason I submitted this, and I'll note with a wry smirk that submitted this public hearing because as I noted during the summer I don't think that's something the mayor can do is schedule a public hearing the City Council so I'm doing it this time because that's the way we wanted to work going forward any questions on that just initially I wanted I wanted you all to hear and the public to hear kind of the the initial thoughts on a schedule and plan for this and I'll note like i'm thrilled right this was one of the one of the big concerns and i know i relied on the mayor's commitment in making that body one camera vote and so here we are and we're moving forward so i'm i'm happy about that i look forward to working with everyone to to get that process moving counselor

Thank you, Mr. President, and I just wanted to echo your comments that I very much relied on the mayor's commitment there, and I appreciate you putting this forward at this very first meeting because I'm also excited to see this move forward, and hopefully we can move it along very, very swiftly. Thank you.

All right, so this item will be referred to legislative matters.

Sorry, Mr. President, I had one. Go ahead. Just in the spirit of clarity and understanding, you mentioned there being likely some executive sessions coming up. In the spirit of explaining that, am I right in understanding those executive sessions, which are just private council sessions, the reason why we'll have those about such an important public matter is because there is an element here which will have to be worked out with the two police bargaining units in their collective bargaining agreements to somehow accommodate the existence and role of any civilian oversight board.

Yes, that is correct. Those negotiations are – well, my understanding is that those negotiations or those discussions are in their early stages, which is good. That's where we should be, as I said, sort of putting the horse out front of the cart. I had a discussion with the mayor last week or earlier this week, and he emphasized – his desire to make sure that those executive sessions discussions are really narrow and limited to the topics that need to be had in executive session and it's our intent to then have immediately following that a public discussion in open session so we can ask other questions that aren't specific to those collective bargaining items. So unlike the way the executive sessions went with body-worn cameras where those were the only discussions we have, It's my intent and the mayor's intent, and we've agreed that we will have effectively probably two items on an agenda. One will be the executive session, and then we'll immediately be able to continue the discussion in an open session for everything that can be discussed. We want it to be as transparent as possible. Okay? All right. Stay tuned on that. All right, Madam Clerk, can we take item 4.10, please?

Yes. 4.10, a resolution by Councilor.

After really quick. So that one will be referred to legislative matters. Yes, thank you.

Mr. President, can we have a 10-minute break?

We're going to take 4.10 out of order, and then we'll have a break after that.

And then can we go right in? Thank you. Madam Clerk.

Next item is 4.10, a resolution by Councilor Link and Councilor Umba that Director of Planning work for this council to increase accessible housing.

Councilor Link. Thank you, Mr. President. The city has a dearth of accessible housing, and we know that we need to do more. And to be clear, this resolution is not going to be enough. But my hope is that it's a start. It's a hopeful start. to the city, putting in some more effort where we really need to, which is to create more accessible housing. This came from some great discussions I had with one of our great residents, Crystal Huff, and it's asking the city to just create incentives um for more accessible housing uh from private developers uh to make sure that we are just um that we're adding and always adding um and yeah that's that's all council body you want to speak in the item go ahead sure thank you councillor link for your generosity to include me to this

You know, I think accessible housing is essential that is just to ensure that people, you know, with disability, older adults, and residents with mobility or other accessibility needs can live safely, independently, and with dignity, you know, in our city. So as our community continues to grow and housing costs remain a significant challenge, we must ensure that new and existing housing is not only available but also accessible to people who need it. So increasing the supply of accessible housing will strengthen our commitment to inclusion and also help residents remain in their community as their needs change. So I'm grateful that we have this being put forward and hopefully we can identify some of the barriers and opportunities to increase accessible housing, including through zoning development, preservation, and other appropriate strategies to bring forward concrete recommendation that will make our city a more inclusive and livable city for everybody. Thank you.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Councilor Wheeler would like to sign on? All right. Councilor Young-Kevin, would you like to sign on? All right. I'll sign on that as well. Councilor Klingon? Councilor Hart? Can't answer Scott.

This thing has gotten a lot of appetite, man.

All right, see no further discussion, then that item is approved. At the request of, I think, several of you through words or sharp glares, I will call a five-minute recess, call it a ten-minute recess for nature break, and we'll start our meeting after that.

Oh, I see. I never saw that. No, no, but that was smart. And they didn't

Oh, my God.

Thank you.

Amen.

All right, I'm calling this meeting back to order. I can see that there is a quorum present. Madam Clerk, would you please, we're going to take a couple of, one more item out of order. Item four, sorry, 9.25, please.

All right, next item is... Where did it go?

Yeah, where did it go?

Oh, here we go.

Item 9.25, public communication, 56 residents, registered voters submitting comments regarding zoning ordinance sections as followed below.

Councilor Link, you wanted to speak on this? Thank you very much, yes please. So just real quick here, this is an ordinance that is going to, or proposed ordinance that would remove the two foot minimum. So there's a lot of people who are interested in it. This came through as a public comment. There is a slightly different process.

Give the folks a little more color on which two-foot minimum we're talking about.

oh that's a good yes sorry thank you so buildings by ordinance have to be raised two feet off the ground and this probably made sense at some point in our past and doesn't there's not really super great arguments for it now and Conversely, it creates some pretty significant issues in terms of accessibility because that means that you need to have a ramp going up at least two feet, which means that you're either eating into what could be used for more space in the units or creating a really large cost barrier. that's a problem we talked a little bit about trying to incentivize accessible housing this is another way that we can try to make more accessible housing in in Somerville so there was some confusion with apologies to the the people who have submitted this in terms of how to get this kind of activated into our our process and actually get the changes made so apologies there and we are going to work to get that actually happening for the the next council meeting

So you'll work with the community members that submitted these comments to put forth a proposed amendment to the zoning that will be submitted at a future meeting. That, of course, then will trigger what we said to the planning board, will trigger the public hearing to get the formal process started?

That's correct.

All right. Sounds like a good plan.

Thank you.

Thank you. Any discussion? All right. Seeing none, that item is placed on file. Councilor Ba.

Yes, Mr. President. I move to reconsider 7.2. 7.26, hoping that reconsideration fails.

7.26 is the appointment of election commissioner. Council Bob moves for reconsideration in hopes that reconsideration fails. Does anybody wish to change their vote on that one? All right, seeing none, consideration has failed. This item, Madam Clerk.

Next item is 4.7, a resolution by Councilor Strezow that the Director of Health and Human Services discuss the street harassment reported by abutters and pedestrians on Prescott Street, School Street, and the area surrounding the warming center, and what steps are being taken to address this going forward.

Councilor Strezow, quiet at entrance. Item 4.7.

Pardon me, I was having my dinner of a cupcake.

We're on item 4.7.

4.7, we're talking about the warming center now, correct?

There's a seven-second lag in the back.

Okay, so when we were – when some of us on the council were listening to the 2026 warming center – listening session of when it was getting to spring and what worked, what didn't, what the neighbors and of the abutters and residents and participants and many who were involved with the warming center in its location on Prescott this season. One of the abutters, actually a few of the abutters in the neighborhood were talking about very specifically how With the warming center, and again, as I've mentioned numerous times, this has nothing to do with not supporting the warming center and our efforts on this. This is feedback from our constituents.

I'm going to clarify that.

So one of the abutters, or a few of the abutters, but one sent an email, and then at the actual warming center listening session, talked about how while the warming center was not yet open and while people were lining up or leaving for the day, that, as we know, that's a path to a high school on Prescott. So From there, there was street harassment happening. One of the emails that came in mentioned, and I quote, both in the mornings and in the afternoons, I see young girls who are coming in and going from the high school face sexual harassment and catcalling, sometimes being followed down the block. When this is brought up at the actual listening session, I don't feel like the response was adequate to the situation, and I don't think that any plan of action was considered of how that, you know, doesn't happen. And so there's another, and I have another order to consider on this as we go forward, but I think this should be discussed, and as we're almost heading into fall and getting ready to discuss another warming center I think we need to be discussing how this if it if the warming center is placed in Prescott Street another year what is the conversation on this what are we going to do to stop this from happening to anyone especially you know Young kids walking down the street. So I'd like this sent to committee. I would like to discuss this with our city departments. And as I said, I have an order drafted if we don't hear from the administration, HHS, and emergency management on what the plan is on the 2026, 2027 warming center. then we can talk about that in committee too, but definitely think it's fair to be updated.

That's about all. Okay, Council Wheeler.

Thank you, Mr. President. Just echoing my at-large colleagues' perspective, when I've spoken with abutters on Prescott Street, what I've also heard is that these folks are not looking for reasons to complain about the Warming Center. I have heard support for the mission of the Warming Center. I've heard a sense of civic responsibility for this safe haven. And sometimes I've heard of some troubling behavior they've experienced, particularly also around issues like human waste. And, you know, also echoing my colleague, I think making these facilities able to fulfill their missions well and be something that our community supports in the long term, I think making sure that any ancillary problems are taken seriously is one of the ways that we can make sure these missions are supported.

Thank you.

Councilman Campin. Thank you, Mr. President. So I've been in touch with Director Fisher, the Emergency Management Director who oversees the Warming Center. They are completing the after-action review that they do each year. He told me that this would be most likely wrapped up by the end of August, and we've asked for meetings with stakeholders to happen after that.

Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilor Streisand, for supporting this. I just want to lend my voice as well. I know some constituents that live across the high school and they've expressed some situations that happened to them and it wasn't the most fun experience. This is like a very physical, like from like kids even at the high school. So I just think that residents, pedestrian and neighborhood, you know, our borders deserve to feel safe and respected in their communities. So reports of, this kind of report of street harassment, you know, on the street or school street and in the surrounding area, you know, just deserve some very thoughtful and coordinated, you know, response that address the concern while also ensuring that the individual experiencing, you know, their own house and other vulnerabilities are treated with dignity. So, it's just to also, the goal, to be clear, the goal here is not simply to respond to individual incident but to develop a proactive approach you know, that balances public safety, neighborhood quality of life, and the city's responsibility to provide appropriate support and services to vulnerable residents. Thank you.

thank you I think that all these these things are extremely important obviously and you know making sure that that our our residents particularly who live on or around the the street and are able to to feel safe and comfortable I also just want to make sure we're reflecting on that you know We're talking about maybe many of the people that are at this forming center are elderly, there's a large group of people. And we're doing a really great thing. So I just want to make sure that we're focusing on not just, you know, the safety of the people who are on the street, but also the safety of the people who are in the shelter.

Great. Councilor Strasser, back to you.

Again, to emphasize that, I think it's pretty clear that no one is questioning that. And that we are all in alignment that that is a priority and a value here in Somerville. And we have to make sure as well, that our residents, our constituents, that everyone feels safe and heard, and valued and respected in this community.

um public health public safety all right so that'll be referred to approved with a copy to public health and public safety next item please next item is 4.8 an order by counselor link that the director of inspectional services provide a report to the city council detailing the number of short-term rentals registered illegal short-term rentals reported during 2025 and a high-level summary of the outcomes and enforcement actions taken counselor link

thank you mr. president so I've had a few too many residents ask me about legal short-term rentals so I'm just trying to get some sort of sense of what we know and what we don't and I want to stress that I don't believe this is a case of you know the city sitting on their hands we have a short-term rental ordinance I want us to you know consider I guess what we're currently able to do what we're doing and you know what more we might be able to do you know we've know we've got a regional housing crisis and we've got from what my viewpoint seems to be a problem that we haven't quite pinned down so I wanted to just start digging into this see what we can come up with.

Other discussion? Do you want this to go to committee? That discussion could go to Housing Equity Community Development for the discussion, and then if we do have ordinance changes, we could send it to Legislative Matters. Sure. I don't want to push it to committee if you don't want to. It was certainly a conversation we could just follow up with the administration, but I thought it took from your comments that you wanted to have the discussion with committee, but that may have been me reading into it.

yes yes no that would be great also I believe there's I just wanted to call out I think there's been I had asked councillor Hart to be a co-sponsor to this one I don't I don't see her listed though what's that I can have her at it okay please thank you yes my apologies to the council from Ward 7 councilor Hart did you want to speak to the item

You don't have to, just wanna give you the opportunity. If we can, the next item is on the same topic.

Could we read in 4.9 then, please? Yes. No, I'm sorry, did I get this wrong?

Well, you're correct, it's 4.9 is the next one, I believe.

Yep, you're right, you're right, you're right. 4.8, we're on, so let's take up 4.9 together.

4.9, a resolution by Councillor Link and Councillor Hart that the Director of Inspectional Services and the Director of Constituent Services work together to update the short-term rental webpage with reporting instructions and to establish a designated 311 category for reporting suspected illegal short-term rentals.

And either or both, Councillor Hart?

Thank you so much, and thank you to my colleague, Councillor Link. So this is something I've been working on a lot in terms of, you know, it is such a big problem, as Councillor Link summarized, the problem of how this is, the lack of enforcement is affecting our housing market and availability for people to have long-term housing and driving up prices. And I don't think that... I agree, I know that ISD has been working as hard as they can to enforce this, but I think we need to have the discussion about how we can enforce it more systematically going forward and where have the challenges been. And so I really appreciate Counselor Link coming up with this idea and one of the Award 7 resident recently reached out about how to report short-term rental you know, operators, and I love this idea to make it easier through 311 to report, because even though we don't want this to be our long-term solution, for sure, this could be one tool in the interim, because obviously ISD can't be everywhere. all the time so that's a long way of saying thank you to counselor link and i'm hopeful that these concrete steps going forward and the larger conversation can push us in the right direction all right so counselor scott and then mclaughlin

Thank you, Mr. President, and I want to thank my colleagues for bringing these two items. I'm happy to sign on to both of them. I think our short-term rental ordinance is something that this council is very excited about as a way to actually make sure that housing stock stays in the rental market as opposed to in the short-term rental market. And it's one of those few things that we could do directly to impact housing availability as a city council. Unfortunately, it has entered the Hall of Fame of unenforced ordinances right up there with the vacant property ordinance, which does the same thing. I believe Councilor Niedergang's leaf blower ban would also be on that list and Councilor Ballantyne's plastic straws and forks. ordinance um some of those i think have uh more public benefit than others but certainly uh oh plastic straws a counselor in baha i'm sorry i'm sorry counselor in baha's plastic straws ordinance was uh counselor ballantyne the plastic forks anyway My point stands that as legislators, our constituents ask us to do something constantly and we are pressed with the limitation that we can only push policy, we can write laws, and it is up to the executive to faithfully execute it. But as we've seen in multiple budget processes, the will to devote resources to actually implement the laws duly passed by this body is something that is disregarded over and over and over again. I appreciate my colleagues attempting to use the other small, limited power that we have as a council, which is to force city staff members to have their asses in chairs as long as we do to talk about why the things that our constituents has asked for and why we as a body have spent time drafting and passing and ordaining and enrolling into law are not actually being done. So thank you, and I look forward to watching this discussion and committee.

Councillor Laughlin. Oh, where to begin on this one, Mr. President, on the subject of unenforced ordinances. Well, first, just some background for people who might have went around when the Airbnb ordinance was passed a few years ago. First of all, one of the things I found is interesting is then we heard from ISD that they're not enforcing the vacant properties ordinance because they're very busy enforcing the Airbnb ordinance. Just as a subject on this, a few years ago, I was a part of the whole conversation where some of us were there about how to make this policy. And I came up with something that passed at the time, which was if you live in the unit you're renting, you can have an Airbnb. If you do not live there, you cannot have it. And I felt like that was pretty black and white, allows people to have their B&Bs, makes it easier to detect who actually you can go online, see all this person's not owner-occupied, therefore you can't have an Airbnb, therefore we will not allow you to do that. That passed, but then years later ISD came up with what I called a very onerous process of registering your Airbnb, having a building inspection, having all these prerequisites for having an Airbnb or short-term rental, whatever you want to call it. I'm bringing this up now for when you have this discussion in committee to ask how many units have actually registered because I really felt like that was the process we set out. If I had an Airbnb and I was doing it legally, I would not bother to go through that process. So I'd be very interested and I think it encourages people to be bad faith actors because they're not going to go through that process. They're just going to roll the dice and see what happens. So I would just be very interested in knowing how many units have actually registered compared to illegal units and compared to the amount of people reporting it. Because I think as a person who has used B&Bs all across the world, it's a really nice thing to have, but it's also not something we want to create a housing crisis over. So I think there's a good middle ground, and I would just encourage people to look into that because as far as I know, There's not that many units registering, and it's not being enforced at all. So why don't we go back to the simple approach of if you don't live in the house, you can't have a B&B. Councilor Klingin and then Bob.

Thank you, Mr. President, through you. Thanks to my colleagues for bringing this forward. I think these things are kind of cyclical. There's definitely been an uptick in discussion around this. You'll see it online. And I share the frustration with my colleagues as far as enforcement goes. I saw one recently, someone was saying that there was a vacant house, basically a single family home. So it's pretty egregious at this point where like you clearly don't live in the home nine months out of the year. It's been vacant for a year and now a bunch of furniture has been moved into it and you're listing it on it and it's already listed on Airbnb. So that's how blatant it is at this point. i do think i remember i thought i remember the mayor saying though that he uh allocated uh some funds for like new software this particular budget cycle so you know i think the software is good but i also agree with council mclaughlin that okay fine we run the software we see the the places then we have to cross check it with this registry um i think that in itself is probably pretty onerous for staff so um i don't know i think maybe we need to look at this whole policy and figure out a way that we can make it easily more easily enforceable but not be so onerous and find that happy ground where we're not wait you know burning our housing stock on you know airbnbs thank you cancer bot

Yeah, I'll just sign on. I mean, yeah.

Councilman, I'll just sign on. Councilman Link, do you have another comment? Anyone else haven't spoken yet? No?

Councilman Link? Just to kind of plus one to uh everything the council from uh well word forger said uh yeah i just saw um from confirming you're correct there they do have some uh budget allocated to some fancy new software so that might be helpful to definitely see uh be interesting to see what that does i do think that there's there's more to it than just the software um and it is truly it is egregious if you go onto airbnb there's there's pages where it just says whole house um it's i mean it's drop dead wrong um so yeah we can i think there's a lot of work to do thank you all right seeing no further discussion uh both of those items are approved with a copy to housing community development and equity and the next item

Next item is 4.11, a resolution by Councilor Link and Councilor Klingin that the administration organize another citywide neighborhood trash pickup for public spaces this fall.

Councilor Link. Thank you. I'll keep this one short. We had a great event in the spring, and looking around the city, it looks like maybe another round would be a nice chance for neighbors to get together, share community, and also make the city look as good as we think it is.

Councilor Klingin.

Thank you, Mr. President, through you. Thank you, Council Link, for bringing me on to this. I've advocated for the more cleanups, the better, obviously, but I do think this makes sense in terms of just kind of marrying it together with the slice of the city, so one in the spring and then one in the fall. As the leaves start to fall and the garbage accumulates over the summertime, I just think at least two flagship cleanups. But then, of course, I suggested a program where citizens can initiate a cleanup if the city can get that going, initiate a cleanup any time that's convenient for them. and uh we should champion that and then also there's just some really great people that are cleaning up in davis and then there's a group that cleans up over by the mystic river in my ward so um so yeah we have some great people that want to want to make a difference in the community we should you know capitalize on that and and do a second cleanup every year thank you counselor ba thank you mr president i'd like to sign on today's i think it's a nice nice to have

You know, because clean and maintained public spaces are essential to health, safety, and quality of life of every, you know, resident. So I think a citywide neighborhood trash picker will provide an opportunity for residents, community organization, and city staff to work together to address litter, beautify neighborhoods, and strengthen community pride. You know, it's the year of the neighbor. So in that stewardship and shared spaces. So I also think that this should be more than one day cleanup. It should also help build a culture of shared responsibility and encourage ongoing efforts to keep our streets, parks, sidewalk, and public spaces clean and welcoming for everybody.

All right, that item is approved. Next item.

Next item is 4.13, a resolution by Councilor Wheeler and Councilor Ewing Campin that the Director of Mobility consider prioritizing the area near the intersection of Belmont Street and Spring Hill Terrace for street painting in several areas.

Councilor Wheeler.

Thank you, Mr. President. Some of our small streets are particularly sensitive to the impact of parking in illegal zones because if cars or trucks park where they aren't supposed to on these small, small streets, emergency vehicles just cannot get through. Often vehicles which park in these zones, their drivers do not realize these areas are illegal to park in. They might be contractors unfamiliar with these particular streets. I've heard many of these examples. The mobility department has been marking streets for precisely this purpose, such as the fire lane that's on School Street, approximately near Berkeley Street, is marked as a fire lane with stripes. So it would be my hope that they could do that in the area of Belmont Street and the beginning of Spring Hill Terrace as well.

Okay, that item is approved. Next item.

Next item is 4.14, a resolution by Councilor Wheeler and Councilor Link that pay for crossing guards be increased both in recognition of the crucial work that they do serving the children in our schools and as a means to ensure the city is adequately staffed with crossing guards.

Thank you again, Mr. President. First, I just want to recognize this is an issue that's been worked on and pushed on by many people for a long time, including by my at-large colleague, Councilor Strezow, School Committee Vice President Leron Betone, School Committee President Emily Ackman, and many others, including in this room. Quite simply, we struggle to employ enough crossing guards, and we need to be able to staff every single crossing guard role consistently. We have students crossing very dangerous streets like McGrath Highway to get to school, and we should have no doubt that we're paying enough to be confident of having crossing guards when we need them. Thank you.

Councilor Clayton.

president thank you through you i always whenever crossing guards come up i always tell the story of how when you went to the brown school in the late 80s when you got to sixth grade you became you got your post for uh crossing kids across the street uh i was on a permit i lived on charles ryan road outside and they revoked my permit in sixth grade so i didn't end up getting to be crossing guard but the point is is that a the streets were a lot you know quieter back then we didn't have so many commuters zipping through our streets And B, on another note, as you mentioned, this has been talked about. This is bargained work for a local 888. And certainly we could increase. The mayor could see fit to increase. But we've talked about solutions, everything from having a hybrid position of PCOs. Because we don't even have the... senior population that we used to uh as many you know people willing to uh get out there and do this job and it's pretty scary work uh for somebody so so there's a lot of challenges to it i i look forward to hopefully something fruitful comes out of that discussion uh because i think you know we can all agree this is something that we need to improve on that council stress out

Yeah, sure. Why not? Okay. Because this is of particular interest to a few of you in this room tonight. And by the way, first off, Mr. President, through you to Councilman Miller, thanks for the shout out. That's awesome. I appreciate that very much. And so since we have a few people... Mr. President through you now pivoting back to my thought on state roads so we have a few people interested in state roads this year a few running for state rep office or state senate office and and some of these roads that are state roads that don't have crossing guards that, I don't know, some councilors at large have begged and pleaded with state reps to please, please, please do provide crossing guards in these locations. Now that this is on your focus, maybe particularly, can you bring us back some crossing guards from the statehouse for State Roads because, yes, Very much so. They haven't had crossing guards. We've had the blessing of having the crossing guards regularly at, what is that, Cross Street? No, no, no, Cross Street. Medford, Ave, and McGrath. We've held on to them for a long time. And I think we still have our crossing guard. I don't know what the new school year brings, but our crossing guard in Mystic, that one. But we're still really lacking on that. And then when it comes to the actual union negotiations of what happens with our crossing guards and when their union contract is up, which I think might be another year, then there's another conversation to have on that. But we are who we are. And, yeah, very much... um i'm grateful for you guys to have the conversation about this and push it forward as well because because yeah it's uh you know really crucially and if anyone's interested in a position doing this please also please consider being a crossing guard or helping out in some way to get safe streets happening that's all all right that item is approved next item

Next item is 4.15, a resolution by Councilor McLaughlin supporting an application to create a state-authorized cultural district in East Somerville.

Councilor McLaughlin. So, Mr. President, I'd actually like to withdraw this one because there's a little bit more work needs to be done, and I'll resubmit it later.

Councilor McLaughlin would like to withdraw the item. Seeing no objection, the item is withdrawn. Next item.

Next item is 7.2, a mayor's request requesting our endowment of an amendment to section 1-11B of the Code of Ordinances to update enforcement personnel. That item is referred to Legislative Matters. Next. Councilor Wheeler.

Yes, Mr. President, thank you. I move to refer to the following amendment. Wave the reading and refer. All right, Councilor Wheeler moves to waive the reading of those items and have them sent to Finance. Seeing no objection, those items are referred to Finance.

And then Mr. President, I move to take up items 7.9 through 7.11 together. My thinking with this is these are three very small dollar items, not that $1,000 is small, but in the scheme of the budget, and I would like to move to approve all three of these tonight.

Do we need any separate votes on those?

These do not require a vote.

Could you read items 7, 9, 10, and 11, please? That would work.

7.9, a mayor's request requesting approval of an inter-fund transfer of $1,000 from the Sewer Enterprise Debt Service Account to the Somerville Avenue Infrastructure Improvement Sewer Capital Fund Union Square Sewer Bond Account to fund required project expenditures. 7.10, a mayor's request requesting approval of an inter-fund transfer of $1,000 from the sewer enterprise debt service account to the Spring Hill sewer separation project design capital fund to pay for required project expenditures. And 7.11, a mayor's request requesting approval of an inter-fund transfer of $1,000 from the sewer enterprise debt service account to the Poplar Street pump station design capital fund to pay for required project expenditures.

Council Wheeler moves for approval of those three items. Is there any discussion? Voice from above. All right, seeing no discussion, those items are approved. Next item, 719. Is that right, Council Wheeler?

That is correct, Mr. President. 7.19, Mayor's request requesting approval to accept a gift of 200 soccer balls with an approximate value of 5,000 from the United States Conference of Mayors.

Mr. President, I move to approve this item.

Councilor Wheeler moves to approve. Seeing no objection, let's take the soccer balls. And Councilor Ba.

Mr. President, I move to waive 7.21 through 7.25 and 7.25. I move to approve these are new police promotions and so they don't require to come before the committee.

Five new police promotions of 7027 is an appointment to the Commission for Persons with Disabilities. Yes. It has been with new newly appointed officers to not send them to committee. since they've just gone through the whole process. So any objection? All right. And Councilor Ban moves to approve those six items after having waived the reading. Seeing no objection, then those six items are approved.

Next item is 7.28, Mayor's Request, requesting approval of an exemption of Mark Antonelli as required by Massachusetts General Law, Chapter 268A, Sections 20B.

Discussion on this one. This is Council Bob. Did you want to speak to this one? This is an exemption. It's one of the things that we've, it's one of the items where we have a conflict. If you want to speak on it.

No, no, no, Mr. Chair. I think that's moved to approve.

Okay. Any discussion? Any questions? Okay. Council Bob moves to approve. Seeing no discussion, that item is approved. Next item, please.

Next item is 8.1, planning board conveying recommendations for item number 26-0835.

That item is placed on file.

Next item.

I do want a copy of that to land use. Yes, let's send a copy to land use, please.

All right.

Let's waive the readings of items 8.2 through 8.5, please. These are communications from the school committee appointing members to the various ranked choice voting and public financing and place those on file. No objection. Those items are placed on file. Next item.

Next item is 8.6, a city clerk conveying block party license issued.

I do miss getting to talk about all the specific block parties, but if anyone's still watching... Check out the list, see if your street's on there. If it's not and you haven't had a block party recently, call the clerk's office. Find out how you can have a block party because they're wicked fun. That item is placed on file.

Next item is 8.7, Director of Economic Development conveying the presentation materials for the update on the 90 Washington Street request for proposals.

That item is placed on file. Counselor Hart.

Thank you, Mr. President. I move to waive the readings of 9.1 to 9.16 and approve.

Council Hart moves to waive the readings of those items and approve them this evening. Seeing no objection, those items are approved. 9.7 is with John. Next item.

Next item is 9.18, Davis Square Neighborhood Council submitting information regarding item number 26-1165, a request for formal recognition as a neighborhood council.

I think we should send this one to Legislative Matters to follow the related items there. So that would be placed on file with a copy of the Legislative Matters. Next item.

Next item is 9.19. Six residents submitting comments regarding item number 26-1165, Davis Square Neighborhood Council Recognition.

Chairman Scott, that's a little bit of a different item. Do you want those to follow as well? We could certainly place them on file since they're on the record. But if you'd like to have them in committee and put everything on the agenda at once, I'll leave that to your discretion.

Yeah, you know what? Send them to Legislative Matters. I was just thinking about mending the agenda for that public hearing night to include these just so the reference materials are in one place. So sure, please refer that to Legislative Matters, and I'm sure it'll be discharged with work completed.

Sounds like a good plan. We'll place that in file with a copy of the Legislative Matters.

That works.

All right, thank you. Next item.

Next item is 9.20, Maria Lysak submitting comments regarding McGowan Square. item is placed on file next item is 9.21 pedestrian and transit advisory committee and travis mcgrath submitting comments regarding pedestrian safety that item is placed on file next item next item is 9.22 gilman square neighborhood councils submitting comments regarding better bus project that item is placed on file next item Next item is 9.23, Lisa Schatz submitting comments regarding item number 26-1185, a petition, a public hearing regarding the proposed ethical procurement ordinance.

That item is placed on file.

Next item is 9.24, Joey O'Neill submitting comments regarding illegal dumping.

That item is placed on file.

Next item is 9.26, four residents submitting comments regarding body worn cameras.

That item is placed on file.

Next item is 9.27. Zach Farm submitting comments regarding Central Avenue.

That item is placed on file.

Next item is 10.1. Derek Dupont and Emily Sandler submitting comments regarding item number 26-1268, a proposed zoning amendment to the following sections.

Councilwoman Camping, you want that one in land use or you want to place it on file? Okay, we'll place it on file and send a copy to land use. Next item.

I believe that is it, Mr. President.

Are there any late items?

There are no late items.

All right, there being no further business before the council, Councilman McLaughlin moves to adjourn. And we are adjourned. Welcome back. Hey, actually, before we go away, before we go away, even though we're officially adjourned, first off, huge round of applause to our tech folks who've got this all working tonight. Thank you so much. I know some folks have gone home, deservedly so, but that was, I mean, it sounds great. So great job. Thank you for that. And I also just want to shout out, we don't have holes in the ceiling. We got some fresh paint.